Stop Pissing Me Off What to Do When the People You Work with Drive You Crazy (21 page)

Be the ruler of your world, at least for a day

The failure to manage negative emotions drives a continual state of being pissed off, as well as dire health consequences. You need to do whatever it takes to learn how to have a healthy outlet for the big four: anger, sadness, fear, and guilt. Doubt that? Consider a study that appeared in
Thorax:
An International Journal of Respiratory Medicine
(
www.thorax

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11.
  Chill Out

.bmj.com
). This new research suggests that men who are chronically hostile and angry may face a future of sharply diminished lung function. In 1986, scientists administered a questionnaire to 670 men ages 21 to 80 to assess their hostility. Each then received a pulmonary exam within one year of completing the questionnaire. The men were tracked for an average of 8.22

years, with comprehensive physical examinations every 3 to 5

years, including an average of three pulmonary function tests. After controlling for age, weight, height, smoking status, and other variables, the scientists found a consistent association between high hostility and lower levels of lung function. Among more hostile men, pulmonary function declined at every exam over a ten-year period when compared with less hostile subjects.

Since levels of lung function were in the normal range at the start of the study, the researchers say, the possibility that poor lung function led to hostility, rather than the other way around, is unlikely. They acknowledge, however, that an unknown factor could cause both hostility and poor lung function. Still, Dr. Rosalind J. Wright, an assistant professor of medicine at Harvard and the senior author of the study, said there was no doubt that emotions could cause physical changes, some of which could be detrimental. “When you experience physical symptoms around negative emotions, your heart rate goes up, you start sweating, and so on,” Dr. Wright said.

“Changes in bodily functions—nervous system, immune function—need to occur for you to feel these things. It is possible that similar processes are going on more locally; say in the lungs, which over many years may cause inflammation that affects lung function.”

You may also be overscheduling too much, making you chronically anxious. According to online sources such as WebMd and Medline, between 6.5 and 13 percent of the

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 Pissing Me Off!

population suffers from anxiety disorders. While this statistic is difficult to track, most practitioners agree that the number of people suffering from anxiety is on the rise. In his book
The Overload Syndrome
, Richard Swenson, MD, explains that Americans schedule their lives at 110 percent, 120 percent, and even higher. Swenson says we no longer have any margin of error. Our lives are so busy, so jam-packed, that we’re tired, worn out, burned out, and yes, we are anxious. He suggests scheduling 80 percent of your life and leaving 20 percent unplanned—open for life to happen.

Feel better already? I hope so. Take whatever time you need to increase your health and energy level. Life requires training; dealing with difficult people uses energy you may not have. Pump up your body and mind and watch the road rage subside. To alleviate stress even further, go on to the next chapter, which will help you add fun to your to-do list and learn how and when it’s still safe to have fun at work.

your

relationship toolbox

How to Move froM PiSSed off to Powerful

PiSSed off

Powerful

Working too much

Keeping your work life in balance

Neglecting your health because Taking impeccable care of your body and of work

mind

Missing sleep because of work Sleeping eight to ten hours each night or work worries

Fueling your work with coffee

A healthful diet

and doughnuts

Al owing others to decide how

Setting healthy limits on work

much you work

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12.

fuN iS NOT A fOur LETTEr WOrD . . .

BuT WOrK iS

How to stay sane and happy on the job.

Twice a day, at 11:00 a.m. and 5:00 p.m., a flock of ducks marches on red carpet in formation to the fountain at the Peabody Hotel in Memphis, Tennessee. The waddling ducks plop into the pool right on cue to the adoring applause of guests and staff. Twice a day, work stops and all the employees gather around to watch the ducks. Don’t you wish that your workplace had a similar way to relax? Perhaps what makes your coworkers so difficult is that you have no way to have fun together. In this chapter, we’ll look at ways that you might be able to lighten everyone up. One reason work is so stressful is that we’ve forgotten this essential tool.
is there any Fun to Be had in a politically correct
world?

Everyone in my office is just so sensitive these days!

Man, we can’t have fun at work any more!

Why is everyone so PC around my company?

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 Pissing Me Off!

Sometimes, the difficult person in your work group may be someone you see as just too sensitive. As someone who’s spent years in the trenches doing diversity and harassment training, I’m quite familiar with these PC complaints. Just how true are they? Well, I have to admit that there’s a certain truth to them, driven by paranoia much more than reality. People these days are afraid to say or do things that
might
“offend” someone. This, as I frequently lament, rests on a total misunderstanding of the law and policy in this arena.

We do not have to worry about what might offend someone. In fact, if we did that, we wouldn’t get any work accomplished, because we would be spending all our time trying to determine who or what might be offensive. That time is better spent learning what the law actually says and how our organization’s policy reads. As outlined in Chapter 3, I can guarantee you that no matter what your location or company, the rules don’t prohibit any remark that could possibly offend anyone. There are millions of things we can still laugh and joke about at work and in fact, one of my core beliefs is that life is too short not to have fun at work! I say, go for it. Just don’t make jokes about these twelve hot-button subjects:

n Race

n Sex

n Ethnic background

n Military status

n Disabilities

n Age

n Gender

n Sexual orientation

n Pregnancy

n National origin

n Religion

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  Fun Is Not a Four Letter Word  .  .  . But Work Is That’s it! Now, that wasn’t so hard, was it? Sometimes if I’m working with groups determined to gripe about these things, I force them to list all the things that are
okay
to joke about. The list includes subjects such as nerds, attorneys, sports teams, politicians, celebrities, the branch office, and the incompetence of headquarters. It may require more creativity to use appropriate humor. Talk to your kids. My experience is that they know great knock-knock jokes, jokes about Shrek, and on and on.

It can also be a lot of fun to get to know your colleagues on a deeper level. Contrary to popular belief, you can talk about where people grew up, the meaning of their last names, and the baby-to-be; you just can’t do it in a derogatory or invasive way. How to make sure that you’re not invading anyone’s privacy or space? Offer similar information about yourself first. If you still have doubts about whether your inquires are welcome,
ask
. Ask people how they want to be treated; don’t assume that they want to be treated the same way you do.

the platinum rule

In Western culture, most of us are familiar with the golden rule: Do unto others as you would have them do unto you. We tweak that a bit for the platinum rule: Treat others as
they
would like to be treated
. Of course, this is extra effort, but in a diverse work world, nothing less will do. Let me suggest a few ideas for getting to know people so that you know them well enough to have fun. If you’re having fun with someone, you’re much less likely to perceive them as difficult!

If you see two people who are friends or close work colleagues, you can always ask them how they met. You could also offer them some of your own background or history. If we

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 Pissing Me Off!

strive to be straightforward with others, it gives them permission to be straightforward with us. One way to do this is to share a popular exercise we conduct in our diversity trainings: “cultural stories.” We ask participants to remember a time when they felt different in some way from the dominant culture, a time when they experienced being an outsider.

For example, I frequently share that my first job out of law school was in Denver with a couple of attorneys who were born and raised in New York City. This was also their first job out of law school and their first time living outside of New York. As people do when they’re getting to know each other, we were sharing our experiences growing up and I talked about how I had grown up in western Colorado on the rim of the Black Canyon on a sheep ranch. Not exactly the end of the world—

but you can see it from there.

I shared with my New York colleagues how in the summers, we would herd the sheep on horseback from our summer permits up above Lake City. This was so strange to them that they thought I was joking and/or making this up. They could not believe that anyone still did that. They thought it was something that was reserved for the stuff of western movies, and more of a myth than a reality in this day and age. In fact, I worked with these two guys for two years and they never believed me. They joked about my being a cowgirl, told sheep jokes and, in general, thought I was a big spoofer.

I finally gave up trying to convince them and just let them believe that I was joking around. It was one of the first times in my life that I realized that the way I grew up was so different from others, people literally refused to believe it.

When we share these stories in our diversity training, we pair people off and then have one person share an experience of a time he or she felt other people didn’t believe him or her. The

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12.
  Fun Is Not a Four Letter Word  .  .  . But Work Is partner repeats the story back to the first sharer and is graded on listening. The listener then shares his or her story while the first sharer listens and then repeats what they think they heard.
using humor to connect with difficult people

Sharing a joke with someone can lead to more connection and make them feel less difficult. Try the Good Clean Funnies List at
www
.
gcfl.net
w
hen you’re really stuck. You can get a free subscription to receive a “funny” a day, and you can even rate each joke. All jokes offered are in the public domain, so you’re free to pass them along. What workplace couldn’t use a dose of good clean fun? Humor also helps you to build rapport with your colleagues so that when issues do come up, you have a common ground of understanding.

help take a load oFF

If you’re not having fun at work, it’s easy to feel pissed off at everyone and everything. Perhaps instead, you could appoint yourself the fun master of your work group. My client Southwest Airlines, for example, built its brand by making the travel experience fun for customers and staff. Flight attendants pop out of overhead bins, joke on the announcements, and engage in other madcap antics.

lighten up: sMiling is part oF the dress code

Still having a problem having fun at work? Consider forcing yourself to smile. Yes, it’s a scientific fact: smiling not only

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 Pissing Me Off!

works the facial muscles but tricks our happiness hormones into thinking that they’re doing better than they are. We can literally fake it until we make it.

Or, if you’re really bold, start a laughing club at work. Seriously. Doctor Madan Kataria, a physician from Mumbai, India, is the founder of and chief proselytizer for Laughter Yoga, a movement that since 1995 has spawned 5,000 laughter clubs—in which people meet regularly just to laugh—worldwide. To date there are just 200 or so clubs in the United States, including those in Atlanta; New York; Orlando, Florida; St. Louis; and Tucson, Arizona. But Kataria hopes to change that over the next few years by training more teachers. (To learn more, go to
www.laughteryoga.or
g.
) “Our objective is to build an international community of people who believe in love and laughter” Kataria is quoted in
Yoga Journal
.