Of course, I have a few friends here who are willing to tell me "how it is" and "the real stuff" and for some of them I'm quite happy to listen, some of them I think are part of what's called "10 odd friendships" with some things telling you that maybe you should let it go? Maybe part of the New Years resolution that is coming up in two weeks?
Anyhow, my post today was to say that I'm feeling a little bit ambivalent the last couple of months telling the truth of what I "feel" and what I "think". Finding the happy middle ground on "What to share. With whom. And how much." [Especially that last part. Oh gosh. So. Hard. Either nothing or too much... hello ketchup effect] This is also part of having a new job - well, it's not that new anymore but for an introvert fairly private person the sharing of feelings and emotions are really not that easy all the time with people that you don't really know that well.
It became real obvious to me the other week, that I have a problem with this, when I was asked to write a note to someone for Holiday times. There is this tradition in the place I work in that you get to fill in a sheet of paper when you start, on how you would like to be appreciated etc. On that sheet is an option "a personal note to my family from my supervisor/peer/X". Yeah.... I got the question if I could write such a note to add to the holiday present.
In theory I love the idea and said yes of course.
In practice - oh dear. I took some scribble paper and started to draft a note. One of my coworkers saw my several drafts and the scribbles. They looked at me and stated "oh you're so cute. you don't have to over-think it. but I guess you really want to write something that means something". I was just in panic mode since I had already written one card that I had to scrap, I smiled towards them and said "I'm pretty pathetic. I clearly need to practice this more. I just don't want to write something that can get misinterpreted".
Of course I was exaggerating. I can write really good notes "as you're suppose to write them". Either full of platitudes and 'stuff you should say'. And if I have more time to think and know the person, I can really rock something out (or so I think anyway). However, I didn't want to do write platitudes for this specific card. And most of what I thought of saying came out sounding a little..... pretentious? 'Too much pathos' as my old rhetoric teacher would say.
I ended up writing something half and half, hoping that the person understands how much this means to me without hopefully making a bad joke or too unreadable handwriting.... They haven't said anything yet since they mentioned that they saved opening the present until Christmas day. Oh joy. (You know how many times I can contemplate what I really wrote, forget what I wrote, misinterpret what I wrote? Probably not. But I will say that I retort a lot to "they probably won't read my note that carefully and then toss it like normal people do".)
The root of the issue is probably - as strange as it may sound - that I don't really like people to know my feelings and emotions. Maybe my upbringing had too much something from any of the stoic books: "If you know the emotions of man, you can manipulate[hurt] them"? Or there might be another reason to why I am so ambivalent of showing that part of me to others, especially in writing and to people that isn't close friends or family.
I wrote that this would be a short interlude... Ah well, why not end on this note with a cute picture of a penguin and some "wisdom" until next time!
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