How to get back up when you lost everything.

Due to the coronavirus, I have had dozens of people reach out for advice on how to get back up when everything goes wrong. Why did they reach out? Well, first I am 38 years old. I have started 5 companies, lost everything twice in my life - including my house, car, credit, personal assets, family money and most importantly, hope.

I was able to rebuild my life and pay off my past debts. My latest company, Nikola Motor Company has become a worldwide sensation that started in my basement. It has grown to employ 350 families and we have become the worldwide leaders in hydrogen strategy and truck orders.

To rebuild after you lost everything was the single hardest period of time in my life. I hope this short article helps you with your journey of getting back up.

The world of social media loves to point out your failures. The government now is showing hostility towards entrepreneurs which makes it even more difficult to take chances. I had to learn to overcome both of those after I lost everything. The odds really are against you now. I feel for all the small businesses that have lost hope. I want everyone to know, I have been there twice and very few people ever have.

To get back up, I had to learn that my greatest weaknesses were my greatest strengths. My goal was to find and hire the best people around me for the things I sucked at.

I built my current company with people that were experts at everything I was not good at. This helped bring my confidence levels up. After my failures, I had lost complete confidence in myself. I suddenly felt like I had hope again when I found people that made short work of things that haunted me. But here is the catch - business hope never works without social hope. I had to find my self again. I had to find a way to see others that had less than I did to realize my life was not as bad as it seemed. I had to find a way to serve others around me first. I had to take away the poor me attitude I had.

Here is a quick conversation I had with a twitter connection. I hope this short conversation gives you hope and helps you get back up after getting your butt kicked - no matter what aspect of your life it refers to.

The message is slightly modified from its original version for spelling and grammatical corrections.

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Twitter Connection:

Hi Trevor, I read the airport encounter on your LinkedIn. It was really cool the encounter happened in Detroit Airport. I live in Detroit area. It is awesome that you reached out to him. It is amazing what a mentor can do for someone. I always wished I had a mentor. I really enjoyed the faith, pivot and you will fail bullet points. I truly feel I reached the exhaustive path and I seemed to have lost some motivation I once had in abundance. If I may ask, what kept you motivated while going through the ups and down and failed startups? I feel like I have been down so much that I need something to spark me. Have you ever had that feeling?

Trevor Milton:

Unfortunately. Yes. I have had that feeling a few times in my life. It sucks. Here's what went through my head. .... I came to the conclusion that I had a few options; give up and let every person say, see told you so or keep going and hopefully tell myself I tried. People have asked me what the proudest thing I've ever done was? And another famous person answered this. "I tried". There's nothing harder to do than start over after getting whipped 3 or 4 times.

Start slow, don't try too fast to recover. Do small stuff. I had to build my confidence up with small stuff. Then, once I got my confidence back up and I found something I loved, I felt hope again.

Hope is what turns resistance into success. Go find the hope. Slowly, because it doesn't come fast.

When you do service for others it seems hope enters your mind faster. Go feed the homeless or do something that focuses on others that have much less than yourself. You'll soon see your life is not that bad and hope begins to come back. Once hope comes back, your confidence can come back.

Twitter Connection:

Yes, I reached that stage where I beat myself up a lot. And oh yes getting back up after 3 or 4 times is so difficult. You are right, build up the confidence with the small stuff one step at a time. I love that one, hope is what turns resistance into success!! I agree doing service helps bring hope. I started a youth interfaith basketball program and it feels really good to volunteer my time. Thank you so much for your advice it truly has me looking on the brighter side and finding my confidence is what I have to do. It's great hearing from someone that has been through tough times and has reached success. God bless you and I wish you the best!