Negativity..

Have been at photoshoot the past few days.. feel very drained by the long hours of standing, sitting, bending over and scrutinizing.
It has been really tiring.

Wednesday was really a bad day. Started off when one of my colleagues, A, who was in charge of the shoot that day was in a really bad mood. I'm still not very sure what happened to her, perhaps something happened at home and she's really homesick. She walked away from the shoot and left me and another colleague B to take over for her. I was initially quite unhappy as I felt it was quite unprofessional,and it's not the first time it has happened. B and I had quite a few meetings that day and A just left us to shoot. After about an hour or two, B and I really had to go for our meeting and A finally came back to shoot. The next morning, she was crying again... I hope things are ok for her. Today is Friday and she still looks a little down, but at least not so emotional.
God, what do I do at times like this? As a project leader, how tolerant and gracious should I be that a teammate should leave her position without accounting and expect other colleagues to take over? Subtly, I think the stress also comes as I feel my bosses and manager (who are not around) would want me to learn to handle the situation as a team leader. Can already hear them saying "You should stop covering up for each other!" "Phoebe, what would you do if your teammate does this?"
Thank you Lord, for helping me not flare up at her. Grant me peace at heart and more grace to handle people relations. Now that she's feeling better, grant me wisdom to speak to her if needed!

That day, other unfortunate things also happened - rushing from meetings, spilled coffee all over the wooden floor in the store room and had to clean up, realized that the flats that we were interested in on the HDB sale all taken up by others already, flared up at ST in the evening and said some really harsh comments. Not knowing that he also had a terrible day and was feeling downcast with his job, my comments only aggravated the situation. And I was reprimanded for my bad spirit and lousy attitude and ungracious remarks late that night and the next morning. Was quite affected by it and found it difficult to work the whole day, but I guess that's not the point. Point is to learn from the lesson...
God, help me to be more sensitive and more gracious with my thoughts and words. Help me be more humble and not put unneccessary expectations on others. Help me also to learn to control my emotions and pour out to you instead of transferring my frustrations to someone else, whether it is ST or my colleagues or my family. Help me to love despite my emotions! Help me also to not take harsh words personally and harbour hurt and anger but to absorb your Truth and grow. Thank you for forgiving me for all my sins and weaknesses. Be my leader and my refuge..

In the midst of all these, there's also stress from other parties at work. Clients, partners, potential partners or outsiders we work with. I guess they'll have constant requests for more and more things. This negatiation business is tiring and strenuous too. I really don't like this part of my job, yet I know it is essential and important. How do I say no politely, without hurting the working relationship? How do I be shrewd such that I can protect myself from those who always want to grab and eat me up, take as much advantage of me, my company or the situation as possible? How do I balance this with God's principles of kindness and consideration, yet not be a stupid prey? I find myself feeling stupid each time others have taken advantage of my 'goodwill- thinking for others'. Seems like I better learn fast when I should and when I should not "think of others first". God help me be shrewd as a serpent, yet innocent as doves.

Since then, coupled with the physical tiredness from photoshoot, negative thoughts have been invading my mind. (Reminds me of the movie Independence Day.. when aliens invaded the earth suddenly and from all over. And their strength was technology and telepathy.) I have what I think can be called chronic negative thought attacks. They can happen quite suddenly and at any time of the day- whether at work or at night or on the bus. Need to hang on desperately for dear life, to God's Word. If not I think these chronic attacks are going to eat me up even if the world doesn't. Pray.. it's my only weapon, but I believe it is powerful. Speak positively for God. Let not discouragement or negativity (the devil's weapons against us) get us down.

"The weapons we fight with are not the weapons of the world. On the contrary, they have divine power to demolish strongholds. 5We demolish arguments and every pretension that sets itself up against the knowledge of God, and we take captive every thought to make it obedient to Christ." 2 Corinthians 10:4-5

"Finally, brothers, whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable—if anything is excellent or praiseworthy—think about such things." Phil 4:8