The pros and cons of fighting and hiding

[Julie]

   STRATEGY: HIDE. RIGHT. 

  Both me and my friend had alcoholic dads. This is hard in your teen years. She's very down-to-earth person, and wanted to change him. I knew, I couldn't change anything. I knew, I shouldn't help my mom to cope with this. She made the choice. She could divorce him. But she didn't. Her choice. We all have free will. Or, freedom of choices, if you wish. So, my friend was learning hard, doing all home tasks, crying, begging and so on. I was somewhere between Swinging London, 1966, creating marketing strategies in Warsaw, 2010, and turning into machine with Kraftwerk guys in late 70s. Now, I'm f***ed up and she's depressed. I don't know, which is worse. The funny thing, is that I'm like a true Christian in this case, I don't remember bad things. Either I didn't pay attention to them or I didn't care, I don't remember. I don't remember almost anything from real life from the period between 12-15 years old. I don't blame my dad. How can I blame, if I don't remember much? He's not drinking now, and we have good relationship. I know, this is egoistic, but it was a matter of survival, wasn't it?

 

  STRATEGY: HIDE. RIGHT.

  So, I was 15, my dad stopped drinking and went far far away to earn money (he's a good engineer, afterwards). My mom was still unemployed (c'mon, she left the work to look after him, bad bad choice). So, we had debts. A lot of debts. And a sick grandmom. Then I learnt about this man. His name was Leszek Balcerowicz and he re-formed Polish economy. He was and still is hated for too radical methods. But it was necessary. So, I imagined myself re-forming the economy of our family. And I was ready to be hated. I always had leadership skills. The guys, so claim that extraversion, social skills and leadership skills go together, are wrong. So, we started the business (renting houses near the sea) and we were saving drastically for next 6 months. Just like they did in 1989. It's not easy to tell no, when your mom is crying, when your grandmom is telling you're killing her, when your sister is depressed and only that dress would help her. But it wasn't me, it was him, hated but determined. Crazy. So, we paid almost all the debts (a few thousand dollars, in American money). And then my dad started earning. I wouldn't do it. I would break. But it wasn't me.

 

  STRATEGY: HIDE. WRONG.

  So, I was 20, studying, and went to USA for Work&Travel to earn some money and spend them on travelling across this beautiful country. And it wasn’t what I expected. So, I had a very ambitious job of selling ice-cream with no promotion opportunity, no tips (formally - forbidden, informally - supervisor taking them but no-one else can), earning only a little bit more than I would do in Poland, listening to constant complaints, working with not a very smart supervisor (but she had an experience and this mattered), sleeping in a shabby room and pretending to be happy. What I had to do it to tell them to f*** off, drive away and find a better job. God knows, why I was afraid. So, I thought that I should just survive until September and then travel on budget. So, I was day-dreaming, when selling ice-cream and imagining this amusement park to be a fairy tale, when walking home. De-concentration level increased, and I started missing the orders or made mistakes, when counting money. The supervisor was mad at me, I told her to shut up as she wouldn't find anyone to work for this salary, and we worked in happy symbiosis. The summer was so lucid, that I only woke up, when travelling. I still hate amusement parks and ice-cream.

 

 STRATEGY: FIGHT. WRONG.

  So, I was 21, having first serious internship. Very ambitions assignment "three little countries, nobody cares about this, nobody ever managed to change anything, but you can try". Very motivated team "whatever you do, nobody cares". What I had to do is to wait until the end of assignment, doing my best but not better, having time for myself and pretending I'm not sleeping. But, as Martin Luther King said, "I had a dream". And I though, I would change what nobody could change and would manage day-dreaming and business excellence.  I guess, I mentioned the leadership skills before. A combination of envisioning, craziness and leadership can kill any team. Unexplainable detachment from time to time can kill any motivation. People hated me. In business this is called "set expectations and did not deliver on them". They would understand, if I was detached all the time. But they wouldn't forgive, that I brought the vision and then detached myself. Especially in that situation. You shouldn't envision, if you know, you will detach yourself. People believe in idea as long as you do.

 

  STRATEGY: FIGHT. RIGHT?

  I'm 26 and I wasn't day-dreaming for a week (ha, it sounds like AA confessions). A very crazy week. So much work, that Ididn't have time to go for a coffee. So much strategy thinking alone, that my head was exploding and I was grateful, when I met people and could have a small talk on any subject. Maybe, this is the way? I mean: not becoming an workaholic, but having a lot of occupations? When I was day-dreaming at work? Only when I  did assistant's job instead of asking an assistant to do it for me. And I know, why I did the assistant's job. I liked it. I liked that it's not challenging and doesn't require that much thinking. Because it wasn't possible to manage my job and what an assistant should do for me, I was working long hours, believing that this would distract me from day-dreaming. But it didn't.  Then I prepared the list of the tasks for assistant, and I wouldn't touch them. It's better to take more "thinking" projects, so my brain is occupied. It's not about long hours, it's about speed.

 

Maybe, I'm wrong, but I will try. Success is going from failure to failure without losing an enthusiam, isn't it?

 

 

[Julie]

I'm usually thinking about patterns, similarities and contrasts. Getting crazy, finding similarities and patterns everywhere. I was reading a book about Pink Floyd and in making of Dark Side of the Moon album I found analogy to a marketing processes, we have in my company. Pink Floyd knew in 1972-73, what we just discovered in 2000s. Isn't this amazing? Or, I found a similarity between our situational leadership training and what happened with that band in 1968. When you lose the leader, and you're not that confident but you have to act, what would do you? Or, I analyzed the history of Pink Floyd and found excellent examples about sharing of roles and responsibilities and team work, and what would happen, if you try to dominate instead of building on strengths of others. I was thinking about this for a few weeks and it only passed, when I told this story to my boss and my team. I'm more a talker, a mix of introvert and extrovert, so I have to talk my dreams. Or, contrasts. How come that Johnny Rotten being from a poor family and a punk, developed so good music taste, appreciating prog rock and krautrock bands? So, I imagine him as a very young man, searching for good records in a shabby store, and talking, talking, talking.

And sometimes about Swinging London of 60s (looking around and thinking, how this people would be dressed, if they lived in 60s, how this song would sound, if it was written at that time) :) It's more or less like music of German band Baseballs, although they do covers of modern songs in Elvis style, not 60s.

And I love science, but it should be explained correctly. Like Discovery channel, a mix of science and fiction. Or, science fiction :)

Everything is mixed. I hear the music, when I look at my forecasting models at work. I see pulsation, when I analyze market shares fluctuation. I see architectural structures, when I hear the music. A mix of extravert and introvert, a talker and a detached person. And I'm probably so f***ed up as I don't even classify to day-dreamers. I'm not shy, not depressed, I don't imagine myself a superstar, I don't cry, after a few days of detachment I'm so exhaused that I need to meet people and go out.

Everything is mixed and goes perfectly together. And I cannot stop thinking about this.

[Jane Wilson]

It seems to me you are managing to be successful despite the circumstances.  What I am curious about is what exactly are you daydreaming for?  Is it emotional release? Or are you thinking about more abstract information, I have always had a love of learning certain kinds of information, usually general science which I could apply to my storylines or speculate about.  A lot of inventors spent hours thinking about their particular speciality.  People gifted in math see math formulars in a way that less mortals dare not thread.  Just wondering what you are thinking so hard about?