Sometimes, life is a very painful learning process.

I know you have been through this, we have all been.

You are peacefully minding your own business, things are going on smoothly and then, out of nothing, out of nowhere, something incredibly bad happens, something incredibly wrong happens: shit hits the fan.

Shit happens, shit storms happen, these predictable or sometimes unpredictable crisis situations that turns really bad leaving you without any immediate perceivable options or way out and making your life miserable, turning your life or having the potential to turn your life into a possible nightmare.

Well, like many of you I have been there and not only once. Many times, in the past, I went through something, through situations that may qualify or may have been perceived by many as a “Shit Storm”. Yes, I did, and yes, I did survive these situations. How did I cope with these potentially disastrous situations? Here is how I did, and how you do it.

First, let me tell you about my last shit storm that happened a few years ago.

What happened

Well, a mix of bad luck, tiredness and just plain strange stuff. First, during a routine medical exam to schedule a knee replacement surgery, I found out that I had a stage four colon cancer and if I was not to do anything to do about it, I had only two months to live.

Like it was not enough, at the same time, my corporation lost a multi-million dollars to the competition and the work unit in charge of this account had to be dismantled leaving me with absolutely no future income.

At home, things were going really bad. The radiation and chemo treatment was definitely affecting my libido and sex life. Not that I did really personally care about that, but this situation was definitely impacting on my conjugal situation and relationship.

In other words, I was having this major “The Shit Hits The Fan”, this “Shit Storm” experience.

What about now?

All of that happened a few years ago. I was under an incredible amount of pressure. While my life partner turned into a total “Nut Case”, I took the bull by the horns and survive the shit storm.

Today, everything is for the best in the best of the worlds.

What follows is, for your own benefit, an attempt to formalize my personal experience in fighting an “Unpredictable” crisis situation and how to survive it, whatever your situation may be, however desperate you may feel.

1.- Assess the situation, do not stress

It is very easy to give in to panic when something goes wrong. Instead, focus on what is happening. When you immerse yourself into an Analysis and Systemic Thinking Process, something very interesting happens. Your adrenaline rush is no longer directed into a “Fight or Flight” mode anymore. When you are facing a crisis, your reactions are following only two possible patterns: Fight or Flight, Give-up or face the situation and do something about it.

Either way, we are talking about stress.

Stress, as dangerous as it may be, does have this incredible feature: It gives you access to a tremendous source of energy.  It releases a lot of energy that you can decide to either block or harness. You can either decide to stress and give up or, decide to transform this adrenaline rush, this stress energy that you are experiencing, into working energy allowing you to fix any situation that you may encounter or may be facing.

2.- Decide on what you want to do

As soon as you realize what is going wrong, as soon as you have to face the situation, the “Shit Storm”, start to plan.

Thing systemically and strategically.

Ask yourself: What is it that needs to be done ASAP? What is it that I can do now? How is this going to impact my life? How is this, whatever I decide to do, going to impact any other aspect either of my personal or professional life? How much time do I have to react?

After gathering all the data, start to play with all the possible solutions; make this part of  the decision-making process. Just remember that some of the things that you may have to do, some of the possible fixes, may not be that visible at first. Our ability to identify and follow up decisions during a crisis is drastically affected.

Despite that, it is vital to step back and choose the best possible solution and the best possible and available fixes. Even in a very dangerous  and/or complex situation, there are always many more options than the “Fight or Flight” solution.

Yes, there is always this urge to run away from the place of the crisis, hoping that a change in context will also change the facts but, unless a building is crashing on you or a bus is going to run over you, running away is never the best option.

Avoidance is never the best solution.

It takes a while and some courage to turn your face toward the fan and take all the shit coming at you upfront. But it is the only viable solution. To prepare and plan an escape plan, to determine a possible direction to go or what you have to do, first, you have to know where the “Shit” is really coming from.

If you do not face the crisis and its causes, there is no way out. You will never be able the reverse the odds in your favor and to survive the situation. You may get away for a while if you run away, but each time you will get back to that place, there may be a different day, but you will be facing the same old fucking shit.

3.- Communicate

Nothing is happening just by itself.

There is no such a thing like a “Black Box” of our life events, something completely inaccessible. Information is always there to reach for it. Believe me, all possible answers to any situation that you may have to face reside within yourself. The only thing you have to do, the only thing you want to do is to reach for that information.

Each time you have to face a crisis, try to communicate. First, acknowledge the situation and then try to communicate with people who know you, people that may help you assess the overall situation. Seek personal and professional advice, get as much intel as you can. Most of the time, people will actually appreciate the fact that you are reaching to them and you can always benefit from their insight and assistance.

Every crisis has the potential to reveal something about you or the others that you were not aware of. As long as you stay on track and communicate, as long as you do not isolate yourself in a “I Know Better” pattern, there is always hope to find the most appropriate solution to the crisis that you may be facing. One more thing: if there are other persons involved in your crisis, try to also understand their point of view.

4.- Rebuild carefully, very carefully

Now that you have fully assessed the situation and possible solutions, now that you effectively communicate your intentions and gathered all the intelligence available, it is now time to strategically and systematically rebuild whatever is to be rebuilt.

You do not want to create or having to go through another “Shit Storm”.

The worse already happened. Why should you worry now? Just sit down and carefully review and test all the data you collected. The emphasis here is on “Carefully” not so much on “Rebuild”. You have to rebuild anyway, but just do it very carefully.

What you do not want to do is to fall back into your old patterns. Unless it is genetic, hereditary, climatic or otherwise driven by the laws of nature, nothing on earth is unpredictable.

Disasters can always be either avoided or prevented.

When you thing your systemically and plan your life strategically, nothing bad can happen to you. Personal and professional crisis and disasters can always be forecast, avoided and prevented. When going through a major crisis, it is very important to realize that you did yourself as much harm as you could have done already and that there is no need to augment on that. Just pay very close and careful attention to what you are doing and things will start to straighten up.

Again, when we are under pressure, we have this huge urge to speed up. Well, speed up, if you have to, but do it carefully, very carefully. You do not want to repeat your mistakes of the past. You do not want to go through another “Shit Storm”. Accept the current disaster and focus on avoiding the next potential one.

One final word

Most of the time, life is a painful learning process. We learn more from our failures than from our successes. We remember the dangerous and hurtful events much better than the happy events. This is an inherited pattern that is wired into the survivals patterns of all animal forms including mankind.

This is how, as a general rule, all animal life forms avoid dangerous and deadly situations. As history is telling us: Only humans are stupid enough to repeat over and over the same mistakes.

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J. Michael Dennis, ll.l., ll.m.

FREE SPEECH ABSOLUTIST / PERSONAL & CORPORATE FIXER

Systemic Strategic Planning; Regulatory Compliance; Crisis & Reputation Management