His voice was loud; his attitude hostile; his words caustic. Despite how rude he was, she remained calm, professional, and gentle throughout the spellbinding encounter. Even from my close vantage point, I didn't detect a hint of irritation in her demeanor.
The man in front of me in the breakfast order line at the food court, in one of the busiest airports in the country, wanted a "full" cup of coffee. He kept raising his voice, yelling at the woman to "fill his cup to the top." His words peppered with angry comments about her not giving him his "money's worth."
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People trekking to their gates paused to see what the commotion was. The upheaval, as it appeared to me, was about a man angry over something other than coffee, and taking whatever it was out on a stranger attempting to fulfill his request.
Maybe he couldn't control what was happening in his life, but he could control how much coffee he got. Who knows? After the fourth time he shouted at her about not satisfying his invite for a "full cup of coffee" and accusing her of "stealing his money" by not giving him what he paid for, she glanced my way. Shooting her an encouraging look, her eyes smiled in return.
I'm sure that in that busy airport, this woman gets her share of "crazy people." Yet population like her, population who are winning at working, aren't de facto fazed by them. They use two approaches when these unbalanced, obnoxious, or demeaning energy bolts come their way.
First, they seem to deploy the equivalent of an emotional shield by switching on a silent option button. Instead of letting some crazy man ruin their day, pour toxic venom into their energy field, or define how they see themselves or their jobs, they select to deflect the angry words and focus on the situation. They refuse to take the occurrence personally.
We all have crazy population encounters at work from time to time. Sometimes customers, clients, staff, bosses, or coworkers, use us as verbal punching-bags to vent their frustrations, anger, or disappointment. But population who are winning at working keep that in perspective, too. They realize, more likely than not, they've been man else's difficult person, from time to time.
I'll never forget as a young, infrequent traveler, our first high-priced family vacation surface the U.S. We were bumped from an overbooked plane out of Philadelphia, bused to a New York airport, missed that plane, rebooked on a flight straight through Puerto Rico that turned into an unplanned overnight stay in a seedy hotel. When we finally arrived at our Caribbean island resort having lost nearly two days of a six day vacation, no luggage arrived with us.
It's true that the man who encountered my rage over the overbooked flight that started it all did not deserve my wrath. I was her "crazy person" that day. Our son, quite young at the time, still teases me about "going ballistic" and screaming at the airline representative in whatever but a pro manner.
Twenty years later, I'm still embarrassed to think how I reacted and to characterize how out of control I was to an unsuspecting man on the other side of the desk, whose caring advent and compassion was memorable. She demonstrated the second advent population who are winning at working use in these brief, explosive encounters. They offer a compassionate heart.
People operating with the winning doctrine of offering the best of who they are to the world, understand this: some heavy life-loads population carry are invisible. The man next to you or behind you or across from you may have a waterlogged heart, a broken spirit, or diminutive days. We can't know the challenges man else is dealing with, the tragedies touching their lives, or the stresses crushing them day after day. But we can view them (and their temporary craziness) straight through compassionate eyes.
You see, population who are winning at working understand life is hard sometimes and we all benefit when we're gentler with each other. That young women serving coffee in a crowded airport modeled a better, winning at working, way.
(c) 2010 Nan S. Russell. All proprietary reserved.
great post to read Those Crazy citizen
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