It’s been forever since I last blogged. There have been things – presentations, projects, parties, and other life events…so many things that I could have blogged about but did not.  Ironically, my excuse is not that I’ve been too busy.  Sometimes I haven’t had the heart, sometimes I’ve been waiting to decide how my blog will fit into my evolving personal and professional identity.

Today, I decided that life is too short to wait. Life is a f—ingly interesting learning experience, and if I don’t start jotting some of these things down, I feel like I’m going to forget how interesting things really are.  I’d hate to look back when I’m 80 and think that I spent most days bored.

So. Inspired by Jon Becker (as always), I’m going to try this whole #365 thing…but not twitter, not photos… I’m going to try blogging everyday. Nothing too time consuming. Just a little note for later, entirely for me.

Day 1

Last night I went to a goodbye party for a neighbor who is moving to Atlanta.  Another neighbor was talking about a recent work trip.  His work is somewhat delicate & international, so I won’t go into details here, but suffice to say he was talking about how much he admired his boss, who had spent the entire trip walking that fine line of disagreeing with his boss in a way that would reassure the individuals with whom they were meeting while not directly saying his boss was wrong – because that wouldn’t be good either.  It was a brilliant navigation of understanding social and organizational culture, managing self, and influencing perception.  It was a game, but one that took tremendous skill, discipline, and confidence.

If I’m going to get anywhere in any sort of organization,  I’m going to have to learn how to play that sort of game. It doubly pisses me off: because I have to admit that I’m not good at this sort of thing (weakness, dammit) and because part of me would love to stay the way I am – just another loose cannon. Being a loose cannon is great, but it might be nice to have something else in the back pocket, to pull out when the situation arises. As my husband says, playing the game is a form of #adulting – get on with it. It’s time to stop refusing to play the game and learn how to play it well.

 

Featured Picture: Maarten van den Heuvel, unsplash.com