Last week, Collins Dictionary announced that the 2020 word of the year is “lockdown”. Runners up included “Coronavirus”, “key worker”, “furlough”, and “social distancing”. Definitely strong contenders and a tough decision, but I feel like the list of finalists missed one very important 2020 theme: Uncertainty. I’m thinking about a conversation I had with a …
I guess it’s only fitting that the year that started with Australian wildfires, took a hard turn into a once in a century pandemic, veered into massive social unrest, and is having a record hurricane season also includes the most contentious Presidential election in living memory. Regardless of what side you’re on – liberal or …
Last week, we talked about asking for help when you’re overwhelmed and stressed. Today, let’s consider the other side of the equation: when someone’s asking you. Should you say yes? When people come to me, “yes” is my default answer. However, while agreeing is the nice thing to do, that doesn’t mean it’s always the …
At work, we’ve really been struggling lately with increased workload, challenges associated with partial return to working on site, and lots of policy and procedure changes. Everyone has been under the gun, and it’s been a chaotic time overall. I’ve taken the past week to focus on two things: organizing my professional responsibilities and taking …
Ladies and gentlemen, it has been a week. As planned, I went back to work on Monday, and to make a long story short, for the foreseeable future I’ll be at work two days a week and at home the other three. Some of my colleagues are still working from home full time, where others …
In case you didn’t know (and let’s be honest-why would you?), in the United States today is National Roller Coaster Day. Many theme parks are open, with social distancing and precautions in place, so I suspect that a fair number of people will be (likely unknowingly) celebrating this “holiday” today. Speaking of precautions, I can’t …
In last week’s post, we looked at the dangers of spending extended periods of time stuck in the stress response-aka survival mode-as well as how to recognize it. This week, let’s discuss how to respond. Short Term Response Just like the stress response is physiological, our bodies have a counter mode: the relaxation response. This …
In the past month, my coworkers, several of my friends, a few family members, and yours truly have all been echoing variations of the same refrain: “I just need to get past X”. You know what I mean…”let me survive this meeting/project/day/week/month/whatever and then things will even out. Once X is over, I’ll be back …
Well, my new year is off to an interesting start. If you’ve been reading this blog for awhile, you would probably need only one guess to predict what I’m about to say: Work. Went. Crazy. (I am now picturing all of your shocked faces.) I also have not been feeling one hundred percent this last …
As I mentioned last week, things at work have gone sideways and the pressure is on. After our first week of extra long days, multiple meetings, and minimal argument, I’m happy to report that my “crisis team” is making progress and on track to meet a critical deadline in mid December. It’s going to take …
Amanda Cade 