‘Ripped Off’

Getting Shafted And How To Address Those Icky Situations

Being or feeling ripped off sucks.

You feel robbed, taken advantage of, blindsided, confused, angry and in most cases, your wallet probably got lighter or you wasted valuable time doing whatever is was you now regret on some level.

Transparency.

Transparency means to be straight up, clear, explicit, to-the-point with no grey areas. Common terms and phrases associated with transparency are words like honesty, integrity, reliability, trust, steadfastness, value and a good bang-for-your-buck.

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I’m not at all a fan of getting ripped off.

I’m not at all a fan of people or organizations thinking they can pull the wool over my eyes.

I’m not at all a fan of having my hard-earned money, money that I use to feed my kids and pay my bills, taken via ways that are shady or that haven’t been thoroughly disclosed up front first…even in the fineprint.

To chill before I act, I will usually throw on some loud music, go for a drive solo or go for walk to release all the feels and assumptions before I open my mouth or press send on that responding email or text message.

In the past, I’ve been in businesses where the language/culture had taken on a murky feel. I didn’t want to align myself with operating that way and so, after a while I opted out.

This post isn’t written directly to any particular situation or business rather in relation to and a relfection of an experience that came up in the last week and it reminded me of how I want to run my business.

I want and commit (to the best of my personal ability and awareness) to act with full transparency, over-delivering on what is promised, a price-up-front attitude and so full of value that no one ever feels ripped on my watch or dime. Inevitably I will fail at times and no matter what, I hope in advance that trust can be rebuilt and integrity can be felt.

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I’ve learned over the years, the best way to address those icky situations is to let the initial emotions subside…go for a run, sleep on it, journal, meditate, punch something (not a person or animal) or whatever you do to release the pent up feelings.

Then, respond (not react because you have now taken the appropriate amount of time to think about things right?) in written form or take notes along with you to stay on track if you are meeting in person.

Having your thoughts written or typed out in any form help to keep emotions out of the picture and offer a best case scenario for all. Stick to facts not feelings.

Then read and re-read what you wrote. Leave it and come back to it and read it again.

Often when we do that, we discover parts of what we wrote just don’t sit right in our gut for some reason. Those are the words we need to take out or we will wish we did and they should be deleted for peace-sake.

Read your text from a 3rd party point-of-view. Does emotion or anger skew the message? Will the receiving group or person hear what you have to say or will they feel blamed and harshed on which will lead them to put up an instant wall that will get you nowhere?

Above all, the most important thing before all of this is to consider asking thought-out questions first. Questions clear up so much misunderstanding, help build trust and positive communication and asking questions rather than assuming helps avoid much hardship in all relationships.

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A few moments ago, I sent my email reply. It was indeed a question and invitation to chat further on the issue.

I’m confident that it will be resolved and if not and the relationship ceases, life goes on and we will simply switch providers. No lingering hard feelings. Up and to the right.

-Becky