Covid19 has robbed us of our most precious resource – thousands of deaths by an invisible disease. The old saying “Dying’s easy… living is Hard” may have truth to it.

I am not buying it totally. I think living is not only hard but it is infinitely harder to tough it out than it is to give up. The greater we fear the inevitable, the greater the struggle it is to keep on going.

Dying alone in a nursing home scares most of us. We view the end as an escape instead of as a step into tomorrow. Why not set up a better “tomorrow” today?

We will never escape our fears. We fight through them if we want to win. I have often observed in this column that you have to know when enough is enough. In my countless failures over the years, I never saw any as reason to quit. It was just time to start over and get it right this time.

So I had to start over more often than most. I was better at failing than I was at quitting and it never once occurred to me to worry about those losses. “Mama Alice,” the matriarch of the Aun clan, used to say “You must keep looking… there’s always another way. Quitting is not an option.”

I learned from Mama Alice that you do not always find success on your 2nd or 3rd try. It takes multiple tries to get close to getting it right and if I never learned another thing from her, getting it right is never good enough. You can always improve!

Sometimes tomorrow’s results are worse than today’s. Does that mean you give up? That is quitting… and quitting according to Mama Alice is not an option.

THE GOAL of an escape ought to afford a better outcome than the status quo. You’ll never escape those 2nd thoughts about life’s next step. Sometimes we zig when we should zag. That is what bankruptcy courts are for ... but that chapter in your life, be it 7 or 11, should not be the escape plan.

You should have a Plan B. For some people, Plan B might be the nearest book or inspirational music, sports, games or art. Let your mind wander. That is half the fun.

Fantasy worlds are not so bad, especially if they motivate you to become better at chasing that rainbow. Inescapable as your life might be, unless you decide to escape it, the best result is to just deal with it.

Will the pain go away? It may not and that may be all the motivation you need.

Our past may define us, and yet we get up every day looking for a better today and an ever better tomorrow. That is an escape plan. Add to the bottom line to make a new plan even better.

Michael Aun, CSP®, CPAE® is recipient of the Phil Hosche Lifetime Achievement Award from National Association of Insurance and Financial Advisors® - Central Florida