Hi, how you doing?
How are you faring in the lockdown?
Of course it’s not all rosy, but hoping it’s working out at least OK for you.
Today I want to be more direct with you on something.
Because I think it’s important that I’m clear on where I’m coming from and what advice I’m giving clients.
Some have called BS on me
Some clients and buddies are talking to me about what I think of this situation.
I’m giving them certain advice.
Then they’re reading what I write publicly, and they see a disconnect.
“You’re skirting the issues,” one said.
“Trying to sanitize it,” said another.
A blunt Aussie mate put it—”Painting lipstick on a pig.”
It’s fair
Truth is that I’m trying my best.
It doesn’t serve you or me to be spewing more opinions on this situation.
We all see what’s going on and have our own interpretations.
The virus is deadly.
As are the choices we’re making around it.
Whether you or me would have made different choices is irrelevant.
We’re not the ones with the opportunity or burden of deciding.
And as I keep coming back to in writing you, the best you can do is—
Focus on what you can control
If you’ve been reading these letters you know this is the message I keep sending.
What’s really going on with the virus?
Who and what is really driving decisions being made around it?
You have zero control over that.
And the best you can do is focus on what you can control—where you put your mind and actions.
This matters most to how you best navigate right now.
But it’s even MORE IMPORTANT for navigating what might be an even harder road ahead.
Things are very not normal
And see this is where some clients and friends have been calling BS on me.
When I’m writing about how you can feel amazing even in lockup.
Or live your best days even when the world has gone to sh*t.
Or how the path to success is still EXACTLY the same.
It does concern me that I’m sending you the impression that—hey yo, soon it’s gonna be back to normal.
When I’m really saying—focus on what you can control.
Because if you ask me…
My deeper concern is we have no clue what will be the new normal.
What is the new normal?
Even using this phrase makes me laugh because you might remember the PIMCO looneys were throwing it around after the credit crisis.
Spreading endless fear with their gloomy crystal balls, they were basically fired for missing the boom that would soon come.
So, how can you know what will be our new normal?
How do you even start to think about it?
When does the lockup even end?
And what will this even mean?
What opens up, when? And what doesn’t, ever again?
When we do open, is it for good?
Of course not, but what will be the triggers for you being locked in your home again?
Is all this contingent on some hail mary vaccine, which may or may not be around in months or even years?
We can’t know what will be the new normal.
Only that…
The new normal is uncertainty
MASSIVE uncertainty.
Our leaders have clearly proven biased to locking you in your home, and shutting down the motor of the world.
So you must expect the new normal is the day before you might be locked away again.
That said, the uncertainty also works both ways, doesn’t it?
The day before this tomorrow we lived in the blissful ignorance that all was grand.
And this new normal might be even grander.
Maybe the best will happen.
Or perhaps something worse is yet to come.
You have no way of knowing.
But no matter what you think about all that, the best you can do is…
Yep, you guessed it!
Focus on what you can control
Maybe I don’t need to write this to you.
But I hate the idea that I’m not being clear with you on how I think about this.
Nor giving you the best advice I’m giving to myself and others.
Personally, in lots of ways I was very well prepared for this situation, but in other ways I failed.
What I’ve seen is that 90% prepared is still an incomplete solution.
And what I’m most focused on right now is being best prepared for what happens next.
What is that?
Hmm, as I said, you have no way to know.
But as I say to my clients and buddies—
Prepare for worse, because then, no matter what, you’ll make the best of what comes.
Again, here’s the link to the free Focus Tools videos if you’re looking to dial it up more.