In times of great uncertainty
It’s been a difficult week, and I want to give the people around me a clear insight into how I’m thinking about the events unfolding around us. Some concepts that are on my mind:
Focus on the things you can control
It feels terrible to feel so out of control from all the things we see happening in the world. Everyone processes events in their own way; personally, I clean. When the world feels chaotic and overwhelming, I can at least organize my small little corner of the world. Maybe it’s my work area, or my inbox. Clean that smudge on the door that I haven’t bothered with, or dust under the couch where I haven’t been. I’m talking to a sewing factory to see if they can make masks from e-commerce defects. I’m placing orders with small businesses that I love who’s revenue has been cut off. Will any of it matter? Maybe not. Is it an over reaction? I hope so. But one thing is certain. It makes me feel better, and more able to face each day and support those around me.
Think Long Term
Using specific time frames for when things will return to normal is not helpful. If you tell yourself, “this will be over in two weeks”, you’re setting yourself up for a new level of disappointment and fear if the situation isn’t improved or continuing to worsen. The mindset you want is one of acknowledgment, short term pessimistic realism, and long term optimism. “Yes, this is painful. We don’t know when it will end. It may get worse before it gets better. But it will get better”. For POWs, this shift in mindset has been described as the difference between life and death. When the promised “this will be over by…” dates come and go, prisoners give up hope and simply stop trying to survive. We don’t know when, or how bad it will get first. But it will get better eventually. Your attitude plays a big role in your outcome.
Find the small pleasures
We all know that life is fragile, and change comes swiftly when it does. In the midst of all that is terrible or uncertain, I will try to enjoy the moments of beauty that I am fortunate enough to have access to. There is a breeze coming through the window as I type this, and it is true, and good.
Terrible things can have unexpected positive results
I once had an employee who was miserable. They were diligent and put in strong effort, but their results were middling at best, the work was just not a match for them. Worse, they were prone to angry outbursts that were dragging moral down for our 8 person team. They would be shouting in another room, and the whole office would go uncomfortably quiet, like children of a bad marriage. When I fired them, it was emotionally charged, dramatic, and terrible.
I ran into them a year later, and approached them warily to say hello. They laughed, “getting fired that day was the best thing that ever happened to me.” They’d been stuck in a rut and unable to see a way out; they were working for me out of momentum and a sense of obligation. Once the cycle was broken, they’d restarted their career on a different path and were doing work they loved, and were good at.
Neither of us could have predicted it, but it turned out surprisingly well. That’s happened to me a couple of times, actually.
I’m not suggesting that lost jobs are a good thing, but I will attempt to remain open to the fact that the future is truly unknowable, and that works equally for things that seem immediately bad and good.
The world is particularly open to ideas right now
People close to me already know my belief that everything is negotiable. That is true to a magnificent degree right now, where we’re seeing monthly payments forgiven on mortgages, barriers lowered for loans, and hospitals accepting donations of home-sewn masks (and sterilizing them before use, I’m relieved to learn).
The world is especially open to radical ideas in times like these, when things are obviously breaking or broken. People have less to lose, because so much is already being lost. The world is reorganizing itself, and there will absolutely be people who pitch in to help (not profiteer) and establish themselves in the new configuration. Personally, I would like to be one of them.
Good people will be out of work through factors outside of their control. Some of them will join startups and go on to change the world. It will be the most rewarding experience of their professional lives, and this will be part of the founding story they tell for the next ten years.
That’s what’s on my mind. Long term optimism, near-term realism. Focus on what you can control. Find the beauty between the lines, and find out how you can help.
