It doen't matter how you feel

Whenever work gets as busy as it’s been the last few weeks, I think about the situation I hate most: having the responsibility without the power. Not power as in power-hungry. Power as in having the critical resources to get the job done right.

There are all sorts of things that can make you feel powerless in that way. True, it may be because you don't have the ability. But often it’s just as much about not having enough time, the right resources, the right information, etc. Few of these situations are perfect. (It may come down to having the right amount of fortitude.)

I mention this because it took me a lot of years to realize that some failures, sometimes, weren't comments on my inadequacy. (Many were, but not always.) And that discovery felt pretty good. Still does.

Of course, it didn't change the fact that things still have to get done--whether or not I have everything I need. Or how I feel about that.

Which leads to another thing I think about in busy times: sometimes feelings don’t matter.

I remember a February night when I was in college. It was about 2 am and 10 degree below zero in St. Paul. I was trying get my frozen Volkswagen started by having my Dad, who was visiting from our home in Des Moines, push my VW with his big Chevy. It was actually pretty easy back then to get a VW bug started, if you could just get it rolling a little. Anyway, after accidentally hooking our bumpers for the second time, having to get out the jack again and crawl around under the cars on the ice again, it occurred to me that feeling frozen and exhausted, and desperately wanting the whole thing to be over didn't matter. It wouldn’t get my car started.

Sometimes it doesn’t matter how you feel.

Those are the sorts of things that slide into the back of my head and make me a little crazy when the responsibilities begin to pile up. And my over-responsibility neurosis begins to kick up. But that's another story.