The logical part of my brain knows I can't do everything. It knows there are some things better left to other people. The other half of my brain, the excitable, creative part says that I can do everything. It wants to do everything. It is nearly autocratic in its desires. It isn't all about pleasing myself. That part of my brain doesn't trust anyone. It isn't that I can do everything better than anyone else; the way this goes, if anything is wrong, my name is the one people will see. If sometingis going to go wrong I'd rsther have it actually be my fault.
Now for some hard truth. I don't get paid enough to do everything. The newsroom assistant gets paid more than I do. It isn't her fault. I've been thinking of things for her to do but none of them take very long. I understand that it is a work-study job. She does more study than work.
I sit there, trying ot do the best I can with what I'm given, while attempting to get more. I can't force people to turn in stories or complete assignments. I have reasonable expectations that these assignments should be completed, especially if the person volunteered for the gig. I don't think anyone has volunteered for any of the posted assignments so far. In one sense, it is not my fault if other people do not do what they said they'd do. My responsibility is to produce the best paper I can. So, if people don't turn instories, it is my fault.
I am a victim of ambition. I want to do everything. I can't do everything. I need to learnt o trust more people. So far, some of the trust I've given out has not produced the results expected. How can I trust people if they do not do what meager tasks are asked of them? Would you continue to trust people if they never did what you asked? Would you continue to trust people who are constantly doing things you didn't ask them to do, things that take away from your control?
I am a control freak, apparently. If I really had as much control as I thought I did, this paper would be out today like I promised people it would be.
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Teej we are similar in this regard - my supervisor at school keeps telling me that I can't do everything, or I don't have to come up with everything on my own - but for some reason the way I complete a task is very different/usually more involved than other people - I just found this out during a midterm grading meeting- I thought I was doing less work than other people, because I knew I wasn't doing my best work - classic underachiever, in my eyes anyway - but apparently that is not the case in all areas - so the ambitions or outcomes that I see for certain things are maybe just too high - but learning to trust other people and accepting feedback or even getting feedback - that is another area - I haven't really gotten a lot of specific feedback about my work - is it because I am doing more than other people so I am snowing my supervisors into thinking I am doing great! hmm
Teej trusting people is a huge thing, letting go of our own ideas so that other's can learn is another thing - critical feedback is important and we all need it in order to improve ourselves--I have tried the doing something bad to get the reaction and it didn't work - I think I copped myself out (the inner wanting to do a good job) that it still came out good enough - I don't think that academic/life expectations are as high as they could be - maybe people are just lazy -
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