For the last three days, my shower water has been cold. I've noticed over the past few months that this tends to happen whenever a winter storm arrives. My roommate, who showers in the evenings, hasn't faced this same predicament, but since I stubbornly must adhere to the same morning routine, I remain insistent on showering right after waking up and before going to work, even if it's in cold water.
To tell you the truth, I was quite grumpy Monday morning. There are few things I derive greater pleasure from than hot showers. It's bad enough waking up on a Monday morning; it's worse to be greeted with a blast of cold water. Tuesday morning, I was in a vile mood and, after getting out of the shower, promptly Googled on my phone to see whether or not cold weather was responsible for my misery. As it turns out, I found multiple articles exalting the health benefits of taking cold showers. Not only does this habit purportedly strengthen your immune system, improve your circulation, relieve depression symptoms, and improve skin quality--but psychologically, if you subject yourself to minor stress each day, then over time, you become better at handling stress. I don't know about the physical health benefits (though I might be able to vouch for the depression one--I've realized I feel pretty darn good after a cold shower), but I was drawn to the psychological benefit. It's kind of the same principle why I started making my bed every morning--it's a small victory that starts you off each day feeling as if you've accomplished something.
Plus, I don't really have a choice about my water temperature right now, so I might as well focus on the benefits, right? So yeah, a lot less grumbling this morning. And honestly, after a while you get used to the cold.
I wish I could be so optimistic about my work-life though. Since December, I've had frequent bouts of extreme irritation at my job. Around mid-January, my frustrations came to a head and I wrote an e-mail rant to my mother (who was in Taiwan at the time) about how I now understood why communism was doomed to fail. A few co-workers and I frequently work on the same projects together and share a worklist that we usually divvy up.The problem? As someone whose personality is geared towards maximum efficiency, when I'm on the top of my game, my productivity is at least twice the average level of everyone else. (How do I know? I'm neurotic enough to keep track of how many patient records I complete each day, so I have a pretty good sense of my daily average and overall record. I can also get a vague sense of how much my co-workers have completed in that same span of time, due to regular updates we have about our project status.) I'm competitive with myself and I hate wasting time, so when I'm motivated, I will get tons of shit done.
But then, what happens when I finished my assigned set? I'm immediately assigned to help someone else finish their assigned set. Which I don't really have a problem with on principle (team effort and all), but it becomes very demotivating when it grows clear that I'm doing the equivalent work of two, maybe even three other people--for no personal benefit. (Especially when I hear that one of my co-workers may be watching Netflix while working. Not that I'm not reading blogs or anything while working...ahem. But I still get more shit done, period.) And this is where I realize that I'm slightly narcissistic and need to be praised. I don't even really care that I'm paid the same as everyone else. I just kinda want someone to notice.
So my mom wrote an e-mail response back, and in all her worldly wisdom, sent me some Chinese proverb about how you can't move the mountain but the trail can curve its path. Basically, she said, you can't do anything about it, so either change your mindset and focus on the positives you're getting from working so hard (in reality.... not much), or slow the eff down and daydream a bit more like Netflix Guy. Okay fine, so I listened to that second piece of advice. I slowed down. I started writing long e-mails to YY and Rogue during work hours. On occasion, I'd pull up my EP drafts and do some freewrites while waiting for the database to load. I cut my pace down to about half, and overall I was feeling more content and appeased.
Until approximately two days ago. Allow me to explain. About two weeks ago, one of my co-workers was assigned to help me finish one of my worklists, as she'd just finished her first set. (For context, this was my third set.) I'd been working backwards from 810, so by the time my co-worker was assigned to help, I had already gotten down to the mid-740s. I told my co-worker to start at 700 and work up until we met. I knew this co-worker works fairly slowly, so I guessed that we'd probably meet up in the 710s range after maybe a week.
On Monday, my co-worker left work before me, and I stayed a bit after to finish up the patient I was working on. I was on 705. I repeat, 705. I'd completed about 40 patients in about two weeks, and I was baffled as to why I still hadn't run into my co-worker yet. After I finished 705, I scrolled through 704, 703, 702, 701, and 700. That's when I realized that in the span of two weeks, my co-worker had gone through only five patients. That's approximately one-eighth of my work, even after I purposely slowed down. Not only that, some of these patients were incomplete--as in, certain fields were missing in various tabs, clearly indicating that the job was not done thoroughly. I could have understood if someone was really slow and doing a very thorough job, but at the revelation that this person was not only really slow but also doing a haphazard job, I went completely bonkers.
The angelic Sophelia on my shoulder tried to reintroduce all that positive-thinking by reminding myself that this co-worker had been absent for a couple of days in the last few weeks. But then the demonic Sophelia on the other shoulder butt in and shouted down this pep talk with: "THAT'S NO EXCUSE. THAT'S LIKE THREE DAYS MAXIMUM. HOW DO YOU FINISH ONLY FIVE PATIENTS IN TWO WEEKS?"
Anyways, I was livid. Bless my roommate, I went home and ranted to her for about twenty minutes. The thing is though, I've decided to just suck it up. If I were in my supervisor's shoes, I don't even know how I would handle this issue. At the end of the day, we are a team--so if we're looking at what's in the best interests of the group, it makes sense for the most productive team member to carry more weight. I can't argue with that. I'm just aggravated by the fact that my co-worker works at a snail's pace and I can't even pinpoint why (i.e. this person isn't visibly slacking off by, say, watching Netflix. Even Netflix Guy works faster than this.).
But all in all, if this is the most stressful thing about my job, I'll admit that I've got it good. I shouldn't be complaining. Just think of it as a cold shower.
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