Eventfully Resilient: Navigating a 'gutsy' year in business and life.

Business, design, education, endometriosis, and post-hysterectomy complications. An eclectic mix, wouldn't you agree? As the founder and chief learning designer at The Eventful Learning Co., my life lately is an eventfully complex design of unique learning experiences, great projects, unexpected health challenges, and countless power naps.

With this article, I'm sketching a transparent, yet (hopefully) vibrant picture of my quiet health journey over the past few years to let you in on the everyday of me, and so many people who quietly deal with invisible health battles inside, like endometriosis, which is only starting to get the attention it needs. To these people, I want to extend a silent nod of recognition; getting on with things, juggling board meetings with doctor appointments, all while delivering stunning projects.?

Design is at the heart of The Eventful Learning Co. It's a process that starts with an abstract concept and evolves into a vivid, tangible experience that imparts knowledge and something useful and memorable. This design process has unexpectedly found a mirror in my own journey with endometriosis and post-surgery complications. It was about a year ago when a specialist told me that things had reached a point where I needed to undergo the final frontier; a hysterectomy. Being both scared and relieved, I prepared for a long recovery but also a future of finally being pain & symptom free.?

It didn’t exactly go to plan.

Much like how I approach an educational design challenge, I approach my health – with creativity, resourcefulness, and a (mostly) unwavering can-do attitude.

The hot water bottle I often cradle or the TENS machine strapped to my tummy (thank goodness for clever MedTech inventors!) are my silent partners, just as significant in my design process as my MacBook & post-it notes. I've probably conceptualised some of our best learning designs from a hospital bed, doctor’s waiting room or a plane seat. Helping my body to heal is helped by doing great work with great people. Sometimes the two happen at the same time; and that’s not because I have some unhealthy need to be working all the time; I just really love the work I do and it mostly helps with my mindset too; it literally lessens the pain.

My knack for learning design doesn't pause when the health storms roll in (although I can often be found cowering under the covers!). Instead, I’ve decided to use it to shape my approach to dealing with these unpredictable challenges; and get real and skilled at ways of working that really hones a hybrid approach. Maybe it was the constant pivoting through COVID times that honed my sharp skill in adaptive design, or maybe it’s been the past year or so of designing strategies to deal with sudden endo flare-ups during crucial meetings & workshops or turning ongoing hysterectomy complications into an opportunity for self-reflection and giving myself permission to get comfy on the couch while tapping away creating content?… it's all a part of the ongoing process of learning and design…. and living. It's a forced way of thinking creatively about the HOW not just the WHAT.

And after all, isn’t that what design is all about? Adapting, improving, and creating something beautiful from the unexpected? I think so; I know so. Design isn't just about the final product. It's about the journey - the scribbles, the rough drafts, the late night and early morning revisions, and finding those ways to use constraints; not just ‘get over’ them, because often, like this endo journey "getting over...." is simply not an option.

I've been told that my work at The Eventful Learning Co. continues to help to transform some learning landscapes and bring innovative joy to organisations. This really makes me happy; because for so long I have wondered if this little war going on inside my guts would negatively impact the role I could play in this industry, and difference I could make in the world.?I have had to design ways of working that work. And I am getting better at that alongside great clients, friends and family, and of course doctors, but importantly by listening to my own little voice. I have made a decision that I can design a way to make my work, work; because constraints are the essence of design, and these constraints I have can’t and won’t be impossible to get around; it’s with the grace and goodness of so many people I work with that means the sticky notes still fill walls, the programs continue to be delivered and the brilliant work goes on.?

As I share my story, I want to pay tribute to the people I work with all across the world in lots of roles; but especially in education; where workplaces aren’t as flexible as we might wish they were. Folks who struggle with tricky health things; I know you are silently battling on with hot water bottles and ways to navigate your day. I see you. I see your strength, your resilience, and your grace amidst it all. You are designers in your own right, crafting your narratives of persistence and resilience; and doing damn good work as well.

So that’s what’s been going on for me and nothing changes going forward, in fact, things can only get better! It’s just that you know a little more about what happens for me and way more people than we collectively realise on a daily basis who are all trying to work with their constraints to turn a “boooo” of our bodies letting us down into a series of little “wooohoos!”, of seeing the hopes of dreams of our work come to life… even if we have way less energy and wear way more stretchy pants than we used to.?

So while the clever doctors, researchers, surgeons and scientists work on solutions for these ailments, I look forward to continuing to design great learning with great people, and face the range of challenges thrown at us together to be creative, compassionate and successful in what we do. Collectively, let’s keep learning together & going on adventures, and importantly let's keep offering to refill each other’s hot water bottles (literally and metaphorically!)... because a little support and visibility of these 'gutsy' battles goes a long way in supporting people to do the things they need, want and love to do.