A Lack of Trust

It happened a few Fridays ago.

I was getting really irritated with my job. People that I work with were getting on my last nerve. Big time. Wanna-be thugs from the hood. Showing up late. Not in uniform. Bitching about everything. Being lazy. Talking shit. Being assholes. I found myself starting to hate a little. Maybe a lot.

And the district manager…he was supposed to talk to me about when I would get promoted. It was certainly overdue.  I’d texted him messages that I wanted to talk about the plans for my future with the company and he’d never even called me back. I know he got the texts and he’d been at our location several times briefly since then and he gave me not much more than a quick hello. I was getting kinda pissed off. I realized I had a resentment about it.

So I found myself in an old familiar state of mind. I was angry and resentful at the company. The people. The bosses.  All of it.

The district manager dropped by briefly again. He talked to my manager, shook a few hands and left. Again. But this time I learned that there was some big news. We were all chosen to take a trip down south for an all expenses paid week of training. We were going to leave in a week.We were going to learn new company procedures and methods. Our location was going to get remodeled while we were gone. Exciting changes were going to be happening fast and soon. Everyone was really excited. Everyone but me.

My displeasure was plain for everyone to see. I didn’t smile. I got quiet. They were all laughing and eager for the adventure to come. Travel.  A hotel with a pool. The partying and drinking that they would do. I’m pretty sure my anger showed. I withdrew. Fuming quietly, I isolated myself from the others.

The thoughts in my head went something like this:

This is bullshit. I have to be with these people that I DON’T EVEN LIKE, twenty-four hours a day now? Seriously? They expect me to leave everything here for a week to go somewhere I don’t want to go? A week of around the clock  bullshit WORK TRAINING and I have to leave my home, my friends, my family, my AA meetings and routine? With only a week’s notice I have to give up my LIFE for a solid fucking WEEK? And that asshole district manager can’t take even ten minutes to talk to me? I hate this fucking job.

For a whole night into the next day I’d had a thousand doubts and resentments. I’d had nothing but negative thoughts repeating in a loop.

I said the Serenity Prayer about a dozen times but it didn’t seem to help.

The shitty voice in my head wouldn’t stop.

I’m gonna have to ROOM with these guys? They’re gonna be drinking liquor and smoking weed every night. I’m going to be forced to listen to that fucking RAP and hip hop shit? What if I can’t get to meetings down there? I’m not going to even have a car for a week. This is really going to suck. It’s going to be a disaster and I don’t even have a choice about it. They give us only a week’s notice? I hate this. I deserve better.  I should quit this fucking job.

And then it happened. A different voice. It was plain and clear and it wasn’t mine.

“Don’t you trust Me?”

Surprise and shock hit me like a wave. Where did THAT come from? That wasn’t my voice. It wasn’t me.

Strangely, it was audible but only inside my head. I thought I’d heard it out loud. Serious and direct, but maybe also a little hurt. Like a friend would say it.

And it stopped all of the other noises and thoughts in my brain. I felt better.  A peace and acceptance came over me in that instant. My trust and faith were restored as if they’d never left. I can’t even describe in words how powerful it was.

I got back from the trip last Saturday. I won’t tell you that I enjoyed it because I didn’t. It wasn’t great or wonderful. In fact, I was sick with a nasty sinus and throat infection the whole time down there. LOL. But somehow, I had peace and a calm and quiet mind.  I was in good spirits. I’d been granted some serenity. I did what I needed to do and I got through it…without drinking. Sober and reasonably happy.

Everything I go through is for some reason that I don’t yet know or understand. And maybe I never will know or understand.

I just have to trust.