The poignancy and resilience of the human experience, especially as we undergo difficulty and hard times, is not only a “human asset”. It is our blessing. A reader shares this response to the blog post a few weeks back.

Ian-

Just finished rereading your post on “Adrenaline Withdrawal” and feel like it was addressed directly to me. As I read each point I was checking off, “That’s me”. My job was eliminated in mid-May. I wrapped up some projects over the next 6 weeks on a consulting basis, and then spent 5 months as interim Controller of another company. By November, I’d begun networking fulltime.

I’m now in sales, and networking is the main way to sell myself and the services I offer. After operating for decades in structured situations and where I had varying amounts of influence and control, this takes serious adjustment. Now I’ve moved from being opportunistic with networking to trying to evolve a campaign approach. It’s a very different structure. It’s not easy to take on faith that it will pay off down the road.

That aside, the last 2 weeks were slow. Holiday, family, friends. My wife & I also started cleaning up a junked up basement. Overdue but now prompted because we may need to sell the house if this goes well into next year. The house is colder and we’re in sweaters all the time. This year we did without a Christmas tree. There are many traditions with it, some ornaments I remember from my childhood, etc. I’m pretty outspoken on all the materialism at year end. This year I got my wish. Christmas came anyway, just like it did in Whoville. It was certainly muted due to the uncertainties over what the future may bring. During the last week of “break” I was awake until 2 or 3:00am. Last night I went to bed with a solid game plan for today and fell asleep quickly. I wonder…

Lest I come across as whining, I frequently remind my self and my wife that my education & experience give me more options than many people have or will ever have. And many people in this country would be quite happy with what we have now. On the other side of the world our guys go out on tough missions each day. A little perspective never hurts.

Just before Christmas I had a routine doctor visit and was told for the first time in my life that my blood pressure was borderline high. It wasn’t to connect the dots as to why. I’ve been getting no meaningful exercise. Well, my fairly young dog & I take a 2 mile walk each day. Yesterday we stopped to chat briefly with two people. It was fun and felt right.

I realized consciously last Fall that having contact with other people is important for me. A phone call or, better yet, a meeting left me feeling affirmed and a bit more energized. I’m not particularly outgoing. Sometimes I have to work myself into the right frame of mind to contact someone. But if there’s a choice between speaking or meeting with people on a networking basis and working in front of a computer screen, I go with the people. The people I contact are usually willing to meet me and offer suggestions. This, more than anything else, gives me optimism that we will all get through this and helps me keep going.

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