Nobody Told Me!

I didn’t know. Nobody told me. Do you ever hear these phrases? Ever hear yourself using them? Almost every time I hear them, they are used as a defensive response or a way to avoid responsibility. Nobody told me, I didn’t know.

When phrases like these are uttered, someone is generally given a free one time use pass. They are forgiven or excused for not knowing. Used more than once in a while, the utterer is not well thought of.

For a few people, these phrases and others like them, are over used excuses. While exceptions occur, exceptions should be the exception and not the rule.

What is your common response when asked why you are or are not doing something? Are you one of the few, guilty of uttering not being told, or not knowing? Do you find yourself uttering these phrases a little too often?

Not knowing, is a sign or symptom of more going in the background than the few words each phrase contains. No one told me, for example, has hidden meanings other than the obvious one. No matter where you work, no one has a job to make sure you know what you need to know after you are trained.

When something changes in your workplace, some form of communication is used telling you what has changed. If you hear yourself using these phrases more than once in a long while, below are some ideas you can use to ensure you rarely utter them again, if ever.

The key to knowing is to be proactive. Being proactive is a very effective tool you can use in your work and personal life. Being proactive, you always learn or know about changes that are important to you.

One of the best ways to be proactive is to pay attention. Some way, somehow in your place of work, there is a system in place of how information is passed on. Learn how important information is passed on.

Find out if  your company uses email, a bulletin board, a formal shift meeting, or the person you relieve is supposed to tell you. Make your first job of the day reading, listening,or asking about: “What is going on, anything new today?”

Asking a simple question like this and actively listening to the answer will save you from ever uttering a hollow excuse again. Once you get used to reading, and asking questions, you will know what you need to know. You will know about any changes, and you will look sharp, and become more valuable at work.

Occasionally something changes and you really had no way of knowing. Instead of reaching for a new way of saying you did not know, or were not told, you can use a much more powerful tool.

You can say: I read, listened to, or checked for changes, and there was nothing posted, sent, or mentioned. I asked ‘somebody’ who I took over from, and they did not mention any changes.

If the power of response escapes you, go back and read the first paragraph of this post and compare the two responses. Which reply would you rather give, and which reply would you rather hear? There is a lot of power in words used correctly.

If you are new on the job, and you truly did not know, be honest about it. Follow up honestly with a good question. “I was not aware of this, how and where do I find out about these changes?” Phrasing your reply like this, you will be way ahead of others, who automatically fall back on those old, worn out, ‘I didn’t know’ type phrases.

Now you know how to be on top of your job and your life, you can identify how important information is not being passed on to you. If you find that there is no formal way information is passed on, suggest a way! Using your new proactive way of being, suggest a new or better way of passing on information or changes. Think of a method that is easy and everyone see, hear, or read and let someone know in a professional manner, who can make it happen. It may get you a raise!

Reflections On My (Occasional) Day

There are moments when I am going through my day and I think I am merely a bit player in my own life, following a script that was written long ago. I find that thought interesting, especially when involved in a painful conversation, or receiving advice from someone about something.

Occasionally I find myself wondering, if the whole situation whatever it is, was contrived for the sole benefit of the other person and I am cameo in the scene? Have they lived all these years and lived through untold trials and tribulations waiting for this moment to enter my life, and tell me in a few seconds, something that I need to hear, but keep choosing not to hear?

In other circumstances when life becomes difficult, I wonder if I spent my life and went through all my life experiences to enter someone else’s life with a different way of approaching a problem? Perhaps, my ‘different way of approaching a problem’ contributes to more frustration on their part. Maybe the interaction was contrived to make this one day even worse than it would be had I not appeared in their day?

Before I learned, or perhaps understood that the type of people I would normally have problems with will keep showing up over and over again until I see myself in them and accept them; that without fail, these same types of people showed up over and over with nothing better to do than frustrate and make me miserable.

Now that I am (mostly) beyond that way of thinking about why they were always in my life, maybe it is now my life responsibility to enter into the life of others and frustrate them with the way I act. Maybe myself and others like me are constant problem in their lives, bouncing from one situation and conflict to another, causing stress in the lives of others without realizing it.

If I know the answer to that question, I am am not aware at the moment that I do know it. I do know that knowing that life is a long series of challenges and conflict since I was born is enough to know at the moment. Whether I would become bored, or not with my life if I was not challenged on all fronts, is not really that important any more.

It is much more fun to take each day as it is, and know that some days are better than others. In the end of my life there is no prize given out, or listing of where I finished in comparison to whatever imaginary group I was being compared to. Often, we tend to forget that thought.

At the end of my life, if I am fortunate not lose my life in a split second accident, there is no prize given out at that moment for how I lived my life. There is no one standing by with a scale measuring how I handled each life event, good or bad, and rating it against an imaginary group.

What is real is the knowing that life is not stagnant. Because I have worked towards a goal for an hour, week, month, or lifetime, does not mean I am entitled to always see the fruit of my labor. What I am entitled to is knowing what I did or did not do.

Knowing that I accepted change, struggle,  and adversity for what it is. Change, struggle, and adversity are benchmarks in any life. Because of them I know I am alive, and taking responsibility for my life and how I live it.

It is not hard to live life going which ever way I am moved by the winds of those around me. Though that is not living life, that is going through the motions of waiting to die. I prefer to live my life as best as I can, and take responsibility for myself and my actions.

It is knowing that I did the best I could with what I had to work with that is important. Living my life the best I know how, like my future death is not a team event.

I share my life with you and those around me, but I am the only person living my life. In those instances I may wish to live someone else’s life if only for an instant, it is up to me to do the best I can with what I have to work with. Unfortunately what I have to work with is not always what I would prefer. That’s life.

Invisible People Everywhere

I was listening to music today and this song played. Whenever I hear this song, I always feel so sad for Janis when she sings it. Whether the song is about Janis looking back, or she was tapping into some very deep feelings of someone around her, I do not know. What I do know is as I listened to it again I thought about how we treat people who are not as pretty as we are.

A very successful and famous singer, and songwriter named Janis Ian wrote a song that swept the nation in 1975. If any other songs, except for a few Country and Western broken heart songs ever came from so deep down in the heart and expressed such raw emotion, I have not heard it. The emotion and desperation, and the ugly truth of life as it is, is captured in the words of Janis’ song.

Here is a short excerpt from Janis Ian’s song, ‘At Seventeen’

And those of us with ravaged faces
Lacking in the social graces
Desperately remained at home
Inventing lovers on the phone

I remember in my young and single years, I would be strolling along a sidewalk, or walking in a store, and I would be attracted by some woman’s hair. I would stroll behind her at some distance thinking about how beautiful her hair was. While doing that I would usually be working up the courage to tap her on the shoulder and speak to her. After all she had to beautiful, who else would have hair that shimmers and tumbles across her shoulders?

Most of the time, probably because I was shy, with no effort on my part, the young woman would turn to look at something that caught her eye. Maybe she sensed someone was looking at her, and wanted to see who it was. Faster than the urge hit me to talk to her, the urge would leave me. She would have bad acne scars, or something else detracting from her perfect self that I had built up in my mind.

It was one of those things in my life I did not like in myself. I worked on this flaw deep inside of me. It is quite hard to see some people as real people, and not see them as most people, which is completely ignore them. This time, after Janis Ian finished her song, and before I started typing, I wondered in the space of a few moments how many opportunities I passed up before I changed myself.

I am not sure where the behavior comes from. Almost without exception we all share this same behavior flaw. We don’t see people who are too fat, skinny, crippled, or otherwise not normal by common standards. For many of those people we choose not to see, invisibility has been their life.

Some of these people have put up barriers of their own for protection. Perhaps due to years of pain from thinking someone really wanted to talk to them they build walls. I know one person who I see almost daily, and they rarely turn around when I call their name. I usually have to tap them on the shoulder to get their attention if they are not facing me. Who would be interested in them after all?

I find that like anyone else, they are only people trying to live their life as best they can. Occasionally someone may mistake interest in them for something more, especially if it is someone of the opposite sex having the interest. Someone is paying them some attention, maybe the first and only attention in months. What would you think if after months of invisibility someone showed an interest in you? It may be awkward to define the relationship as friendship, or as an acquaintance, but that awkwardness lasts only a few moments for you. For the other person, it lasts a lifetime.

One more snippet from, ‘At Seventeen’

And dreams were all they gave for free
To ugly duckling girls like me.

We have enough isolation in our lives without building more barriers and pretending one or two people we see every day are invisible. By making certain people invisible to us, we make ourselves invisible too. I don’t know how you feel, but I prefer not be invisible to prevent a moment of my attentions being misunderstood.

One Story Two Perspectives

Does a story have two versions? Does a story have one version with two viewpoints? I have a story to share of a recent turn of events. A story with two perspectives, and I am not sure at the moment which view, if either, is the real one. They both may be true and they are both may be false. Depending on how you look.

This story is told two ways, is one way is a string of coincidences, and the other way is an intended series of events. Is this story a chain of random events, or is this story an intended course of coincidences which are too disparate not to have divine intervention manipulating events to a desired outcome?

I will start with the version which started some weeks ago.

I have a family member who works at a school which happens to have an apartment complex across and some distance down the street. This apartment complex of has many children which go to the school, a Vista Worker who is working to improve the lives of people in the neighborhood, an elderly woman.

The Vista worker somehow meets my relative. They are at least, two professionals with a similar dream for the neighborhood. A third person is already present in the story. The third person is the retired individual who has put in a request to the Vista volunteer worker for a computer tutoring class.

However the conversation came up, the family member mentioned I did computer tutoring as a volunteer in the past. The Vista worker asked the family member if I would volunteer to hold computer classes for the apartment complex families. The request was passed on to me, and I agreed to volunteer a few hours a week for computer tutoring sessions.

My first volunteer session brings one person to class. The retired person, who also owns a computer, but does not know how to use it. Unknown to me, they have a burning desire to accomplish a singular task, and they need my help. The retired person is a licensed Minister who has something very important to share with the world beyond everyday ministry. They want to share their vision using a computer, as that is the easiest way to reach the most people.

Here is the second version which is a little different.

A retired person who is a licensed Minister, who is also is a self proclaimed Prophet of God, receives direct albeit sporadic communications from God, was once given a visit to  heaven. Afterward, acting on direction from God, they wrote down their experience, and some additional things they were shown or told. It was rewritten a few times, and sent off to one or more publishers for publication. The result to date is poor at best with very few copies sold.

Seeing this dismal result, God sets into play a string of events which brings the retired person cum Prophet and myself together via a computer tutoring session. In the course of the first session the Prophet sends their first ever email to a Christian broadcasting network. A strongly worded expectation, the network needs to read the Prophet’s book.

The second computing class hour with the Prophet, and the rest becomes clear. This Prophet of God in the clothing of a computer illiterate retired person, wishes to get their story into the hands of as many people as possible via the internet having only the vaguest  idea of what the internet is and how the internet works.

It appears to be my duty in the process to assist the Prophet to help get their story out.

End of chapter one. Seen from one perspective there is this string of joined coincidences that benefits a retired person cum Gods Prophet.

From a second perspective, God arranged a number of seemingly unrelated life events so the possibility of a certain outcome could occur. God rolled the dice. My bit part is, I have a blog, some understanding of the internet, and how it works, and have some time to spare each week to help an aging Prophet complete their God given directive.

So now, I am unsettled about this situation. Was there indeed divine intervention, and is this the result? Or is this only a string of unrelated events, and the outcome is simply a coincidence, and no more?

I wish to know, what do you think? What in your opinion is real. What you would do if you were me?

Simple Gestures Make Someone Happy

I was at the grocery store, and a most interesting thing happened. It is January and cold, yet one little girl of (I think) five years old turned it into June for a minute or two. I had finished collecting the few items I wanted, and made my way up front to check out.

In front of me was a young woman with two little girls, the five year old and a younger girl of perhaps four. The three of them were ahead of me, standing around the cart, waiting for their turn to check out. Suddenly the girls, in a flash of impulse saw the flowers for sale display a few feet away.

The flower stand was circular perhaps and eight foot circle, and composed of four tiers with the fourth tier a circle large enough for a single container holding three small bunches of flowers. The stand was filled with flowers, either no one could afford them, or it had recently been restocked.

The little girls kind of skipped and hopped over to the flower stand. The youngest girl was content to stare at one section, admiring the colors and moving a few feet to repeat her observations. The older girl however had a completely different approach.

The older little girl was looking at all the flowers, re-arranging the their positions in a sequence that appealed to her sense of where they should be. After she finished moving the flowers around she started taking out loud to individual flower bunches and telling her mom to look at how pretty each bunch was. Almost laughing, she would pick up a bunch of flowers, say something to each bunch of flowers, and put them back in the container they came from.

The younger girl bored of the flowers, and went back to the cart, and sat on the bottom. Her shoes were worn, and a few sizes too big for her tiny feet. She didn’t seem to notice though, so I think she was used to hand me downs, fitting correctly or not. I then noticed that no one in the small family of three were dressed very well. All their clothes were well used and more than a little worn.

The older girl, was absolutely bubbling by now, flitting about the flowers, taking them off the stand, hugging them, saying something to them and putting them back. She reminded me of a honey bee collecting pollen, or a humming bird sucking up nectar. She was lost in a her own little world she had created with nothing more than a stand of cut flowers in a grocery store.

The magic of her enthusiasm over the flowers pulled me in, and I asked the Mom if it was okay to give the little girl money to buy a single bunch of flowers to bring home. The Mom was not sure how to respond and mumbled something that did not sound like a firm no.

I gave the little girl five dollars and some change to make the tax on the flowers at four dollars and ninety-nine cents a bunch. I was called to another register and it was time for me to check out. I paid my bill, and left the store, wondering if the little girl had bought her Mom, her Sister, and herself fresh flowers to take home, or did she decide to save the money and use it for something more important like proper fitting shoes for her sister.

I would like to think her Mom told her to pick one bunch of flowers for herself. If so, when they wake up tomorrow morning, the flowers will be there there to bring a little sunshine into their lives. It does not take a lot of time, effort, or money to make a positive change in a life.

Facebook And Not Me

Sometimes I feel like the last person in the world who is not on some social networking site. Every now and then I get offers or invitations to join a social networking site. I think about it, kick it around in my head for a few days and decide I really do not care to share my whole life with the world.

I now remember that is not completely true. I did open and account on one site. They did not seem to be overly concerned with who I really was, so I made up some information for the site and created an account.

I kept it active for about six weeks, and then let it die a slow lingering death due to inactivity. I am sure by now it has passed into the great data collection point in the sky and made it into a non important database.

It is not that my life is anything more special than anyone else’s life, or I am a fugitive from justice trying to evade capture and incarceration. I prefer to have my life be my own as much as possible.

Sharing information or pictures about what I am doing or have been doing is a fun idea, but I find I can do it quite well using email, or a phone call. Both of them to me are a little more personable, than posting on a site and checking back to see who if anyone has visited and looked at what I put up there.

This week, the subject came up again, I had an invite from a long time friend to join him on facebook. This time I actually thought about it, and did a little checking on the net to see what I could find. I had heard all these wonderful stories about meeting old friends, catching up with schoolmates, etc.

I went to facebook’s site to check it out, that seemed the most logical. At first glance it looks like an official government site, conservative and blue. I was surprised that  there were no sample accounts to see – unless I signed up for an account. If you are like most people, that did not slow you down. For me it sent up red flags of caution and fireworks of concern.

I decided to check out some facebook pages, and could not look at any. To even have the opportunity to look at a facebook page, I have to have a facebook account. Hmmm. I found that interesting. I did find these bits of information clicking on the policy link at the bottom of the web page:

• Consent to Collection and Processing in the United States. By using Facebook, you consent to having your personal data transferred to and processed in the United States.

and under statement of rights page, number 13. Amendments…

• “We can make changes for legal or administrative reasons upon notice without opportunity to comment.”

You also may want to read the second to last paragraph of the about page. The paragraph starts with:

• “Examples of the types of information”

Still on the fence about whether to join or not, I thought about facebook videos. It seemed logical that someone made a video of, on, or about facebook. I googled facebook, clicked on videos, and found the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow.

It was not quite the pot of gold I expected though. Here are a few youtube links I watched. I have no idea whether they are accurate or not, nor do I know anything about them other than I watched them.

1. What is facebook
2. Facebook pwnd
3. Facebook: What they really have one you

Facebook and other social networking sites may be wonderful, and I may be too cautious and overly concerned with my private information. It is one thing to know there is a lot of publicly available information on anyone. It is quite another to put so much information in one place.

In facebook’s, and other social networking sites defense, I imagine they are trying to provide a service, and make a few dollars along the way. Who can fault that? The policies they have in place are the most responsible policies reasonably possible, I am guessing.

You, of course will have to decide for yourself, as always, what is right for you and your use. My opinion on this matter is obvious, I choose no thankyou.