Bizlife Smarts

2020! Towards the end of the year, I kept hearing people say, ‘I can’t wait for 2020 to end’. Now, that’s an altogether reasonable response to any unpleasant experience. However, it happened so often that I began to wonder, ‘What are these folks all expecting to happen at midnight on December 31st?’. ‘Is it going to be a reverse Cinderella moment?’. Okay…glass slippers now have your name on them; gilded horse-drawn carriage is a Maybach and that prince/ princess really is that person you’ve been crushing on forever. Sigh! 🤦🏾‍♂️

Look, I’m not trying to be insensitive here. I get it. Human nature is, when in a tough situation to look for hope wherever we can find it. I got irritated with that oft repeated, ‘I can’t wait for 2020 to end’ because I found it to be forced escapism. At the height of the early fear around the pandemic, I read somewhere that those who plan well ahead for life during and after the pandemic, will come out of it the best. This piece further reinforces that and goes into more detail on the drivers behind that. https://www.news24.com/w24/SelfCare/Wellness/Mind/its-time-to-create-a-bounce-back-plan-and-overcome-challenges-beyond-covid-19-heres-how-20200518.

Point no. 2 in that article makes my point (pardon that repetition). ‘Accept that things will not get back to the way they were’! The magic wand of normalcy was not waved, and the magic bell of regularity did not toll at 00:01 on 1st January 2021. The COVID induced challenges of 2020 did not suddenly go away. No Christian Louboutin shoes; no Maybach; and definitely no prince charming or the woman of your dreams, sweeping you off your feet. The COVID-19 pandemic is going to be with us for a while, and a new year will not magically soften it’s impact.

After 2020, how do I say this with sensitivity?

The turn of the year was a time to rest, recharge and re-energise. Yes, many had been pummelled in 2020, and like a boxer who has absorbed body blows, we needed to take the time between rounds to come back stronger in 2021.

2021 is with us and little has changed from the end of 2020. Don’t dwell on that fact. Plan, plan, plan; and now is the time! Be pragmatic more than hopeful. I give you these 3 pieces of uncommon sense.

Thriving through COVID

I would not advise you to try and fight fire with fire, after the year 2020 that many went through. You cannot burn hotter or brighter. Don’t tell yourself that by simply doing things better or working harder, things will change. If we learn nothing else from the COVID pandemic, it is not to confront it head on like the other challenges we’ve encountered, but to counter it with alternative actions, that dissipate or minimise, not cancel, its effects.

1. Pragmatism, not hopefulness

Hope is sold to us throughout our lives, and we are told that it is the way to succeed and thrive. But not in the COVID-era. We can hope we don’t get the disease; hope the healthcare system doesn’t become overstretched; hope that a successful vaccine reaches us. But the only thing that gives us the best chance to survive COVID is managing our environment through action. Wash your hands regularly with soap. Always wear a mask when outside your home. Keep your physical and social distance (they are two different things by the way). In your professional life, don’t simply hope that things work out or that a deal comes through. Deal with the elements of greatest certainty around you.

2. A concrete, REALISTIC, plan

Most sensible people I know have always planned around the important things in their lives. However, how often do we pay attention to the realistic detail, rather than what we believe to be the facts. In the past, we’ve listened to the so-called experts, taken the stock market advice from your colleagues, and bet on that horse that your uncle told you was a sure thing. In this COVID-era, we must plan meticulously, based on the knowledge of first hand facts that we have immediately before us. If you don’t know it 💯, then don’t plan for it to happen. Insurmountable odds require extraordinary planning, and then following that plan to a T.

The Agile Alliance is an organisation that is considered best-in-class in dealing with succeeding in uncertain and turbulent environments. Even they got caught out by COVID in 2020, and are now bullseye focused on delivering their 2021 main event through meticulous planning. https://www.agilealliance.org/agile2021-responding-to-change-over-following-a-plan/

Another example I’m going to give may come across as a contradiction, because it was one of the greatest feats of human endurance. Eliud Kipchoge ran a marathon in under 2 hours, a little over a year ago – which was thought to be impossible. He and others had attempted it before, and failed. Do you know what brought the final breakthrough? Meticulous, realistic planning for every single element; from training, to diet, to pace, to wind speed, to humidity, to elevation, to the composition of and pit-stop exchanges of the human pacesetters shield. And you know what – Eliud participated first hand in every aspect of that planning. https://bizlifesmarts.com/1:59:40-possible

This planning may affect the scale of our plans, but at least you won’t get any nasty surprises and it will raise your level of certainty of outcomes. And you may just be surprised at the level of success you achieve, even on that different, smaller scale. Which leads me to the third and final point.

3. Downsize your life to what you can control

We have all been raised and acculturated to live for the future. However, COVID necessitates that we live for today, and the future will somehow fall in place. Maintain all the resources you can muster that are real and can sustain day by day for the foreseeable future. Don’t depend on the uncertain deal that may come in, the dividends you hope the market may yield, or acquiring the things you’ve always wished for; and don’t blindly depend on others delivering results for you. Focus on the things that will:

• Bring you true happiness and fulfillment.
• Put food on your family’s table.
• Put a roof over your family’s heads.
• Sustain your good health.

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