2024-04-15 04:03:54
He easily goes from melancholy to euphoria. It’s important not to get infected, but to center it so it doesn’t fail you too
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Well, he doesn’t even have a medical diagnosis. He’s just one of those people who are normal when things are going as usual. But in emergency situations, the tension makes them unbearable. They fall into a gloomy mood, the whole world is to blame for them, and especially those who are closest to them. Or vice versa – they are overwhelmed by euphoria, grandiose ideas come to them. And they like them so much that they become aggressive as soon as someone says that their genius ideas are impractical.
Great company just when coolness is needed to solve a problem at work or complete an urgent task assigned by the boss. But since your colleague is needed, this is not the time to get into a scandal or complain to the boss, who is probably already nervous. You have to fix yourself.
You have to keep your composure and discern
what type of bipolar behavior are you dealing with.
It’s relatively easier when your colleague drops out in a phase of depression. Be careful not to catch her – you know that emotions are contagious. Especially if there are several people in the team with unstable characters who are easily influenced, the situation can become downright hysterical.
Feel free to sympathize a little with your colleague’s pessimism, all the while letting him know you’re in the same boat. And you are suffering from the crisis, which is probably not your fault. But the sooner you act, the sooner you’ll solve it.
Take the initiative and very carefully suggest who should do what. Careful, because your sullen co-worker may become irritable and rude if he suspects you’re bossing him around. Now he is in melancholy, but he hates the whole nasty world, and in order to relieve himself of the tension, he will take it out on you like nothing. (Read here for a guide to dealing with a rude colleague.)
The reason is his mental instability, which is most likely due to lack of confidence in his professional skills. That’s why
instill confidence
that he can handle it. Even pretend that you need help, not him. You won’t be able to do without it, it’s invaluable for fixing the problem together. A few well-chosen words will center him and he will get to work.
You must act very delicately, if the cause of the situation is your boss. The moods of cyclophrenics are strongly influenced by the attitude of superiors. They can become euphoric when they are praised by their superior and world-sorrow if they feel underappreciated.
Even if the manager was unfair, do not dwell on it – neither scold him nor grieve. In both cases, you will not get your colleague out of the black hole. The only right approach is to make him ambitious that together you can rub the nose of the unjust boss – if you manage, he will be forced to praise you for your success.
Here, too, you need aerobatics to not unlock another condition in your colleague. Cyclophrenia in medicine is called manic-depressive psychosis. He doesn’t have a diagnosis, just similar behavior, but it’s very possible
to jump from depression to mania
precisely with the desire to prove himself. Until recently, a melancholic person is suddenly possessed by a grandiose idea, begins to walk back and forth, shake hands, talk a lot (specialists call it speech pressure). The more he explains his idea, the more he boosts his self-esteem and begins to feel invincible.
For this reason, cyclophrenics are often people who achieve success – when they have a really good idea, they implement it purposefully. (In the depressive phase, they can give birth to works of genius if they are engaged in art.)
But the problem is when the idea is not good. In the manic phase, your colleague will not tolerate rejection or attempts to improve her. Any criticism of her proposal
will take as a criticism of his own personality.
He will retaliate with anger that you didn’t expect because he never showed it in his normal state.
Therefore, do not start a dispute, but take care not to participate in the implementation of the insane idea. Come up with something and let the colleague realize it himself or postpone it. When he calms down, he’ll probably give up. It is possible that after that he will again go through depression for a while.
The cyclophrenic may fall into one of the phases not because of an incident or a crisis at the office, but because of an argument with his wife or an insolent driver who cuts him off. Depending on his character, he will tell or remain silent, sinking into depression and inability to concentrate on work. If he talks, listen and empathize, but don’t let him wallow in self-pity or get stuck in a manic phase. If he’s silent, try to engage him in something he’s interested in to take his mind off it. Until this happens, you will not be able to start working fully.
Whether the reason is personal or business, your most important task is to help your colleague
to switch to normal state.
Buy time to pass from one cycle to another. In contrast to the real illness bipolar affective disorder, when the so-called can occur without any reason. episodes and last for months, in cyclophrenic behavior mood swings occur relatively quickly. If you can afford 15 minutes or half an hour, take a break for coffee, a cigarette, lunch, a walk. Talk about something he enjoys. This affects the unstable character.
Then the person who until recently had been repeating “We’re failing” gets down to work, even gets enthusiastic and says “Whoa, we’re not going to get better.”
—–Clarifying Boss Concepts—-
Bipolar affective disorder is diagnosed on average in one out of 10,000 people. But people with cyclophrenic behavior are found significantly more often.
Cyclophrenia, by the way, is a denied name, so that non-specialists do not confuse it because of the closeness in sound to schizophrenia, which is a significantly more severe disease. The most accurate, but also the most unpopular name is cyclothymia – a condition characterized by chronic instability of mood, expressed in constantly changing episodes of mild depression and mild elation.
It is precisely this characteristic of many people, although most do not consider it a mental disorder and do not treat it. Therefore, it often turns into dysthymia, which is a chronically depressed mood, a sense of a lack of meaning in life, low self-esteem, etc. unpleasant symptoms.
It is bad luck to have a cyclothymic as your boss, especially since the condition most often occurs in stressful situations. You have to be careful not to get infected by the mood of the boss, and how to behave depending on what episode he is in – depressed or uplifted. Especially if elements of obsession appear during the elevated mood – not only grandiose and unworkable ideas that hit him (and the team) one after the other, but also arrogance, a sense of grandeur. Then any attempt to criticize or challenge can bring very unpleasant consequences for the subordinate.
The best tactic is to try to stay out of sight of the boss as little as possible until he returns to his normal state.
The unpleasant thing is that episodes of cyclothymia can last for several days.
In “The Right Man” you can read more:
And solitude is useful for career success
When you hate your boss but love your job
13 body tricks to help you at a job interview
How to raise your mental immunity for career success
Three tricks for successful personal energy efficiency at work
How spatial management at work helps to succeed
The surest sign that you’ve found the perfect job
The surest sign that you need to change jobs
How to deal with an emotionally manipulative boss who assigns collective blame
10 common but tricky job interview questions
You are successful if you choose your work and the boss