“For fast-acting relief, try slowing down.” ~ Lily Tomlin

Busy begets busy, or so the saying goes. I’ve been maintaining a pretty steady pace for several weeks now – work, volunteering, teaching classes, traveling, family stuff – that has also included long training rides on my bicycle, disguised as leisure (my muscles and energy levels know better)… so down time has been fleeting to say the least. And, when busyness and fatigue take over like that, it doesn’t take much for stress to have its way with you.

So, please indulge me as I get it all out, and embrace this strange feeling of … having to slow down.

Watch the short video below, or read the transcript that follows, and do your best to avoid resisting the rest.

I am not going to lie, the last couple of weeks have been a little bit of a roller coaster ride, with tech challenges at work, helping my mom into assisted living, traveling myself for work, and then getting sick and blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.

Hey, Michelle Cederberg here, not necessarily whining (well maybe a little bit) about the stress in my life, but having a contemplation about what to do with it when it shows up seemingly all at once.

I meant to send messages out a couple of weeks ago, and last week, and I didn’t because the technical challenges began back then. I tried to send a message and I’d been locked out of my email campaign sender. That was the start of it. Then trying to deal with that, and then I had to fly to BC to help my mom for another weekend of transitioning her out of our childhood home and into assisted living. And the emotional toll of that one, I hadn’t really given myself full opportunity to feel that. For myself and for my mom. So that was really tough.

And then I came home for exactly 10 hours, and then hopped on a flight to Dallas for a conference I was speaking at. But in the interim, I was dealing with some other technical challenges where my website had reverted back to an earlier version of my website, and all my recent blogs posts were gone! So I was just in a crappy space.

And then I went off to Dallas. I had a great, great event with a bunch of HR professionals for Texas schools. So great. Then I got stuck in the whole Crowdstrike/Microsoft crash of all the airline systems. I was flying on United, and I thought, ‘Well, this is great’ (which is to say, it wasn’t).

I was starting to feel like I was coming down with a cold, so rather than wait to get rebooked, I threw money at the problem and flew home on Air Canada. And I did get home, which is great, but then I was sick. The next day, I tested for COVID and tested positive. FUN. Plus, my assistant got back from holidays and her laptop had crashed and it was done. Then she had to log in back into all the programs she uses, and I just felt like I was getting tested, because she had been gone for two weeks and stuff always piles up when she’s gone. So I thought, okay, she’ll be back. It’ll be great. It’ll help… and then she had these problems.

So I was feeling very sorry for myself, and very sick. What’s a girl to do?

And so it was a reminder, I guess, to slow down. You can only control what you can control. And much of what was happening to me over the course of the last two weeks has been out of my control, with me trying to push back against it, even though there’s nothing I can do. And so the cold, the COVID, (can’t believe I have it again after all this time), was the reminder to slow down and just take stock, because in the grand scheme of things, it’s all working its way out.

I am solving my tech issues little by little. Mom is settled into her assisted living, and she’s going to be great. And the new owners of the house are going to have a wonderful place to call their own or do whatever they’re going to do with it. My assistant got a new laptop. She’s slowly getting back up to speed. I was able to get home on an Air Canada flight instead of sitting around an airport for 12 hours.

And, I had two bad days of feeling sick, and now I’m feeling a lot better. It’s an opportunity for me to just be, to be a human being instead of a human doing. So, it’s kind of an ‘It is what it is’ situation.

TURNING POINT

(thanks for letting me vent)

When the proverbial sh!t hits the fan in your life, as it has in mine, how do you handle it? I know I had a couple of meltdowns last week, much to my husband’s chagrin. But my illness allowed me to slow down and say, ‘All right, it’s out of your control, sister, so what are you going to do?’

I’m just sitting and taking it all in. I’m lucky because I don’t have to get on a flight. All of the travel is done for a while. I’ve got nothing urgent coming up in business, so that’s a blessing. Mom is fine. She’s going to settle in and be wonderful. Technology will sort itself out. And in the grand scheme, everything will be okay.

So as you’re navigating your week, if anything crappy happens, how do you manage it? Do you think about what you can control and what you can’t? I’ll challenge you to do that.

If it’s within your control, do what you can, and if it’s not, let go. I’m hoping through a little bit of this way worn wisdom, you’ll take some advice. And if the sh!t hits the fan, just step aside and let it do its thing before you start the cleanup.

Until next time, I’m Michelle Cederberg, reminding you that in order to Ignite High Performance, sometimes we just have to douse the flame for a little while and just be. I’m a human being working on doing nothing. Because doing nothing is something. Until next time.

IT’S SUMMER, BUT YOU CAN STILL BOOK ME TO SPEAK anywhere across North America RIGHT NOW and into the fall – keynotes, workshops, even 1:1 coaching. If you’d like to chat about how to bring me in to your organization to help your team eliminate burnout, increase engagement, and ignite high performance, pop me an email at hello@michellecederberg.com. I’d love to chat.

Watch me in action above, and check out my offerings here: MichelleSPEAKS_2024

Plus, don’t forget to join me on my social channels below.

Resources Galore!

1) Hey, I’m super excited to share a great product that I can’t wait for you all to see. It’s my new Success-Energy Equation mouse pad. Remember the equation? Some of you have seen it. Links to purchase are below. SO FUN!

Buy single mousepad
Buy 5 mousepad value-pack

2) Don’t forget to check out my new ‘What’s Your Motivation Type?’ QUIZ!  Click the link and answer 5 quick questions to identify your Motivation Type. It’s going to give you daily doses of inspiration based on your category, and you’ll get all sorts of resources along the way.