Entry 1: Things That Did Not Make Me Stronger

"The strength you admire in others is usually a form of damage management. We are not fine. We are just well catalogued."
— from an unfilled memo, author unknown

Things That Did Not Make Me Stronger

1. Things That Did Not Make Me Stronger
2. Crisis. Apparently, it builds character. It mostly builds invoices.
3. Taking the high road. Very scenic. Very unpaid.
4. Having “potential.” The unpaid internship of identity.
5. Being the adult in the room. Congratulations. You now are the room.
6. Giving more than I had because someone else was “having a tough time.”
7. Being reasonable. It was rarely needed—there was usually a man in the room already making a confident mistake.
8. Making it look easy. A known precursor to being handed more.
9. Understanding the assignment. Unfortunately, the assignment was deranged.
10. Outlasting the chaos. I am now promoted to managing it.
11. Humility. No one noticed.
12. Feedback. Usually delivered by people who couldn’t do what I do, but had thoughts.
13. Waiting my turn to speak. Turns out, I was waiting for a pause that wasn’t coming.
14. Being told I was “resilient.” By someone I’d just carried.
15. Trying to change the system from within. It absorbed me like mould in a sandwich.
16. Strategic silence. Which looks exactly like compliance, and is rewarded accordingly.
17. Multi-tasking. I now forget things in five directions at once.
18. Doing “just this one extra thing.” It was never one.
19. Explaining things once. Then listening to a man say the same thing, louder, with a slide deck.
20. Staying late to finish. The work regenerated like a sea sponge.
21. Setting an example. No one followed it. They just raised the bar.

End of Entry 1.