Work Life Mash Up Messiness

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When you hear the life stories of people, you can’t help but be amazed that employees can actually get stuff done at work. It is only a matter of how much, and at what cadence the harsh realities of day-to-day living intertwine, and sometimes interfere with earning a living. The honest challenge we all face is to move forward in a healthy, contributing way as we go about wading through life’s muddy messiness.

If you gathered a sample of 20 people from work together, and asked each of them to describe some of the personal challenges they have faced (or are currently addressing), our eyes would bug out in amazement. We’d shake our heads and also admire the themes of perseverance, courage, resilience and adaptability threaded through the stories.

Why is this important? There are certainly private boundaries between work and life that are ours alone to determine. And of course, we can’t and likely don’t want to know the gory details of everyone else’s personal challenges. However, when people are not having their best day(s) at work, when they are distracted or not “crisp,” it may be worth a pause to compassionately check in.

I fully understand that organizations have to achieve results and that we can’t use “life stuff” as an excuse for not getting things done. Still, we are human first and as much as we have coping mechanisms, it is almost impossible and even unreasonable to fully segregate life and work. It is mashed up whether we like it or not. And sometimes “life” just washes over us and overwhelms everything. That doesn’t make us weak. It makes us vitally human, and affirms that we are fully alive.

Machines and AI can help because theoretically “they” do not have “bad days”. And we should use robots etc., to do unsafe and/or tedious work. However, it is our messy humanness that overcomes and creates. Nothing can replace the angles and avenues we use to navigate through the crap life throws at us. So while we know that each and everyone of us will go through some valley of “hell” at one time or another, that common experience also connects us as people. If we positively tap into our shared experiences, we can overcome, ascend and advance. How great is that?

My primary point is not to suggest overstepping into each other’s personal messiness. Rather it is to make room for compassion and understanding with each other, and to reinforce the principle of “connect before content.” In that regard we are irreplaceable. It will always be humans first.

Think Big, Start Small, Act Now,

- Lorne

One Millennial View: A quick Google search will inform you that lack of communication is one of the top problems plaguing organizations in 2023 (and probably forever). If we don’t learn how to speak with each other, how could we truly be optimizing our performance? Investing in learning about our teammates is a step towards fixing this issue. It might sound like a simple concept, but if you don’t know some of the perseverance, courage, resilience and adaptability that your co-workers have been through, how can you best tackle a work related issue together in the most efficient way? Then again, when you’re armed with this information, you can discover a work challenge is that much more surmountable.

- Garrett

Edited and published by Garrett Rubis

Work Life Mash Up Messiness

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