The Planning Lady

The chapter on Multisolving in tumultuous times from Elizabeth Sawin’s book Multisolving feels ever more relevant this year. It builds upon all the content in the book “to help bolster the flexibility and resilience of your multisolving efforts so that they can best meet unpredictable and even destabilizing conditions.” The start to 2025 feels like its been nothing but unpredictable and destabilizing making a strong case for the approach in this book.

In the reflection section, Sawin asks readers to identify stocks most impacted by the kinds of disruptions or shocks that our region is expected to experience in the coming years. What came to mind first is the ongoing drought conditions in the Midwest which only briefly abated for a month or so this past year. We are also seeing shorter and warmer winter, increasingly windier springs, and far more powerful summer storms. Ways I’ve been preparing for these shocks is to convert my yard into a waterwise garden. All grass is gone, save for a small patch for my dogs. In it’s place are two large rain gardens that collect all the rainwater overflow from the roof when my two rain barrels overflow. I’m also considering the addition of more rain barrels to store more water for the longer periods without rain in the summer. I’ve also built out a large garden to grow a lot of my own fruits and vegetables, canning much of it for the winter.

Flows in the community that might be subject to sudden and unexpected changes bring to mind a recent story from our Poverty Plan work. The week was bitterly cold with highs for the day at zero and sometimes below. As a result of the weather, several service providers in Lincoln that offer hot meals or dry goods closed for the week which was a shock to one residents routine. They relied on these services weekly for food and without them, worried they would go hungry until the following week when the providers were open again. It had me thinking that these separate agencies should be better coordinated to create redundancy or backups for when bad weather causes unforeseen closures.

The last questions were about how personally to cultivate balance in oneself. For me that has been a challenge as someone who doesn’t typically say no to more projects or tasks. Finding balance means knowing when to step back from a role or decline a project and focus more on fewer areas where I can be more impactful. Prioritizing care would look like the opposite of burnout, providing time and space to process one item before moving onto the next. While multisolving is a great approach, multitasking can often be the opposite, leading to less meaningful products.