People are great except for people

You ever have one of those days when, despite all of your hard work and efforts, you feel like you cannot please a single person? That was my day today. I spent most of it fighting off a migraine and being pulled in 10 different directions. I helped a colleague with an assignment and, instead of thanking me, all he wanted to do was nitpick me and gripe. I was not pleased by this and was in no mood for it. I felt myself getting in D-Fens Falling Down mode and thought, "Wait a minute. If I get extremely angry and lose my shit, the only person who will suffer from it is me. My ungrateful colleague certainly won't be affected." And so with a Sam Adams Ruby Mild in hand, I took to the world wide webs/internets (said in best GWB voice) for advice.

http://learningandknowledgecenter.blogspot.com/2007/08/how-do-you-deal-with-ungrateful-people.html

I remember an occasion at a former job when I was fussed at because my boss overheard a conversation that irritated her. I wasn't spewing out company propaganda and it was seen as a sin. I made the comment to a colleague that ours was a "thankless job." And indeed it often was. We would bust our asses to help people who generally were not grateful. We often wouldn't get a "thank you"; it was almost always, "Well, what else can you offer me?" Hearing that day in and day out can wear on you. Especially for me, as I am an introvert with misanthropic leanings, LOL. It seems like the good that we do is often brushed aside quickly but if we make one mistake, it is blown up to nuclear proportions.

http://www.thespiritualscientist.com/2011/11/why-does-the-gita-recommend-working-with-detachment/#printpreview

The older I get, the more I understand this idea of "working with detachment" or not getting obsessed with the end results of a good action. I have an acquaintance who is a chef. I complimented him on his skills and he didn't even say thanks-- he acted like the comment was fait accompli and no humility was needed. I was tempted to offer a retraction and say, "If you're going to be arrogant then let me add that while you're good, I've had much better." But I didn't. I let it go and noted his haughty attitude. And I suppose that's really the heart of this: it says more about the other person than it says about you. That doesn't mean we should expend a lot of effort getting hurt by nasty people or that we should stick around when we're being abused. But it doesn't give us a pass card to repay asshole behavior with more asshole behavior. A few years ago, I had an awakening that it was time to stop holding on to a lot of pain and revenge. (http://sarasplacetorant.blogspot.com/2009/06/is-it-amnesty-clemency-or-pardon.html) I had a friendship that was rather unhealthy and, sadly, one of the things we fed on was one another's anger. If one of us was pissed off and raging about some wrong, be it real or imagined, the other would hop on board and pour gasoline on the fire. Some of the people we were so mad at hadn't even been part of our lives in years, yet we still had chapped asses about it. Trump puts it in a good way: is this a catastrophe or just a blip? Most of the time, it's a blip.

Tempting though it would have been to cuss him out over Whammy fries, eh. It's not worth it.

Back to the beer.