i have a question......how do you deal with someone who is power hungry and tries to drain every bit of it out of you? especially hen it is someone who has authority over you? what do you do to deal with it? and what is your advice on doing so, especially with someone who can make or break you?


Philip

philip you may not want to hear what i have to say about this, but take it with a grain of salt. we are all human. the fact is everyone is accountable to someone else, like it or not. there it is.

as for myself, being a victim/survivor has launched within me a plethora of coping mechanisms for dealing with relationships. certain types of relationships net a special kind of handling, and that means i have a defensive tendency to turn everything, whether i want to acknowledge it or not, into a control issue. the bastards don't want to see things my way, or do things my way, or approve that budget so i can get what i think is uber important to have.

i am not saying this is you, i am saying this is how i was. and being this way caused me a lot of stress and anxiety. but there came a time when i had to just surrender to the fact that i ain't the bossa the whole world, and that life would flow a bit smoother if i just accepted the fact that even people in charge can be human and dysfunctional [just like me!]

i spent a several months in bitterness after making a difficult decision to leave a job where i was on top of the world. and my boss and i got along famously, and our relationship netted an incredibly creative synergy that really grew the spirit of the community we served.

then he got transferred.

the new guy came into a situation which was unlike any type of job he had held previously. he was green. he wanted to 'be the boss'. and he wanted to have things his way. i hung on as long as possible, before i realized that spiritual damage control was in order and i just opted to move on to the next job that i felt called to do. eventually, with a lot of patience and personal growth, i overcame the bitterness and forgave both me and him, and moved on.

sometimes you just gotta know when to leave let dionne strum your pain with her fingers

but be careful not to run away, because no matter where you go, there you are,

just some thoughts that arose in response to your question.....

your brother in recovery,

ron

Phillip,

It is important to identify what you are willing to do and what you are not willing to do. If the other can work within the limits you set then the situation can be salvaged. If not, then you must look for something else and move on. It's as easy and hard as that. That is very easy to say and often very hard to do.

Remember you can't be broken if you are not there.

That's my thoughts.