Grieve and release.

Recently I was talking to a business contact about a problem she had had with technology. Now, technology and I don’t get along, so I was commiserating without really understanding the problem. What I did understand was that a great chunk of her work had disappeared and could not be retrieved. Now, I may not have understood why or how this had happened, but I felt my stomach drop as I thought about the implications of what had happened. What would I do if this had happened to me and my business?

She seemed very calm and philosophical about the whole thing and I said this to her. What she said made me think. She said that she realised she had gone through some of the stages of grieving. She grieved and moved on. At that point we had to move on, but she had started me thinking. So, when I got back to the office, I looked up the stages of grief and apparently it is generally accepted there are 7 stages. They are:

  • Shock and denial.
  • Pain and guilt.
  • Anger and bargaining.
  • Depression.
  • The upward turn.
  • Reconstruction and working through.
  • Acceptance and hope.

Once I read this, I realised that in business if something catastrophic happens we rarely have the luxury of time to ‘grieve’, as we must deal and move on. We need to learn from the experience rather than allowing it to stop us. It may be that ‘grieve’ is too strong a word and perhaps the process is actually ‘breathe and move on’.

What do you think?

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Have fun, stay safe

Glenys