Karmic Hall of Fame

Like it or not, we make our own reality. Basically. We don our own special suit, custom made to fit our particular karmic needs in this life. We dwell in our own personal hotel room, designed just for us BY us--often with just the right level of discomfort: too hot, too cold, hard mattress, etc..

Lots of ways to analogize one's life. However portrayed, it's ours and ours alone with all its joys and sorrows. And it's a mixed bag, at least for most of us. Some aspects of your life go along without a hitch, smooth as silk, while others seem to constantly get stuck in the carpet.

It's those sticking points that are the most important as far as our development: those mistakes we keep making over and over and over again. That's where personal growth occurs, where you finally figure out what you were doing wrong, and why the hell you've been doing it that way all this time!

There are several professions out there that seem to tag folks caught in this behavioral trap, really as a condition of their own existences: Law and Law Enforcement, arresting and convicting repeat offenders; and Human Service agencies(whether private or State or Federally funded)servicing habitually unemployed(and some downright unemployable) people. In either line of work, you do have a good number of folks you only have to see once--but you have an equally "good" number you see over and over and over. Their mistakes bring them back in the door again and again.

And again. Having worked in the Human Service biz for the last 15 years, I've definitely seen my share of folks--some one-timers and some over and over and over again since 1991, and probably until I retire! We refer to them(behind their backs of course) as our Gold and Platinum members, which of course is a distinction-in-reverse, since they've screwed up enough times(i.e. had to come to our office) for us to remember them.

Like any sizeable group of people, our "chronics" aren't a totally homogenous bunch. There's some variance going on. A number of them are nice personable folks who just seem to screw up on a regular basis, but come in and work with us when it happens, when the rock has rolled back down the hill(referring here of course to The Myth of Sisyphus, aka the 'ancient futility rite') without blaming anybody but themselves for it. No problem. Sometimes a pleasure--well, as much as this kinda stuff can be..

Unfortunately, about as many of our "chronics" are unpleasant, often downright toxic characters whose "dysfunctional disposition" loses them job after job after job--and of course none of those 278 times they got canned was their fault. The files on them really start to pile up, really start to gain some heft as issue after issue is added over the years.

One such client, who may well be our Ultimate Hall of Famer(at least during my career), has graced our office for my entire time, since 1991.Their file as far as issues is now on par with a couple Tokyo phone books. I'm figuring that by the time I retire in another 8 or 9 years, it will require a fork-lift to transport.

(Okay, I could make a joke here about the client themselves requiring a fork-lift by then if they keep expanding like their file , but I think I'll show some restraint. Nice of me, don't you think?)

You gotta understand, these are people who've come in year after year- and even decade after decade-leaving the stench of their dysfunctionality behind like the mephitic remains of a 3-Sancho lunch. They manage to alienate staff and management to the point where they're known simply by their first name. Star status of a sort. Kinda like Cher. Or Bono. So you really need to get in a retaliatory dig at least once, from all the times you've "taken it" from this individual..

And the thing is the answer to their problems is usually so simple. Just take responsibility for your actions and behavior: 'gee I really screwed up here. I'm gonna have to try and do better next time.' From there, you have a shot at fixing things. But not until then. As long as you're blaming everybody else, you'll just end up circling the airport.

Hm, just like it's their Karma to be screwing up every job they get, maybe it's mine to be taking care of them. Maybe human service type folks were pain-in-the-ass clients themselves in a former life, the bane of some poor civil servant's existence. Well, hopefully I've paid enough back in this lifetime to break the cycle of client-and-civil servant, and move on...