Terry Storch Dispatch w.13.2020
Dispatch w.13.2020
Don't hold together what must fall apart. The familiar life crumbles so the new life can begin. - Bryant McGill
Covid-19 has knocked the world off its axis. What our lives and situations looked like just a few short weeks ago is no longer our reality. The axis has shifted. If we do not respond accordingly, our lives will start to look like the spinning top that has slowed, become wobbly and unstable and eventually crashes over. My grandfather always said something similar to the quote below, but I’m not sure he knew it’s origins.
It's not what happens to you, it's how you respond to it that matters.
—Epictetus
How are you responding to our new reality, which is now our new normal? For me, I struggled for a few days. The old was gone, and I needed to embrace the new and fight to form new habits. Thankfully, my morning habit of spending time with God is my most critical and grounding habit that has not changed. When uncertainty is all around us in our world, it’s good to remember that God has not and will not change. He is our source of certainty and stability.
There are other habits that are grounding in these uncertain times. With the gym being closed, access to regular tennis matches are disrupted and my daily rhythms are completely in disarray. My physical fitness is very important to me so I built a new fitness plan and ramped up accountability while developing some new habits.
I am paying close attention to other areas where I’ll need to apply new habits and different disciplines. One major decision I made last week was to press pause on a major purchase that I’d made. I was holding off writing about this until it was delivered, but I ordered a Tesla Model Y a while back. It was just a few weeks away from being parked in the garage. In the midst of the current economic situation, I had a decision to make: think like a consumer or think like an investor.
For most of my married life, I’ve thought like an investor, and this has really reaped significant dividends for Robin and me. But this time it was much more emotional because I saved, planned, and lined up all the pieces. I’d been waiting for a Tesla for about five years. But, I chose an investor mindset and decided to press pause and wait. I’m strategically and deliberately leveraging this historic time to invest wisely and delay the purchase until the timing is right.
I’m not sure what this looks like for you and your situation. The world has been knocked off its axis, and if you’re operating with a “business as usual” mindset in most areas of your life, then I recommend that you throw up the caution flag. This is not a time for business as usual in any area of your life.
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By far, one of my favorite reads this week is from Ryan Holiday. He walked through a history lesson, the Antoine Plague of 165 CE, that we can all learn from. It was a global pandemic with a mortality rate between 2-3%, which began with flu-like symptoms until it escalated and became gruesome and painfully fatal. Millions were infected, and between 10-18 million people eventually died. It was such a great read that should remind us that there is nothing new under the sun. The article is entitled, When the System Breaks Down, Leaders Stand Up. Read now.
The spread of misinformation about Covid-19 is a virus itself. We’ve all heard about “Fake News” and misinformation campaigns, but now with so much uncertainty in the world, we really have to be careful what we are paying attention to. In this article, Stanford’s Jeff Hancock shares why deceptive messages are appealing and what people can do to avoid bad advice. Read now.
For those of you who may be working from home, this was a really solid read. Ed Batista unpacked some realities many are facing shifting from a typical office to a home office. Ed has some brilliant thoughts around the concept of work-life balance vs boundaries. Read now.
Here are a few of my thoughts and writings from the week. You can see them all here, subscribe to the daily RSS feed, or you can have them sent to your inbox.