Image from Unsplash
As I turned on my YouTube page yesterday, a podcast of a lawsuit settlement between a famous celebrity Chef and his former Employees showed up
on my recommended feed. Out of interest, I watched it and was both triggered and inspired at the same time.
As one of the former employees spoke of this celebrity Chef, I had a flashback to when I met him (too) while I was working. How he put his hand on my coccyx and my facial reaction that prompted him to make a joke to distract how awkward it was. We were so busy at work that day that I had forgotten it happened until now. After watching this video, I recalled other times when I met and worked for Chefs who were well-known who mimicked this behaviour. One of them once told me that he loved my lips and licked his in front of his ex-wife. Which was very inappropriate.
Today, I see how accepting this behaviour has had an impact on how I have settled for abusive relationships in my personal life. As, how we do one thing is how we do others.
As always, I have learnt and grown from every experience. So, I don’t take it back. I just acknowledge, learn, heal and grow.
Here are 3 things that I wish I knew before I became a waitress in New York City.
1. Being prey for an abusive person does not mean that you deserve it.
I used to work at a wine bar in Midtown, N.Y.C. and one of The Owners was known to be a womanizer, alchoholic and drug addict. Even though he had a girlfriend (who he mal-treated), we would see him once-a-week with a different woman. I am not sure if anything would happen with them, honestly it was none of my business, but it was clear that there was romantic interest between him and these random women because they would hold hands and he would pull out all the stops.
As an extension of his general aggressive behaviour, he would call me into his office and ask me how I was doing, flirt with me and suggest days that we could hang out. I made it known that I wasn’t interested and when I did, the retaliation began. I told a (then) friend what was happening to me and he asked me why I was always in circumstances like this. He suggested that this was a me issue. Unfortunately, I believed him and I developed this belief that I would have to make myself small in order to be taken seriously. I carried this belief into relationships too. So, I would rarely voice how I felt and allow for mistreatment.
Looking back with learnéd eyes, it is clear that I was not the problem. As a society, we will make the person who is being abused the problem and neglect the abuser, while the abuser goes on to abuse many more. The Chef I mentioned earlier is a prime example of this. I have learnt and clearly understand that when someone tries to make me feel small by coming onto me or with inappropriate behaviour, it is not a space that I want to stay in and I need to voice how I feel or protect myself from who is making me feel uncomfortable.
2. Money does not warrant abuse.
As a whole, when I would tell people about what was going on at work, my fear of not making money was fueled by their commentary. I would hear questions like, ‘What will you do for money?’, ‘Sometimes you just have to bear it’ or, ‘Where you go will probably be worse than where you are now.’These phrases could have been true, yes! But, so was my cry for help.
It‘s not only with careers, in family and societal dynamics we often cover up abuse by mentioning what someone has done for us or given us to accept abusive behaviour. No matter what someone has done for you, you have every right to say that you feel hurt if someone hurts you. Materials and past behaviour is not an excuse to mistreat someone in the present moment.
3. We need to listen to each other more.
I can’t emphasize this to myself and to others enough! We need to hear each other’s stories before we make assumptions about how someone is looking at a situation. Before I graduated as a health coach, I rarely listened to people and would throw phrases at others to help them solve an issue because, as a wellness expert, I thought that I knew everything.
In one of our learning modules, The Professor asked us if we are truly listening to others when they speak. I answered honestly to myself, ‘no’. I knew that I could do better and listen to more people when they spoke. We live in a rushed culture where we hardly listen to how someone is; even if we ask. Starting to listen to others deepens the relationship that I have myself and others because it allowed me to acknowledge what I was going and did the same for others. Sometimes people don’t need fixing; they just need someone to listen and shoulder to cry on. It doesn’t mean that they are being negative or weak; it just means that they are going through something.
