Bracing For Impact

Life throws you curve balls. How you brace for impact is what matters most.

How does one brace for impact when life throws us curve balls on our jobs, in our home, with our family and friends?

Below, I’ve listed a few examples on how we can take precautions so life’s blows don’t impact us so severely.

Bracing for Impact on your Job

Always keep your resume up to date. Even if you’re so happy where you are and you can’t see yourself leaving any time soon, update that bad boy. You never know when budget cuts are coming or when they’re starting the 1st round of layoffs. It’s best to update it when you’re in a good place rather than after you’ve been let go and you’re rushing and frustrated. Besides, if you do it now, you’ll have all the time you need to embellish or add in new roles & responsibilities as you’re currently doing them.

Have you ever tried to remember all of the things you did at a job when you no longer work there? It’s a pain in the butt. So get it out of the way and update it when your mind is at ease. You’ll thank yourself later.

Do a LinkedIn endorsement and recommendation swap with your favorite coworkers. That’s a sure fire way to get faster results and feedback for top recruiters and jobs to see how great you are. Also, if you’re currently on the market for something new, here are the top 3 job search sites to get you started: Robert Half, CareerBuilder, and Indeed. Happy job hunting!

Bracing for Impact in your Home

My home is my safe haven. TOI House is literally Toi’s House. Its where I live, eat, breathe, create, write, laugh and love. I feel safe here and I decorate my home to fit my mood and personality. Cool, calm, serene, a touch whimsical with splashes of color and my focus color is various shades of blue. Blue is calming and soothing.

Find a color that exhibits the mood you want to feel when you walk in the door from a long day of work. Better yet, hop onto my Pinterest Home Decor page for some ideas. Follow me of course! I love Moroccan themed decor so you’ll get a sneak peek at what my place sorta looks like.

The best way to soften the blow for anything related to your home is to:

  1. Decorate with budget-friendly decor:

    Decorate so your home looks and feels great. Setting the mood always helps your mindfulness state of being and you’ll always look forward to going home. Less time in the streets means less money spent!

  2. Create a budget for your bills:

    Create a budget so your bills are always paid and all costs are accounted for. There’s nothing better than a peace of mind knowing you don’t need to do anything else but lay your butt down and relax or get up and create.

  3. Leave stress at the door:

    Any job and outside stressors, leave it at the door. Of course, you want to talk about your day and that’s fair but the point is not to let it consume you or your family.

Bring in the best, leave out the rest.

Bracing for Impact with your Friends

This is a special one. Do you know that saying about family and friends? “You can pick your friends but you can’t pick your family.” This is very true and we’ll get to the family part in a sec, but to focus on friends, when you pick good people, it’s certainly a blessing. You control the caliber of people in your life. Let me say this again and I’ll put it in bold quotes too…

You control the caliber of people in your life!

If you let cheery, fun, life loving people into your space, you’ve invited in cheer, fun, life, and love into your life. If you let in Debbie Downers and Sulking Steve’s <—- (I made up Sulking Steve because there has to be a co-part to Debbie. Every negative thing can’t be female. That’s not even realistic! So Sulking Steve it is. I digressed.) naysayers and jealous people, you’ve invited in downers, sulkers, naysayers and jealousy into your life.

The latter makes for more arguing, tiresome proving, coddling, enabling and nurturing negative behavior from your end. That sounds like a full-time job in itself, right? Indeed. (like my pun? lol) Wouldn’t you rather have fun with fun people? I know I would! Don’t be afraid to cut off people who were once fun and cheerful and have become bitter old bats. Some serve their purpose for a season and others we outgrow. This is not you being mean. This is you living life.

We all have to be mindful of the relationships we keep and know whether they are super supportive or if they are super toxic. This can be difficult given how long we’ve had these friendships, but your emotional and mental health is way more important than any relationship you will ever form. You come 1st.

Place the oxygen mask on yourself before helping others.

Bracing for Impact with your Family

The family is a hand dealt by God. We love em and we can’t stand some of em but the fact is nothing can separate us from them genetically. If you are strong enough and have enough courage to stand up to the ones who seem to be out to destroy you, you can certainly love these individuals from a distance. Those type of family members can think they have your best interest at heart but their delivery is only in their best interest, not yours. Being able to articulate this, however, can be a huge challenge. If they’re already difficult, you telling them,

“Uncle, I hear you but I’m not liking your tone. As a matter of fact, I never did. Just like that time at our family BBQ back in 2007 when you said XYZ, and I was like…”

Yeah, none of that is going to work. And if you do try it, hit me up so I can be a fly on the wall, because that is some TV drama I may need some buttered popcorn for. Sometimes limiting visits and conversations help create distance, but that can also feel like you’re running from your problems. Either way, It’s better than being confrontational in a never-ending battle with Uncle so-and-so.

Therapy is also a great tool and helps in this area. If you can convince your family members to go, that’s the biggest step you’ll make here. Because participation is key to rehabilitation. Here’s a link to The Key to Fixing a Dysfunctional Family.

Use of “I” Statements

Check out this link on “I” Statements which is a style of communication focused on the feelings and beliefs of the speaker using the word “I” rather than the word “You” which would focus on the thoughts and characteristics the speaker attributes to the listener.

This is especially helpful when talking to co-workers, friends, and family. Basically, in any relationship you value, these “I” statements come in handy.

There are many other areas in life where you may need to brace for impact. But if you’re proactive and can find tools to put into practice before and during, the impact should be less damaging.

What are some things you do to soften the blow of life’s curveballs?

~ Toi Powell
Author

Just For Today…

I’d recently done an exercise to help lift my spirits after going through some hard times. I decided to share because we all go through tough times. None of us are exempt from stumbling and falling down in our paths and journey’s, but it’s nice to remember that everything doesn’t need to be done in a day. Rome wasn’t built in a day and neither were we.

To think that all of our problems, trials and tribulations will be resolved in a flash or a blink of an eye is a gross misjudgment of our fragility as human beings. Everything great in this life takes time, effort, reshaping and molding. Reshaping and remolding can be painful but as long as we learn from our struggles, we can endure what it takes to move onward and trek through each day one day at a time.

Don’t tackle it all at once. Make a list of what you want to accomplish, Just For Today.

Just For Today

By Toi Powell

Just for today, I will try not to be afraid of the unknown.

Just for today, I will try to put my best foot forward and put my past behind me and move forward with optimism and purpose.

Just for today, I will allow myself to acknowledge my vulnerabilities and allow my strength to come back gradually and not forcibly.

Just for today, I will not think about work, disability, who hurt me and why.

Just for today, I will not think thoughts of fear because it doesn’t exist and the fear of what isn’t will only manifest if I continue to be fearful.

Just for today, I am not who I was a week ago and for tomorrow I will remember that I am stronger than any weakness I acknowledge.

Just for today, my faith is stronger than ever. I will not fear God but respect him because God is not a God of fear. I rebuke anything that is not of him in the name of Jesus.

Just for today, my heart is strong, my spirit is stronger and everything I experienced is just that and everything happens for a reason.

Using the phrase “I will try” takes so much weight off of the actions that follow because realistically, every day will not be peachy. Allow yourself the space to be human and start the next day anew. Who knows, your next day may be your next breakthrough. Have faith and stay blessed.

What’s on your “Just For Today” list?

~ Toi Powell