Ep. 37: When Sh*t Hits the Fan: 3 Tools to Stay Grounded
When everything falls apart, who do you become? In this episode, Laura shares three powerful tools to steady yourself when life, work, or your career pivot feels like a full-blown storm.
When “shit hits the fan,” most high-achievers default to control, overthinking, or silent spiraling. If you’re navigating a career pivot, leadership pressure, or a moment that shakes your sense of safety or identity, this episode gives you something practical to reach for.
Laura introduces three simple but transformative tools: the Silver Linings Tool, the “For You” Tool, and her personal favorite, the Humor Tool. These aren’t fluffy mindset tricks. They’re grounding strategies designed to create just enough space between your trigger and your reaction—so you don’t burn bridges, flip tables, or abandon yourself in the process.
Through deeply personal stories—including workplace harassment and a terrifying solo drive through the mountains of Costa Rica—Laura demonstrates how to regulate, reflect, and respond with intention. Because the real pivot point isn’t the chaos. It’s what you choose next.
If you’re ambitious, self-aware, and quietly asking, “What now?” this one is for you.
What You’ll Hear
✔️Why naming your coping tools helps you stay grounded under pressure
✔️How the Silver Linings Tool expands your emotional capacity in hard moments
✔️When (and how) to use the “How is this for me?” reflection without bypassing your feelings
✔️The boundary lesson Laura learned in therapy—and why it made her angry at first
✔️How humor can interrupt spirals faster than overanalyzing ever will
✔️A powerful reminder that you get to choose your response—even in chaos
“And as always, remember to proceed as if success is inevitable because it is.”
If this episode stirred something in you—don’t just sit with it.
Book your free 20-minute clarity call:
https://leadintactwithlaura.as.me/free-clarity-call
Download the Heart-Aligned Career Transition Starter:
https://www.leadintact.com/freebies/heart-aligned-career
You don’t have to navigate your pivot alone.
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You are listening to the pivot point where we unpack the defining moments that shift careers and lives. I'm your host, Laura Dionisio, a founder of Lead Intact, and my mission is to spotlight the raw real stories behind career pivots, the fears, the hopes. The messy middles and the bold decisions that follow if you're feeling stuck or quietly wondering what's next?
I hope these stories help you see yourself a little more clearly and inspire you to start moving toward your own dream life. Let's begin.
What do you do when shit hits the fan? Today I'm gonna talk about three tools you can use when you find yourself in the middle of a shit storm. Now, there aren't just three tools. I encourage you to listen to these tools, adopt them if it resonates or come up with your own.
The point of these tools and why I think naming it is important is so that when you are in the midst of your feelings, in response to whatever thing that has happened, rather than be en meshed in the feelings, and really just make those feelings even bigger, or make the situation seem even bigger, the tool that you use will help you create enough space so that you're at least a little bit more grounded.
A little bit calmer, a little bit more at peace and ease enough so that you can understand what you actually need in that moment. And hopefully it's not to flip tables or burn something down or trash something, right? Even though those may be the initial feelings. So again, these tools are helpful. I found them to be helpful so that I don't give in to my despair, frustration, anger, and I don't act on it.
Certainly. And it just separates me enough so that I don't regret anything that I might say or do, or even like, it allows me enough space so that I'm able to see my situation in a little bit better light, or I'm able to go talk to a friend and then they can help me regulate back to a calmer date.
So the first tool is the Silver Linings tool. It is exactly what it sounds like. So basically this tool is when you find yourself in a shit storm or whatever crappy situation, and you start naming the good things that are happening. You may be asking like, Laura, like Shit has hit the fan. What are the good things?
That's kinda the point. It helps your brain focus away from the thing that really upset you, frustrated you, or made you angry. And into other things. Not that we're not acknowledging or not that I'm saying that whatever feelings you're feeling are wrong, but more like you're, think of it as you're expanding your container so that you have more room than just the initial feeling in your heart, in your mind, and just generally within you.
I will give an actual example. Unfortunately, this is a true story and the story is mine.
So several years ago, maybe even not quite a decade ago, but somewhere around there, I unfortunately had the experience of someone harassing me. This person was harassing me and we worked at the same place. We went to the same gym. And this person knew where I lived. I felt wildly unsafe, and I remember just feeling a sense of injustice. I was so fucking angry.
I was so angry. I was like, fuck this guy. I'm so mad. And I was prepared to basically fight anyone who didn't believe me. This is unfortunate, but I just kind of assumed people wouldn't believe me I knew that my safety was important to me, and so I knew that I couldn't do this alone. I knew that I had to talk to my then boss about it, the gym owner, get some security for my house.
And I remember thinking, because both my boss and the gym owner at the gym that I went to at the time were men, and again, I had the assumption that they were not gonna be on my side, that I was gonna have to prove that this person was harassing me. I gathered evidence, I had screenshots. I thought about stories in which I had said, please stop doing this, and was completely ignored.
And then so right at I, as I was prepping to talk to my boss at the time, I laid it out there. Now, I knew that in these types of situations, as emotional as I was feeling, it was best to keep things simple and kind of think of it as like bullet point statements as my mentor, Michelle Chalfant calls it. So I just laid out the facts and how I felt.
I didn't go. Through all the story. I didn't go into the mode of, let me prove myself, although I was prepared to do that and I didn't have to prove anything.
My boss at the time was just like, I'm so sorry this is happening. And even now I'm feeling emotional thinking about it. I just, because I didn't expect it.
And same thing with the gym owner. I just said, Hey look, this is what's happening. Look, I'm not asking you to kick him out or bar him, whatever, but I just ask that for my safety. Please keep an eye out on me and make sure that I'm not followed when I leave, if we happen to be here at the same time.
And again, he just put his hand on my arm and was just like, I'm, I'm sorry that this is happening and I'm here for you. And so the silver linings moment is that, wow, I am a lot more. Supported than I thought. It was actually quite healing for me, especially that these two, the gym owner and my boss were men.
And because my assumption is like I'm gonna have to prove it. And it didn't turn out to be true. Even when I told my friends, my male friends, of course my female friends had experienced something similar. So unfortunately, and so I knew that they would believe me, but that was the silver linings for me.
I didn't mean to get like really dark, but. But just so you know, like I just wanted to give an example that was truly, I, it was really bad. I cannot even put into words like for months how I felt unsafe, angry. I hated going to work. I was angry all the time. And just when I finally spoke up and got the support, I definitely acknowledged, I'm like, wow.
The silver linings is again, I'm not like, I'm so glad this happened. I would never say that to anyone who's gone through something traumatic or something really upsetting or a similar situation like I'm describing, but more so I felt grateful that it taught me that I'm a lot more supportive than I thought.
That I don't have to prove myself, that I have people like men out there who've got my back. So that is the Silver Linings tool.
The next tool is what I call the for you tool, and what this is, is basically you look at the situation and you ask yourself, how is this for me? Now, caveat, this tool is not for everyone and I'm just gonna be so straight up with y'all.
This is not my favorite tool. Because it's too close. It's like adjacent to everything happens for a reason. Now for some people this is comforting. Both. Everything happens for a reason and how can this be for me? Okay, so I'll explain what it is, but I just wanted to put this note out there because in case you are feeling the way I am, it's okay.
Like if the tool doesn't resonate, put it down. But hey, maybe it will. So again, same scenario. I'm being harassed, I'm. I am feeling very unsafe.
By the way, side note here is what is not a helpful, for tip especially, um, I just find men. Look, I'm not trying to call any, like, I'm not saying all men do this, but just as a side tip, okay?
And you don't have to be a man. It just happened to be a man who told me this. It is not helpful when a woman is telling you, or it doesn't have to be a woman. When someone is telling you that they feel unsafe in their home, that they feel scared every time they walk out to their car, that they feel jumpy, it is extremely unhelpful to say, oh, by the way, I, I know that person.
He, he's unlikely to do that. Please do not do that if you feel those words coming outta your mouth. I don't fucking care if it's true because now that I'm removed I can see that. Yeah, . I think it was really unlikely for him to go to that extreme, but at the time, the way I was feeling it is not helpful.
I don't care if it's true. If you think you're a hundred and thousand percent true or right about that, don't share it. Yeah. Because what you're basically saying to the person, even though this may not be your intention, is you're exaggerating. Like your feelings are exaggerated. You don't deserve to feel that way.
Don't fucking do it. Okay. Going back to, I just had to do like a public service announcement. Okay. Going back to the for you tool, like I said, being so honest and vulnerable right here in my podcast not my favorite tool did I use it in this same situation?
Yes.
The reason I stated it as was it used is because I was in therapy. Okay. And I was like, listen, I am paying you therapist to be on my side and tell me how fucked up this is now. Okay. To give my therapist credit. Yes. Totally acknowledged what I was feeling. Totally acknowledged that this was fucked up.
Totally acknowledged that, yes, I did say, you know, leave me alone, please stop, et cetera. And how my therapist used the for you tool is to say, what have you learned from. This experience this situation, how can this situation be for you? And of course my reaction was like, what the fuck do you mean?
And my therapist said if you look at other patterns of similar things that have happened, not necessarily the harassment, but getting into a situation where I feel not safe or not respected from a time and space perspective. How is the situation for you in terms of how can you grow from it?
And basically what my therapist had told me is that in my particular case that I could use better boundaries. Again, to be clear, my therapist was not saying it was my fault. Okay. That's not the same thing. But he had said something like, what are some ways in which you let this person in, in the beginning and what are some ways you can improve on your discernment on who to let in?
Because there was another scenario that happened again, not with harassment. Well actually yes, harassment but not the same kind. And I'm, I'm gonna, I'm gonna be honest, I didn't like that. It made me angry. So for me, the four U tool is actually that's how I, it may not be my first tool, but I know it's, it's a tool that's really good for me because it really did force me to look within and say, what was my part in this scenario?
And now that I'm, this is many years ago, now that I'm removed from the situation, it is true. Again, it's not my fault that this. Douche bag decided to harass me and ignore my boundaries. However, my part in it was that in the beginning I didn't necessarily have the best discernment as to who to let in to my life.
I immediately felt like, oh, because we go to the same gym and we work together, you must be trustworthy. Instead of listening to my body and forming my own level of discernment. Not just using my assumptions or what my brain is telling me.
So that is the for you tool.
Now the third tool is my go-to tool, and that is the humor tool. So it's exactly what it sounds like. I'll give two simple examples. One is more lighthearted.
So I have discovered that I tend to be a little bit of perfectionist. Just a little bit, and sometimes I get really into the details unnecessarily.
If I noticed that the files in my Google folder. Like, uh, say it's meditation and there's the file naming scheme. Again, this is what I mean unnecessarily detail oriented sometimes and say, it said meditation underscore, and then the name of meditation, meditation underscore name of the meditation.
If say it was inconsistent, like some is a lowercase letter, some had a dash. And then let's say I was trying to change it and I accidentally deleted it. Not that this has ever happened, rather than get stuck in the loop of like, ah, fuck this. You know, I used a humor tool and this is like a really quick way to get me out of it.
The song Britney Spears song, oops, I did it again. It plays in my mind, and what this does is it makes me laugh at myself, or even if I can't laugh in the moment, I'm like, okay, I'm gonna find that funny later. And it's enough of a pause that I don't end up going down the rabbit hole of feeling even more frustrated.
So in the case of like accidentally deleting the file, because I started singing, oops, I did it again. Literally just that line was enough of a pause that I'm like, okay, I can undo the delete, I can go to the trash. You know, in Google it, it's not gone forever. So that's an example of the humor tool. Now I was just sharing this story with my VA and that's what actually inspired this particular podcast episode.
This is again, a true story. I would say unfortunately, but I'm still here. I'm still alive, so it's, it is what it is.
I was in Costa Rica and I was using ways to go back. I was in specifically where is it? Where the Cloud Forest is? The name is escaping me at the moment. Montevista Monte Vista Monte.
I can't recall. But the reason I mentioned that is because that area is notorious for not having the best roads. 'cause it's by the mountain, some are unpaved, et cetera. I knew this and I prepared for it by making sure that I had a four wheel drive vehicle. So on the way there, no problem. On the way back, I remember following ways and instead of turning left, which would've taken me the exact route that I came from, it told me to go right. And something in my mind was like, you know, ways always tries to, to give you the quickest route. And sometimes it gives you not the best routes, like some back road or whatever. And in the back of mind I was like, I should probably not follow ways.
I should probably make a left, not a right. I should have listened, did I? Nope. Sure didn't. I made the right, and then slowly the roads went from paved to hard packed dirt, and I'm like, okay, still doable. Suddenly there were no cars. I'm like, okay, all right. Suddenly I find myself on a road where it looks like an avalanche had happened and there were just like rocks.
On the road what do you call, there is an, it's an actual sport. I don't know what it's called. It's not bouldering. 'cause boulderings when you climb, but there is an actual activity. I know this 'cause one of my former coworkers slash friends does this. Like when you have a vehicle like, I don't know, like a Jeep or like a truck or something and you purposely go really slowly through an obstacle of rocks, whatever it is.
That's what it reminded me of. That's what was in front of me. There was only room for one car, just to give you an idea, to paint the picture of how wide the road was. I tried turning around, I couldn't, I couldn't even make a u-turn because there was not enough space in the road. There was only 400 meters to go according to ways.
400 meters seems short until you have to do something like this. And literally, I have never to this day. Prayed as hard as I did. I literally was like, please God, let me survive this. And my mind was like, oh, here are some scenarios. Like, what if you get buried here and you're upside down and no one can find you?
There's no signal, not helpful, luckily, or maybe unluckily.
I have the humor tool is my default. There was this voice in the back of my head. Like a comedian with bad timing. Again, I'm in the middle of my freak out and trying to calm myself down of like, okay, just go really slow.
You know you're gonna be okay. Oh, by the way, there was no signal. Okay. Like Waze was just navigating based on like, my last known location. So it's not like I could have called someone or whatever. Okay, this is where I'm at. The, uh, humor tool. Okay. The, the inner comedian that I have deep within with bad timing said the only way out is through, you know, oh my God.
And I was just like, what the fuck? This is not the time but I gotta tell you. It was enough to get me off that spiral because I was so irritated with that voice like, fuck you. This is not the time. Yeah, that I was able to go through and because I'm here recording this podcast episode, you know, that I made it.
I did laugh about it afterwards not directly afterwards 'cause my heart was pounding really, really hard at that point. And I think I had another hour and a half left to drive.
So, those are the three tools. I encourage you to adopt one of these or come up with your own.
And if you were to come up with your own, I suggest having like a really short tool because what I have found now, for me, the humor tool is so ingrained that I don't have to do this part anymore. But what I found when I suggest this to clients is that when you are in a hard situation or something that feels like.
It'll never end, that kind of thing. If you just say that tool out Loud Humor tool or Silver Linings tool, or for you tool, it's simple enough that you can remember, like you may not immediately remember the concept, especially when you're going through the moment.
But if you have a simple enough name for the tool, then. Most likely you'll remember the name of the tool and then it's enough to give you a pause to be like, okay, I can choose to either, like if you're looking at the Silver Linings tool, I can choose to see the positive in, in here. , If you're using the four U tool, I can see how this is for me, what I can learn from it.
If you're using the humor tool, it's just, it takes you out of whatever spiral you're in so that you can decide. What to do next or what you actually need in that exact moment. So I hope this has been helpful. I hope that you use one of these tools in the future.
Let me know in the comments or send me a DM in ig at laura dot m Dionisio.
Which tool's your favorite? Do you already have a tool? I would love to hear from you and if you're really loving these tools, if you're really loving this podcast, please like, subscribe and share this with your friends. And as always, remember to proceed as if success is inevitable because it is.
I will catch you next time.
All right, friend. That's it for today's drop. If this episode hits something deep, don't just sit with it, act on it. Share this with a friend who needs to hear it, and then head to www.leadinta.com to grab your free heart aligned career transition starter, or book a free 20 minute call with me. I'm here when you're ready to stop feeling stuck and start moving toward what you really want.
Catch you next time.