Emotions ….. All in a day’s work

As the morning sounds and light penetrate, the feeling of a new day, new work, new
books to read wakes me up. Spiritual in a way that I thank my creator for the birds that
sing, the flowers that bloom and my family. Most days its a sense of well being and
happiness.

My little phone looks at me, nudging me to pick him up (a phone has to be in masculine
gender, perpetually needing attention!!) and I give him a cursory glance and roll over
and decide to pick him up. Oh my! Is he active, emails from work, chats from
employees, whatsapp messages from India, mind you they are like a barrage of self help
books.

The pride and the happiness when I see a message from my daughter who is at an age
when her young adult self is defined by the distance from us and at a distance she is,
across the seas, in Australia. I reluctantly move on to the emails from work and it’s a roller coaster of emotions, some make me happy, some bring out compassion, some pure irritation, sometimes anger and some time doubt, did I sign up for the right role? Well I say to myself, let me give it a chance, let the day begin.

There is that customary daily call from my mother, and I become a child, I whine to her,
talk about my frustrations, what made me laugh and while she has this “I know you
better than you do yourself” refrain all the time, she is the one who shows me the
mirror every single day and prods me on. It is a high for me because she makes me
stand tall.

The husband prods around, now that we are working from home, is all over the place.
We work in different parts of the house but we do hear the mumbles from each other in
calls. It’s comforting to hear that and the fact that he is around too, well mostly being
around when needed and that he will make me a cup of coffee during the day.
Work starts and my pulse beats faster, call it adrenaline rush or call it the rush of my
feelings as I work. Certainly a sense of being busy, a sense of being engaged and
involved. The riot of emotions during the day at work amazes me, it’s like a rainbow,
probably much more radiant and much more alive and many more colours. There was a
stage when I used to shut my feelings away and work, the part that said keep your
feelings at home and bring yourself to work and vice versa. Some years into my career
with my fathers prolonged and progressice illness, that mode helped me survive some
tough years. Later I realised that shutting my emotions away is not very healthy and I

learnt to feel my feelings, my emotions and work with it. Work without emotions will
make me a machine, will it not? So I started indulging my emotions and I live with them
every single moment, from waking up to bedtime when la la land beckons me. What
changed in me as I let my feelings run is that the child in me awoke and by and large it
helps me in my job in HR, being happy in successes of people, being humble in others
success, my achievements, being proud of my team, my company, disagreeing with
colleagues a whole range of emoting at work but I feel its useful. I get a lot of “you are
emotional” and of course I am, why shouldn’t I be? AS long as it is within me and I
display it without harming others why not. That having been said, there are moments
when anger rears its head and I have to count to ten (there are moments when that
does not help much though!!). Many days it’s my manager who gets the brunt of my
emotions but then when I am hired the company gets the whole of me at work, godd,
bad or ugly, but I give the best of my best at work. Most days when I log off my emails /
work that I am doing, I do that with a sense of “Aha”, I have done so much today, just be
aware of the kaleidoscope of the feelings that I went through during the day at work.
Then comes the ritual of cooking (Oh dear!, I miss India, where I had nothing to do
either than come back from work, go for a walk with my friends, hug and cuddle my
daughter, argue with my mum, chat with the husband. Reena didi and my mum
managed the home, no cooking, no cleaning……I wish!!

So there you go, my daily life and its multiple colours, …….. Emotions at play, all in a
day’s work!!