what i experienced today at the hospital reiterated my belief that to live life in a less stressful way, we should learn to relax and stop comparing! let me elaborate.
at the hospital ward, i had to leave the room to allow the nurses to change my mum's diapers. so i waited at the corridor. there was this man talking very loudly to his lady friend. and he sounded very angry. more accurately, he sounded furious. and it was difficult not to hear their conversation...
he was explaining to his lady friend why he was angry. apparently, the evening before, when he visited his wife (who was a patient) with some other people, he was told by the admin clerks at the ground floor that due to h1n1 control policies, each patient could only have a maximum of two visitor at a time. and as their group had more than 2 persons, they had to take turns to visit. he did so. but when he came up to the ward, he noticed that some patients had more than 2 patients. feeling cheated, he went to ask the staff nurses why so. the nurse explained that patients considered dangerously ill were allowed more than 2 visitors. he was not convinced and went through the whole ward to count how many visitors each patient had. room by room. and he noticed that `quite a few' patients had more than 2 visitors. and so, he went to the nurses and blasted at them. he then told his lady friend that he was considering writing to the ministry of health to get the nurses sacked.
he seemed pretty serious when he talked about getting the nurses sacked. his lady friend was obviously uncomfortable with this proposal and asked politely if this was gonna solve the problem. ignoring her, he went on talking about how he totally hate people who do not do their work and that since he has to do the work for them, it would be better for them to be given the boot. and he related another story about how he, sometime back, visited housing development board (hdb) to complain of some discarded materials at the void deck. the staff told him that they will sent some one to clear the things. but after waiting for 3 weeks, it was still not cleared and he wrote a letter to his mp (member of parliament) detailing how he made the complaint, who he made the complaint to, and how it was not followed up. and according to him, the guy that handled his complaint was given the sack.
seriously doubted this point of his. nonetheless, when i heard these words, i felt uneasy. it seemed like this man was full of angst. he was a very unhappy man. and it seemed like he has a habit of being unhappy. and i reflected. firstly, it struck me that he was like that becos he he liked to compare. and when we compare, we would always put ourselves at the losing end. we would end up feel slighted. we would start to feel disgruntled and dissatisfied. yet amidst all these, who suffers? we ourselves. what's the point right? secondly, granted that there might be people who might not have done their job well enough. but why take matters into our own hands? why blast them? certainly, blasting at people and getting them sacked would certainly not solve the problem or teach the person how to do things better right? what about giving another feedback? what about giving suggestions as to how things could be improved? what about talking to their supervisors? then again, a more fundamental question was - did he get to the right person in the first place? for example, in the case of the hospital visitor count, the enforcement of such policies was certainly not the nurses. nurses were there to take care of patients. why did he not approach the admin clerks? had he barked up the wrong tree in this case? also, for those patients that had more than 2 visitors, how could he be so sure that those were not in the dangerously ill list? or had he assumed they were not?
sighs... i don't know about the details, but one thing i know for sure. this man should stop comparing! and he should learn to relax, take things easier and give himself less stress.
:-)
at the hospital ward, i had to leave the room to allow the nurses to change my mum's diapers. so i waited at the corridor. there was this man talking very loudly to his lady friend. and he sounded very angry. more accurately, he sounded furious. and it was difficult not to hear their conversation...
he was explaining to his lady friend why he was angry. apparently, the evening before, when he visited his wife (who was a patient) with some other people, he was told by the admin clerks at the ground floor that due to h1n1 control policies, each patient could only have a maximum of two visitor at a time. and as their group had more than 2 persons, they had to take turns to visit. he did so. but when he came up to the ward, he noticed that some patients had more than 2 patients. feeling cheated, he went to ask the staff nurses why so. the nurse explained that patients considered dangerously ill were allowed more than 2 visitors. he was not convinced and went through the whole ward to count how many visitors each patient had. room by room. and he noticed that `quite a few' patients had more than 2 visitors. and so, he went to the nurses and blasted at them. he then told his lady friend that he was considering writing to the ministry of health to get the nurses sacked.
he seemed pretty serious when he talked about getting the nurses sacked. his lady friend was obviously uncomfortable with this proposal and asked politely if this was gonna solve the problem. ignoring her, he went on talking about how he totally hate people who do not do their work and that since he has to do the work for them, it would be better for them to be given the boot. and he related another story about how he, sometime back, visited housing development board (hdb) to complain of some discarded materials at the void deck. the staff told him that they will sent some one to clear the things. but after waiting for 3 weeks, it was still not cleared and he wrote a letter to his mp (member of parliament) detailing how he made the complaint, who he made the complaint to, and how it was not followed up. and according to him, the guy that handled his complaint was given the sack.
seriously doubted this point of his. nonetheless, when i heard these words, i felt uneasy. it seemed like this man was full of angst. he was a very unhappy man. and it seemed like he has a habit of being unhappy. and i reflected. firstly, it struck me that he was like that becos he he liked to compare. and when we compare, we would always put ourselves at the losing end. we would end up feel slighted. we would start to feel disgruntled and dissatisfied. yet amidst all these, who suffers? we ourselves. what's the point right? secondly, granted that there might be people who might not have done their job well enough. but why take matters into our own hands? why blast them? certainly, blasting at people and getting them sacked would certainly not solve the problem or teach the person how to do things better right? what about giving another feedback? what about giving suggestions as to how things could be improved? what about talking to their supervisors? then again, a more fundamental question was - did he get to the right person in the first place? for example, in the case of the hospital visitor count, the enforcement of such policies was certainly not the nurses. nurses were there to take care of patients. why did he not approach the admin clerks? had he barked up the wrong tree in this case? also, for those patients that had more than 2 visitors, how could he be so sure that those were not in the dangerously ill list? or had he assumed they were not?
sighs... i don't know about the details, but one thing i know for sure. this man should stop comparing! and he should learn to relax, take things easier and give himself less stress.
:-)
No comments:
Post a Comment