Ask HN: Reliving an old memory of traumatic meeting. How to overcome?

Let me share one thing I learned along the way.

I read a book “Woulda, Coulda, Shoulda” as part of my “personal MBA” mini-project.

Here’s the blurb:

   Who of us can claim never to have made a mistake, missed a goal, regretted a choice, or suffered because of another's action? For those who suffer from a constant sense of regret about the past, who feel their present lives have been immutably shaped by actions they could or should or would have taken but didn't, real help is at hand. In clear, uncomplicated language, Dr. Arthur Freeman, a leading exponent of cognitive therapy, and his colleague Rose DeWolf, a skillful translator of the cognitive method, describe the techniques and provide exercises that will enable readers to actually "unblock" the past. The authors demonstrate that woulda/coulda/shoulda thinking can be unlearned and that this process can be accomplished in a relatively short period of time.

Perhaps this can help. In the end, a lot of distress comes from organizational flaws and hiring argumentative people (and lots more) but the point is that you can only control what you can control. You.

I wish I had answers like “why do you say that? Show me a better way” … and so on. Try to find a supportive environment. Work on your craft. Some say to keep a record of your successes. Acknowledge your goofs (to yourself) and work on getting better. But definitely don’t let the past haunt you. Learn from it and move forward.

Sounds like that company violated the “No Asshole Rule” No place is perfect, but your immediate team is really important. Unfortunately, going into a job, they interview you, and not the other way around.

Good Luck

Thanks for the recommendation of book , I will definitely read it out. I totally agree that no matter what kind of situation you are in, the only change you can control is yourself.

I constantly feel like I want to interview the hiring manager next time I go through interviews:)

The longer we work, the more of these experiences we can have.

It's never nice to have, and sorry that it occurred, but bad experiences at work can teach you a lot about yourself, about others, and you'll pull more threads of wisdom out of it the more life experience you get.

There are always times where things go off the rails, the key is to keep things in perspective. Burnout is a rough beast, but we can learn a lot through it.

I've been working in IT > 30 years and there are many situations I've been through that I don't like to recall, but I also learn from them and when I see repetitions in behaviors (from anyone) then I'm one step ahead of any potential disaster.

It's experience, hard won experience.

You'll be fine in your next role, and wiser.

Thanks for explaining it so well. Can you please elaborate on 'keeping things in perspective' which you mentioned is the key here.

By perspective, I mean that things that happened in the past, have occurred in the environment of the past, not how things are now.

We grow as people, all the time, and what we are today is not what we were back then.

By going through a stressful experience, once we can take time to analyze it and take away lessons, then just by going through that retrospective process, we become different people.

So, the past is in the past.

Today we are not who we were back then.

Today we have a broader experience and more tools and points of view to view situations as they occur in the future.

That's why I say to keep it in perspective...

Let it stay in that part of your timeline, you're growing and learning through more experiences.

Be grateful for the lessons it has already taught you, and you definitely will learn more out of it as you get more experience.

Turning bad experiences into lessons that makes you a better person is a great skill to have. But it takes practice!

Thanks a lot for sharing your own experiences and explaining them so well. I am able to see this incident as a ball of learnings , some I learnt now and some I will as I have more experience in future. Thanks again.

Sounds like the team you were in back then was a bit dysfunctional but if you feel rage and shame over SW bugs in your codebase you need to address that first as it's a disproportional reaction to normal things happening in programming. Speaking up immediately but calmly when you get blamed for something you didn't do would be a good skill to acquire.

I agree with that I need to work on the skill of speaking up, however I feel I didn't do it here as I was burntout with some stressful situations at home like death of a family member and something like that life can throw again where I might not be very good at defending myself at work situations and succumb to people's insensitive behaviour around me. I believe I felt shame due the to insensitive comments in meeting like 'this is so basic' , 'if I was in this place I would have felt really bad about my work quality ' etc. I kind of internalised the shame thrown towards me.