“Everybody has a plan until they get punched in the mouth” – Mike Tyson

I love this quote. We can plan out our work week, set yearly goals and even count the days until retirement but when something big and unexpected happens, all plans can go out the window. Then what do you do? Fall down and think about it for awhile? Continue on as if nothing has happened? Take a break and re-plan?

In the safety world and in our everyday lives, things can change quickly. Mergers can cause seasoned professionals to lose their jobs. Disasters, natural and otherwise, can cause major disruptions in people’s lives. Personal accidents or personal family emergencies such as caring for a seriously sick child or parent can totally derail the best of plans.

So what do you do? More planning? Plan B (or C)? Back-up plans? Contingency plan? Whatever you call them the problem with all of this planning is usually that it is a paper exercise. That is, if the ideas you have for planning even make it out of your head and onto paper! If you do actually write the plan down, are you safe? Say you get suddenly fired from your job and you have three kids in college and an elderly parent living with you. Are those plans on a piece of paper going to help you make the payments you need to make in the coming months?

I’m suggesting that you have to go one step beyond the planning stage to the doing stage. What can you do now that you can immediately go to if your plans are derailed? Financial advisors will tell you to have at least 6 months of income in savings in case of emergencies such as these but I’m not talking about cash.  Do you have something you can do immediately?

I am a firm believer in the importance of a side-hustle. This is an incoming producing activity you do on the side. You can dabble in it while you are employed or work on it more seriously.  The idea though is to have something you can work with as soon as you are punched in the mouth.  What can you do now to make that punch only sting a little and not knock you out? Think about it and watch for upcoming posts for some ideas and some steps you can take to get started.