Wrap it up
It’s the end of the year as we know it and I feel pretty good.* The time in between Christmas and New Year’s always feels so weird to me. I never know what day it is, rules don’t seem to apply (Candy with lunch? Sure! TV in your room? Absolutely! Consume 37 pounds of cheese? You bet!), and everything is just a little removed from reality. This year it also marks the unofficial end to my sabbatical. When Leo goes back to school, I go back to my email and lose the (slight) buffer sabbatical offered in terms of how I spent my time. That is a bummer but I did have an opportunity to do some things I have never done before:
Write a blog
Make several gallons of hot chocolate at once
Decorate a classroom door ➔
Play bingo in Spanish with a bunch of first graders
Read for fun
Create a book proposal
Go to Joshua Tree right before Thanksgiving
Now that it’s back to “normal” I thought I should revisit what I hoped to accomplish this semester. Back in August I laid out some fairly specific goals with the caveat that I was going to cut myself some slack (not my norm). So here is what I had on my list and the results:
Weekly or bi-weekly blog posts on academically-adjacent ideas about the invisible burdens on women @ work and tightroping: This is my fortieth blog and the only time I didn’t post on my Tuesday/Thursday schedule was Thanksgiving. I strayed a bit from work as a topic at times and went into parenting, mental health, why Elon Musk is terrible, teaching, and other random topics but it was fun. Hearing from people I have never met that a post resonated with them was honestly the highlight of this process.
Monthly blog posts where I rant about how Sheryl Sandberg sold us all a lie and that leaning in is a bunch of bullshit and/or stories about my son: I really only went in on Sheryl once (#noshitsheryl)** but I feel like there was consistent Leo content. That kid is a content machine. After taking him to the KSB holiday party a few weeks ago I said “Thank you for being my plus 1 to the party tonight.” He replied, “You mean your plus FUN!!” That’s golden. He should have his own blog. Once he learns how to read and type-watch out!!Six or seven completed book chapters: Well… I spent a lot of time editing the three that are complete and started three other ones but they are nowhere near complete. I did more research. I outlined stuff. But they are a very far cry from complete.
An additional dog: Mango San Carlos has been with us for several months now. He has learned to bark at anyone who dares walk on our street or deliver anything to our house from his brother Mr. Crenshaw Sniffers. They are the best of buddies and play bitey face all day long.
A book contract with an actual company so that I don’t have to make hard copies of what I write to give as gifts: Did not happen. I had a few nibbles. I spent a lot of time figuring out who publishes what I am working on, if they are accepting queries, what information they want, and then tweaking my proposal accordingly. It felt a lot like applying to college. Everyone wanted something slightly different. All in all I sent my proposal to six agencies and nine agents. Some were kind enough to say no thank you but many went into an internet black hole. Sigh.
In revisiting my goals I also realized the things I accomplished that I didn’t plan to:
Almost done writing a case study on the mezcal industry in Oaxaca. I met with an editor at Ivey Publishing who thinks it would be a great fit for their case collection and asked that I submit it when it’s finished.
Wrote and submitted a proposal to a conference about how to discuss cultural appropriation in the context of a business ethics class via an exercise/project.
Worked with the amazing April Cash to raise $$$ for the students in the majors and minors in the Management department. We talked to alumni, students, and random passersby during the Homecoming tailgate hyping all the awesome support we offer our students.
Started a new research project on Egoism with my favorite co-author Ed Love that will yield at least one paper (and maybe more). It will also likely anger philosophers who refuse to measure anything.
For a while I was sad and disappointed in myself because I couldn’t make the book happen. The day of three rejections was particularly shitty. But then I had to step back and think about why I wanted to write the book in the first place. What does a book actually get me? In my mind a book was a checkmark in my favor to the world outside of academia. It was a thing you can buy/hold that represents a publisher seeing enough promise in my work to fund it; thus giving me credibility. But then I remembered that I actually have credibility! At the moment it doesn't happen to be in the “right” places (i.e. industry) but that is something I can work on. I guess I realized that the book wasn’t the point. The book was a means to the end of reaching women and addressing things that matter to them. A book gets me into the literal hands of women which (hopefully) gets me into the doors of their companies to have conversations that drive change. But maybe the blog can do that too? You can’t hold it (unless you print it but please don’t do that because that’s not environmentally friendly at all), but you can forward a link, and maybe that link ends up with someone who wants to have a conversation, and maybe that conversation leads to me getting into those doors and in front of more women. There are a lot of ways to get to the same goal so I’m going to keep doing what I am doing and see what happens. Please know that if someone emails tomorrow with interest in the book I wouldn’t say no (!) I just now have a bit more clarity that a book is only one way to have an impact.
Over the next few days I need to figure out what’s next for #tightroping and the blog. I also need to think about the bigger picture for 2023 and how everything fits together. I can say for certain that this is the most fun I have ever had writing and it makes me happy. Plus, I still have a running list of topics and general angst and they all need an outlet! Now I just have to figure out how to make it all work. I also need to remind myself (like I did in August) to cut myself some slack. Right before the holidays there was a great HBR article on Self-Compassion. It revisits some of the things I said back in August. Mainly that we can be really hard on ourselves. We hold ourselves to levels of perfectionism that are simply unattainable and then beat ourselves up for not reaching them. I don’t want to do that anymore. That approach sucks the joy out of so many experiences. For this last post of the year I want to leave you with the three elements of self-compassion. We all deserve to treat ourselves as well as we treat those around us.
Feeling pretty psyched about 2023. Happy New Year!
*Yes, that is a play on the spectacular R.E.M. song It’s the End of the World as We Know It from 1987. Here is the link to the song but I highly suggest you take several minutes of your life and watch the truly chaotic video. Yes, I still know every word. Also, I had this poster in my room in high school. My grandma yelled at me about it because she thought it said “fuck” and not “Buck.”
**I had mini stickers made with this on them. Email me and I will send you some. Seriously.
Reading Rainbow
The other night Leo was watching a movie called The Bad Guys for about the fifth time while Jairo and I were reading the news and not really paying attention to the TV. I happened to look up to catch a scene where the shark bad guy (who is pretending to be a fancy pregnant lady shark) throws a drink on the floor, tosses a table and yells, “I’m having a baby!!!” in the middle of a party to create a distraction. I laughed at the fact that the drink was thrown to make it look like the shark’s water had broken. That led to a discussion that will forever be burned into my brain (#corememory).
Leo: Wait, what water broke?
Me: Explains that this usually happens before labor and that it’s a sign the baby is coming.
Leo: But where is the water? How does it get out?
Me: The same way a baby does. Through the vagina.
Leo: WHAT????? (starts crying). I am so glad that I am not a girl because that is disgusting.
Me: It’s not disgusting, it's just how it works.
Leo: (through sobs) Are you being serious with me? Is that really how a baby gets out? That happened to me?
Me: Correct (through tears of my own)
Leo continued to cry for several minutes after this revelation. Nothing we said made him feel better and the fact that I absolutely could not stop laughing didn’t help. We have talked about babies before. I know he has heard the phrase “babies come out of vaginas” on several occasions but CLEARLY he was either not listening or simply did not comprehend the situation. This made me wonder what else was going over his head without me realizing. Does this happen at school?! I started to panic but then I remembered that we get (many) worksheets sent home that chronicle his math and writing. We practice reading in English and in Spanish and we can see and hear the improvements he is making. Please know that when I say “we” that is mostly not true. It’s 85% my husband. You would think that as an educator I am the homework parent. I am not. He is a far better person than I am.
So I didn’t have to worry about Leo but then I remembered a podcast I stumbled upon the other day. It’s called Sold a Story. I started listening to it and couldn’t believe these statistics: Sixty-five percent of fourth graders in this country are not proficient readers and scores have been terrible for decades. This is according to country-wide standardized tests. Yes, these tests have a variety of issues but they offer some data. If you pull out specific groups of students, the numbers are more concerning. Eighty-two percent of Black fourth graders are not proficient readers. How has this been a persistent problem for decades? From what I read it’s a combination of a lot of things. It can be linked to underfunded schools, teacher shortages, and more recently, Covid. But, according to Sold a Story, it is also linked to the way some kids were being taught to read. Schools were targeting underperforming readers in first grade with a program called Reading Recovery created by an educator named Marie Clay. This approach is about looking for “clues” in the pictures to figure out the words. Rather than attempting to phonetically sound out the word (char·la·tan) kids use what’s called the “triple check” to see if they have the right word. Does it make sense? Does it sound right? Does it look right? I am by no means an early childhood educator but this seems more like guessing than learning how to put together the sounds and what they mean. Reading Recovery disagrees with me on this and calls it “active problem solving.” They swear by their approach but many, many, many, educational organizations and teachers disagree. Some even say the program has a negative long-term impact. Growing up I was taught to sound out the words phonetically and that is what my son is being taught in first grade. These debates about reading got me thinking about how much reading we assign in our college classes. Are our students actually understanding what they are reading? Are we helping them learn or wasting their time? There is a lot of research about pedagogy (teaching methods/practices) and I think it’s really cool (because I am a dork).
Here’s a fun fact: I was never really taught how to teach. In my doctoral program we had a class that met for 3 hours on a Friday for one quarter. The following quarter we had a class of our own to teach. Not to TA for a professor but to teach 35 undergraduates. By ourselves. Terrifying. That’s about 30 hours of instruction and the extent of my education on how to do half of my job. Bonkers when you think about it.
Because I have very little training about how to educate people I had to learn how to “be” in the classroom. How to deliver content in a way students remember and that does not bore them to tears* I also had to figure out what to assign them outside of class and the answer was obviously reading! That’s what you do in college! You read! Why wouldn't I just assign some chapters and expect everyone to read them and be ready to discuss? Here’s why:
Less than one third of students read assignments before class
15% of college students completed their reading assignments after the material had been covered in class
Reading tends to spike just before exams (No shit, Sheryl!)
Student compliance with reading assignments has steadily decreased over the last few decades
Instructors complain that noncompliance with reading assignments has an adverse impact on students’ mastery of subject matter and on their ability to comprehend, analyze, and critique dense texts (It’s true, we do!)
Learning all of this drove me crazy. To me, reading just made sense as a way to teach students what they need to know but there are different kinds of reading depending on what you want students to actually do with the information. Because I was interested in understanding what would work best, I wrote a lovely (and never published) paper with my friend and colleague Dr. Geoff Desa. We specifically looked at academic reading (stuff assigned to go along with a course and focused on a specific discipline) and we learned that if you want students to understand academic reading they have to know the vocabulary specific to the discipline and they have to have a reading strategy. Ok so, make sure you cover the important words ahead of time. In my case it is philosophical stuff like eudaimonia, consequentialism, formalism. Easy. I can do that. But what the hell is a reading strategy?! My reading strategy has always been: start at the beginning, skim the middle while highlighting things that seem important, closely read the discussion/conclusion. This was how I survived grad school. Apparently reading strategies are things now covered way before college but not all students were taught them so when they get to college things get tricky. Research shows that without these strategies student’s comprehension and ability to construct knowledge is impacted. This all seems bad! But sometimes bad is good because if we know what they aren’t doing and why maybe we can help! Helping does not mean eliminating reading from my course! They still have to read. But now I am trying to offer alternate ways to learn the material and reading strategies they can use. Sometimes I assign articles that come with a transcript or podcast version. This way my students who like reading can read and my students who don’t can listen. I assign TED talks or send them to speakers on campus. I want them to get the information they need to succeed in my class and put everything together and however they do that is fine with me.
Of course I would love it if all of my students enjoyed reading. I try to convince them how useful it is. I tell them about all the smart and successful people who are/were voracious readers.** How it boosts creativity and problem solving and makes you look interesting in public. I even assign literature for class to explain some concepts. Does it work? Not always but I think it helps and I will take a small win. In hopes of getting Leo to become a kid who loves reading I’ve started reading way more at home. Not on a kindle or my ipad but an actual book made out of paper and borrowed from a library. I want him to see me engrossed in a good book and to realize the fun they can be. Before we get to that point though we need him to become a proficient reader. For now, we are sounding out words in English and in Spanish (much easier in Spanish) and moving on to more complicated works and books with more complex stories. Maybe the next book we try should be on childbirth…?
*I have never had tears in class but I once had a guy fall very soundly asleep. Snoring once but that was during team presentations so I will take no credit for that!
**Is it that smart people simply like reading or that more reading makes you smart? Chicken or egg kind of thing but I’m a book pusher ;)
Happy Holidays to everyone but Elon Musk
If you like Elon Musk* you’re going to want to just stop reading here. I am not a fan. I have a very long list of why but the gist is that he is a misogynistic, hateful, bigoted, and dangerous man baby. His (generational) wealth and platform have allowed him to create a persona idolized by dude-bros who love crypto and Joe Rogan. His approach to business is unethical at best and his willingness to support and publicize general misinformation is troubling. If any woman in power acted like he does she would be burned at the stake, but because he acts a fool he is labeled a “creative genius” (a la Kayne West) and a “maverick” (gross). He could use his fortune to truly make the world a better place but instead spends it on trips to outer space and toys he buys just to break (#twitter). He is everything I try and counterbalance in my courses and I can only hope that his own hubris leads to his demise. To further convey my distaste, and in the holiday spirit, I have rewritten the lyrics to You’re a Mean One Mr. Grinch. Please enjoy.
You’re a mean one, Mr. Musk.
You really are so lame.
You treat employees like trash, disregard common decency for fame, Mr. Musk.
You're a man with a god complex who should really hang his head in shame!
You're a monster, Mr. Musk.
You’ve made Twitter even worse.
You allow hate speech on the platform and on society you are a curse, Mr. Musk.
You’re even less appealing than getting picked up by Joe Rogan in a fancy hearse!!
You're a vile one, Mr. Musk.
You lack any moral guide.
I hope your employees rise up, and that everyone takes their side, Mr. Musk.
I wonder how it feels to wake up every single day with zero self-awareness and completely dead inside?
You're a foul one, Mr. Musk.
Were you a woman they’d say you’re a bitch
. Your attitude is inexcusable but you still got really rich, Mr. Musk. I hope all of your escapades (that lead to many children out of wedlock which again a woman would be thrown to the wolves for) give you something that makes you itch!!
You're a rotter, Mr. Musk. Y
ou’re as appealing as a wart.
You want to be a space man, you’re a truly icky sort, Mr. Musk.
You think increasing the birth rate is a good idea even though the planet is dying from rich people like you who use too many resources for sport!!
You nauseate me, Mr. Musk.
You really make me want to kvetch.
You’re a misogynistic blowhard whose actions are rather sketch, Mr. Musk.
You're part of the reason loads of people thought that covid wasn’t real and the vaccine was dangerous you absolute wretch!!!
You’re a jackass, Mr. Musk.
You really are fun to bash.
So many people idolize you because of all your cash, Mr. Musk.
If you were the last man on earth I would run away to avoid your foolishness and having to hear about crypto and Mars and I would do it in a flashhhhh!!!
You’re a liar, Mr. Musk.
You extoll Twitter as a place for free speech. But suspend reporters who criticize you as a leach, Mr. Musk. You’re as appealing as a several weeks old, smushy, dirty, decomposing, completely rotten peach!!
Happiest of holidays to all (even if you like Elon). Thank you for reading this little blog! Here is to a happy and healthy 2023.
*I know he has donated $ to places. I also know that he is smart. I am not debating these things, but neither of them makes him a good person. They make him a person who knows how to get tax breaks. Yes, more money to good things is great but that (as far as I am concerned) does not negate the damage he has done.
Weighed down
The number of things my brain tracks and considers over the course of a week is bananas. Running in the background like an annoying little hamster* is a constant list of things that need to be bought, organized, washed, packed, replaced, noted, picked up, folded, prepped, dropped off, cooked, and generally taken care of. Most of this isn’t even written on my actual to do list(s). It just lives in my head. No one can see it but I assure you that it is there. This (and a lot of other stuff) is the mental load that women and mothers carry. It’s nothing new. Women have certainly been carrying it since forever but the pandemic highlighted just how unfair it is. I saw a quote in an interview with author Brigid Schulte that described the problem in a truly excellent way. She said that, “the pandemic has laid bare the ‘grotesque inequality’ that exists within many families.” Grotesque. That’s not a word you often hear describing everyday life and I think that is an indication of just how bad it is.
The idea for this post started last night while I was in bed. Want to guess why? Because I was mentally preparing for the week ahead and was thinking:
Who needed to go where and when?
Do we have anything on the calendar out of the ordinary?
What am I going to bring for the white elephant this weekend?
How early do we need to leave on Saturday for the classmate’s party? What should we get her?
When are we going to LA? Who will watch the dogs when we go?
Can I move some faculty around on my Spring semester schedule? Will they be mad if I do?
What workout do I have in the morning? What time? Where?
Did Leo bring his fleece jacket home from school so he can wear it if it’s cold tomorrow?
Where can I get a flu shot? Can I take Leo with me to get his? What will I bribe him with to get said shot?
Where can I buy Leo pants that actually fit? How do I get him to wear pants if I find some that actually fit? Will the same bribe for the shot work?
Do I need to go to Target to get the things Trader Joe’s didn’t have? Can I wait a few days to do that? Did Target have pants that fit or did I have to return them?
Will Leo eat anything at the restaurant I am taking him for a PTA event? Should I pack snacks?
Why can’t I fall asleep?
This may seem totally normal to many reading this post but I really don’t think it is. My husband can go from having a full-blown conversation with me to snoring in less than two minutes (that’s a high-end estimate). I spent at least that much time considering which Squishmallo the kid from his class would like! Please know I am not saying my husband never thinks about this stuff! I know he does.** But I am saying that he doesn’t spend nearly as much time doing so. Some people might just attribute this to anxiety, and I don’t doubt that is part of it, but it goes beyond being anxious. Much of the mental load we shoulder is for chores/activities that are essential to everyone having a great day/life. We (try to) ensure that everything happens seamlessly. That kids aren’t left places, sent to school in their jammies on the incorrect day, or we run out of crucial dinner ingredients (pasta).
For a specific example of this, let’s return to our friends, the Squishmallos. Last year I purchased a stash of them from Costco. I added them to my present cabinet. A present cabinet you ask? Yes. I guarantee many women (especially those strapped with multiple children’s birthday parties a quarter) reading this are nodding in understanding right now. The present cabinet takes many forms. It may be a closet, under the bed, or the back of the car. Whatever form it takes it has a crucial role to play in the family. My present cabinet is where I stash the following: duplicates of toys my child already owns, adorable things I found on sale that someone may like, multiple of the same item in case we need to go to a birthday party for twins, things that would be potentially popular at a gift exchange at various price points, something for someone I don’t know that well but need to attend their birthday dinner and feel obligated to bring a gift, small Lego sets, and fun mugs (wine too but that stays inside). Mine also contains the gift bag collection and the tissue paper
The present cabinet doesn't just appear when you are a woman of a certain age with particular responsibilities. I had to create it. Each addition took thought + time but these things are often overlooked when it comes to the mental load. Here’s why. First, no one can see us thinking about all these things so they are hard to quantify. At some point we will be at the store anyway so grabbing a gift is no big deal. True, it isn’t. The big deal is that all of these little things add up over our days/weeks and bog us down mentally and emotionally. Women’s time is valued differently. There is a book that came out right before the pandemic called Fair Play. I read it as part of my research and because I wanted to know what Eve Rodsky’s solution was. One of the points she made that really stood out to me was:
“Society views women's time as infinite, like sand, and it views men's time as finite, like diamonds.”
We do not value things we perceive to be infinite (ex: the planet we currently inhabit). I, however, am keenly aware that mine time is NOT infinite so I wanted to see what changes could be made to remove some of the mental load. One thing we started doing was using a shared shopping list app with lists for different stores. I am the grocery shopper and always hated having to survey my family for what they needed/wanted. Now we each put stuff on the lists. If it’s not on the list it’s not making it home with whoever stops at that store. I realize this is not earth shattering but it is something. Other suggestions I came across included making a list of everything that needs to happen and trying to balance that out. This is similar to Eve Rodsky’s Fair Play game method. The key here is actually identifying ALL of the tasks: seen (taking out the garbage), unseen (birthday party RSVPs), those that happen every day (the dishwasher), and ones that only need to happen every once in a while (holiday cards). Making a family run smoothly is a slog so deciding who does what in terms of these categories cuts down on the mental load. Pre-planning things you need to do on calendars with reminders is also a suggestion. No one needs to remember that your sugar-addled child needs to book a dental appointment in six months if you put a reminder in your calendar now. Across all of the things I read, apparently just sitting down talking about this stuff was the thing most often suggested. Gross. I know. If you are carrying the mental load and you don’t talk about it your partner will not know. If you are carrying the mental load, talk to your partner and they don’t care I think it’s time to dump his ass.
Like so many things, I think we (as women, moms, general magic makers) just want to do a good job for the people we love and that isn’t always easy. We need help. We need to ask for that help (which can be very hard to do). We need partners who offer that help. The goal isn’t eliminating the mental load because I don’t think that is possible or desirable (#tabularasa). I do think lessening the burden is possible though and am willing to try any suggestions that chip away at the burden. I am also willing and able to continue to stocking the present closet with adorable things for all occasions. I look forward to you stealing the gift I brought at the next white elephant!
*I had a hamster when I was about 4 years old. It apparently had some sort of lump on it’s throat and my Dad didn’t want me to get “hamster pox” so instead of taking it to the vet he murdered it (a cost effective solution to be sure). True story. I did not know this until much later in life and lived many happy years assuming he was in hamster heaven.
**He does MANY things to keep this family running and house spider/bug free! He is great.
Thief of joy*
I’ve tried a lot of different things in an attempt to quiet my mind. In grad school I went through a real Bikram yoga phase. It was so hot in the studio that I often could only focus on the poses and not passing out so I didn’t have time to think. It was great while it lasted. Unfortunately the studio I went to started to smell increasingly gross (not relaxing). The final straw was going to class one day and the guy next to me farted the entire time. He was clearly relaxed. I was not. After that I tried yoga in a non-heated studio. I wanted to love it. I wanted to bliss out. It didn’t happen. The instructors kept reminding us to “clear our minds” which did the exact opposite for me so I just ended up annoyed and didn’t get a good workout. My search for ways top opt out of thinking continued in vain for a while but on the very first day I moved to San Diego I took my dog for a walk in Balboa Park and saw two people kicking and punching each other. They were wearing gloves and pads so clearly this was purposeful. I waited until they were done, asked what they were doing and if I could join. The next week I was out there too. Twice a week for over a decade Craig, Laurie, and I worked out and sparred in the park. When you are sparring you simply can’t think about your email because you will get punched in the stomach. That was a real escape for me and I loved it.
Over the years I took several accidental punches. I understand what the phrase “having your bell rung” means. When you get punched in the head your ears ring and you feel dizzy. The cartoon representation we are all familiar with is spot on. Fun fact: if you block enough punches with your arms and legs you bruise less over time!
Once Leo came along he joined the workout crew. He hung out in the stroller, got strapped to me in the carrier, screamed from the portable playpen I set up, or got wrangled by Craig.* These were good times. I had an escape from the non-stop chatter of my brain a few times a week but then Craig moved and I needed to find something else. I tried spin, cross-fit, barre, pilates, boxing, and some other really weird stuff. Many were great workouts but they weren’t giving me the brief breaks from my brain that I needed. So I went back to yoga. But not slow flow calming yoga. Classes with music that are hot, humid, and that you leave looking like you jumped into a pool in your clothes. Bingo! I started feeling like I got a break from myself; something about the heat and the music and the sweat allowed for a little bit of peace.
There is a quote from Dan Harris, an American journalist, that has always resonated with me: It is a zoo inside our skulls. For me this is a true story. I often start talking to my husband about something and he has to stop me because what I said comes out of nowhere for him. For me, I have already had a 20 minute internal conversation that I need to catch him up on for it to make sense. Harris gets what I am talking about. The constant monologue just does not stop. Part of the reason he gets it is because he had a panic attack on live television while reporting the national news. I’ve never had a panic attack and I have never reported the national news but I would imagine the combination is truly terrible. The incident caused him to totally rethink how he was living his life. He started to realize that the constant stress he felt and his own inner monologue were simply out of control. As a result, he wrote a great book called 10% Happier and started to focus on mindfulness in his daily life. Harris wasn’t alone in this predicament. The majority of people have some version of an internal monologue droning on in their heads.
What does yours sound like? How are you talking to yourself? Are you kind? Do you note when you are doing an amazing job moving through the world? If you have anxiety that internal monologue is really willing to go the extra mile for you! Are you feeling like things are going well and that it’s a great day? Not for long because your anxiety fueled inner monologue will convince you something terrible is about to happen. So fun!
Please note, I said “the majority of us” so that means that there are people out there who just carry on with their day and do not have a gremlin residing in their brains!! I am very envious. For the rest of us, this self-directed or self-referent speech (mostly in our heads but sometimes out loud) serves a variety of purposes. It’s a way to think about the options we have when facing a decision. We also do it in anticipation of or reaction to events and circumstances we are facing. Alternatively, it can also just be a critical jerk who won’t leave you alone and loves to compare us to others. Ever hear someone say, “Comparison is the thief of joy?” They’re right. When we engage in these comparisons we get stuck and spin our mental wheels wondering why we aren’t as awesome as those around us. But here is some good news-we are just as awesome. No one actually knows what they are doing. They don’t have it together like you think they do and they certainly aren’t as confident as you give them credit for being.
Fortunately for those of us with hamster wheel brains, there are ways to quiet the critic of your internal monologue and find that little bit of peace. One of the easiest is actually listening to the critiques. Sounds counterintuitive and not super fun but focusing on those internal criticisms shines a light on the fact that they actually aren’t true. The more you really listen to the color commentary of that critic the less you believe her because she doesn’t make a lot of sense and is kind of a bully. Another option is to start dipping your toes into mindfulness if you aren’t already. Now, I will be the first to admit that one minute of mindfulness feels like 17 hours to me. That is why it is called a practice. It takes time to figure out what works for you and you need to build up your tolerance. You can’t go from constant noise to silence in your head. It doesn't work that way. But you also don’t have to sit in a quiet room trying to not think of anything to be mindful. There are a lot of ways you can engage in mindfulness that are actually active. Take a walk, dance, bake something, really focus on what you are eating or drinking, write, breathe. Literally just breathe. We are all just humans going through the human experience and trying to make it in the world. Don’t let your inner monologue/critic steal your joy. It’s all about finding the things that allow you to create space in your own brain and giving yourself a break. You’re welcome to join me in a Hot Power Fusion class. Like I said, there’s no time for that inner monologue when you are holding on to your sweaty ass foot and fighting for your life in Standing Forehead to Knee Pose.
*This is a quote from the Business Ethics episode of The Office.
**Craig became such a part of Leo’s life that we asked him to be his Padrino (Godfather).
It’s oh so quiet*
Well friends, it was bound to happen. More things are happening “quietly” at work. This time it’s quiet promotions. That sounds like a good thing but IT IS NOT. Like all of its quiet predecessors (quitting, firing, more quitting) this practice is a reflection of the general state of the world: it’s shitty. A quiet promotion is when you are given more work and responsibility for absolutely zero additional compensation and probably not even a title change and it is happening a lot. This isn’t anything new. It’s just another catchy rebrand of an existing practice. Employees have been offered promotions without raises since forever. The shift is that Great Resignation, people quietly quitting, and generally overworked and burned out employees are making it far more prevalent. If I were to guess, I would say a great many of you reading this (are there even a “many” people reading this?!) have been quietly promoted.
When I first read about this I thought of a story a friend from my PhD program told me. Before going back to school he was working in a Silicon Valley startup that was floundering. People around him kept getting let go and he kept being given their jobs (in addition to his). He said he knew it was time to quit when he had three desktop monitors; one for each of the full time jobs he had at the company. He was not paid more for any of these additional jobs. All that new work was just him being a “team player.” This is a prime example of how being a team player in situations like this is a scam.
Sure, there are times where we may need to pitch in a little extra and suck it up for a limited amount of time. That is understandable, especially as so many businesses are facing employee shortages. However, quiet promotions are not a long-term solution to whatever issues an organization is facing. Continuous asks of your time and skills for zero extra compensation simply isn’t ok. In fact, I’d go so far to say it’s unethical. One of the key tenets of the social contracts between employees and employers is that fair compensation should be offered in exchange for work being done. I won’t get into what is fair or who determines that here because that’s enough for five more blog posts.** Of course there are always exceptions but generally speaking: you go to work, you do what you are supposed to, you get paid the salary that was agreed upon when you were hired, your salary increases over time and with additional responsibilities.
A quiet promotion is not a badge of honor. It’s extra work being given to you because people assume you will do it with little complaint and (likely) do it well because that’s the kind of person you are. I think this ties into something I have had many conversations about, the “curse of competence.” When you are a competent employee you tend to consistently get asked to do more (often with the same resources or even less). You become the default for tasks that don’t technically fall into your job description but that others know you will complete. Why? Because you’re a team player! You are also likely a people-pleasing sucker who is afraid to say no to these extra responsibilities because (you think) it may negatively affect you at some point in the future. Many of these “competent” people are women. Want to guess why? Because we spend so much extra damn time going above and beyond in order to be given the same amount of compensation/recognition as our male peers that we are easy targets for quiet promotion. We are given more work because it is expected that we won’t complain, we will just get it done. Personally, I get it done because I care. Even when I don’t want to, I do. I don’t want to feel like I have let people down or dropped the ball and I like where I work. Unfortunately that “liking” can be an Achilles heel. Years ago there was a job posted at another San Diego university in exactly what I do. I felt weird about checking it out and called my PhD advisor for advice. I told him I felt bad (#Catholicguilt) even thinking about applying and his response has always stuck with me. He said,
If you could be replaced by someone as good as you for less money they would do it and not feel bad in the least.
That stung but it is true. Organizations do not care about people. Organizations are not real. In the (2003) documentary The Corporation they asked people on the street what kind of person certain brands would be and one woman said, “General Motors is a kind old man.” I’m sure there is at least one kind old man working at GM but, at the end of the day, GM exists to make a profit. They are currently doing so through some enlightened rhetoric on their website but let’s not kid ourselves about what their purpose really is.
So what do we do about quiet promotions? The organization is the problem here so we need to highlight where things are going wrong to those creating the quiet promotions. Here are some suggestions I found:
Keep a spreadsheet. How are you actually spending your time? What are you doing that is inside and what is outside of your job description? Seeing this laid out makes it harder to discount. A side by side of your job description and current duties can be a powerful tool to highlight what you are actually doing.
Assess the situation. What have you taken on and why? The spreadsheet will help with this! Ask yourself if this additional work is taking you in a direction that you want to grow your career or are you just doing the crap no one else wants to do?
Figure out what you want. Are you willing to do the extra work for a limited time? What is reasonable? Can you get that commitment in writing? If you are willing to stick it out for the time being, can you time your request properly and parlay this quiet promotion into an actual promotion?
Create an exit strategy if it just isn’t going to work anymore. Don’t just quit! You have bills to pay!!
All of the above suggestions put the responsibility for trying to fix the situation on the employee but what can organizational leaders do? First, they can recognize that they are burning their employees the hell out and then actually do something about it. Here are the signs:
Unfair treatment at work
Unmanageable workload
Lack of role clarity
Lack of communication and support from their manager
Unreasonable time pressure
Companies are spending so much money investing in employee mental health and well-being (which is wonderful) but they aren’t addressing the underlying issues. I was surprised to see that one of the key drivers of burnout is a toxic work environment but boy does that make sense! Toxic environments just wear you down so adding that feeling of being ground down with more work and no additional pay and you have a lot of very unhappy employees. To manage this there are some pretty straightforward ideas.
Recognize the work that your employees are doing. This goes a long way. Explaining that you see what they are doing, that you understand that it is more than normal, and that you are trying to fix it makes a difference (this is assuming you are actually trying to fix it). Remember, they are people!!
Talk to your employees. Yes, have an actual conversation. Face-to-face if possible. Ask them what they want and truly LISTEN to what they are saying. Would a half day off be more valuable to them than a holiday party? Could a more flexible schedule help mitigate their burnout a bit? Don’t dismiss their ideas.
Look up the chain. Have you been quietly promoted too? Are you passing along work because you have too much on your plate? Time for some real talk with your boss.
After thinking about and writing about all of the quiet stuff, I think it’s time for a new social contract at work. Employers are owed what you are paid for. They are not owed your evenings, your weekends, or your vacations. Your promotions should be loud celebrations not sneaky additional tasks. I know (I really, personally, truly know) how hard it is to push back on requests from people at work so help myself do better I have been watching videos of the general differences in saying no at work. I need to work on my Gen X vibes. Maybe I’ll go put on my overalls and rewatch My So Called Life as a start (Jordan Catalano + Buffalo Tom = ❤️).
*That’s the title to a fantastic and chaotic Bjork song that is pretty darn great. This is the link if you would like to put it in your ear holes.
**What I will say is that minimum wage ≠ living wage. The fact that the last time Congress voted to increase the Federal Minimum Wage (currently $7.25/hour) was over THIRTEEN years ago but they have voted for pay raises (cost of living they say!!) for themselves every year is a crime. Last time I checked, the cost of living increases impact everyone and not just out of touch elected officials.
Metaphors
The other day while scrolling IG (#disassociating) I saw a guy do something that looked amazing and combined two of my favorite things: espresso + peanut butter. From what I remembered, he took the peanut butter jar that had those last bits you can never get out, added some sweetener, a shot of espresso, vanilla, and shook it. He then poured this peanut butter infused goodness over ice and seemed very happy with the result. It loked very straightforward so I decided to try it with my most recent jar of almost-gone peanut butter. I made a shot of espresso, poured it into the peanut butter jar and started to shake (the sweetener and vanilla seemed like unnecessary additions). Immediately the jar started to sputter and leak/low key explode hot espresso. This was the opposite of my desired outcome. I took the top off, gave it a bit to cool down and tried again. The result was underwhelming at best. It was not creamy, the jar was not free of peanut butter,* and I was sad. When I rewatched the video I realized that he added oat milk to his espresso shot prior to pouring it into the container. It would seem this step made the espresso cool enough to make it less explosive and lead to his delicious outcome. I had missed a crucial step. I had inadvertently messed up the process. To me, this seemed like a metaphor for ethics. I understand no one else sees this. I will attempt to clarify.
Every time I hear the word “metaphor” I think of the (1994) movie Il Postino. Please note that the 7.7/10 score on IMDB is an atrocity and clearly perpetrated by tasteless heathens. The movie is about an Italian postman, Mario Ruppolo, who delivers mail to exiled Chilean poet Pablo Neruda. Mario learns what a metaphor is and then incorporates them into poetry he writes for his love interest Beatrice (much to the consternation of her mother). The movie is lovely and sad and has an amazing soundtrack and I think you should do yourself a favor and watch it.
Allow me a digression from my digression. Pablo Neurda poetry holds a special place in my heart and this is saying a lot because I am not much for poetry (or jazz but that’s for another time). Maybe it was the movie. Maybe it was because I read it in college. Either way I distinctly remember memorizing this poem for Spanish class my junior year. If you are feeling too lazy to read you can also listen to the poem.
When I talk about ethical theories in my classes they fall into two exceptionally broad categories. Those that focus on the means (process) and those that focus on the ends (outcomes). I tell students that one of these approaches will usually just “feel” right to them and that you can hear peoples’ preferences in the way they talk about difficult decisions. The people who like process cite rules, individual rights, and their duties as a person; they view the world as black and white. Those that favor outcomes talk about the greater good and what creates happiness for many; they view the world as gray. To help facilitate students’ understanding of these concepts I have them take the Ethical Lens Inventory. I utilize this assessment because I don’t think we necessarily take the time to consider our moral foundations very closely or very often. I often joke that I don’t expect that they spend their weekends discussing Kantianism so this is a great opportunity for some self reflection. If they do spend their weekends discussing Kant, good for them and thank you for taking my class even though you are a philosophy major!
For me, process is important. It is what makes sense but it is not the default for many business students (except my accounting majors!). I think that can be problematic for students when they graduate and enter the workforce. Case in point: Elizabeth Holmes. She was so focused on the (potential) of her final product that she lied, swindled, and caused harm to others in an attempt to achieve it. Don’t do that. Focusing only on that shiny outcome (a new car, paying off student loans, getting your own place, etc.) may cloud your ability to see the process and where it is going wrong. It is exceptionally difficult for newly hired employees to call out inappropriate behavior by their organizations. There is the (completely logical) fear of being fired, ignored, or punished because calling out bad behavior puts a target on your back. Doing that takes you off track for your desired outcome so why bother? My response is usually to ask questions:
If you know something bad is happening and you don’t say anything and people find out you knew, how does that make you look? The simpler version of this is called the Front Page Test. If your behavior was talked about in the top story of the day and all over the internet would you feel good about your choice? Would you be proud of yourself?
Will you be able to sleep at night? Some people simply have a higher tolerance for this kind of stuff and sleep like babies knowing they totally screwed people over but I am not one of them.
When you finally reach that outcome will it feel as good? This is often met with things like, “Obviously, YES it will because I will no longer be living with seven roommates!” Fair, but I think that excitement will be short lived.
I am not saying that focusing on the process is always the best or that it is always “good.” In fact each ethical approach has its own pros and cons. If you are too bogged down by rules you become inflexible (raises hand) and have trouble operating in situations where things are a little loosey-goosey. If you only focus on the outcomes you can miss all the people who aren’t benefiting (i.e. getting screwed over) by your decisions. What I am saying is that I want my students (and everyone else) to be able to get to their desired outcome without dealing with an espresso burn on their hands (or the workplace equivalent). Think about the process AND the outcomes. Don’t make snap decisions and don’t let shiny things cloud your better judgment. Instead, take a step back and think about the person you want to be. Not who others think you should be, but what YOU actually want for yourself. What approach will lead to the decision that makes that happen? That’s the right one. For me, I’ve decided to reattempt the peanut butter espresso by following the entire process. I am hoping for an outcome that is delicious and magical and I am going to drink it while rewatching Il Postino. Arrivederci!
*Seriously HOW do you clean a peanut butter jar so you can recycle it?!?
**Weirdly the one place except when it comes to recipes. In the kitchen recipes are general suggestions to me so perhaps this is the root cause of my espresso explosion.
Stingray shuffle
Have you ever heard that you are supposed to shuffle your feet in the shallow parts of the ocean so you don’t accidentally get the business end of a stingray? Apparently they feel the vibrations and then have a chance to beat it out of our way. They don’t want to sting you, they just don’t like to be snuck up on. I get it. This idea is stuck in my head because Mango San Carlos, the puppy, isn’t as big as Mr. Crenshaw Sniffers. Mango clocks in at about 12 pounds and I am always scared I am going to step on him when I get up and it’s dark. So, I do the stingray shuffle from bed to the door in an attempt to not kill him. This got me thinking about changing behavior for people you like. Not tightroping where you don’t do things because you feel like you shouldn’t. Instead, realizing you are doing something potentially harmful/aggravating to someone you care about and doing something different. The best example I have of this in my life is my husband and chicharrones. If you aren’t familiar with chicharrones, they are deep fried pig skin. They truly disgust me and they are CRUNCHY. Crunchy to the point that it sounds like whoever is eating them is chewing on a mouthful of rocks and glass (or what I assume that sounds like) and the sound can be heard from far distances. An important point here is that chewing sounds really bother me. They bother me in a way that is hard to describe. They make me irrationally angry and gross me out. Turns out this is an actual thing called misophonia.
Hooray! I have a thing. Anyhow, my kind and wonderful husband came to realize that these sounds really do make me feel unhinged. He completely changed his crunchy food eating habits, chicharrones in particular, and will literally go outside or move to the other side of the house while enjoying them.* That may not sound like a big deal but I appreciate it and it’s something some people couldn't or wouldn’t do because changing your behavior is TOUGH. It’s tough because so much of it is automatic. We have two different operating “systems” in our brains. System 1 is speedy, automatic, almost spontaneous. It’s responsible for things like absentmindedly reading text on a billboard, stepping over a hole in the sidewalk, driving, or making a “disgust face” when you see something gross. It works in the background without us even noticing because these are things that we have practiced, things we simply know how to do. I think of System 1 sort of like white noise in a loud place. It blends into the background and we forget that it is helping block out the annoying loud sounds, but if it stopped we would definitely notice. System 2 is what we use when we are trying to figure something out, when we are concentrating, problem-solving, doing anything that takes focus. Unlike System 1, when using System 2, interruptions take us off track. It would be bad news if every time we were interrupted our System 1 came to a halt. We would be very glitchy.
Every semester when I talk about how we make moral decisions I give two examples of types of decision making. The first example is a cheeseburger. When I ask if people see the burger as a moral issue they can articulate why some people might think it’s a moral issue even if they don’t. They talk about animal rights, sustainability, religious reasons; all great. The other example is about blood-related siblings having consensual (protected) sex while on vacation in Europe. I can tell when each student gets to the sibling part because they make the official face of disgust (reading also triggers System 1). Yes, that is a thing and it is universal. Their System 1 decided for them that this is not a good idea. They didn’t have to take time to really consider the pros and the cons to the issue. It does get pretty hilarious when they try to articulate WHY this is a moral issue. They just KNOW incest is a poor choice so explaining why is no where near as easy as that cheeseburger.
So it’s this System 1 that is both keeping us moving through daily life and causing us to engage in those pesky bad habits that can be really hard to change. But have no fear, The Transtheoretical Model and neuroplasticity are here to save us. Hey-ooo don’t they sound fun?! The Transtheoretical Model (Stages of Change) takes a behavioral science approach to understanding why we do the things we do. It was developed in the 1970s while trying to understand how and why certain people could just quit smoking while others had such a hard time. What the researchers found was that you have to be INTENTIONAL with your desire to change behavior and that actually changing habitual behavior is a cyclical process. They came up with these six steps to explain how the process works:
Neuroplasticity also helps with this cycle of change. Our brains are pretty freaking amazing so as we start to develop new habits we form new synaptic connections that start to cement the change in our brains. We basically prune our brain because when you keep doing the new thing the synaptic connections to the old thing die out. I think that is pretty darn amazing. We started with stingrays and puppies, moved through chicharrones and incest, but ended up at the fact that we CAN change our behavior. We do not need to do it fit in at work or because someone else wants us to. However, you can do it for yourself, for a human you love, or a puppy. No matter what the reason, it’s possible.
100% worth the stingray shuffle.
*Some of you may be thinking, “Wow. She sounds like a real pain in the ass” and you are totally correct. The good news is I have some redeeming qualities so it all evens out.
Danger Brain
I am currently staying at a hotel in San Diego.* I do this from time to time to crank out a lot of writing. Over the years I have learned that I am most productive between about 4pm and 1am. This is not an optimal schedule for my life. At 4pm I usually get Leo. Then we do the nightly grind. Dinner, shower, reading, begging that the random shit he leaves all over the house gets picked up, book, bed. The usual. He is settled in his bed by about 7.45/8 these days which would make it seem like I now have hours of uninterrupted time to work. Incorrect. Those after school hours of Momming tend to break my brain (and sometimes my spirit!). If you have a kid you know what I mean. Right after pick up is usually fine. Leo is still abuzz with the day and excited to be home and see the dogs. Dinner is usually pretty ok too as long as it is pasta, pizza, or mac and cheese (which is NOT pasta in case you thought it was). Don’t worry he eats veggies on the side. When we head into shower time things can start to get dicey and somewhere around 6.30 or 7.00 things just tend to break down. Kind requests are met with fiery responses and simple chores become impossible. This is also the time when Leo has the fiercest of criticisms of my parenting. My amazing friend Richard Rathburn calls this danger brain and we have stolen the term. In our house, danger brain is described as your body and your brain not listening to each other.
This is a real thing and it doesn’t just happen to kids. If you think about a typical day, how many decisions do you think you make? The most common estimate I’ve seen is 35,000. That is not a typo but I also can’t find a clear citation to back it up. There is, however, specific research from Cornell that says we make over 200 decisions just linked to food in a day. So we are making somewhere between 200 and 35,000 decisions per day and the quality of those decisions erodes as the day wears on. This is due to a very real phenomenon called ego depletion or decision fatigue.**
Each decision we make takes a toll on our brains. Things like what mug to use for your coffee takes far less of a toll than deciding if you want to accept a promotion but it all adds up. This means that by the end of the day we are depleted mentally and emotionally. This is when our patience and will-power are at their lowest. It’s the time when you are trying exceptionally hard to be kind and understanding but end up yelling and then feel terrible about it. Decision fatigue isn’t limited to the end of the day at home. It also pops up in work situations, especially when individuals may face a variety of tricky choices throughout the day. The daily stresses of working during the pandemic have only exacerbated the prevalence of decision fatigue.
Since I have been living this and it can sometimes make for a really crappy evening I wanted to see if there are ways to help our danger brains and their decision fatigue. It turns out there are some fairly practical things we can do and most of them can be applied to home or work. One of them is attempting to reduce the number of decisions you have to make in a day. That may sound impossible but it’s why some people opt for the same outfit every day, meal prep, make lists, or get everything together for the next day the night before; it saves them a little bit of thinking time. Some recommend establishing a routine for certain tasks to diminish the decision making around them. I started to do this by planning out my workouts the week before so they are on my calendar and booked and I don’t have to think about it and it definitely helps. Another common suggestion is to make big/important decisions in the morning, but after coffee I assume. Makes sense. Your brain is fresh and ready for a new day. I also appreciate the idea of “batching” your decision making. I started (trying) to do this recently and when you commit it really works because you are focusing on one thing for a limited amount of time. These suggestions aren’t going to eliminate danger brain. Overwhelm is bound to happen. It is possible though that they may help you avoid eating the remaining macaroni and cheese out of the pot on the stove while drinking a massive glass of wine and crying at 7.15 pm on a Tuesday even though you swore to yourself that you were only going to drink on the weekends and know gluten will wreck your stomach. Maybe.
*Fun fact. I thought the hotel was booked for 2 nights but it was only booked for one. When the hotel called my husband to say I had not checked out but that all of my things were still in the room he momentarily thought I had been murdered/kidnapped. I was just on my way to yoga.
**Most researchers use these terms interchangeably but some argue that ego depletion as a higher-order construct.