Tag: syndicated

I started to add a daily coping tip to the SQLServerCentral newsletter and to the Community Circle, which is helping me deal with the issues in the world. I’m adding my responses for each day here. All my coping tips are under this tag.

Today’s tip is to choose to see something good about what has gone wrong.

Recently we had to replace our refrigerator. The old one, well, not really old. Four years old, but it died. The manufacturer couldn’t fix it, so they have us a settlement that we used to buy a new one.

However. It was a pain. We had to get a new one before we got money for the old one. We had to keep the old one around until we heard from the company, and we ended up throwing out some food.

There were some good things that came out of this:

We cleaned the fridge out and a number of things that were thrown away weren’t needed or haven’t been something we thought to replace.

This spurred me to spend time getting generator maintenance scheduled. Something didn’t work right at the end of the winter, and I’ve been wanting to get this going again.

This also helped me appreciate how lucky we are. We had an old fridge in the garage that we could use for some things. A pain to go outside and get things and take them back, but that’s a first world problem. I tried to remind the family of that.

I started to add a daily coping tip to the SQLServerCentral newsletter and to the Community Circle, which is helping me deal with the issues in the world. I’m adding my responses for each day here. All my coping tips are under this tag.

Today’s tip is to what do you appreciate in life?

My health.

I’ve talked with a few people lately that are

a) either worried about COVID and health (for good reasons),

b) have gotten sick or had a family member get sick and had a rough time

c) struggle to accomplish things they want to do

I’m fairly healthy. Yes, I had ankle surgery a few months back and the ankle still hurts, but it’s getting stronger and healing. I’ve had COVID a few times and been fine. I had to take a week off, from last Tues to today after getting some hormone therapy.

Those things make me appreciate how lucky I am to not have had any major health issues and that the treatment I’ve sought for minor ones has worked well.

I started to add a daily coping tip to the SQLServerCentral newsletter and to the Community Circle, which is helping me deal with the issues in the world. I’m adding my responses for each day here. All my coping tips are under this tag.

Today’s tip is to find 3 things you feel hopeful about and write them down.

Three things that make me feel good about life:

1. People are excited about live events. SQL Saturday New Jersey was a good sign.
2. My kids are coping better in the world this summer, which makes me feel good about things. They all see the world differently and are in different places in life, but all happy.
3. More opportunities for travel for my wife and I keep appearing, which makes me think the future will be better.

I started to add a daily coping tip to the SQLServerCentral newsletter and to the Community Circle, which is helping me deal with the issues in the world. I’m adding my responses for each day here. All my coping tips are under this tag.

Today’s tip is to identify what helped you get through a tough time in your life.

I’ve mostly had a good life, but there were definitely some tough times. However, what has helped me, or what I did to cope changed over time.

Earlier as an adult, I had financial struggles at times. I used stubbornness and persistence to make my way through things. I took two or three jobs to make ends meet and overworked myself. I know I’ve had more than my share of 100+hour weeks.

When I was struggling early in my first marriage, I went to counseling with my wife. I leaned on a therapist, first together, then on my own to help me come to terms with the need for a divorce.

When COVID hit, I found myself in a strange place. A telecommuter of 20 years that wasn’t used to being at home for months at a time. I leaned on my wife and kids to distract myself from the sameness. I also focused on cooking more food for the family, which was good. Unfortunately, I also drank too much alcohol while cooking. Luckily, I’ve gotten better and less drinking and healthier food as the pandemic stretched on.

Coping can change over time. What worked at one point in my life, might not work later, or might not be appropriate. I have tried to approach things this way, changing when needed: “strong opinions, loosely held.” When I need to change, I will.