I Work Hard, But Not at My Job - Day 65

In Day 61, I mentioned how "I work hard all week," meaning I work hard at work all week, and therefore I deserve a break every once in a while.

Well, let's get one thing straight: I don't work hard at work. Not doing my job, anyway. I do work hard in the sense that I expend a LOT of effort and energy into excusing/justifying my work ethic and performance at this job. I have established that this job is "too easy" and rather than challenge myself and make it harder, or even just appreciate the ease and do a good job, I have instead created all kinds of reasons to be dissatisfied and to not respect the job or do a respectable job. So basically I've been engaging in a lot of cognitive dissonance this past month as I have been making up excuses/justifications in my mind each day when I go to work about why I am performing the way that I am performing and yet believing that I am still being "self-honest" where I have not allowed myself to really see myself, to really look at myself, in who I am at this job and then to take responsibility for who I am in applying myself to do a better job.

This has consequences.

Firstly, I am doing a shit job. The person I am working with deserves better. I am getting paid to do this shit job, and therefore my employers deserve better. I have excused/justified myself here with resentment that I have not been trained. I have even told myself that I just "don't click" with my assignment, or have otherwise created a superior/inferior relationship there. I have allowed myself to become impatient, to roll my eyes, to engage in endless backchat, to withhold eye contact - - to basically create an extreme discrepancy of value between myself & my time and this other person. I have become bitter, resentful, and in this I have not been accepting of others or of myself.

So for myself the consequence is that I see myself doing a shit job and I then question my ability to do a good job. In pending change (or as I joke, "doom"), I notice an increase in my anxiety about my new job which I start in a little over a month. I notice myself doubting myself and judging myself and believing that "I will not do a good job," "I will fail," "I am not patient enough for this anymore," "This isn't the right field for me," "I am not good enough," "I can't." And here all of these beliefs are based on the "evidence" of my behavior (which includes actions and thoughts) where here I have not even really accepted or allowed myself to understand that I am the behaving entity here - my behavior is only evidence of who I have accepted and allowed myself to be, not of who I immutably and inherently "am." So I have allowed myself to be horrible at my job within justifications and excuses and then I have seen that horribleness as if it is a reflection of my actual abilities. That's only two steps out and already I forget where I started: with myself as who I direct myself to be in each moment.

I have even blamed my participation with Desteni for this, where I have seen it fit to excuse myself from self-honest self-responsibility in work and the treatment of others with beliefs/judgments that my job descriptions require me to be dishonest (aka not who I want to be in self interest) or to support others in ways that do not allow or assist them in supporting themselves (aka I am still learning and integrating these abilities into myself and feel confused as to how to apply them in work). I have believed that I cannot compromise my job descriptions with what I am learning with Desteni. I have taken myself out of this equation where I have not allowed myself to realize that I move and direct myself -- not my job description, and not Desteni. And so within this I have blamed the jobs themselves for my dissatisfaction or have blamed desteni as justification for my judgements (which is silly for obvious reasons).

So basically I see that this is all selfish despicable self interest and all huge abdication of responsibility where I blame my employer, my supervisor, my assignment, or even desteni for the ways that I (I!) have accepted and allowed myself to be in this job.

These realizations of taking ownership of myself as my self responsibility and self honesty in work have been actualized in my work ethic over the last two days and it's already such a huge difference in how enjoyable my job is. It's still not a job I would prefer to keep and I am still looking forward to and eagerly preparing for my new job, but nonetheless I am now placing myself in a position to actually enjoy and even learn and challenge myself and be present and forgiving and patient and understanding and find footing in stability as equal to and one with my assignment as life in this human experience we share.

It's amazing how dark life in the mind can be and just as amazing how really wonderful it is to give oneself the freedom to let go of all that the mind has to say and tries to control and simply live and love and do what needs to be done in self honesty as what is best for all.

Self forgiveness and self commitments tomorrow most likely. My computer is getting fixed so this has been a phone post, although most of it was originally drafted two days ago.

Cool post I related to in the points of blame.