Why?

Oops I skipped a month

“The ache for home lives in all of us, the safe place where we can go as we are and not be questioned.”

-Maya Angelou:

My apologies I skipped a newsletter. I had a good reason. We have moved house and those last 4 weeks were pretty stressful with the 'will we' or 'won't we' be moving out.

I could name quite a number of dates that came and went.

And of course the blame game, "Who's fault is this exactly, the stalling of dates?"

"I gave that info already, so why are we still here?", as the finger pointing in every direction of the chain ensues; persists.

But that stress, is blending into the background now. We are in a Cottage of our dreams surrounded by the National Trust Woodland.

We are in a space where we can finally breathe. And I hadn't even realised I was holding my breath.

We, my husband and I, recognised that the house we had occupied for almost 3 decades was just bricks and mortar in the end. Our love for it long since gone. I'm not sure I ever had that deep love for it. I moved in with the idea of leaving in 1997.

And here we are. An environment suitable for spreading out and I am very much in love with this Grade II listed cottage already. I feel like I have created a space where my imagination can run across the page as it grows my next book, the first paragraph, the chapter that sets the scene and then the diving head on into the nitty gritty as plot twists and plots thicken.

And I have a space to create my program that is aimed at helping you get on the page and out of your head. And if you have procrastinated long enough, perhaps it's time to write that book? I'm almost there where you can sign up for this self-paced program, I've shifted and arrived in a safe space where the magic will happen.

The Why? of my reimagined life

“I write entirely to find out what I’m thinking, what I’m looking at, what I see and what it means. What I want and what I fear.”

—Joan Didion

If you've been following me for a long time, you'll know that almost 8 years ago now I was made redundant for the second time. The two redundancy periods lasted 5 years overall.

My takeaway was that I have a wonderful ability to process the lessons in everything. I've learned to identify strengths and work on those emotions that may not be helpful and most importantly reach an understanding of what I no longer am willing to accept.

I was able to navigate my circumstances by tapping into the following strengths:

• Depth of processing
• Empathy
• Intuition
• Self-motivation
• Kindness
• Care
• Knowledge
• Active listening
• Creativity
• Adaptability
• Objectivity
• Resilience
• Focus
• Professionalism

And while I realise that it was stressful and scary, the business decisions weren’t about me, they were about business growth and wealth. I would argue only that in their striving for stream lining and downsizing they forgot to consider the well-being of the redundant workforce in the process.

Ask

"Family should be the place where you can be your most complete self. Where you're accepted and appreciated, seen and valued, even in moments of disagreement. It should be your soft place to fall, the place where you're reminded that no matter what happens to you, in the face of your deepest challenges, you are loved," Oprah said about her family.

- Oprah Winfrey

For all of you who do not feel able to list your wonderful and unique strengths, why not ask your family members, your friends, your boss, colleagues or teacher?

I put the question to my family in our WhatsApp group, they listed some of the above and additional positives below. Phew!

• Caring
• Resilient
• Patient
• Thoughtful
• Brave
• Passionate
• Creative
• Empathic
• Hard working
• Strong

The Light Went On

From the enforced change of redundancy came an opportunity to reimagine my life and I poured my energy into writing and becoming part of someone else's solution when they find themselves in a crisis.

“For your born writer, nothing is so healing as the realisation that he has come upon the right word.”

—Catherine Drinker Bowen

Way Back When

Writing is a skill I've been honing since I was in single digits, age wise.

As a child my upbringing was complicated. The only one I knew, perhaps dysfunctional, but I never considered it this way, as it was all I knew.

We were army BRATS - British Regiment Attached Travellers - and as children, with my Mum, we were uprooted as and when Dad's job demanded. Before I was 10 we had lived in Malta, Holland and Germany. We also moved around within the aforementioned countries.

Dad on the other hand, although stationed at any of the addresses in the countries he was posted to, was often shipped out on manoeuvre. He could be gone for any length of time days, weeks to months. He'd return unrecognisable to me. While his absence was felt by Mum and a norm for us, the atmosphere was completely different when he was home.

Our family life revolved around him in every respect. He, unlike the introverts in the family, had a need to be around people. So he lived life which put him firmly in the centre of that universe.

In his army days he ran a disco. He'd dress up in his black and white pinstripe suit, winkelpickers and a trilby and spin his records. It was the lyrics from those records that I used to express my deep emotions to begin with, until I decided that I wanted to use my own words to express my rich inner world. And so my journey with writing began.

There are many reasons to write, but as a shy, introvert in the early days it is true that I wrote to makes sense of the changes I was dealing with. As an army BRAT friends came and went, and I learned the best way to deal with that is to rip out my heart.

No, not really! Well not in the actual sense anyway.

I can actually remember the last straw where my mind shifted, I decided not to get close to anyone again.

We lived in Germany and my elder sister and I were best friends with sisters of the same age as us.

Sisters who announced one day that they were going to boarding school. It was around the time that dad was preparing to leave the army. I don't remember if their dad was also leaving. The year was 1977.

I didn't go to boarding school. We children were all placed in a small german speaking school in a village that I can no longer remember the name of. I was 9 when this happened. Our vocabulary elevated from 'Ja' and 'Nein' to fluency in 3 months.

Mental Wellbeing

Here I was a highly sensitive child, with a rich inner world, on constant alert, feeling every change deeply, and I had to let big emotions out somehow. A pen and paper saved me!

Although I didn't know I was taking care of my wellbeing by this emotional release, in fact it was quite an intuitive choice I made and of course once released I was free to proceed with the day.

What I grew to understand is this:

For The Love Of Writing

My love of writing didn't only manifest in journals or diaries. I loved the melodic writing that came from poetry. I also had ambition to write a song, I haven't yet.

While much of what I wrote was about the anxiety of growing up or simply making sense of my environment, I also wrote my way into escaping my world and creating a fantastical one.

Grown up decisions

As money became the main driver of necessity, I walked straight into 'secretarial' work. Yes it was referred to that, then. I was bilingual and I learned short hand and I hated it, even if I was good at it.

I was far too inquisitive and recognised I wasn't a fan of how society had decided where women fit in within the workforce.

So when my inquisitiveness in my early 20's gave me the opportunity to join the Computer Department - yes that's what we called it then - I dived in. I took a very large pay cut, but had recouped within the year and I loved the learning that came with operating and programming an AS400/iSeries for a while.

Life Reimagined

I had begun my degree in late '90s while pregnant with my first born son and in a full time job.

I was beginning to want more from my career and so I intended to do a full IT degree (BSc). However, something bigger was pulling me in and so I switched to what was then know as an Open Degree and incorporate IT with Languages and Creative Writing. The variety was exciting, but the creative writing modules felt like I had come home. I had such wonderful guidance and encouragement from my then lecturer, the poet John McCullough.

But, my driver was still money and professional development. I had a mortgage to pay and mouths to feed and I didn't have the support or luxury at home to take my foot of the accelerator.

Until the breaks were pressed for me, through redundancy.

Redundancy taught me there is a great lack of support available to a broken workforce, so I trained with the Coaching Academy as a Personal Development Coach. While training, I began writing my paperback novel 'In Search of the Christmas Spirit' and my ebook 'Plain Janey'. Today I merge my life as an author and writer with Creative Coaching.

If you are thinking that redundancy is the end, please do think again. Once the grief and the loss of identity and friendship has gone there are possibilities that lie on the otherside of your fear.

Writing has been my life's journey, the desire to process upon the page is never too far away.

Whether I write a newsletter, the short stories in the Gazette for my dad in his care home, a speech or a letter, a poem or a journal entry, I work with what I need intuitively.

I feel blessed knowing that my younger self found such a wonderful way to navigate the world.

I am here to help you reimagine your life through the power of writing. If you are highly sensitive or an introvert and you would like to write your way, DM me or find me here: https://linktr.ee/nicolamcdonaldwriteyourway

"If I waited for perfection, I would never write a word"

-Margaret Atwood

If you haven't listened already, you can learn a bit more about my journey here: