The Manager

I work with a manager, a very talented woman in her 40s. She is a gifted violinist and loves to ride her stable horse for recreation and release. They have no children but have a strong marriage. She tells me that her husband gently resents the tranquility and happiness that time spent playing the violin and riding her horse. These leisure activities give her great solace, comfort, peace and happiness.

Her husband must be devoted to her. He made the sentient remark that that happiness that she derives from  these leisure activities are a different and separate kind of happiness that he cannot provide her. He likely would never be jealous of her for talking to another man (she is religious and deeply faithful), but he is jealous of her separate self, doing her own thing, a kind of happiness producer that has nothing to do with him, no matter how he reacts to it.

So, I am going to go out on a limb and label this fine woman an individuator. She is also a very successful businesswoman, manager, budget-wielder and boss to 60 college educated employees.

As I often alert the reader, my philosophy largely grows out of the experiences I have enjoyed, and lessons learned from the people that I have met.

What she has taught me is that an individuator lives two lives at once. The first role played is that of a parent, partner, spouse and community member. What she does in that area demands much of her time, energy, love and handling abilities.

What time she has left is dedicated to her passions, her interests. These activities deepen and develop her personality. They give her an opportunity to explore her personality, her soul, her aptitudes, and expanding the thresholds of her talent. These opportunities will take her away from everyone else, but they will provide her with a type of happiness and contentment that are very unique and totally satisfying.

All individuators are moderate (note that this woman excels in the world of art and music as well as inthe busness world), so she will still be a parent, a partner, a spouse and a community member. Indeed, time spent away, developing and exercising the self like she exercises her horse, will enrich her relationships with the dear others in her life as she returns to the close friends, the community, etc.