Don’t  work  with  assholes—and  other  lessons  from  

my  trip  to  Spain  Susan  Mernit  

Oakland  Local/Hack  the  Hood/LiveWork  Oakland  February  2014  

July 2013, Oakland, CA: ! I use my last frequent flier miles!to buy a ticket to Barcelona in January 2014.!

My  goal  is  to  have  a  mini-­‐sabbaHcal    and  spend  3  weeks  in  Spain  

By December, I really need a break—fundraising is grueling—and we don’t really make our goal  

By January 14, I am so ready to go:!Not only am I leaving the country for 3 weeks—I am not even bringing my laptop.!

Spain is amazing  

We eat, !we drink, !we talk, !we read, !we sleep, !we look….!It is so relaxing!

We go everywhere….  

And I decide I love what I am doing! in Oakland!--I just need way better self-care  

And then I come home  

I have a full day of work,!a bunch of meetings….!

And I am in a !terrible mood!when I go home.!

What’s with that?  

And  then  I  realize…I  am  in  a  bad  mood  because    some  of  the  people  I  had  to  deal  with  were    complete  assholes.  

It’s the scarcity mentality.  

.  

Or,  to  put  it  another  way,  if  I  was  a  fruit  tree,  they’d  pick  the  fruit,  chop  the  tree  down  for  firewood,  and  then  complain  that  the  tree  DIED.  

And what would we have left then?  

So I have a profound insight !3 days after I come back !from this amazing,!restorative trip---:  

I need better language to !ward off the assholes  

“So how are you going to support! my organization?”  

“My consulting rate for that work is….”  

“No.”  

And with those words---!I should be feeling !A LOT better….  

Thanks!