Organic Mutant

Changes are afoot at CasaWeX.  There has been something hanging over my head for the last few weeks, taking up a lot of psychic real estate.  I was very apprehensive about beginning this particular chore because I felt unsure about tackling the necessary steps to complete the task.  Today I finally sat down and addressed the issue without allowing myself time to feel the fear and I completed it in about an hour.  I felt turmoil and stress in the midst of the task, negotiating this particular bureaucracy.  I even ingested some rescue remedy at one point due the constriction I felt around my throat from the many steps needed to be taken and decisions to be made. When I was done I felt so relieved and excited.  The pressure of the last few weeks evaporated.

Several weeks ago I finished reading A Framework for Understanding Poverty.  The book illustrates the assumptions that our society makes about the value of different types of knowledge (among other things) among different economic strata.  Something that the middle class takes for granted is the cultural knowledge of knowing how to surmount forms, hierarchies, and complexities.  I feel relatively experienced in dealing with bureaucracy, but the fear and apprehension that was coagulating my thoughts in the prelude to taking care of this piece of business was amazing.  I can’t imagine being a non-native English speaker trying to deal with this or even someone with less experience trying to negotiate these treacherous pathways.  Wade & I were discussing some of our choices and we had to pause to decipher the lingo and even trace out our understanding of the construction of the organization in order to move forward in understanding.  How does one do this with limited reading comprehension?  My hesitance played out in fear, but once I undertook the task and completed it, I felt great.  I’m sure there’s a lesson here somewhere.