5 practical ways to cope with uncertainty right now
I’m writing this while rain buckets down around my office. It's been raining all weekend in Melbourne, where I am, and looks to continue for the next few days.
A good friend yesterday suggested the current weather is perhaps a reflection of a lot of people’s moods right now and I had to agree. We are days away from entering the season of spring here and I think many people (myself included) are starting to get really “over” the various winters 2020 has brought with it. Being in severe lockdown sucks. There’s no way around that. Not being able to travel more than 5km from home, not being able to open up your physical stores if you have them, not being able to see your staff IRL and chat about things outside of why no one knows the password for Zoom calls, not being able to leave the house for more than an hour and not being able to go anywhere at all come 8pm... It can be grating.
And even if you’re reading this from a location that’s not in lockdown, this year has brought with it a level of uncertainty that few of us have ever had to grapple with before. We are –globally– facing situations and circumstances that have rocked our routines, shaken up our support systems and made us genuinely question what's important.
So, in today’s blog I wanted to suggest some ways to work through that uncertainty, as a small business owner and just a human in 2020.
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Now, obviously I am the same as you in never having experienced 2020 or Covid-19, but I have experienced major periods of uncertainty before, times when I just wasn’t sure if I should keep going, what the future might look like and how to know what the next best step could be: my mother’s sudden death, moving to London days after turning 21 on a one-way ticket knowing NO ONE in that city, sending out my book proposal, saying "yes" to my first client and not knowing if I could fulfil their expectations, hiring people, my father’s unexpected death, trying to have another baby and going through the heartache years of TTC brings with it, walking away from a well-paid exec role to start my own business...and the list goes on. Now, not all of these situations are comparable, but all of them led me to battle with, and, eventually embrace, uncertainty.
Below are five things that definitely helped:
1. Focus on what you can control. It sounds so cliché, but this is by far the best advice you can follow. I can't control when my city goes into lockdown, I can't control when my youngest will decide to sleep (if at all), I can't control how my book sells and I can't control if a client will postpone or entirely cancel their work with me due to their own financial situation right now. What I can control is my reaction to those things and the way I bring my whole self into my work (whether coaching, speaking or consulting). How might you be spending too much time focusing on what you can't control and not enough time celebrating and working on what you can?
2. Stop the spiral of speculation. I'm all for using your imagination to envisage the future, or set goals for your business. But when it comes to negative speculation, there's little to be gained. If you find yourself going down a path of not doing things that bring you joy in your business because "what's the point if we can't do X or Y for another 12 months?" stop. Nothing is certain right now. As Eckhart Tolle famously said, "worry pretends to be necessary but serves no useful purpose".
3. Cultivate your biz crews. I speak on this a lot, but that’s because I think it is just so important. We always need a supportive network around us and never before has this been SO crucial as small business owners. This is part of the reason I started my Good Business Group on Facebook, to provide a space for small biz owners to ask for advice, share tips and access free expert trainings. If you do one thing this week, reach out to someone in your crew and see how they're doing. Cultivating your crews is as much about being there for others as it is about them being there for you. Don't have crews?
4. Turn to ancient wisdom. Death is the only thing that's certain about life. And while that may sound mega 'downer' to some, it also means that we have thousands and thousands of years of wisdom to learn from. Wisdom that comes from others having experienced uncertainty in all its various guises and somehow survived. Depending on your belief system you may turn to certain religious or spiritual teachings, or you may tune into the words of ancient philosophers, poets or even legendary songwriters to help. When my son was born last year, a good friend gave me a book by Carl Jung, the Swedish psychiatrist and psychoanalyst (and, lesser known, builder, artist and craftsman) whose work continues to inspire and intrigue me. It may sound bizarre, but I have often found some serious business breakthroughs when I take a few minutes out of my workday to read through these pages. Similarly, the On Being podcast always helps me consider new paths forward when facing uncertainties in life.
5. Create your own happiness. My final tip is one I talk about endlessly with my 7-year-old son (and one I need a reminder of too every now and then!). If you're reading this on a laptop, iPhone or computer, and you have money in the bank you are in such an INCREDIBLY fortunate position. We often forget how good we actually have it. We are in the global minority in that we can choose, to a large degree, what our life looks like, where we work, who we work with and what we do on a day to day basis. Things are tough right now but that does not stop us from being able to take some time to consider how we can cultivate more happiness in our lives. Which three things can you practice daily to help you pep up? This could be to choose to watch comedy over the news, to laugh with a funny friend, to listen to some stand-up, to dance around the kitchen to fun music, to take 5 minutes out to have a cup of tea outside, to spend some time cooking loved ones a meal or to revisit an favourite book or film.
Look, I get it. Living with uncertainty is not something anyone longs for, especially not small business owners who have enough of it in a "standard" year. I hope these five tips give you some food for thought and help you work through the stress, anxiety, frustration and fear that uncertain times can bring up.
PS. If you are seriously struggling right now and need someone to talk with, please visit Beyond Blue (Australia), Depression.org.nz (New Zealand), MInd (UK) and 7 Cups (USA). For countries outside of these areas please review your local mental health support services.