Sarah is a successful marketing executive in her mid fifties, going through a major transition in her career. The company she’s played a big role in helping to grow over the last 25 years is changing and she no longer has a future there. While she’s grieving the loss, she’s also been given a generous termination package which means she can take some time to figure out what she really wants to do with the next chapter of her life. A prospect which thrills and terrifies her in equal measure.
She is confident that she can find another well paid job of a similar nature but even though it’s the safe option, the thought fills her with dread. She’s ready for something new and she’s been trying to figure out what’s next by making lists of what she does and doesn’t want out of her next role.
In our work together, she acknowledged that even though she was really good at her job, work had been feeling more like drudgery for some time now. She connected with her deeper self and spoke about the longing to live from a place of deep joy going forward.
When we discussed her hobbies, every time without fail Sarah talked about music, her eyes sparkled and she lit up like a Christmas tree. Further exploration revealed that she had been a decent singer in her youth and had discarded a dream to perform on stage with a band in favour of a sensible path into the world of business.
Even though it’s something that still makes her feel alive and brings her great joy, she doesn’t think that she has the kind of talent to pursue it now and besides it’s too late for her to start something like this at this stage of her life. Contemplating the future, in her own words, made her ‘feel ‘daunted and scared’. On a scale, she the feeling a 7 / 10 and even though she said she’d really like to lower that rating in our session, she didn’t look hopeful.
Here’s what we did next (and just so you know, I'm sharing her story with her permission and wish to benefit others):
We worked with an exercise called defrosting your dreams by Martha Beck. To do this you need to have an activity that you enjoy doing and a dream that you had but consider completely impossible to have now. There’s a link with full details on the exercise if you’d like to try it for yourself. I’ve used it in my own life with amazing results.
As Sarah worked her way through the exercise, her energy changed from doubt into positivity and even excitement. In ten minutes, the intensity of her fearful feelings about the future dropped to 3 / 10. Then she spontaneously began stating all the reasons why this was the best time for her to rekindle this old flame and started appreciating the amazing opportunity to reclaim her dream.
Of course, there’s no way of knowing if she’ll end up pursuing it all the way on to the big stage right now. That’s not important. It's the next step making her feel genuinely energised and that’s what it feels like to be on track with your destiny even if we can’t see the final destination yet. In the dance with the unknown, we can trust the energy of aliveness to take us all the way home.
Thing is, Sarah is a very capable woman and I’m willing to bet that she’ll settle on to her thing in due course. She’ll make that into something exceptional, just like she did with her last job. She’ll need to keep taking the next step from this place of curiosity, open to receiving the support she needs to thrive and use her resources to sponsor her dream. As she navigates this change, my role is to support her to stay on track with the quest to unlock the life of joy, fulfillment and purpose that is coded in her inner longings.
It’s not the safe or easy choice but as she checks in with her inner self it’s no longer an option for her to ignore the calling of her soul to evolve into a greater alignment and wholeness. Is it strange that letting go of stress and choosing joy can feel uncomfortable and counter intuitive? In actual fact, a new awareness is emerging, a sign that we’re ready to evolve. To shed layers of cultural conditioning and start the process of returning home to our natural selves.
What activities do you enjoy without needing validation from others?
What do you stop yourself from doing because it doesn’t seem to serve any purpose other than that it brings you pure enjoyment?
What’s your big and seemingly impossible goal in this area that you wish you could have had?
