Reaction, Attitude, and Perception

My wife is fond of saying “Perception is the all”, and I agree. How you perceive things is how they are…for you. Perception dictates how we see a thing, a situation, a problem, a gift. It dictates not only how you see it, but how you’ll react to it. Control is a tricky thing, take too much, and your bossy or obnoxious. Take too little, and people walk over you, or you don’t feel like you matter.

I think the thing I have learned this week is to be active in your life. Take part in the decisions you can influence or help, and move forward and don’t concern yourself with the things you aren’t and shouldn’t be involved in. Too many times we’re so caught up in she said this, or he did that, and we get stuck on that thing, or event or whatever it is. I think the key is to continue to be involved in things, but don’t let the negative stuff weigh you down too much. Have a positive attitude about something that might be negative, and it’s not necessarily going to always come up roses, but maybe it won’t stick quite so bad as it would have if you had indulged in the negativity. And maybe, MAYBE, you can learn something from it and grow in your experience.

I never thought I was a jealous person by nature, but I think that I do have issues with it. I’ve gotten caught up in what I did or didn’t get, what I did or didn’t deserve to the point where I start feeling sick from holding it in or stewing over it. Rather than looking at what someone else has or what I didn’t get, I need to concentrate on what I do have and what I do deserve, and the real why of what is involving me and not anyone else. I think by concentrating more on me, instead of on everyone else, I can find my real talent and my real gifts. For a long time I have never felt good enough, or that I knew enough to be entrusted with responsibility. I always wondered why I was never really getting anywhere, in multiple aspects of my life, and felt like I was spinning my wheels, or waiting for that ‘thing’.

I’m done with that. I’m done with reacting to things in a negative manner or getting involved in things that I see as negative. I’ve learned that a lot of it is bullshit, a lot of it doesn’t concern me, and that my perception of things in many cases are not what they seem. I just sat for too long, brewing up things surrounding this event or that thing, making it all worse in my own head, or completely misunderstanding things and making something out of nothing.

Time to move forward. Time to get things done. Time to take a handle on my life, tell people how I feel sooner, and not sit on things making them worse or being eaten up my misconception.

Nice thing about the new attitude is it coincides with my promotion I’m the new Application Development Manager for my company I’m in charge of just about everything that I’ve built so far, plus a lot of projects we’re going to be building in the near future now that the MONDOPROJECTFROMHELL is done Yes, thank goodness, that biggun is over

What to do when you’re pissed?

So I’ve been using this blog for online therapy for a while now, and for the most part it works pretty well. I start writing about something and by the time I’m done with the post, I feel a lot better. Not necessarily because I’ve found the meaning of life, or solved world hunger. It’s mostly because I’ve sorted through my feelings and emotions and thoughts and at least put them in order. BTW, what’s the difference between feelings and emotions?

Anyway!

So, what do you do if you want to work out something that you can’t write about on your blog, or at least don’t feel comfortable about writing on your blog? Obviously I can’t blog about work because I don’t want to get Dooced. Plus I like to think that I’m fairly professional and I don’t think it’s right to do that anyway, good or bad, because that company info, not public info. I can’t blog about friends or family because I just don’t want to expose them or talk about them in a public forum whether it’s positive or negative. Fae has told me I can say anything that I want, but she’s always been different

It’s been several weeks, lots of stressful situations, pending crap that never wants to seem to happen, and a general feeling of the world is out to get me, take all my toys and give them to other people. Like the universe is sticking out it’s tongue at me or giving me the universal finger.

Wah wah wah, why don’t I whine a little more?

Okay, I’m fat too Well, I’m heavier than I have been in a while, mostly because I haven’t gone to Kendo in a month due to a huge work project one week, a blizzard the next week, cancelled class the 3rd, and having to take my wife to the hospital with a cluster headache last night. Yeah, that part sucked, she scared me when I got home and although I didn’t like being at the hospital until midnight last night, I’d do anything for that woman.

“But Matt, you have a gym downstairs from your office in White Plains.”

Yeah Yeah Yeah, I’m good at making up excuses, did I mention that?

So what is this post about really? It’s about me bitching in general because somehow in some small way, it makes me feel better. I have a really bad tendency to let things sit, let them fester until I get so upset/resentful/pissed off that I say or do something stupid. Either that or I sulk around until someone asks me what’s wrong, and then I usually say “NOTHING!” or pretend that everyone knows what I’m pissed about.

Yeah, I”m lame, sue me. I feel bad because I feel like I’m turning into the Anti-TerriTerriTerri. She’s a wonderful woman who is always so upbeat and positive. I’m hoping that my goal of working out and eating better will lead to me feeling better about myself, give me a better position to deal with crap that I have to, and allow me to operate from a better place.

I think one of the keys to my future is setting expectations, and making sure they’re realistic. Things I have thought to be one way have turned out to be only that way in my head and I end up getting slapped in the face. Stings too. Do I lower my expectations? Do I stop taking crap, or just not sweat the shit I can’t do anything about? Speak up when I see unfairness or bullshit? Maybe a little of all of it. I’ve always been Mr. Nonconfrontation, mostly because when I do bitch about something, I think a lot of it is in my own head or I’ve been stewing on it for so long, it’s a lot worse in my own head.

If you made it down to this part, I’m truly impressed, and truly grateful that you’ve listened to me spew. Don’t get me wrong, I have a lot to be thankful for. Problem is, the crap feels heavier right now, even if it’s not in reality. This is my pity party and you’re invited, but thankfully you don’t have to stay

Anyone got a shovel?

Bridgewater NJ as of 6pm is forecast to get 16-22 inches total.

Wow dude. that’s nuts. We had a little snow over the weekend that stuck for a little while until SNOVERKILL came thru MD and VA and kicked our butts today. Not that I mind tho. My boss is cool with me working from home so I worked from here today – as did most of us anyway. It wasn’t bad this morning, but by 10:30 or so, it started coming down in buckets. Gilli’s sick, which really sucks, so she read, and watched TV and she and I played Mario Kart for a while. Aidan’s been outside or at his friends house for most of the day, he just came in about 20 min ago.

So, how the heck is everyone? I just got through the migration project I’ve been putting together for a long time and thankfully there have only been a few hiccups here and there – server adjustments, small bug fixes in an application. I’ve been working a lot on my laptop so my elbow is getting sore again unfortunately. I was really hoping that the last cortisone shot would have taken, but no such luck. It’s already getting sore. Sucks to be me.

Got lots of cool stuff planned so I’m looking forward to doing something new at work. Being buried under this big thing has been depressing, but now that it’s out, it’s going to make it easier for a lot of people, me especially

One more and I can breathe!

I’ve haven’t been writing a whole lot lately because of some major releases at work. Nervous, paranoid, and stressed, but truthfully I think the fallout will be minimal and manageable and I’m freaking myself out for no real reason. Got a big one on Friday and when it’s done it becomes a series of managing much smaller releases, which is the way it should be anyway. Plus we start using some cool stuff and get rid of some old dusty manual processes, YAY!

I’d rather be ready for anything than slammed by stuff I didn’t think of. Even now, a few days before, I’m coming across little things that wouldn’t bring the walls down, but will make it a lot cleaner when all is said and done. It’s funny how I never thought I was good at paying attention to detail, but when I work on these big migrations, I go back to an ex-boss that I couldn’t stand but knew the value of crossing every single t and checking everyone else’s t’s before even looking for i’s Thanks man, I wanted to strangle you then, but I’m thanking you now. Even tho you were a putz.

As always, thanks for stopping by! Drop your .02$ in the comments!