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shadowkatI think I mispelled the title but am too lazy to look it up.
This weekend I undertook a marathon class called Human Resources Management Practices and Techniques -basically 10 sessions in two days. Exhausting is an understatement. I cancelled party plans with a friend so I could complete a homework assignment for the class. Involved writing a strategic plan for starting up a human resources department.
The unexpected result of the class was the ripping off of that bandage I'd wrapped around that hostile work experience I survived. Human Resources apparently is the place you go to report hostile work environments. Part of the HR director's job is to ensure these environments do not occur, that employees are not abused by employers and vice versa.
One of the principal roles of an Human Resources department is to do just what the title implies maintain the invaluable "human" resources of the company. Difficult, undervalued, and worthwhile job. In this case I discovered what the HR department of my old company could have done to rectify the situation I had been in and what actions I might have taken. I also realized I'd done the right thing by leaving the hostile environment. These realizations did not change the fact that I experienced symptoms of post-traumatic stress this weekend. For the first time in ten years, my speech impediment (a frontal lisp) showed up when I spoke. No one noticed it, but me - I felt the misplacement of the tongue on certain key consonants. I also found myself auditorially and verbally rearranging words, which appeared correctly in my head causing me to substitute less worthy substitutes- the dyselexia, which I usually can keep under control was coming to the surface. Presented with the choice whether to panic or take charge - I decided to participate and asked, forcing myself past the speech impediments which I only appeared to be aware of, to ask hypothetical questions based on my past experience. I had to use third person and keep them as far away from myself as possible. It was hard - b/c in the back of my mind, part of me still believes the horrible things my boss had said about me, still questions myself regarding them. In an odd way going through the experience again through the class and seeing what everyone involved had done wrong and realizing that I was not alone in this experience - according to others in the class it's wide-spread, several of my classmates had similar experiences or were undergoing similar experiences- was cathartic.
The other item that helped me reach a sense of catharthsis was oddly enough Steinbeck's East of Eden. If you've never read this book? I highly recommend, one of Steinbeck's best. It's a semi-autobiographical tale about a man who must learn to forgive himself, his brother, his father and his son. Who basically learns the value of not so much forgiveness but choice.
Here's a section from the book East of Eden that moved me Friday, one of many:
[Samuel to the character Lee regarding why he informed Adam Trask, a mutual friend, that Adam’s wife is alive and operating a whore house.]
"You know, Lee, I think of my life as a kind of music, not always good music but still having form and melody. And my life has not been a full orchestra for a long time now. A single note only- and that note unchanging sorrow. I'm not alone in my attitude, Lee. It seems to me that too many of us conceive of life as ending in defeat."
Lee: " Maybe everyone is too rich. I have noticed that there is no dissatisfaction like that of the rich. Feed a man, clothe him, put him in a good house, and he will die of despair."
Samuel:" It was your two-word translation, Lee [Lee translated the Hebrew version of a phrase in the Caine and Able story - American Standard Bible - it's thou must overcome sin (an order), King James, it's thou shalt overcome sin (a promise), HEbrew is thou mayest]- Thou mayest. It took me by the throat and shook me. And when the dizziness was over, a path was open, new and bright. And my life which is ending seems to be going on to an ending wonderful. And my music has new last melody like a bird song in the night... Thou mayest rule over sin, Lee. That's it. I do not believe all men are destroyed. I can name you a dozen who were not, and they are the ones the world lives by. It is true of the spirit as it is true of battles- only the winners are remembered. Surely most men are destroyed, but there are others who like pillars of fire guide frightened men through the darkness. 'Thou mayest, Thou mayest!' What glory! It is true that we are weak and sick and quarrelsome, but if that is all we ever were, we would, millenniums ago, have disappeared from the face of the earth.A few remnants of fossilized jawbone, some broken teeth in strata of limestone, would be the only mark man would have left of his existence in the world. But the choice, Lee, the choice of winning! I had never understood it or accepted it before. Do you see now why I told Adam tonight? I exercised the choice. Maybe I was wrong, but by telling him I also forced him to live or get of the pot."
I think all too often I forget this. I have the choice to get up out of bed each morning and pull myself forward and find the music in my life. It's sort of like Gunn's speech at the end of Inside Out ATS S4- where he tells Fred - they have the choice to flip over the board and play the game their way. Or Buffy's speech to the potentials - they have the choice to grasp their power and fight off the evil. Or Whistler's speech in Becoming - it's how we deal with the events...how we choose to deal with them. We can't control the fact they happen. It's what we do after that counts. It's why in the story of Cain and Able - the father protects Cain from any who would kill him and allows him to find a life, a wife and children East of Eden. He gives him a choice to rise above actions of the past. In my class - I made the choice to use my bad experiences to help others. To find something positive. So exhausted yes, but also oddly inspired. I think.
Now on to class #2. Marketing Tuesdays 6:10-8:10pm not including subway travel. My replacement for BTVS. Wed's ATS remains sacred. ;-)
Currently reading Game of Kings by Dorothy Dunnett.
This weekend I undertook a marathon class called Human Resources Management Practices and Techniques -basically 10 sessions in two days. Exhausting is an understatement. I cancelled party plans with a friend so I could complete a homework assignment for the class. Involved writing a strategic plan for starting up a human resources department.
The unexpected result of the class was the ripping off of that bandage I'd wrapped around that hostile work experience I survived. Human Resources apparently is the place you go to report hostile work environments. Part of the HR director's job is to ensure these environments do not occur, that employees are not abused by employers and vice versa.
One of the principal roles of an Human Resources department is to do just what the title implies maintain the invaluable "human" resources of the company. Difficult, undervalued, and worthwhile job. In this case I discovered what the HR department of my old company could have done to rectify the situation I had been in and what actions I might have taken. I also realized I'd done the right thing by leaving the hostile environment. These realizations did not change the fact that I experienced symptoms of post-traumatic stress this weekend. For the first time in ten years, my speech impediment (a frontal lisp) showed up when I spoke. No one noticed it, but me - I felt the misplacement of the tongue on certain key consonants. I also found myself auditorially and verbally rearranging words, which appeared correctly in my head causing me to substitute less worthy substitutes- the dyselexia, which I usually can keep under control was coming to the surface. Presented with the choice whether to panic or take charge - I decided to participate and asked, forcing myself past the speech impediments which I only appeared to be aware of, to ask hypothetical questions based on my past experience. I had to use third person and keep them as far away from myself as possible. It was hard - b/c in the back of my mind, part of me still believes the horrible things my boss had said about me, still questions myself regarding them. In an odd way going through the experience again through the class and seeing what everyone involved had done wrong and realizing that I was not alone in this experience - according to others in the class it's wide-spread, several of my classmates had similar experiences or were undergoing similar experiences- was cathartic.
The other item that helped me reach a sense of catharthsis was oddly enough Steinbeck's East of Eden. If you've never read this book? I highly recommend, one of Steinbeck's best. It's a semi-autobiographical tale about a man who must learn to forgive himself, his brother, his father and his son. Who basically learns the value of not so much forgiveness but choice.
Here's a section from the book East of Eden that moved me Friday, one of many:
[Samuel to the character Lee regarding why he informed Adam Trask, a mutual friend, that Adam’s wife is alive and operating a whore house.]
"You know, Lee, I think of my life as a kind of music, not always good music but still having form and melody. And my life has not been a full orchestra for a long time now. A single note only- and that note unchanging sorrow. I'm not alone in my attitude, Lee. It seems to me that too many of us conceive of life as ending in defeat."
Lee: " Maybe everyone is too rich. I have noticed that there is no dissatisfaction like that of the rich. Feed a man, clothe him, put him in a good house, and he will die of despair."
Samuel:" It was your two-word translation, Lee [Lee translated the Hebrew version of a phrase in the Caine and Able story - American Standard Bible - it's thou must overcome sin (an order), King James, it's thou shalt overcome sin (a promise), HEbrew is thou mayest]- Thou mayest. It took me by the throat and shook me. And when the dizziness was over, a path was open, new and bright. And my life which is ending seems to be going on to an ending wonderful. And my music has new last melody like a bird song in the night... Thou mayest rule over sin, Lee. That's it. I do not believe all men are destroyed. I can name you a dozen who were not, and they are the ones the world lives by. It is true of the spirit as it is true of battles- only the winners are remembered. Surely most men are destroyed, but there are others who like pillars of fire guide frightened men through the darkness. 'Thou mayest, Thou mayest!' What glory! It is true that we are weak and sick and quarrelsome, but if that is all we ever were, we would, millenniums ago, have disappeared from the face of the earth.A few remnants of fossilized jawbone, some broken teeth in strata of limestone, would be the only mark man would have left of his existence in the world. But the choice, Lee, the choice of winning! I had never understood it or accepted it before. Do you see now why I told Adam tonight? I exercised the choice. Maybe I was wrong, but by telling him I also forced him to live or get of the pot."
I think all too often I forget this. I have the choice to get up out of bed each morning and pull myself forward and find the music in my life. It's sort of like Gunn's speech at the end of Inside Out ATS S4- where he tells Fred - they have the choice to flip over the board and play the game their way. Or Buffy's speech to the potentials - they have the choice to grasp their power and fight off the evil. Or Whistler's speech in Becoming - it's how we deal with the events...how we choose to deal with them. We can't control the fact they happen. It's what we do after that counts. It's why in the story of Cain and Able - the father protects Cain from any who would kill him and allows him to find a life, a wife and children East of Eden. He gives him a choice to rise above actions of the past. In my class - I made the choice to use my bad experiences to help others. To find something positive. So exhausted yes, but also oddly inspired. I think.
Now on to class #2. Marketing Tuesdays 6:10-8:10pm not including subway travel. My replacement for BTVS. Wed's ATS remains sacred. ;-)
Currently reading Game of Kings by Dorothy Dunnett.