Tableturner

I struggle here. A lot. One of the things I struggle the most with is that one of my greatest skills, perhaps my greatest professional one, is shaking things up. I don't go around and see what everyone thinks or politely agree to mildly interesting concepts. I go into meetings and people's offices and tell them what's wrong and often lay out no uncertain terms about how it will be solved. It's a brash style and a pretty ballsy one, but I do it with great thought and accuracy and have received lots of respect, praise and appreciation for it in the past. I'm not a table-setter, I'm a tableturner.

I struggle with this here because seven months later I still don't know how to use this skill, or if I even can. I can see problems and understand the textbook solutions, but I never specialized in giving those solutions - I don't actually think anyone should. I specialize in knowing those solutions, understanding the local situation enough to know what to adopt and adapt and then making it work. This is what I do. I do it well and I like to do it.

It's not clear to me how to make this work here. What to do about it. How to make people think about it. I can write and help write all the project proposals in the world, but real change - sustainable change - comes from people and the system, not from grant winning. Proposal writing feels so close to table-setting and setting the table time and again makes me feel like a muted version of myself (on top of it, muting my strengths is currently helping my weaknesses seem monstrous). I can do it, I just don't really get any satisfaction from it. I need to find something satisfying.

It may very well be that I can't do what I am good at here. That blows and I have no idea how to deal with it. I need to find and tap into other strengths. First step: explore what they are. Tableturning is just so natural to me. Strategy and problem-solving are fun even. I regret that now may be time to turn over my own table though. Damn it!