Hurricanes are known to be scary and often deadly. These natural disasters can make one feel unsafe, and in some ways out of control, similar to life and the many disappointments and mishaps it brings. Whether it is losing a loved one, losing a job, etc., there are natural forces in life that can often make us feel like we are in a hurricane. There is nothing one can do to change the path of an actual storm. There’ s little one can do to stop a hurricane in life from taking its natural course. It’ s how we recover that makes the difference.

Despite the devastation of life’ s hurricanes, I see a subtle beauty budding in the midst of every storm. Motivational speaker, Les Brown said,“ If you can change your mind you can change your life.” Essentially, he’ s suggesting

that by shifting the way you think about something, you could possibly shift the outcome. Yes, hurricanes are looked at as a bad thing and can be very disturbing and unsafe for many storm victims. And I would never say they aren’ t. However, in the midst of all the destruction and debris, there is beauty to earth’ s natural disasters. According to the Weather Channel, there are several things that could be looked at as benefits of a hurricane.

Hurricanes can bring rain to areas of drought. They uproot trees that are unsteady and shed light on unstable structures that you might not have known existed. Life’ s storms are no different. Mother Nature does not allow us to put the storm off for another day. It slows us down, and forces us to take care of things for ourselves that might have been overlooked. Hurricanes force us to take note of the areas that are in drought, ignored, and require attention. It might be sickness in your body, an automobile accident, a lost job, or lost loved one, leaving brokenness and debris all around you. Take a minute to question yourself. What areas of your life have been in droughts that are now getting replenished? Author and celebrated motivational speaker, Lisa Nichols says,“ Energy goes where energy flows,” which means, what ever part of life’ s hurricane that you focus on will be magnified the most and reap the benefits of your focused efforts.

Getting hit by the wind bands of life is almost guaranteed to break a few things. Hurricanes are powerful enough to break up large areas of bacteria in the

ocean. The ocean is so big and bacteria is microscopic; there is not really a physical way to go in and clean it up. Tiny microscopic organisms gather together and after a certain period of time, there is a big mess in the ocean. Hurricanes are big enough and strong enough to mix up the ocean water, which causes them to be powerful enough to break up large areas of bacteria.

Sometimes when bad things happen in life, it takes us by surprise. Due to survival mode, sometimes we as people can put ourselves in situations that may be toxic. We stay in the situation so long that we are swimming in a pool of bacteria, toxins and pollutants that may seem to be impossible to break, similar to bacteria in the ocean before a storm. What areas of your life are polluted that this storm has now disturbed? That lifechanging event that the hurricane threw your way broke some things. It caused some shingles to fly off of your comfort zone. Your brokenness has created a pathway for positivity to flow your way. Only the hurricane of life was powerful enough to break those things. Only the hurricane of life was strong enough to break up the connection Steve Jobs had with his company Apple. Let me explain.

The late Steve Jobs was a very innovative and creative entrepreneur who founded the company Apple. As CEO, he made the decision to hire someone to help run the company. That person ran the company for a while but plotted against Steve. The treachery eventually got Steve Jobs fired from the very company he founded. He said he was publicly embarrassed and he did not know what

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10 IBA Success Magazine n VOL 4, Issue 1