￡9.72

I’m taking a bit of a sabbatical at the moment. Another way of saying I’m not doing too much work at the moment. Seven years after starting my business I decided that it was time to stop, take stock, take time out and re focus. It’s no coincidence that this desire, need, absolute requirement (and privilege) has come about at this point in the pandemic cycle. An 18 month cycle which has involved working mostly full time, worrying about elderly parents, 9 months of home schooling, creating home offices, managing a major home building project for something like the first 9 months of it, soothing my partners furrowed brow as he delivers a huge, long term project and generally keeping the show on the road. Like so many other people.

It’s no surprise that after 7 years in business, I discover that my motivations for starting are no longer the motivations that I need to continue. My Jewish upbringing, great grand daughter of refugees, daughter of a mother that always wanted their child to get an education so that she could do better than she did, (although not so good that she forgot about her primary role which was to marry and make babies) and of a successful entrepreneur father that grafted from the age of 15 in one job, business, idea after another, the latest venture set up in his early 80s during the pandemic. Its clear that where I came from heavily influenced where I was going.

Or did it. My upbringing would suggest a bit of a mixed bag. Get an education but don’t be too clever so that you become a smart arse. Get a job but don’t be so successful that you don’t make time to have babies. Have a family, and relinquish everything so that you can stay at home and look after them, don’t worry about money or jobs, that’s what your nice, Jewish husband is for. The man, the one that you marry in order that they look after you so that you don’t have to look after yourself. Forgive me if I sound cynical or confused. It’s because I am. I’ve not yet made peace with or sense of my Jewish upbringing and education from 4 -18 in a Jewish school, the idea that you should be successful but not too successful, work hard but not too hard, earn money but not too much. Be just the right kind of person. Just right and not too much or too little. I’m still working it out.

Meanwhile, I’m on sabbatical for a few months. Mainly because I’m a bit knackered and know when I need a break, a bit like the knackered women that I coach, in order to help them understand what’s knackering them so that they can something less knackering or do more of the same but in a less knackering way. After a few weeks of sabbatical I decided to try some time without alcohol. Not because I drink too much, but because I’ve seen enough alcohol problems, close up and for long enough, to want to stop and assess whether I want alcohol to play a part in my life and if so what part and when. It got way too easy during the first lockdown, the sunny one, the spring one, the novelty one to get the wine out at 4 pm. Work was finished, home schooling was finished, the world was still turning, we still weren’t going out anywhere so why not try something enjoyable to take the edge off. Not too much mind, maybe a couple of glasses. Then a beer. Maybe a gin if the night turned out to be a long one. Not too much, never really drunk, but just a little too much day in day out until it was time to pull back and re-assess.

The other re assessment that has gone on is the people around me and as I saw written somewhere, those that are at my hearth and who I need to keep sustained, healthy and happy as their health and happiness sustains me in some way and those that are within my realm, people I love, like and respect but actually they are capable of looking after themselves. The radiators and the drains. Those that radiate sunshine and know and can manage their own shizzle and the drains that neither know nor care to manage their own shizzle. We all know the type.

So asides from taking some time out to re focus, enjoy the kids over the summer, remove myself from social media, explore my relationship with alcohol, manage my inner and outer circle and clear out some mind dust, I’ve invested in a coaching programme to help me sort my next steps out for September and beyond. I’m a little over halfway through and it’s been a bit of a revelation. An uncomfortable one at that. Just like all the best coaching is. It has held up a giant mirror to my face and shone the lights on me until I have been forced, in the glare, to open them wide and smell the coffee. I know I’m mixing my metaphors right up there but really what I am saying is that it has enabled me, encouraged me, inspired me, challenged me to see myself as I really am. Beyond that I am putting together a plan, being held accountable for that plan and I know that the impact and effects will last long, long after the coaching programme has ended. I suppose it makes me think about what the purpose of coaching is and when people use it. Sometimes to work through a situation to make sense of what has happened, what your part in it was, what you need to learn and how you are going to move forward. Sometimes it’s because you are not making headway in some way and you need someone to hold up a mirror to help you see things in a different way and understand yourself better so that you can try out new ways of being and doing, sometimes it’s because you have lost your way, you are not sure who you are or what makes you tick anymore and you need someone independent to help you assess your options and come up with a plan.

In the process of reducing the mind clutter, the creative side of me has been able to come out to play again. Helped in no small way by some time and money investments I have made over the last 18 months in reflective and therapeutic writing, a course following the artists way, a story marketing course and latterly a 21 days to publication course. I have discovered a love of painting and re discovered a love of writing. Personal development and cathartic writing which I have practised over the last 5 years, articles almost writing themselves, tripping over themselves to come out once I put fingers to keyboard, articles that flow through me rather than from me.

The biggest change though, the thing that has enabled me to publish short books, successfully submit a painting to an exhibition, carry on podcasting, write a blog and regularly post about all these things is to have let go of any attachment to the outcome. That’s a journey in itself, to post, to publish, to paint, to press the button and release something without having any attachment to the outcome. No interest in likes, who likes it, how many like it and all of that because its not for likes, its not for predetermined outcomes, it’s not for anything more than a form of self-expression and a certain knowledge that like with anything done in flow that occasionally it lands with someone else just at the right time, just at the point where they may need to see it, where they might read something and think yes, me too and feel seen, heard and understood. There is no way of knowing who might be touched, inspired, changed or motivated, just the knowing that someone, somewhere, will be. Maybe one day they will show up and say so. Or maybe they won't. Either is ok.

So what’s ￡9.72 all about ? This is the amount I have made from my first 2 published books so far. Not profit, that’s ￡9.72 - $30 of advertising - ￡97 worth of training – how ever many hours of writing, formatting, grammar checking, proof reading and cover designing. So its minus who knows what right now and it may never get anywhere close to breaking even. My refugee great grandparents, my ego and the little Jewish kid inside raised by the entrepreneur are doing their nut standing alongside the inner critical parent that says your job is to look after the home, your children, your family not to be fiddling around writing books that only make ￡9.72 - $30 - ￡97 – the hours you have spent writing them. However as I let go of any attachment to the outcome some while ago, I realise that this is a journey that is best taken in small steps, its a journey for the ride, not the destination, because the journey, the unexpected stops, twists, turns and cul de sacs, often that’s where the magic happens.?