faking it

I feel like if I’m straight­for­ward and as­sertive and de­ci­sive, it’ll be im­plied that I’m rigid and dif­fi­cult and con­trol­ling, and that I don’t have peo­ple skills.

But if I’m sen­si­tive, if I let some­thing get to me, or if I pri­or­i­tize kind­ness and em­pa­thy over be­ing au­thor­i­ta­tive, the im­pli­ca­tion will be that I’m not strong enough, pro­fes­sion­al enough, or a good leader.

And it’s not just any one place. Or just the work­place. It’s every­where.

I have nev­er been able to fig­ure out the every­day world, and the se­cret is that I’ve been fak­ing it pret­ty much my en­tire life.

And I say ‘im­plied’ be­cause for as much lip ser­vice is paid to the idea of open and hon­est com­mu­ni­ca­tion, very few peo­ple ac­tu­al­ly prac­tice that. You only find out that these char­ac­ter traits you didn’t in­stinc­tive­ly know how to bal­ance per­fect­ly and ad­just pre­cise­ly for any giv­en sit­u­a­tion were con­sid­ered prob­lem­at­ic af­ter the fact, and it’s nev­er in a di­rect fash­ion. It’s through some un­fa­vor­able de­ci­sion or pas­sive ag­gres­sive­ness or even just some­one be­com­ing a ghost.
 

—emi­ly duchaine

Flom­mist Emi­ly Duchaine lives in the Pa­cif­ic North­west. She likes to drink mead, learn about sharks, and lis­ten to the Talk­ing Heads. She pre­tends to be a pro­fes­sion­al busi­ness­woman most days. Copy­right © 2018 Emi­ly Duchaine. Pic­tured: Crown Zeller­bach Build­ing, San Fran­cis­co, 1957, Source.

MOR D’ARTÍCULOS  MOR FLOMM !

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