05/01/2022
Who’s that girl?
I have taken a good chunk of the last month away from my desk - and I have loved (almost!) every second of it. December was historically my busiest time of year as a lawyer (suddenly that deal that had been gathering dust on my client’s desk for months becomes more urgent than a trip to the bathroom after a particularly potent vindaloo the night before). So, finally being in control of my December was novel - and much appreciated!
Some of my time-off was productive (I am now the proud owner of a set of “P” plates after successfully passing my driving test - it only took 3.5 attempts…the less said about that the better).
Some of it was self-indulgent (I now seem to be wearing the entire contents of my snack cupboard around my waist).
A lot of it was spent in my dressing gown (my kids now don’t recognise me when I dare to slip into something a lot less comfortable - but, I suspect, a lot more socially acceptable).
But most of it was spent reflecting on the rollercoaster of a year I’d had - from the punch-in-the-face in the form of my redundancy, to doubting myself, to feeling lost, to feeling vulnerable, to launching a podcast, to feeling more vulnerable, to feeling strangely at ease with myself, to feeling lit up, to feeling ready to take on the next level of what’s in store for me (even though I don’t fully know what that is yet!).
I now see the sweet spot in all of this, the turning point, the point where the self-doubt ended and the self-belief began. It lies in the moment I chose to own up to my redundancy - the moment I chose to embrace my vulnerability over it. Which led to me taking away the power it had over me; taking away the “if only you knew” heaviness that had been bearing down on me. An absolute game-changer.
If you’re where I was - full of self-doubt, unsure of where to go next - please know that you’re not alone (continued in comments).
