Oh, The Ups And Downs Of Being Human!

I’ve just started an online self-help challenge that someone sent me called The Daily Stoic: Ancient Wisdom for Everyday Life. It starts with the suggestion to keep a journal every day on what has happened in your life and how you felt about it ...

I was feeling far more sceptical than stoical, so I started that yesterday and thought I'd share with you the outcome. It was more cathartic than I expected.

"It started as every Monday has started for the last couple of years!"

I rolled over and saw the empty space on the other side of the bed. Oh yeah, my husband got up at the crack of dawn to go to South London for his hospital treatment and won't be back today. That familiar little stab of worry rears up about what this next set of tests and scans will show.

I open my computer and of course, there is horrible news on the BBC. I'm not sure, but feel I'm watching the start of a man-made catastrophe in the Ukraine where true evil may win. It knocks some sense of perspective into my own domestic worries, so I dive into dealing with the mundane part of my working life. Monday morning is for routine admin.

I get my real lift around 12.30. It's the day my support group meets for Lunch on Line. A regular group of twelve people who meet online once a month. I started it with the first lockdown at another horrific time when we had no idea what was in store for us. The reason for meeting regularly was just to support each other in business or personally in whatever way we could and we're still doing it. The majority of that original group still come along and it is my favourite hour of networking.

"I have no concrete expectations from letting the agenda emerge, but it always lifts my spirit!"

My spirits were lifted further when, after lunch, I started work with a new mentoring client. She fed back to me that the advice I'd given her months ago was paying dividends. Then she related her own anecdote of how she was able to pass on valuable information that helped someone else with their client prospecting. That always gives me a punch of pleasure when I learn that a small off-the-cuff suggestion made a big difference and has a ripple effect as people pay forward.

Then this evening it was back to watching the extensive coverage of stories from Ukraine. What struck me most about that was the emphasis was on how the ordinary people and governments from around the world were united against something that was so obviously wrong. Many, many acts of kindness and gestures of solidarity for the trials of coping when the world suddenly turns upside down for ordinary people.

My takeaway from all this is that there are horrid things that happen all the time and we can feel totally helpless though we each have our own coping mechanisms. For me, I remember that the world is full of the uncontrollable and the only bit I can control is my own reaction and subsequent actions.

I hold onto the belief that as social animals, our strength comes from how we corporate and work together. My tip for us all is to take solace from the acts of kindness you've received or witnessed in others recently and pay it forward.

Who can you help today.


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