Anybody who’s ever been in a slump can tell you, “It ain’t fun!” The self doubt. The product doubt. The company doubt. The economy doubt. The system doubt. The ‘whatever else’ doubt. Having been in my share of slumps, I can tell you that every slump is a downward spiral with increasing slope and increasing speed until near the end, you’re actually swirling, you feel like Willie Loman, put your hands in front of your face and prepare to crash and burn. You see your income and savings dwindling, your bills not getting paid, your kids starving, your spouse leaving you and you think about giving up on your dream, getting a ‘regular job’, settling for mediocrity and ‘normalcy’, then you’re out of it. The seas are calm. Your clients love you. Nobody’s slapping you on the back saying, “Keep at it!” The sky is blue again. You’re dreaming again. You’re wondering if your goals are high enough.

Pick your favorite baseball slugger and think about how you worried about him (or very sensitively called him a bum) when he was in a slump. Or how about gold glovers that all of a sudden can’t catch or throw. Everybody has a slump sometime. Recognize it. Acknowledge it. Handle it.

Handle it how? Let’s hear from you. Tell us about your slump horror. Tell us how it started. Tell us how you got out.