To have the courage for the next step, when you feel like curling in a ball with a pillow over your head, has always been a mystery to me.

Bob and I are business owners of two completely different businesses and both are hurting. Throughout all our lives we have been used to challenges, but to lay off most of our construction business staff, instead of supporting those people is a nightmare. Even if temporarily - it hurts. As a planner and strategist, not being to foresee future options is the hardest of all.

Yet, I want to share the two survival skills that help me, when the anxiety feels squashing me.

First - we are never ever alone.
We are never ever here just for ourselves - we are here to be of service to others. Even though it hurts like crazy to take actions like lay-off, it is temporary. It's on a standby base to focus on consequent steps leading to the future.

We constantly consider all involved and what will help us all. And the focus on the fact that we owe our future to our workers, family, friends - saves sanity.

Second - is even more important.
In each of us, there is a well of resilience.
It’s carried from your grand-grand-parents in your DNA. Via them, you have survived, like they survived moments of unimaginable fear and pain and it passed.

We don’t carry these moments on our sleeve. They hurt. We prefer to lock it and keep it out of view. But they will carry you through and ease the fear.

I absolutely despise remembering the time at the bus station with $30, no home and no person to turn to. The time when I thought “I give up”. But something in me, said “No”.
A time when I was waiting for an ambulance and thought it would never come. And I suddenly thought “This can’t be all, that’s not to end like this”. I survived and my baby did, too.
A time that I block out as much as I can, when I was attacked with no escape and could not think anymore. But I felt “This can’t be it”. And a miracle happened. I saw an attacker being pushed further and further away by an invisible force and in disbelief, I walked away.

Reach down to that well. It is in all of us, we ignore it as it is painful. But in each of us there is a well of resilience that will help us survive. This is not just about me and you -- we can be of help to others.

It may not seem like this today but it’s true.The world will be different but it will continue needing you and your love.