Something has been poking in the back of my mind since a colleague suggested that a younger version of myself was alone. In a sense, he was right. One of the reasons I was frustrated at the world in high school was because I felt like I cared more for other people than they cared for me. I would give my time to others and think about their problems obsessively. I would think about them obsessively, but it was not reciprocated. To be honest, I think I forgot about this point because I concluded that no one thinks like me and has these same tendencies. I have met plenty of people who spend time putting others first before themselves, but I have never met another person who thinks to the extent that I do.
In high school, I recognized that part of my anger was that I didn’t love or respect myself or my time. Because of this, I had no one to blame but myself for not having fair boundaries. For caring too much for the others than they did for me. I do not like saying that because it is dramatic and not true. Other people cared for me, but love languages are all about learning to love someone in their language, and I am not sure anyone ever loved me in my language. It’s probable to assume that everyone feels this way – that people do not care for us as much as we care for others.
I eventually made the decision that even if I spend more time focused on helping other people than they do me, I would make that sacrifice. This time, it wasn’t about not loving myself and that made a big difference. It was because I love myself that I was able to spend time with others. However, I am kind of realizing now that the boundaries part did not change. The obsessive nature of thinking about others far more than they think of me is interesting and a little uncomfortable to sit back and reflect on. There is a fear, I think, of caring for others than they care for you. But why? If I decide to care about another person without expectation of anything in return, it feels like unconditional love. Providing unconditional love for others feels like I am enacting a purpose. I feel excited to give myself and help however I am equipped to. However, the ego, or lower nature, seems to take hold and becomes more possessive. Like, I feel upset or jealous when someone I want to be there for goes to someone else. Does that still equate to unconditional love then? Am I still following in on what I believe my purpose to be?
I found it coincidental that in my dad’s journals about me when I was a little over one year old, he mentioned that I was very territorial and jealous. Maybe it’s silly to relate who I was at that age to who I am now, but maybe some commonalities follow us throughout our lives. Is this one of them?
I start to recognize some sense of vulnerability when it feels like I am becoming less important or needed by those whom I spend a lot of time thinking about. Do I feel discarded? Am I ever more than just another helper on the path? Why do I feel the need to hold onto the role I play to these people? The reality is that I know it’s human nature to feel that way, and I beat myself up because I feel like I should be better than my human nature – which is ridiculous and self-righteous.
A lot of this ties into my feelings of cocreation. I met a lot of people who helped me see the power of cocreation, and living cocreation became something worth chasing. It was the outlet in which I could see the universe and be in awe at the intricacies of human lives vs. soul planning. However, I started to notice that cocreation wasn’t happening as frequently and I panicked. I felt like I was losing something at work or maybe someone(s) at work and that made me go through a bit of an identity crisis – what do I want to be happy at work? Is there a way to feel less lonely?
In the Celestine Prophecy book, it says that we need to overcome the urge to pull energy from other external sources and instead let the energy come from the universe. Human nature tends to focus on cutting other people down at their expense to boost us up. Is that what is happening in some regards for me too? Have I fooled myself into believing that I am helping the world when I am just doing it for myself? Is the energy coming from me? Or am I pulling it for others on some self-righteous journey of forcing people in my way to adopt my way of thinking?
Who am I without my need to help others?
I was thinking about how I thought my dad was nothing without all his work. Well, I am probably not all that far behind. I may have my hobbies, but hobbies aren’t fulfilling. Who am I without the work? Is there another purpose I need to find? Or is it the point to work and grow with small days of rest from hobbies?
How can I enjoy life without being in an extreme? Without wasting away playing video games or painting?
Is my views of work unique? or did I just fall in line with what society says work is for? Can I put it on the shelf?
The person cutting my hair this weekend asked me, what would I be doing if I wasn’t working or doing class, and I can’t answer it. The thing that brings me joy is being with people and talking about life and the universe, but that is also an issue…
I had many discussions about people talking about WFH in the workplace. I took my normal stance of the fact that organizations have less ability for cocreation. I do believe this, but I realized it was short-sighted. I think it’s because most people who view WFH as a benefit are those who do not see work as an important piece of their life. On one hand, I strive to challenge this. Not because I think people should care about work, but because there is a huge reason why work is in our lives from gathering lessons and growing standpoint. I think people miss out on a lot of opportunities by just shutting off their minds and going to work for the majority of their lives. I want people to live in all areas of their life. The hypocrisy that I realized is that I am not doing a good job of learning the lessons everyone else is learning outside of work. I am not living outside of work. It needs to be balanced.
I also realized one of the reasons I fear WFH is because of previous conversations I have had with Caitlyn about setting boundaries, specifically with women. Interestingly, most people that I have deep conversations with are women. I’ve always felt like my energy is more feminine anyway, but there is some strange pattern there. Anyway, work becomes an acceptable place to have certain relationships and friendships as a married man. However, outside of work, it’s not socially acceptable, or it becomes more risky in terms of boundary setting. I think there are some flaws to this line of thinking, but I also fully understand why Caitlyn and I have had challenges in the past regarding this topic too.
In a sense, we are all different. Caitlyn’s love language isn’t to have deep conversations all the time, but it is one of mine. Honestly, if Caitlyn went to other men to discuss and have deep conversations with, I’d be pretty upset about it. In some ways because of my jealousy/ competitiveness, but also because I want her to have those conversations with me. Caitlyn might not be as interested in discussing all of the millions of thoughts I have, but I also understand why she wouldn’t want me spending a lot of time outside of work with other people – especially other women, and especially when I could be spending time with her. Which is also what I want to do. The other reality is that it doesn’t make sense for me to be married to a person who goes through all of these thoughts with me. Caitlyn grounds me and keeps me from venturing too far into the unknown. I need that.
Anyway, through discussions, I realized that this was more of a ‘me’ problem and not so much a WFH problem and I guess that is something I need to figure out because WFH is going to be a future reality. Even kids will take up time too, so I need to establish something that allows me to set up structured and meaningful time to keep up with people I care about and wish to discuss the mysteries of the world with while keeping good boundaries that continue to establish trust with Caitlyn. Anyway, I am glad to see why the WFH discussion kept coming back to me, and I was grateful for this lesson to learn.
Who am I without cocreation? Is it okay that cocreation defines me? should we have something that defines us?
A lot of these feelings caused me to feel like I wanted to turn myself off and isolate myself. I felt alone like in high school. I was trapped by too many thoughts. I wonder if this happened to Dad for too long of a time…
All of this is to say that at work, I realized I wasn’t happy with my job. Even though I was eager to give my time to other people, the busyness that work brought on made it so that I seemed less accessible. I was too busy for other people. I started to realize that if I climbed any further on the leadership path, I would become less and less accessible to have cocreation impromptu discussions.
I spoke to Caitlyn about this and she suggested that in her WFH environment, she doesn’t get the chance to have meaningful chats with people. She has to schedule them and make time for them. I realized that without these discussions, I don’t feel like I am living. Even my cubicle buddy mentioned that I was quiet lately. She picked up that I wasn’t happy in her way.
I think the path forward for me is to slow down at work and make time for others. Seek to have more chats that lead to cocreation and start scheduling more. Even scheduling time outside of work to connect with others.
Could this be what I needed to learn before becoming a father? Universe knows that once I have a kid, time will become even harder to find. I need to find a way to slow down in the day-to-day. Maybe I can start a podcast or spend time scheduling calls with people from my past and also spend time finding ways to connect with new people outside of work.
Per Caitlyn’s suggestion, I am starting small. I scheduled walks for myself and will put an open invite for anyone to join. I hope this means I’ll be more diligent in getting walks with people I want to walk with. I’ll start scheduling lunches, and maybe I’ll even look into making a podcast for discussions outside of work.
I know this was an important, and winding, journey for me to go on. So I am excited to see where it leads.
