Did you ever have days when everything seems to go wrong … Those days when things get worse as the day goes on. I have experienced many of these types of days throughout my personal and business career. Like most people, I would complain about it to everyone and anyone who would listen – but I came to realize that no one really wants to hear about all your problems and worries.
My realization came from a vivid real-life experience that I had during the energy crisis of 1976. I was the Energy Czar for Brockway Glass Company. Brockway had drilled gas wells and had built a gathering system to pipe the gas over to the natural gas supplier. During the crisis, the gas company confiscated our gas and would not deliver it to our plants. Since glass manufacturing is an energy-intensive industry and we could not get enough natural gas, we had to shut the plants down and lay off all the people. We had only enough gas to keep the glass in the furnaces molten; there was not enough energy to manufacture any glass containers.
Every morning at 7 AM, I would have an emergency meeting with the President of the Glass Container Division to review where and how much energy we had so we could determine what our Emergency Operating Plan would be for that day. Since it was my job to procure the energy for the glass factories, I was under intense pressure and had many problems and worries.
Naturally, I would tell my “tale of woe” to anyone who would listen. During one of the worst mornings of the crisis, I was in the men's room when a co-worker walked in. He was a happy-go-lucky eight-to-fiver who liked to tell stories, shoot the breeze and gossip. He asked me, "How you doing?" I started to unload on him about all my woes and worries. Well, he hurriedly washed his hands and bolted out the door ... he couldn't wait to get away from me.
My realization came from a vivid real-life experience that I had during the energy crisis of 1976. I was the Energy Czar for Brockway Glass Company. Brockway had drilled gas wells and had built a gathering system to pipe the gas over to the natural gas supplier. During the crisis, the gas company confiscated our gas and would not deliver it to our plants. Since glass manufacturing is an energy-intensive industry and we could not get enough natural gas, we had to shut the plants down and lay off all the people. We had only enough gas to keep the glass in the furnaces molten; there was not enough energy to manufacture any glass containers.
Every morning at 7 AM, I would have an emergency meeting with the President of the Glass Container Division to review where and how much energy we had so we could determine what our Emergency Operating Plan would be for that day. Since it was my job to procure the energy for the glass factories, I was under intense pressure and had many problems and worries.
Naturally, I would tell my “tale of woe” to anyone who would listen. During one of the worst mornings of the crisis, I was in the men's room when a co-worker walked in. He was a happy-go-lucky eight-to-fiver who liked to tell stories, shoot the breeze and gossip. He asked me, "How you doing?" I started to unload on him about all my woes and worries. Well, he hurriedly washed his hands and bolted out the door ... he couldn't wait to get away from me.
It hit me like a ton of bricks that people really did not care or want to hear about your problems. From that day on, I have tried not to burden people with my worries and problems and found that the best approach when someone asks you, “How are you doing today?" is to simply grit your teeth and reply "I have bottomed out ... I’m on the way back ... I’m doing fine."
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