I was always looking a year or more ahead and I had a very clear picture in my mind of how I wanted my life to look like in the future. I Stayed Focused on The Bigger Picture (and the Small Steps That Would Take Me Towards it) I can't think of a time where I slept on a response and didn't tone it down a bit. I haven't always gotten this right and there hasn't always been the luxury of time between emotion and response, but as a strategy to keep peace and maintain sanity, it's proven invaluable time and time again. It hurt to do that because I really wanted the house, but I also knew that "want" wasn't enough, it had to actually make sense and without agreeing to my terms, it simply didn't. I sat on the email, went and did a conference talk, drank some beer, had a sleep and responded the next day, cancelling the deal.
I received their reply and was initially upset. A perfect example is that the house purchase fell through due to the vendor not being agreeable to the terms I set forth. I'd sit on my own emails for a day, granting time to reflect on whether my words represented the best path forward or merely reflected my emotional state at the time. But none of these feelings would help me make rational decisions.įrequently, I'd simply sit on an email for a day. More than anything, it was the unpredictability of emotions that got me I could be cruising along thinking everything was on track then wammo! An email, a text message or a phone call would suddenly throw everything back into turmoil. I Did My Utmost to Not Make Decisions Based on EmotionsĮmotions have been high during this period, both professionally and personally. Finding common ground with friends was always a huge relief I wasn't alone in what I was going through. I mean that across all the fronts I was feeling the stress on too whilst in San Francisco in particular, I spent a bunch of time with people I knew well who'd been through similar business processes and as for the things stressing me in my personal life, it felt like every second person I confided in had a similar story. The thing that perhaps surprised me most about those discussions with friends was how much their own stories resonated with mine. The quote above about helping to increase a sense of belonging really nails it. Often those discussions have directly focused on the stresses in life but equally often, they've been an opportunity to bond around less contentious common interests cars, tech, family. Since Feb this year as travel has become a thing of the past, it's meant talking to friends in different parts of the world every couple of days. Last year and early this year, it meant spending a bunch of time with friends in person during my travels. They can also help increase our sense of belonging, improve our self-confidence and help reduce stress and anxiety. Our friends can be that ear to talk to, shoulder to lean on and nonjudgmental perspective that we need.
That’s why it’s important to have healthy friendships to turn to in times of need. Putting it in words now seems almost stupidly obvious, but there's a lot of evidence around the benefits of friendship on mental health: It can be hard to talk to family members about mental health. It wasn't until the stress really started mounting early last year that I actually made a conscious effort to do this. Maybe that's "just what blokes do" (or don't do), but it certainly wasn't a conscious decision on my behalf. I realised something very profound last year I've very rarely discussed my emotional state with friends. Here's how I sustained my performance whilst under extreme stress: I Leaned on Friends More Than I Ever Had Before It was extreme stress the likes I'd never dealt with before at a time when the demands on me were at an all-time high, so I started writing this blog post, adding to it at the worst of times. As part of attempting to rebuild my life, I was also in the midst of buying another house, a stressful process at the best of time let alone under these circumstances whilst on the other side of the world. That much was very broadly known publicly, but what I haven't spoken about until now is that earlier that year, my wife and I had decided to separate and later divorce. Project Svalbard (the sale of HIBP which ultimately turned out to be a no-sale) was a huge part of that and it was all happening whilst still being solely responsible for running the project. It was at the absolute zenith of stress a time when I had never been under as much pressure as I was right at that moment. I started writing this blog post alone in a hotel room in Budapest last September.
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