Life can be hard. The world can throw us into extremely tough circumstances when we least expect it. Take the Coronavirus as an example. The world never saw it coming but has had to recognize and react to it has unfolded in front of us.

Although the Coronavirus is a very new obstacle, the underlying circumstance is normal and true to life.

Unexpected things happen in our own lives all the time.

The uniqueness to the circumstances of the virus is that it happened to THE WORLD, not just an individual.

We don’t have to feel as alone in this hard time because it’s happening to our coworkers, neighbors, world leaders, literally all humans everywhere.

I say that because I don’t want you to feel alone. Many people are having their hours cut at work. Many people are worried about their finances. Many people are having to reschedule big planned events like weddings in our case.

The bright side of this is that we get to choose how we react to this situation.

We get to choose if we operate out of the anxiety and unknown or if we take that initial anxiety and unknown and turn it into something productive.

One of the best pieces of advise I’ve been given is…

“We are not responsible for our first thought, but we are responsible for our second thought.”

How does that apply here? Well, our initial human reaction to this is to freak out. Buy all the bottled water and toilet paper in every grocery store and bury it in the backyard! To be anxious and worry constantly, and be fearful of every person that you come into a closer than 6 feet range of.

But, as we continue to navigate through this season, our second thoughts need to be more evolved. Consider these two:

“What do I actually need to make it through this current season?”

and

“How am I going to plan for disaster/emergencies in the future?”

I will get personal with your for a minute. I got my hours at my day job drastically cut. Like so much so that if I didn’t have savings, I wouldn’t be able to pay my bills. So, heck yes, my initial gut reaction was certainly out of fear and anxiety.

But, as I have trained myself and been trained by my family, I took a deep breath, pushed that initial human reaction to the back of my mind, and started to brainstorm my next moves.

I went home from work and made a todo list of things that I could do to be proactive and to refocus my anxious energy.

Some of the things on my list are… pray, comb through my monthly budget, eliminate unnecessary “wants” from my life, focus on tasks I’ve been putting off in our business, deep clean my house, exercise, etc.

One of the very first things I did when my manager told me about my loss in hours at work was pray. Although I have a pretty good emergency fund, I didn’t want to drain it right away if possible. I knew prayer was my only answer because this problem is so much bigger than me.

I had been praying for a few days when two things happened. A coworker came up to me and told me that his family would be ok if he didn’t work his shift the following day so if I was interested, I could take his hours. Y’all. He will never know how much that meant to me. Those hours equal to hundreds of dollars! How kind is that?!

On a more funny note, the second thing happened a few days ago. I was hanging out at home, and something told me that I needed to clean out the drawers of my console table under my TV, which I haven’t opened in months. I started cleaning and throwing things away, when I stumbled upon some old Christmas cards. I opened them to see who they were from and found Christmas money!! I won’t tell you how much money, but let’s just say it was more than $20, y’all!!

I tell you all of that to remind you that there is always light in dark situations. Let yourself fully feel the fear and stress, but don’t stay there. Push forward. Plan for the future.

We are creating some content around what we are doing with this time at home and will post it in the days and weeks to come. Stay tuned and know we are praying for you all.

xo. Chelsea