Author: Dan G.

A couple of weeks ago at church, our preacher talked about the need for community in the church, speaking from Ephesians 4:1-6 and a few other passages. One of the points that he made and that has stuck with me for the last couple of weeks is the idea that many of our problems today stem from deeper failures than we’re willing to address in regards to our personal relationships – and one example in particular has been rolling around in my head.

What is counseling? A lot of people think that it’s getting advice, but professional counselors are specifically taught not to give advice – or at least not much of it. Counseling is primarily listening, responding to what you’re hearing, and showing concern and empathy for the problem. That’s the core of it. Seems simple enough, right? So why do we have tens of thousands of people across the country who can charge $100 per hour for this relatively simple act?

One of the things that makes a counselor unique is that the client feels able, even obligated, to be completely open and truthful with that person. Think about this: how many people do you feel you can be completely open and honest with in your life? Most people would probably say no one, or maybe one person. Maybe a spouse, or a best friend, or a sibling. Why do we have such trouble being honest and open with each other? Why do we need to hire a professional to find someone to talk to?

Shifting gears for a moment.

According to one major study, 69.7% of divorces are a result of communication problems. Whether you believe the figure or not, few would challenge the claim that it’s one of the most common causes. Objectively speaking, that should be surprising. Here are two people who’ve sworn vows to be as one til death do them part, and they can’t find ways to establish basic communication? How absurd does that sound?

And yet we all seem to have problems doing it ourselves, don’t we?

How many times have you put on a mask for someone, because you didn’t want to appear as if you didn’t fit in?

How many times have you said “I don’t know,” when what you really mean is “I’m afraid I’ll say something wrong and you’ll blow up at me?”

How many times have you felt like your world was coming apart, and answered “I’m fine” anyway?

Why do we have so much trouble being honest and open with each other?

Let me preface this with a brief bit of history about myself: I’ve been dodging management roles for about five years. Starting back at my first tech support job, I have been offered roles as a team lead or supervisor on multiple occasions and always said no. It just didn’t appeal to me; I saw management as empty talkers and not doers. I wanted to think and to solve problems. So that’s what I stuck to through five years of technical support, provisioning, escalations, and general problem solving. And then I bumped into my old manager Ricky at my current job, and he told me that he’d get me to be a team lead this time. I didn’t think much of it, but as I worked in the new environment and saw the quality of the management team here, I decided to go for it.

So I’ve been in this management role for nearly a year now, and I’ve started to recognize pros and cons to the position that I’d never thought of or noticed before, largely thanks to the personal input and feedback from the management team in place above me. Having a management team that is this competent and also invested in their employees is incredibly rare and I consider myself blessed to be a part of the organization.

Now, as I stated above, I like problem solving. I see a problem, I fix it – or I try to figure out who can, and get them to do so. I value action and productivity – you may talk a good talk, but what have you actually done? Finding new, more efficient and effective ways to do things makes me feel like I have accomplished something. This is “tactical” thinking. It’s the process of executing the objectives set by the strategy.

Management, however, is not so much about tactical thinking. There is a large element of that, but what makes a good manager is the ability to work on a strategic level. Figuring out a problem exists, specifying a goal while not necessarily how to execute it, is the art of the manager. Trying to execute it on your own will be the quick undoing of you, and will as often as not result in the problem becoming worse, not fixed. This has been the single biggest change for me to adjust to.

Additionally, management problems are inherently people problems, rather than technical problems. With a router, you can reset it. With a computer, you can reboot it. With a person – well, you have to work with what you have. And you have to determine whether or not that person is capable of working within the role they’re assigned or if you have the wrong person for the task. Replacing a defective cable modem is one thing – replacing an incompetent worker is another. It’s a daunting thing having to tell someone they no longer have a job.

Do I like management? I think so, yeah. It’s quite a change of pace and it’s a constant challenge. It’s been a learning experience and a chance to grow. It’s certainly not been boring. And it’s not at all what I saw myself doing a few years ago.

Which, I think, is a good thing.

It’s been an interesting few months here at the abode. Back at the start of May, I woke up to banging on my door and thick smoke pouring into the front room – apparently, my upstairs neighbor had left the rest of us a going-away present when he moved out, in the form of a pair of gascans and a match. That was the first time I’d ever experienced a “real” fire, the evacuation, the panicked neighbors, and all that goes along with it. I learned a few things: First, firefighters are some of the most remarkable people you’ll meet, and can also be complete jerks. Second, the Red Cross is pretty cool, and not just an abstract organization- they came out to offer all of us in the affected units assistance. Third, renter’s insurance is a hundred times more difficult to deal with than auto insurance.

In the aftermath, I was told that my apartment wasn’t going to be livable and so I needed to get my stuff out. With the help of some friends, I got all my stuff out and moved into a unit that was recently vacated. With everything moved and me sitting in a new unit, I figured the problems were over and I could get back to normal. That is, until I discovered some unannounced roommates had already been living in the unit I was placed in – bedbugs.

Now I don’t know about you guys, but I’d thought bedbugs were all but extinct. One of those things relegated to folklore or the sayings of old people – “Don’t let the bed bugs bite,” for instance, had about as much relevance to me as “Pocket full of posies.” Incidentally, it turns out that not letting the bed bugs bite is damn near impossible. But I digress. It turns out these little guys were essentially eradicated back around World War II, but have made a nationwide resurgence in the last decade or so thanks to a dramatic reduction in pesticide usage around the country, especially in hotels and such.

As it turns out, bed bugs aren’t quite what I had imagined them to be. The bugs themselves aren’t that big of an issue – their bites are painless, leave barely any mark for most people, and only occur maybe once a week per bug. They never show themselves in the light, and they don’t really make any noticeable impact on your environment unless you happen to catch one as it scurries back to its hiding place. What’s more impactful is the irritation: once you know they’re there, you always feel like you’ve got them sneaking up on you – it’s apparently a major cause of delusional parasitosis. And come on, no one likes the thought of sharing their home with tiny, parasitic bugs. Especially invincible ones.

Oh, had I not mentioned that yet? These little critters are nigh-impossible to kill. Sure, you can step on one – though it takes an impressive amount of force for such a little creature, and will leave a mess – but aside from that, your options are limited. The common treatments are heavy pesticide application and steam, as they’re vulnerable to high heat. But even that doesn’t work as well as you’d hope – when I told my apartment about what was going on, they signed me up for a three-week treatment through a pest control company. Five weeks later, the bugs were still here – their ranks diminished, but still fighting for the cause. I’ve not seen any since the latest treatment (week six!) but I’m not going to consider it solved until I go a couple weeks without noticing anything. And it’s not like they’re easy to spot.

Also, for the treatments, you have to pack all your clothing, towels, dishes, hygeine items, etc., into plastic bags, and you have to wash all your bedding and clothing on high heat – and not just any high heat, you need the heat that’s only found at a laundromat. Conveniently, I discovered that Ziploc sells giant bags – 20 gallon Ziplocs with carrying handles, in fact! It’s made the whole ordeal of having all my clothing stored in plastic a bit easier, and cheaper, since I don’t have to toss them out every week after doing laundry like I did with the garbage bags I was using originally.

So here we go with another week of constant vacuuming and living out of a bag. I think I’m beginning to understand why people burn down their homes for the insurance money.