Hard Day at Work?

If you had the sort of day that sees you miffed for want of justice then you fit with most of the rest of the world in your ‘right now’ moment. We all have them.

Yet, that sort of flippant everybody-has-those-days response doesn’t empathise much does it? Surely we can do better.

Hard days happen for some of the following reasons:

D You got some bad (some might call “constructive”) feedback;

D Hurt people hounded you and somehow you’re implicated;

D Change is being foisted on you, even though you’re actually doing a great job;

D The workload—which was once an exciting challenge—has ground you down;

D Nothing went right or to plan;

D You felt tired all day and just couldn’t think straight;

D Trying to get work done, you were interrupted by noisy colleagues.

Of course, the list would wind on and on.

The point is, there are many reasons for despairing at the end of our working days. It kind of makes us feel better that with a new 24-hour block of time a fresh start is mandatory. We can put yesterday behind us.

Resolving the Bad Day

It would be little help to leave the ‘hard day’ where it is in Complaint Land.

Many people drown their sorrows in a few alcoholic beverages, which every now and again wouldn’t be bad. As a standard coping mechanism, however, it leaves much to be desired, not least our health, besides not actually fixing a thing.

Others take to coping by getting comprehensively distracted on things totally estranged to work.

And still others will talk it out with a spouse, a mentor, a friend, or process it with themselves—something for which journaling is good for.

Some make an intention of having a laugh about it—or sinking into some comedy.

Whatever method we use the test of how effectively the day’s resolved is by how well forgotten the issue becomes. Unresolved issues have their way of combining and therefore recurring.

“Everyone Has Bad Days”

Recall this is where we started. Again, to hear these words does little to help the person feeling frustrated and upset by their day. But it’s still an important fact to bear in mind.

How good is it to find an example of someone who’s had an even worse day than we have? We don’t have to look too far. Turn on the News.

Self-pity is the dangerous temptation for us when we dwell over horrible days. It’s better to understand, and accept, that—besides bad seasons—for every month we’re alive we’ll have a day or two of bad happenings.

Whilst everyone has bad days, the key is recovery. Putting the bad day behind us is important, but not as important as owning the bad day in the first place—it happened, but it’s not the end of life as we know it.

Tomorrow’s here quick enough.

© 2011 S. J. Wickham.