Laura (Oh!) Tannenbaum.

Laura Tannenbaum, my wife of almost 41 years, is our final participant in Guest Post week. 

She's been a freelancer in the healthcare sector of the advertising business for the last ten years or so.

During that time, she hasn't had a single involuntary day off. She's the Lou Gehrig, the Cal Ripkin, the Joe DiMaggio of freelancers.

A decade or so when she was squeezed out of a long time job and I was squeezed out of my five year job, we both found ourselves "mature" and unemployed. I asked Laura, "what do you do better than anyone else in the world?" Like a lot of women (too many in my opinion) she said "nothing."

But she was obviously wrong.

Because she hasn't had a single involuntary day off in over ten years. She was wrong. Though she'd never admit that.

Here's Laura's post.

It will tell you more about her talent, drive, and energy than my dopey powers ever could.

One more thing: Laura has a lot of energy. Of course, she tires me out. 

She can also out-energy a 14-month old golden retriever.

Laura's post.

I received this text from a close friend who’s incredibly talented:

 

I’m stressed over a big project, but glad for the work.

It’s keeping me up at night.

Hope I can get a handle on it soon so I can calm down.

               

Who cannot relate?

As soon as I read this, I knew that pain—as I was also feeling overwhelmed by a Sisyphean task. I had 2 large, complicated assignments from different teams. For weeks I was counting on these to have staggered timing. But of course they were both assigned and due on the same day.

 

The analysis is paralysis

At first I froze over how perplexing each assignment was. So instead of digging into the work and perseverating over it, I did my daily puzzles and even did some new ones, then I read that editorial I meant to read over the weekend. You get the picture…I wanted to do everything but these assignments. And another day went by avoiding the inevitable. This made me even more nervous. Finally I stayed up one night worrying about how I could possibly get everything done. I took a look from a high level, then down to earth to a reflection pool of sorts. And I realized there was a way to get this going.

 

One lap at a time

When our older daughter was overwhelmed by a swim test she needed to do to swim in “A” water at her camp, my husband told her to concentrate on one lap at a time. She shouldn’t be thinking about all of the laps as that was too much. Just think about that one lap you are in. Then think about the next lap. We all agreed that this was an important life lesson. And it certainly applied to my situation. I could do the work by taking it apart, piece by piece.

 

There was a method afterall

After looking at that lap pool and thinking it through, I was able to do one part of one assignment and actually turn that in early…I even over-delivered on the assignment. The team was pleasantly surprised by my timing and effort, then gladly moved that along. In the meantime I forced myself to look at the 3 parts of one assignment and figure out the most difficult part. I reasoned with myself that if I could do the toughest task first then the rest wouldn’t be as hard. That turned out well as I worked through the complexities and finally got that piece ready. The team was impressed when they saw it. I was glad to get that done and move on.

 

Mapping out what was left

Or the blockhead blocked it out

For the rest of the assignments, I blocked everything out taking the input from the brief, even though I knew it wasn’t really what was needed. This gave me structure for what goes where and how it would eventually come together. Then I put it all together.

 

5 courses of “of courses”:

Of course the brief was way off.

Of course the clients had different expectations.

Of course they wanted it right away but couldn’t meet for a few more days.

Of course I was promised people to help me but I was all alone.

Of course everyone had helpful materials and comments to share—after the fact.

 

How do you spell relief?

It was all done and on time, and better than anyone expected.

And finally I could rest assured and think beyond these projects.

There was still plenty more to be done, but the first draft was out there.

What was the lesson learned?

Take each lap as it comes, take the high road and muster everything it takes to get the tough stuff done first. Have confidence that you will get there. And like anything worthwhile, there will be some pain involved. Work is called work because it is. But it can be rewarding well beyond the paycheck. And that’s pretty important.

So next time that boulder starts to roll your way, know you will overcome it.

And you’ll be better for it.