Life

6 Things I Learned From Quitting My Job

About a year and a half ago, I had an epiphany. I was in a job I enjoyed. The prospects were great. But I decided that I didn’t want it any more. I needed change. I seemingly became unemployable overnight. Not one to do things by halves, I quickly set myself a goal of quitting my job by 23rd May 2012 (exactly one year after I launched my first website). I knew at the time that the goal was not rooted in any logic – I had no firm plan that would get me to where I wanted to be. But I felt that any goal was better than no goal at all.
To be perfectly honest, whilst I was determined to achieve my goal, I had absolutely no idea whether or not I would. And as it turned out, what I thought I needed to achieve in order to quit my job wasn’t what I ended up doing at all.

Changing My Mindset Changed My Life

Aikido changed my life. When I first started, I was hesitant and scared. I had trained in martial arts before, but I’d always had a mental block that held me back from giving it everything I had. I constantly looked to my trainer (or Sensei) for approval.
I was constantly second-guessing myself. But one day, everything changed.

Who’s Cooking Dinner? (The Changing Female Brain)

‘What’s for dinner?’ asked my youngest son. ‘I have no idea’, I replied. ‘I’m not that kind of Mum anymore’. Before you castigate me for being a bad mother, this youngest son is actually aged 19 and for a year lived away from home at College on another continent before he flew back to the nest!
Still, it did seem a bit strange even to me. Why had I gone from a stay-at-home Mom who played nurse, taxi, housekeeper, cook and Counsellor to ‘feeling’ almost completely disinterested in these roles?

How to Uncover and Live Your Life Passion: An Interview with Barrie Davenport

This week my friend Barrie Davenport launched a new site focused on helping people uncover and live their life passion. I know this is an area many people struggle with, so today I’m thrilled to share with you an interview I recently did with Barrie in which she shares real, practical and actionable strategies for uncovering your life passion.

 

Perception of a Changing World. My Journey to a Better Life.

I was twenty-seven years old when I saw a glimpse of how I would perceive the world in the future. Of course I didn’t realize it at the time, but the events that would follow from that time in my life, would alter my views and beliefs forever.
I went on an inner journey to discover what it was that I should do with my life. I had felt lost most of my life. I never really wanted a regular job. I didn’t like the idea of working until I was 70 so I could “retire”. Heck, I didn’t like the idea of working period. I wanted something more with my life. I wanted meaning. To do something that aligned with my non-conformist ways of how I perceived the world.

How Breaking the Rules Taught Me to Trust Myself

I’m the strange one in my family. I don’t always follow the rules. In fact, sometimes I’ve intentionally set out to break them. Because I think some of those asinine rules, are sort of – well, asinine. And, if they’re dumb enough and they continue to hurt or limit me, I simply let them go, and live my own beautiful life.
Here are some of the rules I’ve broken over the years:

The Art of Compromise

Not many people like to compromise, and why should they? A compromise means two people need to exchange something, but one or both can’t easily come to an agreement. Whether it’s negotiating a work-related partnership or negotiating who will do the dishes at home, we want things to work out in our favor.
When we use the term “compromise,” we often use it to describe something in which we lost more than we gained, but coming to a compromise doesn’t have to be a losing game. Notice how the word breaks down: “com” and “promise,” or in other words, “we make a pledge together.” That means you should be getting something out of the deal.

How To Change Your Mind

Some people would rather hack off a limb than change their mind. Perhaps a slight exaggeration, but it doesn’t change the fact that changing your mind is one of the hardest things you can ever do.
Once you have a specific idea in your head – whether it’s an idea about who someone is, the way something should work, the way something happened or the way something shouldhappen – it becomes sticky. Your brain becomes attached to it and expects it to be there, just like you with that limb of yours. With a stubborn streak a mile-wide, I know this all too well.