Inspiration, Courage and Love

Wednesday, May 6th 2009 @ 8:28 PM (1 ratings)    post viewed 472 times

In my last post I spoke about the inspiring work I have been doing with people affected by the Victorian Bushfires. The work continues to this day and I am happy to say that many of the people are starting to see some light at the end of what has been for many, a very dark tunnel.

During the weeks since the Recovery Programs began, we noticed many of the impacted people were following a similar pattern in terms of dealing with this situation...

First there was the adrenalin rush - fighting the threat and getting organised.

Second came relief once the rains had fallen and the danger was gone.

Third came the hardest and for some the toughest to deal with - grief for everything and everyone who had perished.

Fourth has been a sense of overwhelm - so many areas to fix and so much to do with nothing at hand to do it. In fact many of the clients I am working with stated how hard it was for them to get motivated - to get out of bed, let alone deal with all the work to be done.

As part of the recovery work I was asked to provide some short seminars about the tools we have been using to get individuals back on their feet. None of them are new, YET all of them are equally valuable to anyone faceing troubling times or who has been forced to re-evaluate their lives or change direction because of circumstances beyond their control (conscious control that is).

The tools fall into 3 main categories;

1 - plan HOW you are going to most effectively use your time

2 - understand and accept the truth of where you are

3 - decide where you are heading to

For the first one, we created a simple weekly planner so people can create blocks of time to handle specific groups of tasks. In this way energy can be focused on one thing at a time and progress can be seen which in turns provides motivation to take the next steps.

The second tool was to take stock of the current situation - openly and honestly to determine what we had to work with and what was missing.

The third has been to make a decission - where to from here...

With this decision made, we are able to create a bridge between the now and the destination using a simple 5 Phase process of creating landing points and then actions to move from one landing point to the next. Once again this allows focus on what's required NOW and provides the confidence and motivation to keep moving forward.

In an overall sense I am truly grateful for the opportunity of working on these projects. At times the levels of gratitude and postivity I've seen and felt from those who have lost so much has been overwhelming for providing something many of us naturally do - sharing of ourselves with some love and support.

Their inspiration, courage and love will stay with me for the rest of my days.

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