Letting go, finally

[Zues126]

I understand exactly where you're coming from. I too am an extremely sensitive person. I am very introverted, and only had a few close friends my entire life.

In 2011 I became a supervisor. Boundaries were not natural for me. Maybe I have a personality disorder of some type, maybe I was just lonely, not sure. Anyway, I remember being in awe of how amazing it was to have these other people working with me, each with their own lives, each with their own experiences. I wanted to have a family at work, to share my success with them and make them successful as well, to have fun while we served our clients.

This story does have a happy ending, but it starts rather bumpy.

It didn't work at first. I will tell you that I was chewed up and spit out. My employees learned that conflict, disapproval, disappointment, and negative feedback emotionally hurt me. They started to manipulate me unintentionally. In turn I 'spoiled' them, I wanted to make it a good work force and was focused on doing what I could to make it better, as a result they started focusing on what they wanted that they didn't have, and would be upset with me for not being able to change things they didn't like out of their control.

Some of my employees that I at first thought of as positive I learned were actually a cancer, they'd always talk about these idealistic ideas of how things should be, but the end result was they were so frustrated with how things were that they would complain, blame, and become very disengaged. As a leader I was going through the same thing. I wanted this Utopian work place, this dream team, but when I saw how little some of my employees cared about that, and how they didn't want to be there, or would complain about everything, it hurt me that they wouldn't want to make it the best it could be. Sometimes my very idealism would cause so much pain I struggled and ended up making a negative impact. There were even times I depended on my team emotionally for support, a big no-no as a supervisor (for the most part).

I did some great things. Inspirational addresses to the department that were very powerful, and made a big difference for retention and morale. Etc. But it always hurt that no one seemed to really care. I wrote a poem about that spoke of loneliness and disillusionment. Talking about the joy of spending time with my best friends, only to see the clock turn 5 and I rub my eyes and they were only actors, and now they are walking off the set, and stuff like that.

No, it didn't go well. I tried to resign, I thought I'd do better leading from a production role, showing what was possible. My boss's boss kept me together and told me that I'd adapt.

And I did. I developed better boundaries. I found that when I stopped caring what my team thought of me and whether they were happy, they became happier. If they complained about something that wasn't changeable, I'd just laugh and ask them how that was going to make them feel better about their job. Of course I was always deeply interested in their well being, and I was always safe to talk to, but I found that because I was stronger, my employees did better because they could count on me to be a rock.

Eventually I found a hybrid, tough on the outside, soft on the inside. Idealistic enough to strive for Utopia. Realistic enough to be able to accept the limitations of our world. And finally, somewhere around 2013, I hit my stride. My team became a wonderful place to be. My co-workers and I knew each other's styles. We played and had fun. We developed inside jokes, we pranked each other, we laughed at the absurdity of corporate life, all while jamming and making great things happen. It was truly a blast.

Why do I share? First, I want you to know I appreciate you being here and I'm glad to have you as part of our family. Second, I am really excited for your breakthroughs. I am confident you're more experienced than I was in the beginning, and you won't make the mistakes I made. Don't get discouraged if the reality doesn't live up to your vision, same goes for if we fall short on this forum. Striving for the heavens is a noble endeavor because we'll get further than if we didn't, as long as we don't become negative about where we fall short and are instead appreciative of what we can achieve. Finally, the same way having boundaries and being detached to my employees allowed me to be a better boss and ultimately have a better relationship with them, so too is a WAS, and I find it very funny how similar they are. I'm starting to think I had the same issues in my marriage (no boundaries, co-dependency, high expectations that were impossible to achieve). If you can take the good and leave the bad you will make great things happen at work and in your personal life.