Monday, 17 October 2011

The Art of self doubt.


Its 03.50 in the morning, so as I cant sleep, kettle on and Earl Grey at the ready. It was a un-comfortable dream that woke me from my slumber, and it did not take me long to analyze it either.
I was back at my old school Whitkey Abbey, a new headmaster was in play, and we had all gathered at morning assembly, change was everywhere, the assembly had been re organised to a impressive spectacle, like a Roman amphitheatre, the new head started to demonstrate to the pupils how to play fight with plastic swords, and as his demonstration progressed the pupils got carried away and started hurting each other. You could see that this was becoming a source of irritation to the head, he was the type of person in supreme control, and a sharp suit. Then all of a sudden he singled me out, called me David by mistake, and informed me I had to go and see some authority figure as if to imply I was in trouble. I naturally resented this as I did not want to be part of his spectacle, and his actions were quite un-professional.
So I walked out of morning assembly in a suitably demonstrative fashion and attempted to make my way back to 'T' block, slowly crowds of pupils began to gather, and tried to restrain me!. I began to throw them off me like rag dolls, but they became quite over whelming, I then bumped in to Lieutenant Uhura whom was trying to help me, then all of a sudden she joins in with the melee, with an apologetic look on her face, as she needed to demonstrate her acting skills. At this point an elderly black gentleman approaches me and scratches my left forearm with a hypodermic syringe. I naturally resist, but am overcome by the sedative. My dream sees me being taken away somewhere in a state of sedation, as pupils watch on the pitiful scenario, and the man with the syringe explains to the paramedics about the antidote to his injection and how it can be quite dangerous...
It was all to much for me and I woke up. Of course it is all quite clear to me now (to quote Dave Bowman from 2010). This powerful dream was about my recent experiences working for my last health care company. The situation I found myself in by being witness to bad management on an almost daily basis by multiple managers and not being in a position to do anything about it, and as they fail, they try to find a scape goat in the like of muggins here. As also in the dream, as I may be made to move on, the problems remain endemic within the organisation, and it will continue to fail until somebody in authority really does something about it all. Uhura was just doing as she was told as in that episode of 'Mudds Women' from Star Trek, where she had to pretend to want to be a beautiful android, so she's forgiven. Now I think about it, the guy with the needle was possibly Barrack Obama?.
Doubts and insecurity are always natural before you start a job for a new company, the trick is to channel those natural fears into a constructive and positive sense of dynamicism, and teach those around you never to let it happen to them. There are many times in my career that I have hated nursing, but have always loved psychiatry, for within psychiatry lies the truth, within ourselves and the actions we all take.

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