Pride Feeds Shame: A Downward Spiral

They say pride comes before a fall. I think in my case it is actually preventing a fall because it is preventing me from going up in the first place, or in any direction for that matter.

I need help changing my diet and exercise habits - the past few years have shown that I can’t do it on my own. The problem is I don’t like to report to people about what I’m eating or how much I’m moving.

I remember once I was on Weight Watchers, which assigns “points” to different foods and then allows you to eat pretty much what you like (within reason) as long as you don’t surpass a certain number of points per day. It forces you to learn to make good choices or else be hungry and malnourished. My co-workers knew I had joined, and one day a well-meaning friend who shared my cubicle saw my lunch and asked, “Should you be eating that?” I like this girl, but I almost punched her. I took a deep breath but I forgot to count. I snapped back, “You’re not allowed to ask me things like that!” Bewildered she blinked and asked, “Why not?” I tried to explain, “You can’t assume the role of my keeper. I can’t answer to you. This has to be for me or it won’t happen.” I was right, but I felt like an ass saying it. I quit the program soon after. I’m not blaming her at all; I’m blaming my astonishing inclination to cut off my nose to spite my face, or your face, or whoever’s the face it may be. I don’t handle meddling well, even if it’s meant with love. Don’t ask me to join a gym with you or to go on a diet with you, and don’t you DARE tell me how many calories are in the food we’re both eating unless I ask, which I won’t.

I’m not a hypocrite about the don’t-ask-me-how-I’m-doing thing. I’m not going to ask you either. Trust me, I don’t want to know how many calories you’ve eaten today, or how many points you have left, or how your jeans are fitting, or whether or not you got up in time to exercise this morning. At all. I am 0% curious about these things. This makes me a bad friend. Friends want to know what’s going on in their friends’ lives, even if that includes topics that are boring or uncomfortable. People need support to reach their goals, and that’s what friends are for. If you put it that way, then yes, I do want to know because I care about you. I just don’t care about the minutia of your diet plan and I don’t want to talk about it every time I see you, especially if I see you frequently, and especially if you’re only one of many people in my life who are trying to get healthy. I know you’re only talking about your own personal goals, but it's like the eighth conversation I've had about this today. Also, it can feel like a not-so-subtle manipulation, “I’m doing all these things, what are YOU doing, fatty?” At the very least it forces me to make those kinds of pointed remarks internally, so that even if the guilt trip isn’t coming from you it’s caused by your favorite conversation topic. What a selfish way for me to think. Not everything is about me.

So back to me, I don’t want to join a gym because when people see me work out I feel embarrassed, like they’re watching me poop (stinky, undignified, necessary). On the other hand, I may be completely wrong. Who goes to the gym to watch other people work out? No one. At least, no one whose opinion I want to worry about. Logically I know you don’t have to be perfect on the first try, and that applies to everything, even working out. It’s ok to look silly. It’s ok to feel silly. Even so, I still want to be perfect on the first try. That’s my problem. I don’t want to get there; I just want to be there.

Pride is keeping me down. It starves my self-esteem into nothing. This leaves me without the confidence to act and without the ability to admit it's my own fault, both of which make it harder for me to change. If I was more comfortable none of this would matter. I’m not comfortable because I’m not right. I have a bad attitude about it, and I don’t want to be one of those people who say, “Yeah, I know I’m wrong, but that’s just me,” because that’s an even worse attitude.

I know the answers. I just can't seem to make myself apply them.

No Alibi

I’ve taken a lot of time off from school and other goals, to the point of developing a stagnant life. I look back over the past 10 years, and there is nothing that I’m proud of. It used to make me itch. Now I think it’s infected.

It’s not even like I have a good excuse for putting my life on hold. I wasn’t seduced by a double talking, snake charming salesman in tight, pinstriped pants with well-oiled moustaches and the face of an angel, who left me alone and pregnant to fend for myself on the Mean Streets, where it’s perpetually winter (except when it’s sticky-August), without so much as a bootstrap by which to pull myself up.

It’s not as if I lived with my parents in some forgotten armpit of America where crystal meth abounds until they died and left me to raise 7 dirty, barefoot siblings and to pay the debt on our farm, held by an evil-uncle landlord with a pedophiliac gleam in his puss encrusted eye.

It’s not like I broke all my bones and fell into depression, requiring years of physical and psychological therapy. I haven’t been doing odd jobs and hard drugs while trying to “make it” as an actor. I was neither kidnapped nor sold into prostitution. I was not called upon to avenge anyone’s untimely and unjust death. I have not been on walkabout. I’ve had no TARDIS adventures. I was not waylaid by love, and I have not been too busy as a wife and mother to bother with the dreams of my youth. There have been no Ponzi schemes, gypsy curses, or felony convictions to slow me down. I’ve never been lost in a jungle, lost at sea, or lost on a foreign planet. I didn’t spend any time in a mental hospital, rehab, witness protection, a haunted circus, or an enchanted garden labyrinth.

It’s not as if an alien parasite attached itself to my brain, rendering me useless so it could feed on all my would-have-beens until a chance encounter with the perfect, random combination of ordinary chemicals killed the unwelcome guest and broke his hold over me but left me unharmed (at least I’m pretty sure that didn’t happen).

It’s not as if I died.

It’s not as if I didn’t know better.

I just stopped. I let myself stop, always meaning to start again, but taking longer than intended to do it. After one part of my life slowed and stopped, bit by bit, so did everything else. 

Work Still Sucks

I promise, not everything I post will be a work complaint, but I do have another one.

Sometimes I have to tell a customer something along the lines of, “That’s a really good idea / interesting point. What you want doesn’t exist in our company, or possibly in the universe, so I’ll have to notify management that our customers are requesting it. They’ll be happy to make the change if they deem it feasible and beneficial to the whole.” In those cases the customer is likely to reply (in spirit and action, if not in these exact words):

“That doesn’t give me exactly what I want right this instant, therefore it doesn’t help me at all. By extension, you are not helpful at all. You are bad at your job and this is a horrible company. My mom never told me ‘no,’ or even, ‘wait,’ and now I’m a 45-year-old toddler who no one likes. Allow me to explain to you in a condescending tone, using glib clichés so you’ll be sure to understand, that your job is to do whatever I say, regardless of what a ‘computer’ or ‘natural science’ will allow; even if it’s ridiculous, even if it hurts the company as a whole. I proclaim dishonor upon you and your house. As soon as I hang up on you in a justifiable breach of social decorum, I’m going to complete a survey detailing the ways in which you suck so that, hopefully (if your company knows the meaning of justice, which I now doubt), this ‘management’ entity you speak of will dock your pay and berate you publicly. Perhaps then you’ll understand that the rules which were carefully planned for the good of all simply don’t apply to me. I am not everyone else. I am the customer and I will have satisfaction! Exeunt!” 

Work Sucks

I’m not sure what this blog is going to be yet, but at least sometimes it’s going to have to serve as an outlet for complaints about my job. This is one of those times. Your patience has been noted and is appreciated.

I work in customer service for an MLM, answering phone calls, emails, and live chats. It’s less fun than it sounds and less fulfilling every day. To quote the Broadway show, [Title of Show], “My day job… is killing me softly. I wrote this song sitting at my desk today: Can't you see that I'm dying inside? Can't you see that I'm dying inside? If you shined a flashlight in my butt you'd see I'm dying inside.”

As part of my duties, I’m often called upon to help people who aren’t comfortable with computers to navigate our web site. I actually really like doing that because I feel like I’m teaching them a skill that can be applied to many future online adventures, not necessarily just with our company. Once I taught a lady how to scroll down so she could see more of the text on the screen. I felt something like what an eye surgeon must feel, having opened at least half of the world to this individual who will no longer live in semi-darkness. I'm not being sarcastic; I really do like helping people in this way. Since I can’t see their computer screen and they don’t know computer words it can be difficult to help them sometimes, but it’s a rewarding challenge (which is somewhat rare for me in customer service; there’s often a challenge but usually no emotional reward).

What I can’t stand, though, is the constant, incoherent muttering certain customers employ while trying to figure it out themselves, even though they called me for help. They usually do this at a lower than conversational volume, but not low enough to be whispering. It’s like they want me to hear the inner thoughts they’re not quite having. Today, for example, there was a guy who couldn’t log into his account.

Me: Click where it says “forgot password.”

Customer: Ok ok yeah I see uh yeah ok my number and then whuhh sumfooah hmm sfah shhhh hrmm… so I see I’ll ch-hoomin haaaahmmn grimb shah… that’s hard to read mnchaaa figleh hargoonaah… That didn’t pash smiffulaaaa crm sommy cha… how come scuhuh frivelleeee kafrim… ok ok, then let’ssssssss ha mrang aaaaaand…

FYI – this is a screen with 3 questions on it. I can tell at this point that either A) he misspelled the nonsensical security phrase or B) he got it right but doesn’t see the notice that says so because he’s too focused on only one section of the screen, so he keeps repeating the request over and over again without moving on. I suspect B. When you work in customer service, you’re not supposed to interrupt your customers. Even so I can’t listen to mutterings forever – it won’t help him accomplish his goal and it’s driving me CRAZY – so I try to interject:

Me: Sir, does it sa-

Customer: I’m hamana sho vahhhhh ok ok, yeah then shroooofis

Me: SIR -

Customer: Mhm, yes, then I put my number and haaaaa

Me: Please allow me to help –

Customer: frmin pah type that there an I cheee ma dooley

Me: What does it sa-

Customer: I see, I see, ch-hoomin nmm froooo mrnn gar

Me: Look at the –

Customer: Uh huh, yeah, I’m just shrookin for mingus

Me: SIR, PLEASE –

Customer: I’m doing hhhhaaaaa wul mrphin gum fhumm…

By the way, the ellipses don’t indicate pauses because these customers don’t break for help or for breath; they’re there to signify the mumbles getting quieter and my lack of desire to continue to type them out. If you think this is irritating to read, you should try listening to it. I’m not kidding, I’m not exaggerating, and it happens all the time. I finally did get through to this guy. I could tell he felt sheepish about it, which made me feel guilty even though I raised my voice without emotion, solely as an effort to communicate.

Clearly, the moral is that if you’re going to ask a question, you have to shut up to get the answer. I wonder if God is trying to teach me that very lesson, and if He’ll continue to send me these people until I learn it. I seem to understand the principle, but maybe I’m not applying it very well.