What a difference a day makes, they say. And in deed, what a difference 4,383 days make! Yes, I’m old enough to remember the Australia 2020 Summit, organised by then Prime Minister Kevin Rudd, which took place on this day in 2008. A time of unbridled optimism when we looked forward to the year 2020 as some mystical far off time when anything was possible.
But we didn’t really know what was possible, that’s why we needed a Summit! The only things we could predict with any certainty is that Holden would always be “Here for the Long Haul” and this new fangled social MyFace thingy was a flash in the pan that would never really catch on. (I also seem to recall myself predicting mobile phones with camera’s would never catch on).
But we none the less hypothesized that by 2020 we’d have self-driving cars, be landing on Mars, and have a cure for every disease (how ironic!).
Fast forward to 2020, and who on earth saw THIS coming? We know that life can throw up the odd curve ball at times, but OMG 2020 has just been the mother of all curve balls! Normally, this is what happens right, every now and then, life throws you a little hurdle in your way, a little speed hump that you need to overcome. It may affect you for a little bit. If you’re in business, it could throw you off kilter for a while. But like a cyclist that hits a bump in the road, you may loose balance for a moment, swerve to regain control, but then you’re back in your mojo, back in the groove and continuing like nothing ever happened.
Those things are unpleasant, but they do happen in life. They’re short lived, we keep going, battle along and make it through, come out the other end often stronger and better for the experience. But then we have something like the COVID-19 experience.
This is not a temporary bump in the road, not so short lived, looks like being around for some time to come but even after it has passed, the effects that it has had will be so profound that it will reverberate for much longer than the disease itself.
This is something that we’re not used to, not prepared for. For the vast majority of us, it’s like nothing we’ve ever experienced in our lifetimes. As a Life Coach, I’ve seen first hand just how devastating this has been for many of my Clients.
One of my Clients was a young woman who only recently started working with me before all of this happened. She is a hairdresser who only just started her own business working out of her home. When she came to me, she was so excited about her new Business and bursting with enthusiasm for the future. Now her Business has closed overnight, her husband has had to stop work and they have a home loan, business loan and no income!
Another Client that I’ve been working with for over a year now, she actually used my eBook, “How To Profit From Your Creativity” (which you can download from my website www.dreamfulfilmentlab.com) to come up with the idea for her Business. She started a Business from home selling Gourmet Cookies to cafés and restaurants. Her Business has all but died overnight too.
The things that have been very important for me to impart to, not just to these 2 women, but to all of my Clients, and indeed everyone, is that the most important think you need in a situation like this is the right psychology...
It’s fair to say that most people have never experienced anything like this in their lifetime, but then some people HAVE. Things like this are, thankfully, extremely rare. But they DO happen. Things like WW1 & WW2 were both MASSIVE events in the life of people, that caused RADICAL change and completely turned peoples way of life upside down in a way that no-one could have previously imagined. This created fear of what might happen next. It’s hard to think about the future when there’s so much uncertainty. What will happen next? Are things getting better or worse? When will this all end? Does that sound familiar?
These things do happen in our lifetimes and they will profoundly alter our way of life and leave a scar that none of us will ever forget. But as bad as it gets, remember nothing lasts forever. COVID-19 WILL end at some point. We don’t know when, it’s hard to imagine right now, but we know it WILL. Emerge from this we will, and it’s how we respond to this adversity which will determine how we will emerge.
What I personally believe, and what I have been teaching all of my Clients through this challenging time, is that there are 4 key factors to focus on which will determine how successful you are at not only surviving this, but charging forward to an empowering future.
1.) Accept that these things happen.
2.) Embrace the NOW.
3.) Prepare for the end.
4.) Look forward to an inspiring future.
Accept That These Things Will Happen.
The first and most important thing you need to do in situations like this is to accept that these things will happen in life at some point. If you think, I just need to survive this and then nothing like this will ever happen again! The next time something like this happens you’ll be right back to where you are now. And as much as you may HOPE, or even BELIEVE, that this will never happen again, there’ll always be that lingering doubt that maybe it WILL happen again. And that doubt will never allow you to have true peace because there’ll always be that thought at the back of your mind that says what if.
Things of this epic magnitude are rare, but they do happen. They’ve happened throughout history and they always will. Even if you mentally prepare yourself for the possibility that there could be another pandemic, what would happen if there were a Tsunami, or World War 3. We need to be able to prepare ourselves to deal with ANY eventuality. When I was young, I used to suffer from ‘Happily Ever After Syndrome’. What I mean is, I was always a work hard now, play later kind of personality, I wanted to get in and get ALL the work done and then I could just relax. When I left school, I was super ambitious, I started my first Business at age 18 because I was desperate to work my arse off, to set myself up for life, and then I’d never have to work again. I discovered though, that life doesn’t work that way. Life is constantly in motion; new things are always happening. There will always be new things to adapt to, probably not as massive as COVID-19, but if we prepare ourselves for constant change and not only accept that change will happen, but embrace it, we can walk forward through life with confidence knowing that whatever life throws at us, we will be able to adapt. I wrote a Blog about this exact thing back in 2016. You can read it (which I do recommend) here….
Embrace The NOW.
As much as we should be ready for whatever life throws at us, we should never forget to embrace the now. Even in the midst of all the stuff that is going on around us, we can all find things in our day to be grateful for. And they say that every cloud has a silver lining, so amidst all the bad things that have happened as a result of COVID-19, there’s probably some good stuff that’s happened to, that wouldn’t have happened otherwise.
There’s plenty of stories about how COVID has been bringing communities together, people helping people. All this extra time that people have on their hands has seen a surge in people getting out and exercising, looking after their health. Hardware stores have been booming as people put this time to use doing gardening and all the odd jobs around the house that they’ve been putting off for years. Take the time to ask yourself, are there any changes that have happened in your life as a result of COVID-19 that have had a positive effect, that wouldn’t have happened any other way, other than what we’ve been going through?
And that’s just the things that have happened as a result of COVID, but irrespective of this, there’s always things that we can find each day to be grateful for. Some people keep gratitude journals, I’m not a huge fan of this because what usually tends to happen before too long is it becomes like a monotonous chore and loses it’s meaning, and you end up just doing it for the sake of it and not being grateful at all.
but what I am a HUGE believer in learning to NOTICE when thing happen that you can be grateful for and then just taking the time to linger in that moment for just a little bit longer than usual. There are things going on all around us constantly that we can be grateful for, but usually we miss them. We’re too busy with ‘life’ to notice these things, but they are there. So step one is to notice them, and then once you’ve noticed them, step two is just to take a little longer than normal to stop and just be in the moment and allow yourself to FEEL the feeling of gratitude for them.
And it doesn’t have to be a massive thing, we’re surrounded by simple little things each day that we can be grateful for. It can be as simple as stopping to notice the beauty of nature, or a compliment that you receive. When these things happen, and they do, we’re usually too busy to really take it in and appreciate it. I can remember a stark example of this one time when I was working in the Corporate World, I was on my way to work one morning, on a train approaching Central Station, when we got delayed at a signal for about 5 minutes. I remember everyone around me was complaining about having to wait, and how they were going to be late and so on and so on, meanwhile I was just sitting there looking out the window and I happened to notice the Sun catching some grass at just such an angle it seemed to glow. So whilst everyone around me was complaining, I was sitting there feeling grateful for this beautiful image that I was witnessing.
So the next time that this happens to you, just take a few extra seconds even to just stop and really appreciate it and be grateful for it. Linger in that moment for just a few extra seconds until you can actually FEEL yourself starting to experience the feeling of gratitude. And I can promise you that the more you do this, the more you’ll start noticing things to be grateful for, the more you start noticing things to be grateful for, the more grateful you’ll become as a person, and the more grateful you become as a person, the more your life will change.
Prepare For The End.
When I say prepare for the end, I’m not talking about the end of the world! (Cue R.E.M “It’s The End of the World”), I’m talking about the end of this whole COVID-19 thing, because we know that it definitely will end. So the question that I would have for you is, how do you want to emerge from it? Are you just hunkering down waiting till this all passes or do you have a plan in place for what you want to happen WHEN it passes?
Some people say it’s hard to plan for the end when nobody really knows exactly when this thing will actually end. Well, for me personally, I’ve actually never been a big believer in putting time frames on my Goals anyway, because I find that to be too limiting. When you visualise the future, you have to see yourself being there as though you’re actually there right now. Imagine this things has now finally passed, what do you want to have accomplished while it was all going on?
We know it’s going to end at some point, so what are you doing right now to prepare for that time? What does that vision of your future self in world where COVID has passed look like? As I’ve said, many people are taking advantage of all the extra time that they have to do things like gardening, working on the house, learning new skills, starting a new hobby. The list is limited only by your imagination.
Look Forward To An Inspiring Future!
Lastly, we need to look forward to an inspiring future. We need to prepare now for the end of COVID-19, have a vision for what we want our lives to look like, and all the things that we want to have accomplished when this thing finally does end. But then what? What do you want to do with your life after COVID? How long will this thing last, maybe another 3 months, maybe another 6 months, probably not going to last another 12 months.
So let’s look forward to say 2-3 years down the track. Fair to say that COVID would have well and truly passed by then. As we’ve said, you have to accept that life will throw you a curve ball from time to time, you have to be ready for that, you have to be prepared for all eventualities, but let’s say it’s 2-3 years’ time, life is back to normal. What do you want your life to look like then? So this is like a Goal setting exercise as if COVID had never existed. Imagine you could go back to this time last year, coronavirus was a hangover you got from drinking too much Corona, and you booked a session with me and we were doing Goal Setting. What Goals would you be setting yourself?
It’s important at any stage of your life to have some inspiring Goals that give you a reason to get out of bed each morning, but in times of uncertainty, it’s even more important than ever to have an inspiring future that you believe in with all your heart that you’re heading towards, and one that you can actually see yourself in.
I often use the analogy with my Client’s that having an inspiring vision for your future is kind of like watching sport on replay. We’ll use the example of NRL here, but you can use whatever works for you, just for this example. Now imagine there was a game you REEEEEEEALLY wanted to watch but for whatever reason you couldn’t watch it live. So you recorded it, to watch it back later. You were careful to avoid anyone or thing that could tell you the score, but someone managed to spoil it and tell you that your team won 32-30 in a thrilling finish. But anyhow, you decide to watch the game anyway. Imagine the opposition scores in the 2nd minute of the game, converts the Try, it’s 6-0. The very next set, your team drops the ball, and the opposition scores again, it’s now 12-0. Are you concerned? No, because you know the score. You know that your team wins in the end. Imagine one of your best players gets sent off, then the other team scored another Try, it’s 18-0. Are you worried? No, because you know the score. So, basically, it doesn’t matter whatever happens in the game because you know that your team is going to win in the end right.
Well it’s kind of like that in life. When we “know the score” the little ups and downs that happen along the way don’t bother us, because we know we’re going to win in the end. When you have an inspiring vision for your future, it’s like knowing the score of life. Something bad happens, it doesn’t bother you because you know where you’re going to be in 2,3,5 whatever the case may be, years’ time.
If you can do these 4 things, you will not only survive COVID-19 but will thrive and burst out the other side to the kind of earth shaking inspiring future that you were destined to live!
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