Don't Bite More Than What You Can Chew
Good Sunday morning. The skies remain gloomy, tell tale signs of an upcoming typhoon, not to worry though as I got this cup of coffee to kickstart my day.
Heard of 'horror' stories about someone awash with monies and wealth but nowadays seemingly kaput ? Surely, you have your fair share of stories to re-share as well.
And this leads us back to yourself. Go and face the mirror and revisit your capacity to take things under your fold, be it in the lines of wealth and monies, and even work responsibilities. Many had those sunny days where resources, especially on the financial side, was literally overflowing until one day, everything has dissipated in thin air. Stories of that 'unico hijo/hija' who effortlessly inherited everything from his/her parents, driving the child literally crazy in unabated spending sprees until it worsens when he/she ends up with that affliction and addiction for an activity that dissipates resources and eventually drains even himself/herself as a person. Can that affliction be fixed for a person to get back to the mainstream of what is normal and acceptable without those detrimental effects to one's life? Absolutely but that requires a gargantuan effort that is best triggered from the very person himself, not from his family support structure, not from anyone else.
Swinging over to the work environment. Indeed we heard of worst stories [especially during this long drawn pandemic] when workers end up underworked simply because the volume, the demand is not there anymore. But have you heard of those travails where someone has been tossed with more work way beyond what one can take on? And where does that lead up to? This is a classic failure in the making, where circumstances will portend that, that person was set up to fail, doomed to fail right from the very start because there's just no way out getting extricated given the work cut for him. Way to get out of this deep morass? Obviously you can cry out loud. Pushing back is the way to go but don't push back for the sake of it. Instead, make your case. Present facts. Lay your cards on the table. Reaffirm your bandwidth, your capacity to take on tasks and responsibilities. You can only chew so much and not beyond else you will likely get choked and that could be fatal, both figuratively and literally.
Here we go with this two-pronged approach to recalibrate things before it goes beyond control. Reset expectations. Throw out in the window that obsolete adage that you can't say no to the boss. Present your case, your capacity, your capabilities. Failing which, no amount of Hail Mary will extricate you from that dilemma. And the flip side of resetting expectations? Align and reconcile it with reality, be pragmatic, factoring-in everything to have a win-win fix.
What follows suit is measuring up to the reset expectations, self-monitoring yourself [and where possible, do not lose by default for someone else to monitor you, not even your boss at the workplace]. Be exacting on yourself. Be tough. Be uncompromising. Berate yourself when you fumble. Be harsh on yourself. You'll be better off that way rather than others getting harsh on you, trust me.
Bottom-line. We want to arrest that skid, that downward spin of disappointments, all because of poorly set expectations. Go back and seek refuge with Mr Google and the search results will unselfishly show you tons and tons of reasons why we end up with disappointments recurring like a plague until you get pushed at the edges of the cliff, taking one deep breath if you are about to give up. No way, Jose.
