I work with entirely all women. (you know where this is going–)
And today, for whatever reason, maybe it is the full moon coming on Saturday, we are all raging with estrogen.
Bitching, gossiping, back-stabbing, talking mean, complaining, feeling overly sensitive, being triggered, insecurities are high, and everything is blown out of proportion.
Now I find this to be entirely interesting from a psychological standpoint. Seeing all the interactions and talk being evidence of deeper wounds and places of deprivation, fear and insecurity.
But from an ESFJ standpoint (that’s my Myers-Briggs personality type), it is excruciatingly uncomfortable. I like harmony. I like people being okay with me and thinking well of me. I have low tolerance for people’s insecurities and ways they are triggered.
So my goals for the rest of the afternoon and all day tomorrow are to:
1) Keep my mouth shut.
2) Mind my own business.
There you have it.
Any advise from any of you that primarily work with all women?
Oh, yes. As a former teacher, at a girls school even, I can relate. All the personnel were either women or gay men with a few hetero men thrown in to do penance of some sort for sins in a former life, I’m quite sure. Some women were on the pill, some not, every menses fighting to pull the others onto its timing. And then there were 800 female students, to boot.
Good plan– keep your mouth shut and mind your own business.
I also found it immensely popularity-rescuing to bring in a freshly baked crumb cake, Martha’s recipe of course, still in the pan, not cut into portions, so the particularly angry ones in the teacher’s lounge could gorge themselves when no one was looking and have a little sugar high. Put a little sign next to it saying, “Cheer up! Things could be worse!”
I attended a women’s college and dealt in the realm of women (with just a few male teachers and the odd male student from one of the nearby colleges taking a consortium course –they were usually either really brave or really desperate) for four years.
It got to the point where being surrounded by women was all just totally normal. I don’t even remember feeling like there was too much estrogen. That was the way it was.
But my escape was having a single room. Living with a roommate in a little dorm room was just too much, I discovered. So when I had my own room for two years, I’d keep my door open much of the time as to engage in community, but on occasion I just shut and locked it and had time to myself. I also spent long periods sitting in solitary silence by the pond or in the gardens. Although I did share a one-bedroom, on-campus apartment my senior year, being able to escape to the living room (or even the bathroom) was key.
Then I would lose myself in a book and de-stress.
I suppose you can’t do all of this at work. But you do have an office, right? When things get really keyed up, head in there and do some paperwork or take a walk around the parking lot just to calm down and gain some perspective. Or you can even spend 10 minutes in your office journaling your feelings and getting them out that way so you don’t take them out on somebody else (I do that at work even now when I am about to explode).
Otherwise, minding your own business and keeping your mouth shut is a great plan!