Living the high life? Now I am!

8 years ago, from the outside in, I was living the high life. A good coaching practice earning serval hundred thousand dollars per year, a large 5 bedroomed home in Epsom, a Porsche 911 Cabriolet (997), a Honda Hornet motorbike & all the toys a girl could wish for. I was smashing it… Or was I??

From the outside in, this looked great...

However, there were huge cracks. The relationship wasn’t that great in reality, I wasn’t ‘allowed’ to spend time with friends, I wasn’t ‘allowed’ to have dogs, even though we had room for them & they have always been a major part of my life, my family had been all but alienated & as a consequence of the poor home life, my business was starting to show cracks too. In order to ‘keep up’ with the expectation, I started taking on clients that I wouldn’t usually work with – I had bills to pay, I had a lifestyle to keep up & the pressure was immense.

And then I had the stress of living with someone whom I do believe was genuinely a good person, but he needed to be seen in a certain way for him to be happy. Often this meant him putting other people down & making them feel bad so that he could feel good, myself included.

I can’t imagine what that must feel like & for that I feel for him. I wish he could see that being happy with who you are & enjoying life for what it is, is the best feeling ever!

In a couple of weeks, I turn 51 years old & whilst from the outside in, my life looks pretty basic, I LOVE it x

I now live in a tiny, rented, 31 square metre house in Ponsonby. It has a huge backyard & it’s close to Ponsonby, Grey Lynn Park & the city, which we love because we have those dogs I always wanted & they love being close to the park.

We also love it because we have a fabulous outdoor area with a spa pool & it turns out we don’t need 5 bedrooms, 2 lounges, 2 dining rooms, a huge kitchen & an office to make life enjoyable.

Turns out 1 bedroom, 1 living area & a big backyard is absolutely fine because we don’t spend that much time here & we love being able to spend time together, intimately.

The Porsche & Motorbike are a distant memory, but it turns out that I quite like my husband’s Yaris, because it is far more practical for our bicycles, our kayaks, our dogs & our adventures. Would we prefer a 4WD? Absolutely – but the Yaris can do amazing things!

We rent because I want to make sure that I pay off the debts that I have incurred rather than live the high life - that for me is integrity.

And tonight, my heart sings & is complete….

Living in a tiny space, you must make the most of it. And so, for my birthday, I requested a drinks trolley that would fit into a small spot that we have in the current home.

Here you can see my 3 favourite boys putting it together. Is it an expensive drinks trolley? Not particularly. Would it be featured in a home & garden magazine? Unlikely!?Is it cool & fun & fits in perfectly in our house? In my eyes, yes!

But most importantly, it shows me that you don’t need ‘things’ to make your life complete. You don’t have to care what other people think.

Seeing these 3 humans / fur humans together, that I know to love me beyond all doubt, will laugh at my misadventures (some of which I can never share on Social Media) & who have supported me through my toughest 2 financial years ever! (And there's another story in itself - summarised by selling my house, car & toys to fund a start-up business that required huge capital investment & not getting the returns back before Covid forced the permanent closure of the business).

That is all that I could ever wish for.

Life isn’t always great – however, it’s those that you surround yourself with that make the difference.

I love what I do now, I love who I work with, because I choose them because I love them (rather than the money they bring in) & I am so happy to be in a relationship where I can be fully myself.

I can’t wait to see what the next few years bring.

Bring on 61 & 71 & 81 – I am ready for it, because of my learnings ??

Plus I still get to have nice gin ??