If there are two lessons in life to learn, then it is these:
- Trust your instincts
- Explore opportunities when they present themselves before choosing between “Yes” or “No”.
These two rules form the basis of many decisions I have made over the last few years and I won’t apologise for talking about them frequently because they are so important. I chose these rules as a result of learning from past mistakes. If I had not followed these rules then I would not be an artist and I would still be working in a job I hated. They also lead me to do stand up comedy for charity, train to be a life coach and challenge myself with my outdoor swimming. All things that have helped me grow as a person.
Regular readers will know I work part time alongside my part time business. It was a choice I made a few years ago, I wanted to leave financial services, have the flexibility of being my own boss but the security of a pay packet to cover the bills. Have my cake and eat it (didn’t we talk about cake last time?).
Good part time work can be more difficult to find than full time and I have done a variety of jobs, (some I haven’t liked, some temporary, some not enough hours) before returning to my core skill set around mortgages. I did not want to go back into the corporate financial services world and wanted a role that fitted better around my new skills. However it ticked a lot of boxes and has been a great little job, hours to suit, a job I was skilled in and some nice colleagues being the icing on the cake (cake again). Sometimes you just know something not right and I needed to trust my instincts and move on. I was a square peg in a rectangle shape so there was no point jumping into any old role that didn’t fit as comfortably, I just needed a squarer shape to slot into.
But eyes and ears were always open for a better fit. So almost 4 years on, I have left that work, in a world I’m confident and competent in, within a sector that I have worked most of my life to take a role in the not for profit sector doing something completely new. It is a steep learning curve but the opportunity presented itself and I had to explore its possibilities. It is more hours which will be more challenging to get a great work/life balance, but it excited me immediately and at that point I realised how much of a rut I had been close to being in.
We make so many decisions daily based on instincts, when someone asks if you want a brew (and cake ) you do not have to think too hard, yet we do not apply this instinctive thinking to bigger decisions and we often try to answer the questions based on logic. It is so easy to let our head talk us into or out of an opportunity. Statements like:
“I don’t know how to do that” or
“that will change my routine and make life difficult”
are simply not helpful. Those questions should be replaced by:
“it’ll be interesting to learn something new” and
“how can I make changes to make this work” .
These are much better questions to be asking and lead us in the right direction by challenging us to explore the truth. They may not always lead you to say “Yes”, however at least you will be saying “No” for the right reasons.
I would love to hear about when you have accepted a challenge. Feel free to email me with your stories at the address below or leave a comment on my blog on the website.
In the meantime, I am off to eat cake.
words & picture copyright Carolyn Trafford 2023
Carolyn Trafford is a Creative Life Coach, supporting others in reaching their own goals in a creative way sine 2010. Author of “Don’t Just Dream It – Achieve It!” (A great way to kickstart those goals). This interactive book is available from her online shop: https://carolyntraffordart.ecwid.com/Dont-Just-Dream-It-Achieve-It-Book-p196854491) . She was diagnosed with Breast Cancer on the 20th September 2021 following her first routine screening with the NHS at 51.
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