Fatalism pervades glum outlook on work: Take charge

This is sick I mean major barf-city. I have fingers down my throat.

In my consulting work, I often will ask the question, "What can you do to become part of the solution around here?"

I hear, over and over again, "My best hope for the future is winning the lottery or hearing that someone in senior management has taken early retirement." That's it. End of story.

Think about it. If I can believe what I hear, every day millions of us are goosed out of bed by the thought that today may be the day when the right numbers will mystically appear under our scraping dime at a convenience store or we will hear the sweet whisper that we will no longer be doing hard time for Mr. I-Know-It-All-And-You-Are-Nothing-More-Than-Pond-Scum-In-My-Life.

Have you noticed there is a pervading fatalism, rivaled only by Nietzche, that any attempts to improve are a gigantic waste of time because nothing will change.

Our only hope seems to be this retreat into what is called magical thinking. This line of reasoning assumes that randomly, some day, a prince will ride in on a white horse (or a speeding Publisher's Clearing House van) and screech to a stop in front of our twice-mortgaged homes and make it all better.

Notice what this may mean for your workplace.

First, we are all victims. Work doesn't fulfill or complete us