Tropical Storm Imedla | Our Conversations Matter
18 days ago, I kicked off a challenge to business owners inside and outside my coaching organization to produce and post one video a day in the month of September. When I awoke this morning, over a cup of steaming, hot coffee, I was thinking about what topic would I cover today. My question was soon answered. Bouncing down the stairs was my 10 year old son, Logan, asking, "Daddy, are we going to flood?" Tropical Storm Imelda had made landfall around Freeport, Texas yesterday. For something that was forecasted to be a rain event within a one hour time period became a tropical storm, and then Tropical Storm Imelda. Not a dangerous wind event, the chances of flooding rain increased greatly. Why did my son ask that question? We have to go back a little over two years ago when Kingwood, Texas (my hometown) was devastated by the remnants of Hurricane Harvey.
Hurricane Harvey landed on the Texas Gulf Coast as a Cat 4 on August 25th, 2017. The storm tracked towards San Antonio, and then looped back towards Houston, stalled, and eventually moved north. When it was located west of the Kingwood, Texas area, Kingwood received the rain from the east side of the tropical system dumping nearly 50 inches. Kingwood was inundated with both rising water from the rain and river flooding from the San Jacinto River (the rise in the river was a result of Lake Conroe releasing into the river basin - a entire different, and sensitive topic for those living in Kingwood). Approximately 15-20 percent of the entire Kingwood community was under 3ft - 6ft+ of flood water. The flood in Kingwood and the Greater Houston, Texas area was the largest flood recorded since Noah's Ark. Crazy.
In the following months, several of our friends and co-workers (at the time I was working with Keller Williams) were impacted by the flood waters. Many of the children in our kids' classes were impacted by the flood waters. Kingwood High School had flooded, and now the students were having to attend school on an adjusted schedule sharing the campus of Summer Creek High School. Total disruption. Total chaos.
In 2018, in extreme weather events, Kingwood experienced two floods in a period of 7 days. One rain event created 7 inches of rain in about 15 minutes. Our daughter in the first flood waded out to our vehicle, and the second flood she waited it out at the school until the waters receded. These rain events, especially the Harvey event, have caused our children (and I believe many children and adults in our area) to have a fear of these types of storms.
So Jeremy, what's the big deal? My wife and I have been much more conscious in talking with our children about these storm events. We are reassuring that everything will be okay, and we avoid watching the news which over hypes and builds up these events. I spent a few minutes this morning, because it was all I could tolerate, reading Facebook posts in a group for our school ISD. If parents were this panicked, I could only imagine what they were speaking into the lives of their children. Now I am not one to tell someone how to parent. I believe each parent has the right to parent their children as they chose, and I believe there needs to be a greater awareness. Why?
Our children listen and learn from us whether we like it or not, and if we are building fear in them, you might not see the results today, yet in time they begin to make decisions based on the environment in which they are raised. (Side note: I coach people on environment, and environment can greatly impact someone's ability to perform at a high level.) Are we speaking into our children assurance and problem solving, or are we feeding them with fear? I am 100% guilty of the latter on occasion, and I realize this as I write this blog post. It is making me more aware so I do better.
When I coach, I work within a coaching model that programming leads to thinking, thinking leads to feelings, feelings lead to actions, actions leads to results, and results reinforce or change programming. If our children's programming is to fear the storm, how does that impact their thinking, feelings, actions, and the results of those actions taken? The answer...not so great.
How does this even relate to building a business? As a business owner, what and who are you listening to daily? How does this impact the way you think? Do your thoughts impact your feelings? How do those feelings serve you? Do you take action that moves you towards great results, or do the actions you take limit you? Based on the results, does it reinforce or change your programming? Circling back to thinking, has someone spoken something into your life that has impacted you in not such a great way. Words are powerful. Words can cut. Words can impact you and I on levels sometimes we don't even understand.
I wrote this out of personal experiences in the life of my family, and I trust it gets us all to think a little differently on what we speak into the lives of our children, and what we have spoken into our lives as business owners. My biggest goal as a coach is to bring about an awareness to things that sometimes run under the radar, yet they have great influence in our lives and businesses; sometimes good and sometimes bad.
