The driver in the story had her hands on the steering wheel. Her problem was that she panicked.

Don’t Panic — Just Go!

Karen CaccavoLife Lessons

Where do you get your inspiration?  Life lessons?  Over the past 16 years at Personal Money Manager™  I’ve found them in expected and many unexpected places!  In the spirit of discovery, I’m sharing this story from a wonderful quilting colleague, Melanie Tauzon, with her permission.  (I encourage you to look here and here for her creative work.)

 

Last week, I was driving on a familiar street and suddenly realized that I was going the wrong way down a one way street.  Apparently, the traffic pattern had been changed.  But I hadn’t been in that part of town in a while and auto pilot took over.

 

Suddenly I found myself at an intersection where the traffic light looked like it had turned its back on me!  What to do?  Turn around?  Quickly forge ahead?  Was I going to get pulled over?

 

I put the car in reverse and started backing up.  Just then, a kind soul ran out of the bank on the corner.

 

“Just go!” he said.

 

“Didn’t this road used to go both ways?” I called back.  The man calmly waved me through, without hesitating to answer my question. 

 

“Don’t panic.  Just go!”  A great motto for: Accept, learn, and move on.

 

Do elements of Melanie’s story resonate with you in your practice?  They do for me.

 

At Personal Money Manager™ I strive to be the “kind soul” guiding my senior clients and their families.  At times from the sidewalk; At other times steering the car.  With 16 years experience, I encounter lots of familiar territory—from taxes to a family member passing away to incorrect billing or worse.  With both the big picture in mind and expertise in the granular details, I bring calm and reason.  And wave clients through to safety.

 

But what makes my work even more interesting is seeing a financial organizing situation for the first time.  Recently, a client’s daughter and I handled a vendor billing kerfuffle that was new to us both.  When we got it resolved, I turned to her and said:  Now I’ll know next time I encounter this!

 

In one important way I am different from Melanie’s sidewalk angel: When working with clients, none of their questions need to be put aside.  We successfully navigate potentially dangerous on-coming traffic.  But thankfully, can do the work while explaining (and sometimes repeating) the “how’s and whys” along the way.

 

 

Photo Credit: 12088973 © Lightpoet | Dreamstime.com