It’s coming. Can you feel it? Spring is in the air. Depending on where you live, you might not believe it, but it is coming. The “positive” change we all look for after the cold, gray, blustery days of winter. I don’t know about you, but when the perennials pop from the earth it rejuvenates my spirit and exhilarates my mind.
As baseball season rolls around I fondly recall the phrase “Hope springs eternal.” It allows the fan to believe this could be the year their team gets to the World Series. That eternal hope should not just apply to baseball and it shouldn’t just arrive in the spring.
Several good people have reached out to me lately as their lives have been forever changed by their job situation. For some it is traumatic. For others it is the new lease on life they have been waiting for. The trauma comes because the person is thrown into a situation unfamiliar to themselves and their family. Too young to retire, too old to think they could be hired by someone else, too insecure that they have marketable skills outside the work they’ve been doing for 10, 15, 20 or more years.
Among the many questions to be answered are possibly these:
What about the kids?
How can we move them now?
Who’s going to take care of the folks or the grandparents if we move?
Will the house sell in this marketplace?
I suspect the circumstances are tantamount to blindly jumping off a diving board and hoping the pool has been filled with water.
The other side of the equation is the person who can’t wait for the next adventure. A chance at a new career, a new hobby, a new location, creating new networks or expanding existing ones. This person is filled with hope for the future and faith in themselves that good things will happen.
W. Mitchell the inspirational speaker, disfigured and confined to a wheel chair from two separate horrific accidents is known for saying “It’s not what happens to you, it’s what you do about it.” We can all sit around and complain about our plight in life, our circumstances and our bad luck. Or we can create a new strategy for ourselves to be successful. It really is up to us.
If you have that feeling of despair, hopelessness, anger at your circumstances or overwhelming anxiety, rest assured you’re not alone. This is a natural state of being. At least for a while. Everyone goes through disappointment. Big and small. The key is understanding it’s all temporary and move on. Seek out someone who will provide you positive perspective. You can learn from people who have struggled with blaming others and rationalizing that bad events and circumstances were caused by everyone other than themselves.
Without getting too political, Hillary Clinton immediately comes to mind. She has spent nearly 18 months blaming practically everyone else for her defeat. She goes on speaking tours, wrote a book, and will tell anyone who will listen what she thinks caused her defeat. She could be spending her time in a much more positive way, but she has to be the one to let go and move on. We all could learn from her behavior.
As I’ve visited with folks who have reached out to me, I first empathize with their situation and circumstances and then I pose several questions.
What is their family situation?
What are their plans moving forward?
What is most important to them?
From those few questions I’m able to assess their mindset, their strategic thinking and most of all their values.
I’m pleased to say the people who I have shared time with have been positive, optimistic, innovative in their plans and excited about their future. They all realize it won’t be easy, but they are up for the challenge. They’ve shared stories of people who are completely changing careers, pursuing their “real” dreams, moving to places they always wanted to live and looking at this crossroads as the best thing that could possibly happen to them at this point in their lives. I’m confident these individuals will be successful in their new endeavors. It’s in their DNA to take stock in their circumstances, be confident in their talents and skills and have faith in their future.
The current state of things might seem as bleak as a brown yard on a breezy March morning with the wind directly in their face. But to those who have faith in themselves, to those who are willing to believe the best is yet to be, to those who are creative, innovative, positive people, the future belongs to them. They know the grass will turn green, the colorful perennials will sprout through the thawing earth, and their future will be a budding success.
Until next time….