Welcome, dear readers, to another month of taking metta off the meditation cushion and out into everyday life.
Last month found me pondering right speech amid workplace gossip in “Metta’s Changeover.” Rather than the transfer I was hoping for, this month held the stage with an unexpected plot twist.
I’ve often heard hospitality described as essentially “hurry up and wait,” and the same could be said of this month too, serving food, bartending, and housekeeping for a walking holiday company. After reporting just how unwelcome I’d been made to feel in a new job by the local female staff, I naively thought that I had my manager’s support to transfer to a bigger site.
Several subsequent rejections were followed by explanations from all involved, each contradicting one another. I wanted to give everyone the benefit of the doubt, but as I sat with the growing pile of spaghetti-crossed wires, something just didn’t sit right.
What came next was possibly one of my biggest and best lessons to date in both patience and discernment.
Sadly, all the behaviors I described last month simply escalated. I continued to turn up for each shift with as much metta as I could muster, despite really, really, really not wanting to be there anymore.
One evening, before dinner service, I surprised myself by bursting into end-of-my-tether tears on my teammate, housemate, and new friend scrubbing pots and pans. I felt like I was working in a daily unspoken warzone not of my making or understanding, and somehow my peace was the enemy. I had even volunteered to bow out gracefully, so why was I still here?
In the theater, to “exit stage left” means a quick or uneventful departure to make way for more significant events. I had hoped that this would be my role in all this, but clearly not.
And so instead of hurrying like I’d hoped, I waited.
Waited for clarity.
Waited for courage.
And, most importantly, waited for compassion.
Those who had witnessed my tears urged me to escalate my concerns. In my experience, however, official grievances often muddy the workplace waters even further, rather than resolve or change much. And so, instead of submitting an official complaint, I simply wrote out the unvarnished truth of my experience to my manager’s manager in the hope it could cut through the increasing tangle of spaghetti-crossed wires and perhaps improve working conditions for everyone—particularly anyone replacing me.
It turned out that my manager’s manager was on holiday for a fortnight, so more waiting followed.
Each shift went from the sublime to the ridiculous, so I kept my head down and my chin up. My heart wanted to trust that all involved were doing their best to help me move on, but my head knew the only one I could realistically trust was myself.
Every evening, I forgave the day’s happenings and comforted myself that maybe telling the truth and nothing but the truth would eventually hurry this waiting phase along.
Every morning, I thanked the Dharma for the ultimate opportunity to practice right speech in the most toxic workplace I’ve ever encountered. With another month, I discovered that the local female staff who were giving me such a hard time were also giving each other and themselves a hard time. This was most definitely not my, or anyone else’s, happy place, despite how hard the queens were defending their castle. Sadly, that included my manager by this time.
Dear readers, I must admit hurt and frustrated and angry parts of me were still trying to figure out this plot twist. But nothing my imagination could dream up made sense of it until the simplest explanation of all dawned on me during one sit. Although by now it could understandably feel very personal, it really wasn’t. The queens of the castle were simply bored and scared in equal measure, and most plots need a dirty rascal to poison the well.
This tiny glimmer of insight helped me regain some equanimity—as did remembering that an actor’s stage left is an audience’s stage right. While I like to think that I’m an unlikely villain, maybe adding metta to this workplace’s well tasted like poison to the others?
Some days, the waiting felt interminable, and it was tempting to just yell, “Liar, liar, pants on fire!” whenever someone misunderstood, misrepresented, or misled me from the opposite side of life’s stage.
Last month’s challenge was not to feed the workplace gossip. This month’s challenge was not to feed the workplace drama. But boredom still continued to create it daily, and I sometimes had to laugh to myself at just how uncreative their efforts were.
In any job I’ve been in, I take a “leave no one behind” approach before the end of shift, and I like to check to see that everyone I’m working with is well and has what they need before clocking off. After discovering last month that my current team was prepared to leave me in a potentially burning building, I made a point of continuing this approach, especially on changeover days.
Most of my offers received blank or dirty looks, perhaps because they thought I was checking up on them or showing off that I’d already finished, rather than checking in to see if they needed a helping hand? It cost me nothing to continue asking and kept me true to myself, so I carried on regardless, and offered to carry a heavy dirty laundry bag or finish off a bathroom as needed. Interestingly, by month two, my stage left and their stage right met in the middle and I sometimes received help making a bed, or left a vacuum cleaner instead of hiding it, as when I first arrived.
However, there was not much else I could change until my manager’s manager returned from holiday.
I turned the spotlight onto what was in my power to change, such as clearing the staff accommodation’s overgrown back garden and sowing a wildflower meadow to welcome new beginnings. As the latest joiner, I couldn’t take holidays yet, so instead I joined the local swimming pool and swam laps to the moon and back. At work, I flipped the script whenever possible, making the guests feel as welcome as I still felt unwelcome behind the scenes. Many were on their first holiday after losing a life partner, and their quiet courage encouraged me in turn.
Bartending became my favorite shift for an intermission from the drama, just for the simplicity of serving and listening to guests. Bored of my own musical choices, I asked them to DJ using the lounge Alexa. Introductions to amazing new artists and touching reminiscences about specific songs soon followed.
One night, a guest surprised me by asking what happened if we told Alexa we loved her? I laughed and said, in truth, that I’d only ever told her to be quiet at the end of a night. We declared our love and received a sweet song about loving us for our efforts. And when we cheekily asked her the meaning of life, she reminded us to be excellent to each other and party on, dudes—a nod to the 1989 film Bill and Ted’s Excellent Adventure. The irony wasn’t lost on me that Alexa’s AI was proving better and wiser company than the all-too human hostility playing out behind the scenes.
In musical theater, the “11 o’clock number” is a production’s show-stopping song at the end of the second act, usually when the lead character undergoes a transformation or makes a major decision. The name originates from when musical shows started at 8:30 p.m., and the name has stuck even if the timing hasn’t. Famous examples include “No Good Deed” from Wicked, “Memory” from Cats, and “Sit Down, You’re Rocking the Boat” from Guys & Dolls.
Dear reader, I often wish it was 11 o’clock now and that I had some new news to share after another month of waiting for this strange second act to close. My major decision was already made, but perhaps sometimes more transformation—as well as more poisoning of a particular well with metta—is needed before a show can truly stop as well as go on?
Or, to metta-morphose “What I Did For Love” the 11 o’clock number from A Chorus Line:
Kiss today goodbye
The sweetness and the sorrow
Wish me luck, the same to you
But I can’t regret
What I did for metta, what I did for mettaLook, my eyes are dry
The gift was ours to borrow
It’s as if we always knew
And I won’t forget what I did for mettaGone
Love is never gone
As we travel on
Love’s what we’ll remember
Related features from BDG
Navigating the Emotional Terrain of Social Media Through Vipasyana
On Relationships, Greed, and Generosity
The Language of Kindness
Buddhistdoor View: Separating Stress from Busyness—Helping Students Cope with Pressure
