In my 41 years of being married and 40 years of being a parent of six kids, I have experienced my share of hardship and crisis. Every time I have gone through them, I’ve learned a little more. But there are two things I have found that have really helped during those times.
1. Survive. For example, let’s say you are having a financial crisis. There may be a temptation to freeze. It feels overwhelming to open the mail so you don’t. You don’t know what to pay first so you ignore your due dates. You can’t sleep because you don’t know what’s going to happen next and you don’t have a good sense of what is happening now. So the first thing to do is to survive.
Ask yourself some questions.
*What is most important right now?
*What can wait?
*What do I have control over?
*What is one thing I can do today that will make tomorrow a little better?
And for that, you’re going to have to open those envelopes. Make an evaluation of your situation right now and take one step at a time. Cut whatever needs to be cut. And just as a hint of what is needed right now, consider that it should fall into one of three buckets. Housing, Food and Transportation. Everything else at that time falls in the category of extra. This is a temporary solution. You just need to survive until you get back on your feet. Don’t wait for things to go into collection or your mortgage to be late. You open the envelopes, you make the calls, you do it now.
2. Stabilize. Now that you know where you are, you can create enough breathing room to think clearly again. Give yourself permission to take the next right step. Not ten steps, just the next one. Consult with others if you’re stuck on ideas. Take some time just to think. As a person of faith, I really appreciate the ability to pray for wisdom, direction and clarity.
Survive and stabilize works can be used in every possible area of crisis. Relational, financial, medical, etc. First, stop and consider where you are and focus on the most important thing, setting everything else aside for now (survive). Second, give yourself space to consider your one next step (stabilize). You will find these two steps to be empowering and helpful in times of crisis, even when the solution may take time or may be out of your control.
Sometimes we don’t need to solve everything at once. We need to survive and stabilize and take the next step.