Daily Struggles

Well good things happen, or so we want to think, if we are patient and diligent in our efforts.

That is a very good way to look at things very optimistic or opportunistic.

Unfortunately that is not the reality for most situations life throws at you.

Recent times and economic changes caused me to get laid off from a very good job and since 2008 I have been searching for work. Trying to stay motivated but still attempting to upgrade to a career that utilizes more of my technical background than simple labor experience.

I have sent out so many resumes that I have started to lose track of whom I have sent them to. I know that I am not the only person in this sort of situation because I see the news and hear and see others when I go to the job fairs or employment agencies.

Wow I got a job! I am happy that I have income in these tough times.

I believe that it is a wonderful time for employers. They get to pick and choose the employees. They can offer them pennies on the dollar for skills they have. They can work them harder than before. All the while blaming that mistreatment on the economy.

I have finally found a job (not career) that will pay me 70% of what I used to get. Will work me harder than before and constantly remind me that this or that can get me fired.

Maybe this is just a disgruntle posting but I do not feel that way. I realized that it would be a change but the first week I got 51 hours of overtime, 91 hours in a week. That alone is a hard fact for any job but especially going from zero to all the time the first week.

I think sometimes that maybe they are just testing me. Trying to see what my deeper morals are. Looking for my breaking point, what I need and what I don’t. I don’t know but it is real stress when it hits you all at once.

I heard a story from another employee that he was given conflicting orders from the two bosses. To put something outside or inside, he said that he did this several times, because when one boss would walk up he would say ” I told you here (inside/outside)” then the other boss would walk up and say the opposite.

Is it just they are disorganized? Should I keep looking for a different job? This job really offers little to no time to look. This is an excuse, maybe, I want to see the good nature in all people.

I think the thing that bugs me most is the fact there really has been no kind of schedule. Constantly on call, with very little notice, or being called in when not my On Call time. They have so few employees it pushes a major burden on the few that can do certain tasks. Or maybe I being taken advantage of, hmmm that’s kind of scary, because if so what are they willing to do?

Well right now I am not supposed to be On Call but the day will only tell if I actually work or not.

Everyone needs some time to get reorganized and refresh and regroup this is what this position is lacking.

Not disgruntled, Simply overworked…

Since we were kids we have been told that in order to get what we want we must chase after it. We must be assertive in what we strive to achieve. We must chase after it to no question or end. But when does simple assertive attitude turn into aggressive behavior erasing the good efforts we have put forth. When do you say assertive versus aggressive.

The way that one person is raised might be completely different than another. One person may have experience a passive parent and all types of mild mannered mentors growing up making them see assertive as aggression when it does come. Then it turn the child raised in a situation where they had to voice clearly what they wanted or had to fight harder than the average to get what they wanted. Many people have to look at how the person on the receiving end might see any situation.

The individual brought up in a more passive environment might look at aggressive at a completely different point of perspective than others. They might get offended easily in critical situations. They might be offended by just a manner that someone carries themselves. They might take deep offense to crude humor or find error in someone who is talkative.

On the flip of the coin the other type generally considered an alpha might look at the other as being to soft or weak. They have a hard time seeing why the other get offended over so simple an item. They constantly feel as though they have to tip toe around others as to not upset them. They feel that they are having to incorporate the others ideas when in fact the other don’t care to do the same.

Let us take a real situation and see how it is handled:

A person goes into a florist the morning of their anniversary. They want to buy some of the best flowers to impress their mate which relationship was already on the rocks. They agree with a price and have some special instructions on delivery-that the flowers be delivered at the mates work at a certain hour before lunch several hours later and that they attach a gift that was given to them at the time of purchase. Nothing real special florists do this everyday and incorporate anything special into the final price.

Later at the end of the day the florist calls the person and says that the delivery was unsuccessful because they had just tried the delivery and no one was at work.  They continue on to say that they had arrived very late in the afternoon to deliver them and that they could be picked up or attempt to deliver them the next day. Which would have been on Monday because this happened on a Friday.

Of course it is expected that the person making the purchase would be upset. The order they paid for was wasted. Had they had known that this company could not fulfil the commitment they would have sought different approach maybe buying the flowers from a different florist or something but either way the good thing had now turn into a fiasco. The person clearly states how incompetent the business is and discusses what they needed to do to get a refund because the opportunity to achieve the same effect had been lost. The florist in turn states that the flowers could be picked up if the person would hurry because they were closing.

Upon arrival to the florist the buyer is approached by police that had been called by the florist. They tell that they were called because of an abusive phone conversation. The buyer retrieves the flowers and gifts and leaves promptly not wanting trouble from the police.

The situation above is real I know I was the buyer and was utterly upset when the florist could not fulfil their side of the deal. And when I had the police there I did not want to do anything else because my attitude from the sour deal would be perceived as aggression and I would get carted off. That fact became so obvious when I pulled in and one pulled behind and one beside me to block my path. After being non confrontational the police left me alone but wouldn’t anyone be upset? And why the need for police?

After I had the flowers in my hand and returning to my car I sat there for many minutes trying to think of how I could have approached this different but I really came to no concrete solution. I believe that I handled this productively and said what I wanted to say to show my level of discontent with the florist.

How could I have achieved a different result? How could I have showed less tension even being upset? Is there a simple way to look at disappointing situations in order to automatically calm yourself? I have learned only one method but I am willing to take your approach if it is different. My approach is once upset I go outside get a couple deep breaths of fresh air and stop to think of how I am coming across to the other person. But often I can not see the others opinion and just try to think of something soothing or relaxing and many times that does help. Sometimes I find an answer if I write it down because I have to think about it differently when putting it into words.

If you have a solution to this simple dilemna please share your comments…

For about the last week or more I have been busy doing many things. One of them was looking for a decent job. In which I have went to three interviews all in fields that I do not work or have not worked in many years. Well I got a couple of the famous replies “We Will Call You!!” which I interpret to mean “Sorry Dude you Didn’t Impress me” and of course the honest opinion “Well you don’t have what it takes” (which was expected since I haven’t worked in the field in 15 years) after a hands on interview in which I did not even impress myself.
Well to make yet another resume and try again that’s what I have to do.. Just “Keep on, Keeping On..” . Sometimes what we go after does not come easy, and many times that is for good reason. Would you want it if it were? The fact is probably not. The times when someone gives you a hand out or a hand up are nice but they are not to be expected. It is through trials and torments that we discover new ways to approach an issue. It is through long hours of trying to accomplish a task that we can see the solution. This is normal.
Do you think that php programming is easy? Then it is obvious that you have spent many hours like myself learning new methods to do many different tasks. You have a learning curve, some use formal schools and some people, as myself, just read and read. The learning curve is a simple matter of trying then using what you have learned to apply that to a different approach or technique.
Even the students have this problem. They learn all this that the courses teach but many times that is not enough prep for the strange situations that can arise and are often learnt from struggling with a task. Attempting to accomplish it in many ways then maybe sleeping on the idea to find a different avenue the next day.
What we all must learn is to “Keep On” even when we have many setbacks or disappointments. We sometimes have to step back and write down on paper what we are doing to see where the issue is. Often times we have learned a way that we consider a shortcut that may be a handicap in the current situation. When we write it down many times we can clearly see where we are going wrong (or someone else can).

Albert Einstein

Well we sometimes are setback from our own discouragement. No matter if you fail at your fifteenth attempt to do something just remember this is all experience you can apply if you keep trying. Don’t you think that Einstein had to set some ideas down to pick them up later looking from a different perspective. To be discouraged is normal but to keep plugging is what we must do even when discouraged. To try the other approach. To look at it from a different angle. To sometimes get another opinion can be a great solution but when you try and try is the only way you can overcome.
Even the greatest minds in history had personal trials that posed them to interflection at some point or another. Many of the greatest ideas were discovered by chance. But that chance would not have presented itself if the individual had not been trying.
Even modern day science is no different how would any scientist be given a credit for discovery had he not been looking at the result of an experiment and applied the knowledge maybe to a different project. Science today uses techniques that are many centuries old applied using the conglomerate of knowledge and computation of the many who have studied beforehand.
So look closely at what you try to do. Look at what you want the big picture to look like in the end. And look for the paths from the end to the start. This will give you a different approach. No matter what the task you want to achieve if you try the and only then can you succeed.

Basic Commands

The ls Command, Hidden Files, Command-Line Options

In addition to directories and ordinary text files, there are other types of files, although all files contain the same kind of data (i.e., a list of bytes). The hidden file is a file that will not ordinarily appear when you type the command ls to list the contents of a directory. To see a hidden file you must use the command ls -a. The -a option means to list all files as well as hidden files. Another variant is ls -l, which lists the
contents in long format. The - is used in this way to indicate variations on a command. These are called command-line options or command-line arguments, and most UNIX commands can take a number of them. They can be strung together in any way that is convenient [Commands under the GNU free software license are superior in this way: they have a greater number of options than traditional UNIX commands and are therefore more flexible.], for example, ls -a -l, ls -l -a, or  ls -al –any of these will list all files in long format.

All GNU commands take the additional arguments -h and --help. You can type a command with just this on the command-line and get a usage summary. This is some brief help that will summarize options that you may have forgotten if you are already familiar with the command–it will never be an exhaustive description of the usage. See the later
explanation about man pages.

The difference between a hidden file and an ordinary file is merely that the file name of a hidden file starts with a period. Hiding files in this way is not for security, but for convenience. The option ls -l is somewhat cryptic for the novice. Its more explanatory version is ls --format=long. Similarly, the all option can be given as ls --all, and means the same thing as ls -a.