# Tip 8: Look for silver linings - **Episode:** [201](https://agents.truthliesandwork.com/episodes/201.md) (2025-06-02) - **Type:** other - **Tags:** optimism, positivity, gratitude - **Time:** 33:22–41:07 (start 2002s) - **Listen:** [https://truthliesandwork.com/201?t=2002](https://truthliesandwork.com/201?t=2002) --- [33:22] Leanne Elliott: Yeah, because again, in that, in that moment where workload is high and time is short, and that is a scenario that I know every small business owner listening will be familiar with, it's important to reduce the workload where you can to make the rest manageable. Because if it's not manageable, it's going to break. And at that moment, that moment of crisis, you don't have the luxury of breaking. You don't have time to break. And as Al said, it's communicating that quickly, clearly, honestly, apologetically, um, with the tone of, I'm mortified to have to do this. This is the general reason why. Do you, you know, is that okay? And can we rearrange this for another time? It's making sure that people know this is an extreme circumstance. This isn't business as usual. This isn't how we normally do things [34:19] Al Elliott: Yeah. So the email I sent to, so we had 3 or 4 soundchecks booked in and 2 or 3 interviews. And this was the email I sent. I said, hi, name. I'm so, so sorry to do this. We've had a bit of a domestic issue. Nothing bad, just really freaking inconvenient. Again, adding a little bit of humor and And brevity, a levity to it. Um, this means we have to spend the next few days sorting that out, so I'm gonna have to cancel our upcoming chat and ask that we reschedule. I'll be in touch early next week with some alternative dates. As I say, I'm devastated and seriously wouldn't reschedule if it wasn't 100% necessary. Please don't lose interest. We really want you on the pod. This person replied, no worries, totally understand. Take care of yourself. Chat next week. And every single person replied in the same way. Every single person was like, I hope you're okay. These things happen. Just let me know. And that was such a lovely thing because we respected their time so much. We didn't just cancel it. We, we had a little bit of an altercation with a, with a guest, um, this week who, in our opinion, kept canceling and rescheduling. And then they got quite arsey when I said, dude, I'm not sure you're for us. Um, but this is the thing. We were like, look, I'm so sorry. And so just, I think it's okay to pause. It's okay to postpone, but Honesty by explaining, I'm not just binning you off. Something's come up. You don't have to tell them what's come up, but something has come up. Wouldn't otherwise do this. So I'm really, really sorry [35:40] Leanne Elliott: And again, it's protecting those relationships, those relationships that mean a lot to us that we want to continue to, to build on. I've had people who I've been in fairly long-term professional relationships with and got to a point where I'm assuming they're in crisis. I don't know because they never told me. But I just have meeting after meeting, reschedule, cancel, reschedule, cancel. You know, when you do it through automatic link on Zoom, to the point where maybe they did that 4 or 5 times. The last time got canceled and I never heard from them again, despite my, my attempts to check in and follow up. Um, so there's different ways. It's ghosting, essentially. You could ghost these people, but probably not going to serve you in, in the long run. Um, and I guess going on to tip number 7 in terms of these I guess modeling these boundaries, these behaviors, that this is how we normally do things, so we'll be open and honest when we can't do it that way, is setting yourself some boundaries in terms of, of your own ability to feel this and deal with this. Give yourself a break. Be kind to yourself. Know that this is hard. I think one of the things I kept saying all the time was like, this is a lot. Like, this is a lot. And I, I could tell when I was looking at you, Al, when I said that, you'd be like, okay, I know this is— you're starting to feel it now. So let's just take a, take a moment. One thing that Al and I have always done very well, um, but probably more so well since we started working together maybe 3 or 4 years ago, and this is, this is not something we did automatically. We had to learn about setting our own boundaries and checking in and And one thing we, we said to each other at the end of day 1 was, I said to Al, we're gonna be really shitty with each other tomorrow [37:23] Al Elliott: Hmm [37:24] Leanne Elliott: I was like, we're both gonna be stressed. We're both gonna be grumpy. We're both gonna be devastated. We're both gonna be tired. I said, we're gonna, we're gonna be unintentionally mean to each other tomorrow. I said, let's just give ourselves permission to not beat ourselves up if we say something we didn't mean. Try not to take it personally if somebody said something that they didn't mean. Give us each other permission to walk away if it's just getting too much and too heated in that moment. Um, and almost making those, those rules and boundaries ahead of a situation getting even more stressful can be quite useful. Did we stick to them entirely? No, not necessarily. But because we'd had that conversation, we, we had that, that ability to go, so, you know, before when I walked away and it really pissed you off, that was just my attempt to remove myself from that situation because I could feel myself Let's say, oh, right, yeah, okay, I understand. It's that constant dialogue and that kindness to yourself and also kindness to the people you're in this with. And I think particularly any team that's gone through a stressful situation is going to see their teammates react in stressful situations differently. Um, and just give people a break, give them a free pass, you know, if things are particularly stressful. Um, you don't have to pull up people on Every little bit of, of bad behaviour if it is in a very stressful situation [38:42] Al Elliott: Yeah. So, I think our tip 7 is self-compassion. Just be, be nice to yourself, be nice to your other teammates. I, I think just one other thing I want to add to that is that, um, and I know that I talk a lot about gender right here, but I, I, what I try to do is sympathise with listeners who are maybe my age and my, my gender, um, because We are struggling to learn what the new world is expecting of us, what is acceptable, what's not. And I think for, if you tend to be sort of a, you know, an old, a middle-aged male of a certain age, then you, your temptation is to fix things, to go, well, I'm the fixer. And this, and in a marriage, you know, often that's what happens. This has gone wrong. You know, I've got a puncture. If it's people of my age, they'll go, well, I'll go and fix it for you [39:29] Leanne Elliott: Yeah [39:29] Al Elliott: And so it's really difficult cuz you can't be the fixer because you've got just as many skills in this situation as the other person. No, not always, but in this particular situation we did. We both had skills like that. So, you know, not jumping into the, I'm gonna go and save the day because sometimes, like as I learned with Leanne, any particular, even just a smaller problem, she was like, well, I've got this problem. And my instinct is to go, well, why don't we do this? And I've learned with Leanne, I need to stop and go, so tell me the problem again. And she outlines the problem. I go, and what sort of thing, what, what are the ideas of solving this problem? And often she, often all she wanted to do was talk it through. Then she'll just go, okay, no, that's fine. No, I know what I'm going to do. That's fine [40:07] Leanne Elliott: And equally, I've learned when I can, you know, sometimes start on this, this way of coaching, essentially, if I can feel myself pushing against it, I know that I'm not ready to solve the problem yet. And I'll say something like, oh, do you know what? I was just having a moan. I'm not ready yet. That's usually at that point they'll just give me a hug and we'll, we'll go about our day. Heard, helped, or hugged. That's a key thing. If you can have that kind of conversation with your partner, what do you need in this minute? Do you need to be heard? Do you need to be helped? Or do you need to be hugged? [40:35] Al Elliott: Absolutely. So tip number 7 was be compassionate with yourself. Um, and if you're a leader, then model this. Don't, you know, be compassionate, be, have, be self-compassionate. I'm not sure that you can be self-compassionate, but you know what I'm trying to say. Because your team will follow. And if they go, you know, he's locked himself in the office, or she locked herself in the office because she wants just an hour to herself, maybe that means I can take an hour to myself. Maybe I can go and have a cup of tea or something, or a cup of coffee, and just go, this is, this is a lot, isn't it? Tip number 8, I think, is just look for silver linings. Um, Lee, what are your thoughts on, on, on this?