Goal-setting

Somehow over the past few years, I've fallen out of the habit of regular goal-setting. Other friends have merrily plotted magnificent courses for themselves, saving money, paying off debts, improving their fitness and cleaning up their unfinished business. And I've just been sitting here on the couch eating tortilla chips and thanking God that I'm not one of those crazy goal-setting maniacs who's always pushing herself to improve. Because, you know, self-improvement is hard work. It's kind of a drag sometimes.

I mean, who needs goals? I've got serenity, and a bag of tortilla chips, and a remote control. Sweeeet.

So I've been drifting along, aimlessly bumping into jobs, friends, activities that happened to float my way. Did yesterday mark my 100,000th tortilla chip on the couch? Maybe it did, because I suddenly realized that I'm getting really tired of being so utterly rudderless.

At work we've been going through an excruciating cycle of "self-development and coaching." This cycle apparently comes up once a year, and sweet mother Mary, it is torture. You have to request written feedback from others who judge how well they think you're doing in the area of Change Agility™ or Communicating Impactfully™ or Building Meaningful Relationships.™ It feels awful, asking a co-worker to wax eloquent about how skillful I am at Change Agility. I would rather ask them to personally throw away my used dental floss.

I thought I was done with all of this, but then yesterday my Superboss came in and provided some On-the-Spot Coaching™ about this one final bit of development I need to take care of. It is a massive Self-Evaluation Form™ where I have to write a long, reflective essay about how I've done with my own work objectives over the past year. I have to write entire paragraphs about my skills in Sharing Knowledge Openly™ and Communicating Impactfully™.

"I usually spend four or five hours putting mine together," Superboss said. "It's good to spend some time on it, because it ends up getting put into in your permanent file."

I nodded thoughtfully and made a good Listening Attentively™ face, absorbing all the details about this massive crap-fest I cannot seem to extricate myself from. As soon as she left, I took out my journal and wrote an angry screed which contained so many swear words that I am too embarrassed to quote it here. The bottom line is that I am getting back into personal goal-setting, and the first goal to permanently eject myself from this company in the next year so that I never have to go through one of these ridiculous self-assessment cycles again. Change Agility that, Superboss.

Yes, I know I'm pretty much repeating myself a lot here lately. But this is where I go to process reality and concoct new plans. So bear with me.

(Deep breath.)

Yesterday I ran across this quote from Theodore Roosevelt. I keep reading it again and again:

It is not the critic who counts; not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles, or where the doer of deeds could have done them better. The credit belongs to the man [or woman] who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood; who strives valiantly; who errs; who comes short again and again, because there is no effort without error and shortcoming; but who does actually strive to do the deeds; who knows great enthusiasms, the great devotions; who spends himself in a worthy cause; who at the best knows in the end the triumph of high achievement, and who at the worst, if he fails, at least fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who neither know victory nor defeat."

First, I wish this guy was still president.

Second, I love that final phrase: "those cold and timid souls who neither know victory nor defeat." I know that when he wrote this, Roosevelt was probably talking about courageous soldiers who went into battle to give their lives for the cause of freedom, but from where I'm standing, I feel like that phrase is a good characterization of my attitude towards work over the past few years. All the upper-management shakeups at the office over the past few weeks have helped me clarify with unshakable certainty that sitting on the couch eating tortilla chips is not enough anymore.

mental health day

Today I called in sick to work. I'm not feeling unwell at all — quite the contrary. Just needing a break. I had told my boss yesterday that I might be coming down with a little something, you know, needing a sick day. He gave a little smile and said, "You know, sometimes people do get sore throats, and they really need to stay home." It was such a simple little thing he said, but there was so much gentleness and permission in it. I took him up on it by staying home today.

The past couple of weeks have involved a lot of tumultuous concerns about work. Yes, it looks like my job at the Very Large Multinational Corporation will be going away in the next six months or so (maybe the next six weeks — who knows?). The Very Large Multinational Corporation leaders have lots of colorful words for exactly what's happening. My department is not being downsized; it's being redesigned. Our work is not being off-shored; it's being centralized. The upshot is that about 20 people on our 80-member staff of artists across the country will be laid off, and the rest of us will probably be asked later in the year to "centralize" ourselves down to "central Florida." Or, to accept severance packages.

Getting fired has never sounded so lovely.

After feeling terribly conflicted about my job for months, this seems like perhaps some sort of divine push to get the hell out of the company and doing something else. I don't know precisely what that "something else" is yet. But I hope and believe that it will be a good thing.

So I'm asking myself lots of questions lately about what might be next. At the same time, I'm still worried about money and very unclear on whether I can go to grad school now, or if I should just shelve that idea for a while.

Last night I got together for a lovely dinner with Jean and Lalah, two of my favorite, most connected, most lively and authentic friends. Lalah was late but when she showed up she had three dozen roses in her arms, a dozen for each of us. We all looked like prom queens as we were seated at our booth. At one point during dinner, they asked me what was going on with my job. I'd been sharing the rumblings about potential layoffs for a while, and they wanted an update. I took a deep breath and said, "I don't know what is going on with my job, but I do know that I have too many skills and ideas to stay cooped up in this stupid job that has absolutely nothing to do with my values or personality!" And Lalah lifted her glass and said, "All right!" and then we drank to that, and I started to think that even if I don't know what else is around the corner, things are going to be OK.

the lynch mob sounded like a good idea

I've been cleaning like a madwoman this afternoon, right down to the strips of rubber on the refrigerator door that help seal the cool air in. A mild solution of white vinegar and water is what I like to use for this chore. I suppose the acidic content of the vinegar helps eat mold and destroy microscopic creatures that would otherwise build their condominiums right next to the fresh egg compartment.
Yesterday afternoon I got a phone call from an old friend. She was rounding up me and four of my oldest, most beloved friends from our college years, calling an emergency meeting for that night on behalf of X., who had something she needed to tell us.
When an emergency meeting like this is called, it's rarely for celebratory reasons. We met at the restaurant, all of us feeling a little concerned, and settled into the biggest booth we could find. X. steadied her nerves with a glass of wine and told us that she had been living in a physically abusive relationship with her husband for ten years. She was initiating a separation from him. He finally went too far this week, his rage reaching a level that left her fearing for her life.
I went cold and shuddery at the news. I could only shake my head. We all listened as she told us what she had been through for the past ten years. How it started with a little shove against the wall years ago from this man, who is two heads taller and eighty pounds heavier than she. And then things just got worse and worse.
We all cried, and told her how much we supported her, and offered sympathy and help with lodging and practical necessities. We remembered times when things had seemed not quite right between the two of them. We said mean things about her husband. We expressed wishes for him to experience pain, a lot of it, and slowly. I had to hold my tongue during that part — I wanted to go into graphic detail about exactly what I wanted for this man, but I also knew that that wouldn't help.
Truthfully, I kept thinking about how great it would be to go down to Ye Olde Viking Superstore, and get some big torches, the kind as big around as the trunk of a sapling, the kind that actually drop little pieces of flaming cinder on your shoulders as you hold them aloft. And then I was thinking about how maybe all of us could go down there, march down the street with our torches blazing and cinders flying everywhere, and beat on the door of his house and demand that he come out.
Of course, I do think of myself as a peaceful hippie, a middle child, a peacemaker, someone who has actively sought to incorporate the qualities of Nonviolent Communication into my relationships. To suddenly relish thoughts of leading a lynch mob was unnerving, and I quickly tried to bleach the thought from my mind. Calling a lynch mob together would not improve the situation in any way.
Plus, I might get put in jail.
As we continued talking, I realized that X.'s husband is exactly where he needs to be. He has stopped denying everything, and is beginning to recognize the depth of his problem. And his wife is already doing OK. After years of knowing that things have not been right, she is getting her life back. She is going to be fine. She is going to be very, very fine.
The women that were called to the restaurant that evening have been in my life for a decade or two. Though the reason for the gathering was very painful, I couldn't help but rejoice over the fact that we were all together in that booth, all thinking the same thoughts, wanting the same things, a tribe who would gladly walk through fire to help our friend. These women found ways to support, care for, question, and bear with me during some of the darkest days of my life, and they were doing it again for X.
I thought about the strength of that tribe of beautiful, strong women, and I knew that we didn't need a lynch mob. We were unleashing hell on X.'s husband simply by being completely present for her, for bearing witness to her story and reminding her that she would never feel that kind of aloneness again.