I am fine 🥸🥹😔😵‍💫🤐 | We need a new language to learn how somebody is doing.

It was a beautiful early fall day in Chicago. We had a great event with customers, and I was about to board my plane to New York. Nothing special; done it a thousand times.

Somehow I found myself on the airport floor. Two caring older women leaned over me and asked: “How are you?”. Guess what my answer was? "I am fine!"

“I am fine.” 🫠

What happened? Startup life happened. Too many meetings, not enough sleep, our business was as smooth as a roller coaster, and I was not sharing my concerns with anybody. Everything was fucked up - aka business as usual. And I collapsed.

We can’t assume that people are fine. I certainly wasn’t. And we might want to revisit our language when we want to know how somebody really is. Some ideas I am applying ever since:

Follow up

How are you? Fine! How does fine feel for you?

‘Fine’ is easy, a shield to not answer the question. We need to respect that. Yet, I would have loved somebody to follow up and allow me to share.

Check-in

What is your status, red, yellow, green?

You open the door without overstepping. If the answer is green, great. Often the answer is not just a color but a path from one color to another.

Embrace the Silence

How are you? Fine! (smile)!?

Give room. The awkward silence might allow them to share if there is more to “fine”.

What happened next back in Chicago? I took the next flight to New York and pretended nothing happened. It took me a couple of years to realize that a change was needed.

Ultimately, I added two hours of sleep to my schedule and opened up to coaching about what was happening in my head. I accepted the nuances of life as something beautiful and, in the process, became a coach.

What is your status 🔴🟡🟢?