Today, I write to you from my home, my family’s place—where we are all doing what we have been asked to do — “shelter” until this virus storm has passed.
For years, I have written and talked with people about how to have more Perfect Days. And I don’t know of a better time than now to begin your own journey to experience more of these each day.
A few weeks ago, we were all in disbelief as we began to hear news about the spread of Covid-19. I was in the middle of planning to summit Mt. Everest in May (Everyday Everest), and I’m still planning to hike as many feet as Everest is high in an effort to raise awareness and money for cancer prevention.
I’m taking social distancing seriously, but I also know that cancer never takes a day off. Even now, some cancer patients are not only struggling to complete rounds of chemo, they are battling real fears of catching the coronavirus!
So, for me, my Perfect Day is still wrapped up in completing my goal to raise one million dollars for a mobile heath screening unit. In fact, it is laser focused on early detection and prevention—not just for cancer but for the health and well being of those who do not have a health facility nearby.
Our lives may seem momentarily interrupted, but the truth is you still have the future stretching out before you. And even though, there’s an additional hold on life for another 30 days, as you and I continue to “shelter in place,” there are countless opportunities to experience life through time spent with your family, giving to others, and reconnecting with people via messages and phone calls.
More than one client has written asking about the future, what should be done, and how to do it. Each time, I explain that while there are so many shifts in play, there is still an underlying sense that the strength of our economy will return.
Therefore, be bold in your reach and not desperate to return to your office environment. If you have a solid financial plan in place, you will be able to weather this extremely difficult storm. If you don’t, please sign up for a free 15 minute consultation with me and we’ll work through a plan together.
That said: this is also an excellent time for you to do maintenance on your Perfect Day plan.
In fact, it’s the perfect time for you to do inventory on your life and your finances by beginning here: What do you value more than anything else? What would you like to be remembered for—your chase for more money and material possessions or your desire to have a balance to your life that includes caring, giving, saving, planning, and enjoying the wealth you have achieved?
In his book Road to Character, David Brooks makes a distinction between resume virtues and epitaph virtues. Resume virtues have to do with your titles, credentials, and income. While epitaph virtues have to do with the love and care you shared with the people around you, the service you provided for your community, and the contributions you made.
I advise clients that if you want to plan for the future, start with the end of your life in mind. When you do, you make much better life decisions today and you will live your “epitaph focus” each day.
As the expression goes, “What you take with you is what you leave behind!”
Having the right view of life and the future includes goal setting—short, mid, and long range—not just for your business, but for your personal life, too.
One of my goals with my Perfect Day strategy is to teach you how to lift your head up from your laptop, turn off your office lights, switch your cell phone to off, lay aside your tablet, and think seriously about your epitaph virtues.
This time when you may be thinking through your mortality, could actually be a turning point. It could be a time when you realize the most important thing in your life is not what you have in the bank but what you have right now.
So, let me ask you: How do you want to be remembered—for your chase to gain more money and material possessions or your desire to have a balance to your life? Better yet: how do you want to live your life—today?
You may think you have discovered what you believe you want in life only to find out that it really doesn’t mean anything. It is just a title, a thing, a sign, letters behind a name and nothing more.
But there is much more to life, more to you, and more that you can be. In times like these, when you have to lay aside all that you deemed as important, you can discover what truly matters and makes a difference. You can uncover what is deep inside of you.
You may lose your normal routine, but you may also may gain something so much more—yourself, your care for others, and your Perfect Day.
The key to getting through this time is not found in trying to buy your way out of it. In fact, you can’t do that! No amount of money will save you from a pandemic, but you can change the way you do life now.
If you dig deep and discover what makes you better, then when the country opens again and you are back behind your desk, you will have a new perspective on life and what it means to have Perfect Days amid imperfect moments. What you do within this time will leave a lasting mark on your life.
I teach entrepreneurs how to get to a place where every day is a Perfect Day, and I would love to show you how this is done. Let’s get started! And actually, with free time on your hands, why not sign up for my free webinar and gain some simple insights into what you can do to have more Perfect Days beginning with today.
About The Author: Cokie Berenyi
Cokie Berenyi has been in financial services and serving the needs of individual and institutional clients and entrepreneurs since 1996. Mother, author, business owner, financial “samurai” and Perfect Day engineer, Cokie loves food, wine, travel, stray dogs, goat cheese, tennis, and alpine mountaineering.
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