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Wellness Wednesday for January 25, 2023

The Wednesday Wellness threads are meant to encourage users to ask for and provide advice and motivation to improve their lives. It isn't intended as a 'containment thread' and any content which could go here could instead be posted in its own thread. You could post:

  • Requests for advice and / or encouragement. On basically any topic and for any scale of problem.

  • Updates to let us know how you are doing. This provides valuable feedback on past advice / encouragement and will hopefully make people feel a little more motivated to follow through. If you want to be reminded to post your update, see the post titled 'update reminders', below.

  • Advice. This can be in response to a request for advice or just something that you think could be generally useful for many people here.

  • Encouragement. Probably best directed at specific users, but if you feel like just encouraging people in general I don't think anyone is going to object. I don't think I really need to say this, but just to be clear; encouragement should have a generally positive tone and not shame people (if people feel that shame might be an effective tool for motivating people, please discuss this so we can form a group consensus on how to use it rather than just trying it).

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I had a weird conversation with my boss's boss yesterday. It started with talking about a new project I might be involved in, but then went into her telling me that "people don't know how to read you" and "it's hard to tell when you're excited and passionate about something." She also kept repeating that I was very "even-keeled" and I make people feel relaxed. I guess those were supposed to be compliments.

Then she says that I need to come up with a plan for what I am going to do about this! Basically, I need to take some deliberate actions to let people know what I am thinking and feeling. I told her I would set up some check-ins with her where we can talk, but I'm really not sure what else I'm supposed to do. I asked what other people were doing that she felt was more effective, but she didn't have an answer to that.

It was so bizarre, because I am fine with getting feedback if there's an issue with my work, but this seemed to be about how my personality was causing a problem (I'm sorry, I was raised by Midwestern farmers - we're not expressive people). I ended up crying in front of her, which pissed me off. It just touched on some lifelong feelings about feeling a little out of step with people.

To tell the truth, I don't really get "passionate" about things at work. It's work - I enjoy it when I have interesting problems to work on, but I'm passionate about my family, about ideas, not about work stuff. I suppose that's why I appear "even-keeled" at work, because I don't deeply care about any of that crap so it's easy to let things slide off my back.

I do well with older men and young(ish) women, most younger men do better with young men and older women

Why?

My experience roughly aligns with what 2rafa said. I'm a young man.

  • Young men - Easier to get along with on a personal level. I can swear, say things without sugarcoating, and bond over nonwork related things easier.

  • Older women - They tend to be more easy going and forgiving than older men. If you are lazy you are less likely to be shouted at, etc. So those willing to cut corners might like them.

Imo, I think women make bad mentors for young men because they often won't beat them into shape or confront them when necessary.