25 June 2007

Inside our heads

Monday 25June07
I've started reading A Return to Love (Reflections on the Principles of A Course In Miracles) by Marianne Williamson. I've been wanting to read A Course in Miracles but my focus still isn't there for it. For some reason, I still like the interpretations of it, like comments that Wayne Dyer has made and now Marianne's book.

In it, I had to laugh at her comment, "what I learned from A Course in Miracles is that the change we're really looking for is inside our heads.' It fit perfectly with my dealing with Talk Show Host today. When I stopped insisting that he shouldn't be that way, when I changed how I react to him everything changed for me.

I realize that he gets it too. Not once has he ever asked me why I don't respond to his incessant questioning. When I don't play his game he walks away. If his questions were so important he would ask me again but he never does.

EY

My Two Cents

Monday 25June07

I wrote an entry in my other blog awhile back about having an epiphany about staying in one place versus running away. (click this link to read it)

The thing about staying put is that you do have to find a way to cope with naturally argumentative people. Talk show host is one of those difficult people I have to deal with at work. He has a shit disturber mentality. He likes to tell you that Harry said such and such about you then get you all worked up to the point where you say something about Harry. Then he'll run off to Harry to tell him what you said. He'll run back and forth until you and Harry confront each other over some non existent situation orchestrated by Talk show host. It makes him laugh, that's why he does it. He is truly gifted. You wouldn't believe how easily you can get drawn in.

He's been pulling these pranks on the guys for years and can still get a guy or two riled up. After every instance each person will say , "I don't know how I let him get me into this again. I should know better. I should know him by now."

I've been caught in his sticky web a number of times to the point of yelling with the veins popping out of my head. He has a way of putting things so innocently that you don't even realize he's doing what he's doing until it's too late. After so many times of coming home mad as hell and asking myself what I'm going to do to cope with this person I've finally figured out my own way.

If he asks a question, I answer the initial question and when he fires off the next question, I either claim, "I don't know," or I just don't answer him. I turn my attention and do something else as if he never said a word. Rude as it may sound, it's been working for me. Silence really is golden.

Today he asked, "Did you see the gay pride parade?"
I answered, "I didn't do the parade this year."
He said in an inappropriately loud voice, "I didn't ask if you did the parade, I asked if you saw it."

Normally my disposition is geared towards saying something like, "you know what I meant," and that would give him the opportunity to have our conversation escalate to me being angry and him having his big laugh at my expense. Instead I just shrugged my shoulders and walked away keeping my two cents to myself.

I realize that it's my need to be right that used to catch me up in his web. But happily enough my need to stay calm and have peace has superseded my need to be right. I find it's helped me to not only cope with this person but not get caught up in his constant bullshit.
There are some people you just have to write off for your own sanity. And my sanity is worth more than being right.

EY