Taking Responsibility for Everything

The summer after I graduated from high school, I took a job stacking boxes of fruit at a packing house. Basically, I would stand at the end of a converyer belt with two to three other guys. Each time a box would come to us on the belt we would stack it. About the only mentally engaging part of the job was making sure that boxes of peaches were stacked with peaches, plumbs with plumbs, and so forth.

During some parts of the day the boxes came slow and we could easily get them stacked. At other times, the boxes came to us on the conveyer belt at a pace that forced us to work faster. During fast times, if we didn't get all the boxes stacked in time some would fall off the end of the conveyer belt leaving peaches or plumbs to spill out of the box and roll everywhere.

The problem was, when the boxes came faster, everyone didn't work faster. Some guys worked as if they were content just to let the boxes fall. Others of us worked harder to pick up the slack. We took responsibility for not letting the boxes fall no matter how slow the other guys worked.

I was one of the guys that picked up the slack for others.

Looking back, I would guess it was the guys who didn't speed up that never had a panic attack or anxiety disorder in their life.

The guys that picked up the slack for everyone, like me, were probably the ones most prone to having panic attacks - or developing agoraphobia.