Shortsightedness v Everything Else

The past few weeks have been a maelstrom of frustration, anxiety, stress, lack of impulse control and ultimately unemployment for me.

On the other hand, I feel like I've been set free and a weight lifted from me.  Except for the one regarding how I'm going to make money moving forward.

I'm a writer, and that's been my therapy over the past several days.  But it's also been a mirror.

Writing is my best form of communication, but the writing impulse tends to offend because words have power-to convey emotions and tone that aren't always the kindest to those who might recognize or perceive themselves as the target.

And like all forms of communication, it's highly subjective on both ends of the channel.

I've related some real scenarios involving real people in recent posts, and I've been chided by at least one person that I've been unprofessional in doing so.  They've advised me to remove them.

I'm not going to and here's why:  I don't believe in whitewashing things.  Conflict happens.  People get upset, frustrated, feel betrayed or disrespected.  Pretending it never happened isn't healthy, imo.  Figuring out how to move past those things is.

I struggled to sleep over the weekend, turning over in my mind all the mistakes I'd made, my anger over how I felt I'd been treated, and the dread of having to face the consequences on what surely would be my last day on this gig.

It was, but it was far less overwrought than I thought it would be.  A simple acknowledgement that it simply wasn't working for either party, followed by a quiet exit.

Initially, I wanted to write about how short-sighted it was that I wasn't going to be allowed to work out a transition and finish some key work that I was close to completing.  Work that had been floundering for about two years and I helped guide to what will be a solid resolution.  Unfortunately, that resolution will now likely be delayed significantly.

But as I reflected on that regrettable circumstance, I realized that I was at least equally short-sighted by burning it all down in my posts.  The larger audience will never know who my client was or who was involved in the conflicts I wrote about.  But there are several people who do, and most of them were very kind to and collaborative with me. 

Now I stand in the light of what I said, how I acted, and the fact that my own short-sightedness has left some of them in the lurch because I can't finish what I started.

Because when you decide to write and hold up the mirror to the things that are lacking in whatever sphere you inhabit, sometimes you need to turn that mirror on yourself.