success – Valerie Dimino

I’m calling this “semi-open” because I won’t use your name. A lot of people who know me know who you are anyway, and I suspect that many who read this can easily fill some other name in those brackets — someone who wronged them, who rattled them, who forced them to start over and discover a new version of themselves. I hope that for them, like for me, that new version proved to be far better off.

Two years ago, after many exhausting months of our work styles and priorities failing to coexist in harmony, you terminated my job contract. In an instant, with the sight of a single checkmark on a PDF, my life changed. After six years, I was no longer going to be the person who worked that job in that office, made that commute and parked in that spot, collaborated with that team of amazing friends.

There was no way around it: you and I did not see the world through the same sort of lens, and you were in a position to make that issue go away. In addition to being stung by your decision, I felt powerless to counter it, which hurt even more.

There were many broken pieces of our attempted partnership that, in hindsight, I wish I had addressed differently — many things I’ve realized only since leaving that would have helped me tremendously to know while I was there:

My voice deserves to be heard. It has as much potential as any other at the table, regardless of its volume or its speaker’s title or gender. And when I’m feeling overlooked or disrespected, that’s not a reason to retreat into silence but an urgent reason to speak up louder than ever.

I am the most important advocate of my work. I wish I hadn’t let you shake my confidence in my work or my approaches to it. I should have promoted my own successes instead of hoping you would notice them or looking for the flaws you might see. I shouldn’t have let my passion for my work occur mostly behind a closed door.

I can prevent frustrations from festering. I wish I had pushed more for us to address the frustrations I felt about my job — the uneven workload, the extra hours, the stress level — as they first became issues, rather than letting them build. I kept hoping you would see them as I did, that they would then be solved as if by magic. Our conversations about them were never active enough and soon became empty words.

A job should not define the entirety of a life. I never could have believed at the time that the concerns of the workday could be left behind when signing off for the day. I was so controlled by deadlines and processes, so afraid of letting other people down, that those anxieties followed me home at night and consumed my attention. I know now that no pursuit of success should ever come above my health or happiness.

While I was first reeling from your decision, all of those things were harder than ever to believe. My brain didn’t have the capacity to process them. I doubted myself, thinking maybe I wasn’t good enough for that job or for any other, that I was doomed to fail.

After a short period of wallowing, though, I was no longer willing to give you that power over me. My anger became a source of motivation more than pain. It propelled me into my next chapter, one so much better than I could have imagined. After initially breaking me down, your decision ultimately set me free.

A friend of mine — seeing the potential for that motivation before I could — told me I should dedicate the book I’m writing to you, because none of it would have been possible without you. At the time, I laughed at the irony and felt slightly nauseated at the thought. But, in a way, she’s right. I did need to be released from that suffocating situation in order to feel inspired again (how fitting that one definition of inspire is to inhale), to have the energy to work toward this enormous goal and the confidence to make it happen.

There’s a great analogy in Buddhist teachings that compares anger to a burning ember: I may pick it up with the intention of throwing it at someone, but I’m the one who gets burned by it.

Holding onto my anger toward you did burn me for a long time, and I grew tired of it. I’ve let go of that ember now and am walking farther and farther away from it. But I still remember the heat of it. And I need you to know how utterly fantastic it feels to be free from its weight.

*Photo by Pixabay, downloaded from Pexels*

It’s been a while since my last post — which was somewhat intentional. It wasn’t that time slipped by quickly or that I forgot about blogging; in fact, it was rather the opposite: I’ve thought a lot about what I might post next. But nothing seemed good enough — not important enough, not informed enough — to follow the weight and personal significance of that first post.

And then I realized that that self-dialogue was, in itself, the post I needed to write.

I realized how much of my inner monologue (which, heaven help me, is always on) centers around that word, “enough” — or, rather, what I perceive as a lack of enough, a mark I haven’t met: I haven’t written enough lately, this writing isn’t good enough, I didn’t get enough done today, I haven’t lost enough weight yet, we haven’t gotten enough done on our home renovations, I haven’t saved up enough money…

Enough, enough, enough.

I’m hearing these sentiments from a lot of friends and family lately, too, especially those trying to balance parenting, homeschooling, and working from home during the coronavirus pandemic. They feel they aren’t able to devote enough time, attention, or effort to any one of those elements, let alone the combination.

But who defines what’s “enough”? How are we each defining it for ourselves? By comparing our situations to our perceptions of other people’s lives? By notions we had in the past about what our present would look like? I tend more toward the latter — whether that’s what teenage Val thought thirtysomething Val would be like or what when-I-woke-up-this-morning Val envisioned for her day.

I don’t think it’s fair for us to hold ourselves too inflexibly to any sort of past or outside concept of what we’re supposed to have achieved. It’s great to have goals, of course, but so much unfolds in any given day that we never could have anticipated. Whether it’s a small interruption (or ten) or a major, life-altering moment, the unexpected has a tendency to waltz in and command our attention.

And some days it’s not about too much else happening but about the need for very little to happen — days we decide it is enough to have gotten out of bed, maybe taken a shower (maybe not!), maybe put on pants (maybe not!), and been present in whatever form the day takes. Even if that’s just watching TV or reading or goofing around with loved ones. For me, those can be such helpful ways to recharge that I’m then all the more productive the next day. Refocused, realigned, renewed.

Professional writers often advise that, when you find yourself stuck, you simply need to start writing — something, anything — without worrying about how it sounds or where it will end up (ie, whether or not it’s good enough), because you never know what might come out of it. I’ve seen that advice prove true many times in my own writing. Sometimes I only keep a sentence or a key word or a vague idea; sometimes I suddenly find the solution for something I’d been stuck on for months or discover an entirely new idea that I love. Sometimes, of course, I end up with nothing worth keeping. But, even in those instances, maybe having made the effort is enough.

And maybe this unique time we’re in right now is an opportunity to shift our way of thinking. It’s certainly forced us to slow down in many ways, and it’s brought out so much kindness and generosity and creativity that might not have come about otherwise. Personally, I’m trying to apply that kindness, generosity, and creative energy toward myself as well. I want to use this time to reassess my measure of what’s enough. Some days, “enough” is just about doing what I can and continuing to move forward, knowing there are challenges and wonders that await around corners yet to be seen.