Stomp, Stomp, Stomp

Imagine you are having the best day at work and everything is going well, you are being productive and getting through things just fine. You are on target to finish up at your usual time and are in the process of tying up loose ends when you send a message to a colleague giving an update on a situation. What follows is a barrage of messages, accusatory in tone, argumentative and quite frankly rude!

Answering a number of them as best you can, getting madder and madder at the line of questioning and rudeness. What do you do next?

Communication is important and vital in all jobs. The method of communication used is also important. Messages can be construed differently to what the writer intends. The tone may be interpreted one way, when in fact it wasn’t meant that way.

When we read messaged from people we read them as though the person is speaking to us. We know the person and can therefore picture them talking to us.

In this situation, the best way to resolve the issue would be to call the person who is sending all the messages and chat to them instead. It might help to understand where they are coming from and it will likely take the heat out of the conversation. It is always easier to type something than to talk through. It is way to easy to hide behind words on a screen. If you do speak with the person, you could let them know how their messages came across. Start by saying to them ‘when you said this, I read it to be aggressive and you probably didn’t mean it but this is how it came across’ and give them a chance to explain.

However, this is an ideal situation, where you give the person a call and resolve the issue (if there was one to begin with) and chat through their concerns and yours. The call may not go quite as to plan as this, however, chatting through the issue is important.

Now if the messages continue and you continue to get mad, given that you were already about to get your jacket on and leave for the day, then close the messages down. Stop responding. Walk away. You don’t want this person, saying something that then triggers you to say something you may regret. (Even if you really want to say it!)

Be the bigger person and close your laptop or lock your pc and walk away. Those messages can wait for another day or better yet, don’t respond to any further ones that come in and talk to the person when you next see them instead.

After a great day at work the last thing you need is to take this angry annoyed feeling into your evening or worse still into your weekend. Don’t let this person have power over you.

So here are some tips to help you let go of the issue, until you can resolve it or forget about it.

1. Go for a walk or run or go to the gym and stomp this feeling out of you. Remember when you were a child and you would actually stomp off in a mood. Well drop the mood part and just stomp your anger out. Take satisfaction from your footsteps being heavy on the ground, wear your comfiest trainers and allow them to take the impact of those heavy stomps.
2. Book a boxing class – now this perhaps will not be immediate as you will likely need to find somewhere and book. So an alternative, would be to get your pillow get someone to hold it up for you and punch it, really get your anger out. If no-one can hold it then leave it on your bed and punch down to it. Get your anger out.
3. Talk it through with your partner, friend, family even your pet. Get this off your chest and get it into the atmosphere so it is out of your head.
4. Write or type it down, get everything off your mind and onto paper or a screen. Write until you no longer have anything about this person to say or no longer feel angry. Once you have it there, either, scrunch it up and throw it into a bin. Or rip it up into tiny pieces and then recycle it.
5. Meditate – focus on your breath and let your thoughts float away. If you find yourself thinking about it, bring yourself back to the breath and don’t hold onto the thoughts coming in. Your breath is the most important thing at this time for the length of your meditation.

I hope you have a wonderful rest of your weekend and have let go of any anger or annoyance someone at work may have caused you. Remember, most people do not set out to rub you up the wrong way. Be kind to yourself and breathe.

Have a great week.

Love Emma xx