10 Tips to Get Through Tough Times

Heidi Fore
Sep 12
5 min read

Tip # 1 Acknowledge what you have control over and what you don’t have control over.

You have control over your belief in yourself.

You have control over your belief in God - You can choose to believe that God’s got you and he’s going to lead you through this.

You have control over your words that you think.

You have control over your words that you say.

You have control over who you talk to and how often.

You have control over what you watch, what you read, and what you listen to.

You have control over how you see situations and other people. You do not have control over what other people say, or what they think about what you say, or what they believe to be true. You can choose your response to their words. You choose if you see their best intentions or assume the worst-case scenario.

You control the amount of effort you put forth in your relationships, and at work, and on your mission.

You control whether or not you keep going or stop trying - in relationships and at work.

If you choose to work today, you have control over how you spend your money and where your money comes from.

You have control over how you vote.

You have control over the amount of effort you are willing to put in to fight for a better tomorrow than the way the world looks today.

Tip # 2_Find the strength to keep your business going even when you don’t feel like it.

If you stop finding leads and getting people under contract, you’ll only make a horrible situation worse. Being broke and going through a hard time multiplies the hard time and creates new problems. Get someone (coach/accountability partner/leader) in your life that pushes you to your potential, that says, “I know it’s hard and you’ve got to focus on work anyway. Being strong is the only choice you have.” Make yourself focus on bringing in new business for a certain period of time every day. Also, block times to think about your situation in your life. Such as, “I’ll just focus on business until 4:00. After 4:00 I’ll spend time processing what just happened.” At 4:00, journal, or take a walk, and think about what happened, not until then.

Tip # 3 Accept help when strangers, friends, and co-workers offer to help you.

Let them give you blessings and prayers, or money, or clothes, or their time. Lean on your friends. Ask your friends to pray with you. Visit with friends and talk to them about how you feel and what your options are. Be careful not to take advice from anyone whose life you don’t want. You are the sum of the 5 people you hang around most. It doesn’t mean you are weak if you accept help. If they want to be a blessing and “pay it forward,” don’t stop them. Someday you’ll return the favor.

Tip # 4 Do nice things for other people.

Volunteer to help people who need help. You’ll feel better and put positive energy in the world. It’s a win-win.

Tip # 5 Find inspiration from others who have gone through challenging situations.

Read articles about heroes in history that you admire. Recall heroes from the Bible, or your faith’s history. Remember our military heroes who endure so much to keep the good guys safe. Think about how strong those people are and say, “if they can do that, then I can do this.”

Tip # 6 Say affirmations daily.

Put positive messages around your world to counterbalance the negative words in your head.

Arrange your room so that the first thing you see when you wake up, is something that will get you out of bed. Print out a positive message that you can put by your bed that will remind you why you need to get out of bed in the morning.

Tip # 7_Remind yourself of all the good that you did and you had.

When you find yourself feeling sorry for yourself about what you don’t have, and didn’t do, look at what you do have, at what you DID get accomplished. Because of what happened, there is pain. Before the pain, good things happened. It’s okay to think about the good things and be grateful for those.

Tip # 8_Get professional mental help to be emotionally healthy.

Don’t feel bad about getting professional help for you or your kids. It can be a therapist, group counseling, church group, pastor, psychiatrist, psychologist, or life coach. Coaches can help you change the way you look at negative things in the past so they don't get in the way of your successful future. Talk to someone who can help you reframe how you see pain from losses, such as “because I feel loss, it means I felt love. Therefore, when I feel big grief, I can be grateful that I got to love so big.” Ask your doctor if medication would help you. Ask an alternative healer what your natural options are.

Tip # 9 Choose responsibility for everything that happens in your world, instead of being a victim, but do not be responsible for the whole world.

Acknowledge when things happen “to you” as a result of your choices. Decide that from now on, where you will end up in life is a product of your choices, everything that will happen will be because of the choices that you make regarding how you spend your time, and who you spend it with, and how you spend or save your money. When you choose to love big, you will hurt big. Live big anyway. Accept the fact that when you choose to live a big life you will have big losses, and it will be alright again one day. The other option is to play small and live a small life. You deserve a big life, a great life. I hope you choose greatness. And let me add this too about the the word responsibility. I think of it as two words, response-ability. When you are able to respond to make a situation better, do it. Remember this though…You are not responsible for the weight of everything that happened to other people in the world today. Somewhere in the world today someone got hurt., someone died, someone was robbed of something. Someone else made those choices, not you. You didn’t do it, but you can choose how you respond to the responses about it. Help when you can help. Make a difference where you can make a difference. Acknowledge when you can do nothing other than pray for healing and comfort and mercy and grace. Be the light in the darkness that lights a candle near you. Prayer and love are response abilities.

Tip # 10 Make a vision board of what you want your life to look like when this storm passes,

when you’re on the other side of this valley on a peak again. Martin Luther King Jr. said that to have faith means taking the first step even if you can't see the whole staircase.

My hope for each of you is that you are either living your purpose or finding your purpose, and you feel the courage to take the next step on your path to what fulfills you and brings you peace.