Caregiving TLC - Constant in Life

CAREGIVING TLC

By Kie Copenhaver CSA, RHIA, SHSS, RCFE www.agingwellpartners.com

The only constant in life is change.

It wasn’t until I was somewhere over Kansas City that these words rattling around my head finally made sense out of my current predicament. You see, I was flying home to Montana for the holidays. Flights were booked. Accommodations were set. All that was left to do was fly. And then the text came in that changed everything.

My original flight from San Diego to Seattle and on to Helena, MT had been canceled due to the impending storm front hitting the west coast. Instead, my flight would take me to Helena by way of Orlando, Florida. Orlando?! How is Orlando, FL on the way to Montana. I grabbed a map of the United States just to make sure I hadn’t completely forgotten my geography. The next hour was spent looking for available flights that wouldn’t be as circuitous but there were none to be had. Everything had either been canceled due to weather or was completely booked and probably overbooked. I went to bed the night of the 19th resigned to the fact that I would be flying to Florida to get home to Montana, and it would be one day later than originally scheduled.

In the not-too-distant past, this kind of curve ball would have completely taken me out of the game, and I would have either been angry or extremely sad and defeated, with the mindset of “nothing ever works out for me”. But that wasn’t the case on the evening of the 19th. In the moments following receiving the text outlining my new flight information, I took a deep breath, remained calm, and rolled with what was coming at me. I experienced the kind of calm I had always wanted in situations like this but had seemed elusive in my life. If I wanted to get home for Christmas, I was going to spend two days in the air to get there.

So, what does this have to do with the new year and new beginnings, you may be asking. Well, the fact of Retirement - What’s Next the matter is that life throws us curve balls and it’s up to each one of us to choose how we are going to react. We can’t change the weather, the airline schedules, the flight patterns, and a whole lot of other things in life but we can change our perception of the situation which in turn, changes our actions and behaviors. I couldn’t change Alaska Airline’s new plan for me to get to Montana (and I wasn’t going to sit on hold for five hours to speak with a representative) but in that calm I experienced, I changed my perception of the situation from disappointment and frustration to one of adventure and challenge. I also happen to believe that everything, even the crappy stuff, happens for a reason; and I would need to find my seat and buckle in for that reason to be revealed.

When stuff happens, and it will, take a deep breath and see if you can change your perception of the situation. See if you can find the positive, the diamond in the coal, the pearl in that grain of sand. I can’t think of a better way to start the new year than with a fresh new outlook on life.