Tag: sulking

It’s funny how other people push us to do things. Man, that’s been on my tongue for a long time. I guess it’s been a common theme for me for the past couple of weeks.

Recently someone commented on an issue on a repository of mine wondering when that particular feature would be done. My reply: Tonight’s the night! That repository had been, and probably is still, for the most part dead. I just never got a real chance to use it myself.

I thought it was a good idea, and I still do to be sure; but the idea never took at work so… I work on other, shiner, things instead.  But, someone updated the issue, someone wanted something from me. So, I’m on it.

That entire code base is likely sit and rot until someone else comes along and pushes me to do something more with it.  I don’t use it, so I don’t work on it. But by golly, if someone wants something more out of it; I’m all over it.

I like to help people.  I don’t know why, I’m just an idiot like that.  Here’s a simple example:

Someone at work: I have a problem that's cursorily involved 
in what you do.
Me: Ughhhhh, Yes please!

There’s a darker side to this phenomenon though; there always is.  In the former case it’s “Oh sure I’d love to help you/do that/show you who I am!”  In the latter it’s “Fuck you, I’ll show you who I am!”

I get a lot of that too.  There’s a Jessica Alba commercial that’s been running for a while that has that same sentiment in it. Naysayers I keep proving wrong, etc. And also buy my water. And though I find the commercial phony and over played, I still relate to it.  I still find myself trying to prove my own naysayers wrong.

I don’t like carrying that with me. I like to think oh I’m smart, I’m capable. I like to think things like that can’t affect me. Other people’s bullshit is just that, other people’s.

But what’s there to be done? I’m not zen enough to let it go. Dust your shoulders off.

Of course the feelgood answer would be make something positive out of the negative. Intent matters here though.

People make you do things. They force you to become who you are, who you want to be. I didn’t expect to be peer pressured at 30, yet here I am. The upside is my peers have changed and the things they’re making me do is actually positive.

Even so, the downside is I can’t just be. I still measure myself by others.  I still envy.

What’s to be done? I don’t know, but if I find out; I’ll remember to write it down.