Ever receive disappointing news? I don’t mean “I’m sorry, sir, but we’re out of the Boston Crèmes today.” Rather, news that alters the basic trajectory of your life, precipitating a decision of great significance for you and your family. I’ve received news of this nature this week, and so am dealing with the full range of dueling emotion and logic that news of this nature invariably brings.
For years, when people asked how long I intended to remain in the Army, my response has been essentially the same, that I’d stay until I quit having fun or the Army got tired of me. Funny that I always expected the former would happen long before the latter, and I’m sure those of you who’ve served can easily understand that assumption. Some days, right? Still, my last job was by far the most rewarding and exhaustingly enjoyable I’ve ever had, and I was looking forward to more such positions in the future. That will not happen, it seems, and the abrupt news to that end has made for a very interesting week here at Fort Haynes.
It’s a bit weird, you always hear about the stages of grief, and I’ve seen them play out many times over the years. Yet I never really understood that there seems to be a similar dynamic at work following a major disappointment. This week I feel I’ve gone through them all in dizzying succession: shock, disbelief, anger, and now rationality.
The shock is easiest to understand, I think. We’re taught in the Army to hope for the best but prepare for the worst, so the worst case of any potential decision or situation is never far from conscious thought. Still, the whole “hope for the best” part can cloud rational preparation for the worst, and I’ll admit that in spite of being very aware of the potential results of my promotion board, I still was not emotionally ready for it. Nor had I taken a single action to help prepare for that eventuality. It’s almost as if I felt that preparing for the worst was to admit defeat. Funny, now that I can look back on it a little, it’s a bit like saying “If I prepare my house in case the nearby river floods, it might flood.” Dumb, but there it is.
The disbelief is pretty easy to understand as well, I think, and it came quickly once the initial shock began to wear off. The promotion list physically hadn’t been published yet, and so maybe—just maybe—somebody had made a mistake. For those of you unfamiliar with how often the Army personnel system makes mistakes, you can, perhaps, be forgiven for finding this an odd reaction. For the rest of you . . . well . . . you can see how that kernel of thought can grow quickly, to be quashed in an instant a few days later when the list was officially published.
Then comes anger, a general bitterness from which we’ve probably all seen folks never quite recover. That anger usually is focused on people who’ve been promoted ahead of you over the years, and it evinces comparisons and evaluations that may or may not be valid, but are certainly not helpful. This line of thinking in turn leads one inexorably to consider ways to push back against the system, to get that small measure of revenge that would certainly, at a minimum, make one feel better. And after 23 years of service, there was, I’ll admit, a strong desire to burn the besieged fortress down around me. Many of you may have seen the results of such thinking over the years, and at times it has done tremendous damage to our institutions and, in some cases, our country. Don’t get me wrong, there are things that need to be changed in the Army, and these things need to be brought out into the light of day so they can be addressed for the good of the entire force, but that shouldn’t be confused with an angry, ill-considered pressing of the self-destruct button that brings about more harm than good.
So, finally, I seem to be moving into the rational phase. The place where I can seriously look at the problem, analyze the situation, account for the most important variables, construct potential courses of action, identify key decision points, and generally lay a course for the future for me and my family. In short, to do all the things the Army has taught me—over the course of two decades— to do when facing complex problems. This is where I am now, and, frankly, why I can sit here at my computer (yes, “The Scorpion King” is playing in the background), and write all this down for you.
I will say it was a near-run thing. I feel that I could easily have stayed in that place of anger much longer. I’ve no doubt at all that those emotions—and that’s what drives the angry response, a toxic concoction of emotion and pride—will return from time to time, but I’ve decided they won’t own me or determine my future. Still, I feel it could have happened that way, that I could have easily chosen a darker path.
Much as I’d like to take credit for finding my way out of the anger phase—claim it’s an indicator of the impeccable nature of my character, perhaps—the credit’s not at all mine to take. You see, I’ve been very fortunate over my years in the Army, to work for and with some truly incredible people. Of course, I’ve worked with some real morons as well, but one doesn’t reach out to folks like that in a time like this. And so, facing the most difficult situation I’ve encountered since entering the military back in 1990, I reached out to a small group of individuals I consider mentors, people whose judgment I trust implicitly. And I was not disappointed.
To a man, these individuals refused to feed the anger. They also didn’t waste a lot of time on pleasantries or the salving of wounded pride. These consummate professionals are all retired from the military and know me well. They each did the one thing I really needed, they provided me information. In every single case I gained data, increasing my situational awareness, all of which prodded me in the direction I needed to go, toward the rational, “figure-this-out” phase. In most cases I didn’t ask them for information, mind you, but that’s what every single one of these individuals provided, and I find myself deeply indebted to them for that.
In an earlier post I talked a bit about what makes me . . . well . . . me. Something else I’ve learned about myself over all the years is that I’m a problem-solver and, in point of fact, have always enjoyed that aspect of being an Army officer. So now, here I am, rapidly gaining awareness of a new, unfamiliar battlefield, taking it all in and looking for the best possible way forward. The Army’s provided me the tools to do this, and I have a collection of experienced and engaged mentors to help keep me on track.
For years I’ve cycled through the problem-solving process, generally with a view towards briefing recommendations to some senior-level decision-maker. I’ve generated excel charts and Powerpoint slides like the Sorcerer’s Apprentice, flooding email in-boxes and laying waste to vast forests, perhaps even making ME a primary contributor to global warming. But now, in dealing with this new problem set, I find I am the decision-maker (well, when my wife lets me be), but I’m also the action officer, and every other staff officer in between, and that’s a bit weird. This means, ultimately, however, that I get to choose my own path ahead, for perhaps the first time in my adult life. That’s kind of exciting, if a bit daunting as well.
Regardless of the novelty of the situation, however, I do need to get back to the work at hand, having taken enough of a break to jot all this down for posterity. It’s a different problem set than any I’ve ever faced, but at least I’m not alone, I have a veritable panel of experts with which I can consult as I analyze the situation and construct viable courses of action. I guess this time around I can probably forgo the usual excel charts and Powerpoint briefings. That said . . . old habits die hard.
Wish me luck!
M.G. Haynes