Is this it?

I sat at my desk at home in the middle of the Covid lockdown. I wanted to go somewhere as an escape, anywhere, but my only real option was to go for a walk, so I did. I’d had a strange morning, I was being asked for something completely reasonable by my boss, and also being given a nudge that I’d missed a couple of things of late, and being asked if I was OK. I wasn’t OK.

If I reverse engineer this, the truth is that I had been wondering for a while what I was doing and why. I had ticked the boxes I’d set out to tick: Senior Manager within an international organisation, flexibility, authority and a handsome salary. But it wasn’t enough. I wanted to be able to say that the role was fundamentally bad or wrong, but it really wasn’t. It simply wasn’t me. In gaining the seniority, I’d lost touch with what really fired me up. I was in the Training industry because I wanted to develop others. Owning strategy and ensuring other people got things done, simply didn’t excite me. So why did I put myself there?

In truth, I wanted progression, plans and goals. I wanted something to aim for, but I’d never taken the time to get in touch with what I valued and what motivated me. I had set myself a plan to get to Senior Manager level, but it wasn’t a me-centric plan. I was doing work, but I wasn’t doing my best work.

I walked for about an hour, I got lost, I found myself and then I went home and grabbed a pad. I noted the key bullet points I needed to cover, the reasons I was going to give as part of my resignation. I put that to one side, finished my day, then called my manager the following morning. I felt fantastic. I felt free. I told my manager, who told me I looked lighter and happier.

I spent my notice period doing a lot of soul-searching. I worked backwards throughout my career, Leading, Creating, Managing, Teaching, Training and Coaching. I unpicked what had fired me up most and motivated me most, but I found a lot of clarity in also doing the opposite. Lockdown shone a light on a lot of things, but one thing that I really couldn’t stomach, was just how easily people were being knocked off stride, conned by fake news etc. How can we create a world where more people are unmessablewith?

When we’re happy at work, we’re happy at home, and vice-versa. It bleeds into the other facets of our life:

“A child’s sense of well-being is affected less by the long hours their parents put in at work and more by the mood their parents are in when they come home” – Simon Sinek

I realised that developing others, Coaching others, was where the answer lay. I’d missed it for years, purely because I’d missed the obvious; I could set up on my own, and choose a coaching niche that truly fired me up. Purpose Coaching.

I now focus purely on those who want to bring their lives and careers into alignment with themselves, purpose and person-centric coaching. Life can stop making sense pretty quickly, but our values, motivators and the things that will fire us up, can be uncovered pretty quickly. Action plans build upon this, are action plans that lead to achieving things we actually want.

Your best work and your best life go hand-in-hand. It comes from living in alignment with yourself, if best utilises your unique strengths and leads to a life lived on purpose. Life is short, live your own.