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The Back Door into Adulthood

FROM
Break Out: Finding Freedom
When You Don't Quite Fit The Mold
James R. Hasse

"So our self-feeling in this world
depends entirely on what we back ourselves to be and do."
William James

The last time I referred to myself as "Jimmy" was in the fourth grade, and it never cropped up all the way through high school and college.

But, when I entered the workforce after college, I noticed the tendency among my superiors to call me "Jimmy," even though I clearly signed my letters "James R. Hasse" and the masthead of our company newsletter displayed the line,"Jim Hasse, editor."

It was an on-going amusement among the staff people in my department as they started tracking who within our organization called me, "Jim," and who called me," Jimmy."

We found the "Jimmy" people fell into two camps: the truly unenlightened and the condescending.

I must admit I have met very few condescenders in rural America.

Since my staff and I classified most of our "Jimmy" people as unenlightened, I gave the issue only a passing thought. Some things were worth fighting for and some were not. I had bigger fish to fry.

It was the early 1970s. I was making headway in my job -- getting things accomplished for the organization that I thought needed to get done, challenging management in a patient way to change ever so slightly into a more participative mode of management.

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