Midnight Meldown Avoided

It was midnight and our sale had just started - I was really excited as we had been planning for this moment for months!  My husband was trying to fall asleep next to me as I scrolled on my phone - updating the website with the sale info and making sure it populated. 

"You need to go to bed" Daniel said groggily, attempting to ignore the glow of my screen.  But I was keyed up and still wanted to check everything thoroughly.  I did a mock cart and the discount applied - check!  I added more items to the cart to get our free gift to load (our first year for a free gift on top of our discount - this was a big deal for us!) - it wasn't loading.  Why wasn't it loading???  

I sprang out of bed, leaving Daniel and our dog, Jasper, to slumber and beelined it downstairs to my computer.  I confirmed that the gifts weren't populating in carts - they literally weren't showing up.  Panic.  But new and improved panic - instead of spiraling down, which is a historical M.O. for me - I saw the Post-It note from our work bathroom flash through my mind "I choose to focus on what I can control." 

Our team read Mel Robbins' book "High Five Habit" for our Erin's Faces Book Club this month and that was one of her mantras she shared.  We each wrote one down that we liked and put it in the bathroom as we'd see them there daily and choosing to focus on what I could control was mine. 

I even did an Instagram post about it in the middle of the night 😂

So instead of feeling waves of failure, guilt, anger at the app that wasn't synching, I chose to focus on what I could do something about - and that was to make a list of each client who should have gotten a gift to ensure that in the morning she/he would! 

A fun thing happened while I was going through every order - I saw Desiree, Rachel and Debbie* who I went to college with, Anne who was the stage manager of my first union acting job, Julia who I met at a Green Beauty Workshop in Oklahoma years ago, Melissa who hosted a Workshop for me in Texas even longer ago, Alena who I met in dance class in NYC 15 years ago, Taylor who I've never met but have talked with over IG many times, and so many more ladies.  With every name and every order I smiled and had a memory of that person and was reminded that this was what was important - these women.  I knew them (even if we had never met), I loved them and I was so grateful for them.  

I went through each order, noted who should have what gift, and at around 1:15am emailed the completed list to our office manager, Gwen, so she would have a copy too.  And then I went to bed.  I didn't stay up tossing and turning about it.  I knew I had done what I could and would fix it in the morning to the best of our abilities.  And we did!  

Gwen, Lea, Jeanne, Sylvana, Jasper & me - our crew this past weekend

I'm so grateful for every email, text, DM, comment on IG and in our FB group from you and for your orders - it truly gives me so much joy to offer a big discount as a thank you to you for your support.

This time of year always has a lot of pressure around it - needing to close the gap that may be happening financially, making sure we have enough product on the shelves, ensuring orders go out quickly and correctly and more.  So I'm grateful for reminders, even when they come cloaked as midnight problems, that what we're here to do is to love people.  To lift them up.  And the rest can get figured out in the morning.  

*just for the record Rachel and Debbie have also both hosted Green Beauty Workshops for me in California because my friends are awesome