A Different Point of View

And the winner of last weeks competition is:

"I don't go postal because every night I plot my boss's slow and tortured demise in my dreams."

From cellophanegirl

Nice one! (taken slightly out of context)

As some of you may or may not remember, I spent the last ten years or so massaging stressed out clients who, on the whole, came to me with work related stress, much of which could have been avoided by one of the following:

• A company that gave a shit about it's employees
• A greater tolerance from co-workers
• An attitude shift

The first one is hard to deal with, because when you spend 8 hours or more a day working for a company that thinks very little of you, it's an uphill battle to maintain any sort of work related self esteem. The only way to deal with this is to not let it get to you, take a deep breath, look in the mirror and say I am worth something, I am I am." If that doesn't work, QUIT.

Everyone is in the same boat, and it's really easy to let your frustrations spill over onto your co-workers, and vice versa. Sometimes, just talking about why you are feeling so bad will help. They are probably feeling the same way, and the real target of your frustration needs to be the company and environment, not your cubicle mate because they speak with an annoying phone voice.

The last one on the list is perhaps the hardest and easiest to change. I have spoken before about how a slight change in your environment can help with not only your own attitude, but those around. Seriously, try changing something and see if there's a change in perceptions. One day, wear a drab colored item of clothing to work, and spend the day complaining about things. Next week, wear a brightly colored item of clothing, put a bunch of fresh flowers on the receptionist's desk and smile at everyone. Sit back and see if the love spreads, and take note of other's attitude towards you. It's like ripples in a pond.

Oh, and as far as the title of this post goes, my own website, www.youcube.us has been collecting photos of the sort of thing people do to their work cubicle to make it more bearable, and this is a sample. If you are familiar with icanhazceezebrger, I copied the idea from them.

I hope you like this one. There's nothing like jumping on somebody else's bandwagon, but I have some fun pics on my website. Take a look, it might give you an idea for your own cubicle. And if you have any photos I would love to have them. Send them to:

admin@youcube.us

This weeks competition:

My ideal workspace would be XXXXXX.

As usual, I'll start the ball rolling:

My ideal workspace would be a beach hut on a desert island with nothing but palm trees, hula girls and a broadband internet connection.