Yesterday I had an experience with two directors or higher ups that sent my self esteem into the gutter.

One of the directors articulates his ideas very intellectually vs in easy to understand terms, and I have a lot of trouble following his train of thought and the way that he speaks. He articulates very well, like a professor does, however, I need concepts to be explained to me in far more simple layman's terms with concrete, easy to digest examples.

So, I had trouble following the director's line of thinking in this meeting yesterday, yet this was a team or group "brainstorming" meeting, so I participated by speaking up several times. There were only 4 of us in this meeting, so it felt like I should participate. My other three colleagues were also speaking up.

Well, it turns out that my thoughts and points were kind of moot to the subject matter and irrelevant (or at least that's how it seemed to me), even though I thought I understood enough of what he was talking about to bring up a few valid points.

Well, towards the end of the meeting, I gave an example and asked if the example is along the lines of what he is thinking, and he said no, it's really not.

Point being, even though I spoke up and participated as a member of my team, I felt sooo stupid walking out of that meeting and felt like I had put a huge foot in my mouth.

My much younger colleague, in contrast, completely understood our director and had to explain the concepts to me after the meeting. Then I understood it, yet felt even worse because he had to explain it to me and I am 30 years older!

And now, I am dreading going to work. How do I hold my head high after this?

The only silver lining is I know that my boss and another colleague share the same difficulties following this director's dialogue, so I am not the only one who doesn't understand him.

My boss did say that we have to do a debrief with her boss (who was also in this meeting) about our meeting. So, it appears as though perhaps my own boss maybe also had trouble following the meeting.

But I woke up this morning feeling sooo incredibly stupid and ashamed of myself. I wish I had kept my mouth shut and remained quiet listening intently, rather than attempt to speak when I did not understand the subject matter.

I now worry about each of my colleagues' perception of me and the director: do they now think I'm incredibly stupid and foolish? Will they look down on me now and think less of me?

I tried, and failed. My self esteem and self image have taken a hit, that's for sure.

How do I recover from this? How do I not let this kill my self esteem at work? And how do I not worry about what others think?