thick-skinned

adjective
   insensitive to criticism or insults.
   "you have to be thick-skinned and none too squeamish"
 synonyms: insensitive, unfeeling, tough, hardened, callous, case-hardened; 
                   informal hard- boiled
                   "these guards have gotten pretty thick-skinned over the years"

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That's the dictionary meaning. But, what is actually entails is so much driven by the fact that we are all humans. I wish I was thick skinned. But, I am not. I want to be accepted by other people. But, when it does not happen I am in the dumps.

Snappy people, rude behavior, negative attitude, or any such action makes me re think! Is there anything wrong with me? What did I do wrong?

Incident #1: A person in my office was yawning every time I talked to him about the project status. It was such an awful feeling standing there, but I had to get the work done. I did get affected by this attitude.

Incident #2: I asked someone how they are doing? I get back a snappy reply.

Incident #3: I purchase an item for someone on their behalf, and am told for one month that what a junk thing I got. 

.. and a number of such incidents

I wish I was not upset with these remarks. I wish they make me strong to bear such incidents in future. But, it's not. I as a human being still get affected by these small things. This concept of being accepted seems to be taking a far greater toil on me than I thought. If i over analyze this subject, it's more like I feel lonely and alienated out here and I am searching for a group or a friend circle to fill me with life. Writing it down seems so depressing, but that's the fact. 

When I was back in India, I doubt if I felt so strongly about it. I know as a kid I used to cry a lot (ok I still do...) I cried  when a close friend of mine left me and became friends with another girl who was supposedly more intelligent. I know I cried when I was taken out form the annual function because I had gone on vacation.. and I know I cry while watching movies. 

But, that is not the point. What am trying to figure out is why am I so sensitive to being accepted? Why can't I just become a thick-skinned person. When I see the sports person or movie stars, I wonder how thick skinned they might be. They are not affected by games lost or flop movies. They still continue to play and act.

Can I do that? I doubt! I'm just being pulled down by these feelings.

Hope, it's just a passing phase, and am bright, cheerful and optimistic soon :)

Cab 83

Today the cab driver was a known gentleman. Driving me to office for I guess the 4th or the 5th time. Another interesting personality!

He was in Air Force. After completing his tenure, he joined Nationwide as a Project Manager. Got laid off in 2008. Did have a PMP then, used to attend PMI workshops etc. After being laid off, he started delivering Pizza, which he still does in the nights. While from Mon-Wed, he drives the cab. His source of income, all his previous and current jobs. 

According to him, he likes his present situation as this is being more active rather than sitting on a desk job all the time. 

I compare the same kind of thing back in India and feel that we have drawn barriers in the society. As in which class does what kind of people. What age, you are supposed to stop working and start praying. What experience, should make you a manager, etc. I guess it's all a cultural issue. We have build the society thus. 

But, what strikes me about this gentleman is that he still has the "Go", the spark to carry on and do something and not sit idle. As I understand he's pretty well off, but he needs some thing to keep himself busy, so he does it.

We have had some wonderful chats. Some have been around the language, some have been around project management, some have been around culture, and some have been just random. 

I can just sum it all to "It's all a learning experience for me". I just can't stop learning :) 

What's your perspective?

Everyone has the right to have different perspectives. But, emphasizing your point in a manner of being right and having experienced it all, is crossing your limits.

1. Mom's and Daughters are not best friends. How can anyone say it so emphatically. Maybe you don't hold such a relationship. I'm not stating nor refuting this statement. I'm pretty close to my mom to the fact that a close friend of mine states that my umbilical cord has not been cut yet. In fact I'm close to both my parents. I talk to them and do a video chat with them twice a day. Right now I have the time and the ability to do, so I do it. This way my parents don't feel that I'm quite far away and are comfortable. I'm also comfortable with the thought knowing how they are doing at all time. Sitting so far away and not being able to support them at this age, this is the least I can do. Unfortunately, for some what I do is wrong. I should not be so attached to my parents. I should slowly lessen that up. But, I wonder why? When that time will come, it will happen. Why should I reduce it now?
2. This is a wonderful country and you should not yearn to return back to your home country. Again why? I'm not saying this is a bad country. But, I don't belong here. My parents, my sister, my life is back in India. What's the harm in yearning to go back? I have made peace with myself to spend the time out here happily, but on the pretext that one day I will go back to where I belong. I do not know what fate has in store for me. But, does that mean I give up on that dream?  

I believe explanations like these make your mind go more anti. You become a rebel and force yourself to think negatively. You want to make that extra effort of proving the other person wrong. In this process what you end up doing is burning your own blood. I know it's not right. But, this time I was lucky, I didn't burn for long. I dusted it off my shoulders.\

Happy Me!

Learning from my own mistakes

I wish I would never make a mistake. But, that is not so. So here I am learning from my own mistakes. Though it is tough. Gives me a hard punch in my stomach. But, I have to do it. Have no choice.

To cite an example, I was asked to setup a help desk software for my company to use. I did some analysis and some trial runs. 

First one, was installed on our server but was very rudimentary. When I gave a demo to my manager. He was not too impressed. So I set onto searching more. 

Second one, was installed on cloud. It costed around $10, but we could not customize it cheap. I just informed him that am searching. But, I did tell him the cost and he was like not much.

Third one, again was installed on cloud and as i did some settings figured it was $15. Since I was on trial version I saw a similar flavor of all customization was available at a lower cost. I confirmed with the support agent and he also agreed that I should go for $25 rather than $40.

I told my manager, showed him the demo and he was all happy with it.

However, later today I found that the low cost one did not give the customization I want.  At this juncture, I hate to go back to my manager and tell him the cost. Ouch! my stomach hurts now.

Another example of today, when the team proposed a solution they gave a certain estimate based on assumptions that were never written. When this project got handed down to me for requirements, I was told nothing about those assumptions. All through the requirements things went back and forth, wire frames were designed and still no assumptions came alive. Now, when we started the design discussion some 2 months later that assumption suddenly came afloat and the blame game started. The design team/ estimation team asked me to go back and inform the customer for scope change and to pay more. 

Suddenly, it appears the whole mistake was done my me in my requirements. But, I clearly remember telling these folks that this is how the current system behaves. It appears they did not even hear it.

Not liking the day today. Nothing seems to be going as expected and I have a weird churning in my stomach and a strange shiver.  I don't want to acknowledge or say the STR*** word. I'm not in that area. I know it,

I just need to work and figure I do not make these mistakes again.