When the Feeling Has No Address

I was doing something wrong at work yesterday — I had been doing it for a while with the best of intentions, stuck in something that wasn't working for me or for others.

A woman I was newly working with corrected me in no uncertain terms: she told me exactly what was not working and what to do instead.

It was like a mini-liberation: I felt embarrassed by my previous behaviour but very grateful to have the key to unlock the situation.

I pondered it in the night. The clear metric for behaviour set me free from a false image I had of myself and allowed me to see clearly where my true next step lie. Nothing beats gaining a bit more freedom — even at the cost of an old illusion of self falling away.

The next day I returned to work with the new insight driving my behaviour and the clear metric or boundary of the previous day containing me. The change had worked.

I feel this is what so many crave in the emotional domain: to be told and shown exactly what to do and not to do — if we can only express it clearly and firmly enough — so they can be set free and the old oppressive feeling of something being wrong without being able to locate the cause of it dissipate.