Will You Test Positive For Your Actions During Covid-19?

My fifteen-year-old son walks into the kitchen and says, “Who would have thought that some guy eating a bat in Wuhan, China would prevent me from going to the gym several weeks later in Park City, Utah?”

I’ve always loved the idea of the Butterfly Effect. The idea that a butterfly can flap its wings and create a tidal wave thousands of miles away. That our actions, no matter how seemingly insignificant, impact the whole of society and the health of our planet. Today it’s not enough to sound good, we need to do good, to ensure the health and safety of ourselves and our communities. I’m hopeful that through this pandemic we’ll slow down, think more about how to share, help, and support each other and realize how interconnected we all are.

I’m starting a new format for my newsletters. Once a month I will bring you:

Something Personal

Something Professional

Something Profound

This idea was inspired by George Couros, the bestselling author of The Innovator’s Mindset. I’ve followed George for the last couple of years and I’m always inspired to do better when I read his posts. You can follow him here for great tips on life, leadership, and innovation. https://georgecouros.ca/blog/

Something Personal

Aside from the fact that my hair is graying and my shellac nails are chipping, I enjoy spending more time at home. This week, in addition to business activities, I instigated a 2-2-2-2 activity goal to feel productive and whole in all aspects of my life. You may want to incorporate this practice. Every day except Saturday, I commit to completing these actions:

2 calls to check the health and wellness of a colleague or friend.

2 wellness activities: (yoga, running, hiking, weight -lifting). We’re using pipes and water jugs in the garage to create a makeshift gym.

2 acts of kindness – purchase gift cards from a local business, volunteer, deliver groceries, cook for a friend.

2 new writings, learnings, or completions of content

I’ve also decided to take a cue from my mother and commit to getting fully dressed every day and wearing my jewelry. As a side, Walmart’s sales of clothes have increased since COVID19… from the waist up!

Something Professional

This last week we received mounting requests to create new online courses, appear at virtual events, and teach students remotely. I had the honor of:

• Teaching a remote Harvard Extension class on Sales Leadership
• Appearing as a business growth expert on the Town Hall for the National Chamber of Commerce to address how small businesses owners can continue to make sales and add value during the crises. https://www.inc.com/national-small-business-town-hall-stimulus-us-chamber-of-commerce.html
• Launching our first ever Leadership Live course to a sold-out audience of over 300 participants.

It was an unexpected pleasure partnering with my friends Dave and Emma Garrison. Through this pandemic, we recognized our professional synergy and shared beliefs. We discovered new ways to share ideas and even clients. The idea of collaborating with someone in my space used to make me nervous. But I’ve come to realize there’s enough success to go around and when you cultivate a mentality of abundance rather than of scarcity, your success multiplies. This has been my greatest lesson in the last three years.

Something Profound

One of the greatest illusions in life is that of critical decisions. When we tell the stories of our lives we often tell them with a suspenseful climax. “And then I made the fateful decision to…”, or, “It was then that I realized…”

We focus our stories on isolated moments. After all, that’s how stories go, and a good story can and should impart wisdom. But that’s not how it works most of the time. Real men and women living normal lives make small unspectacular choices daily that ultimately define them and reveal their character.

This is one of those times.

How will you respond to this crisis as an employer, a parent, and a seller [or whatever your occupation may be]? Please write to me and share how you’ve helped someone else, or how someone’s lent you a hand.

This is a time to make choices: not to own but to give, not to control but to share.

The decisions you make during these times of uncertainty will, like the butterfly and the bat, create a multiplier effect.

Choose them wisely.

Reprinted with permission from The Levitin Group. For more inspiration, visit Shari’s blog at https://www.sharilevitin.com/blog/.