Moments of Clarity

A moment of true, unaltered clarity can be one of the most elusive things in life.  We can have epiphanies, we can have ideas, we can have understandings but a true moment of clarity - that piercing instant when something something suddenly becomes completely clear.

Such a thing happened to me yesterday.

It was a meeting that many who work in the corporate world will be familiar with:  the HR meeting, where the process of dealing with employee difficulties (opportunities for improvement, if you will) was being reviewed.  The presentation was more entertaining than most but much of the content still the same from any HR presentation one would recognize.  And then, suddenly tucked away in time midst of a discussion of supervisors came the following statement:  "If employees don't like their supervisors, they're free to vote with their feet."

It just hung there for a moment, floating in air.  Someone apparently did not understand it and questioned it again and the same words came out:  "If employees don't like their supervisors, they're free to vote with their feet.  They can leave."

The world became piercingly sharp in its clarity for a moment.

The implications were obvious.  After all of the discussion we had just had concerning how supervisors were to help guide their employees and deal with issues, the equivalent relationship - that of how employees deal with their supervisors - was summarily addressed: "If employees don't like their supervisors, they're free to vote with their feet."

All of a sudden much of my consternation melted away.

Why?  Because there was no longer any need to bear it.  There was no need to be hopeful or even concerned that such things would change - because as a matter of policy, they would not.  Management would not - except, I assume, in extreme circumstances - hold supervisors to the same process and program that they would hold employees.  The relationships above are less relationships than they are religious relationships:  take what is given to you, and like it.  If not, find a new religion.

Or new workplace.

Things did not change other things, of course.  My job will be the same this morning as it was  yesterday.  But I go to work this morning with a clarity of understanding that I did not have yesterday.  We are often taught that we can - and should - change things if they are incorrect or wrong.  What I realized yesterday is that this is simply not only true. The only thing you can truly change is yourself.  And if changing yourself does not resolve the issue, perhaps it is best to realize that voting with your feet is the best path towards making a better tomorrow for yourself.