invincible spring by spreadthelove, found via decor8

I forget how Laura Neff & I originally connected, but I think it had to be on Twitter. The Life Leadership Coach, she & I immediately “clicked”. I can’t put my finger on exactly what it was, but it immediately felt like we’d known each other forever, & I automatically considered her as a friend. I was thrilled to be asked to be interviewed by Laura on her Rock Star Coach call this summer (listen to the recording here – it’s fun!), & I’m glad I can now return the favor by hosting her guest post on my blog. Read on to hear Laura’s “from there to here” story, a touching, inspirational account of how she removed those corporate shackles – successfully! passionately! excitingly! – before figuring out the “what” of it all.

When I worked in Corporate America, I spent a lot of time crammed into a corner and confused.

See, I was lucky to have a cubicle with a window and even luckier to have one with a thick, round column that ran floor to ceiling in the corner of my little gray domain. When no one was looking, I would tuck myself back behind that column, into the small space between it and the window, where no one passing by in the hall could see me. And with hands and forehead pressed against the thick, thick, one-way glass, I’d peer down, watching the small cars zooming by on the city streets below, watching all the people moving through the world, on their way from somewhere to someplace else.

“How can they do that,” I’d wonder. “What jobs do they have that they get to drive around at 2:00 p.m. on a Tuesday? Where are they going?”

Oh, I desperately wanted to be going.

But I was stumped. For the longest time, I thought I needed to know what job title I wanted next in order to get going. And I had no idea. Whenever I thought of an interviewer asking, “So, Laura, where do you see yourself in five years,” my mind would go blank. I would sigh, and I’d turn back to my gray, ergonomically-correct, spinny chair in my gray, fabric-walled cubicle with its gray desktop and cold, gray, metal filing cabinets.

This actually went on for years.

Until the day it stopped.

My dad had been sick for a decade or so, and he finally succumbed to the diseases that were ravaging his mind and body and our hearts. I’d taken a two-week leave as my family and I spent our last moments with him, then planned and experienced his memorial service. We tended one another’s needs and tears, and each of us, in our own way, had felt the tectonic plates of our worlds shifting and quaking. Life could never be the same, nor should it be.

On the day I returned to work, my entire team was at an all-day, off-site meeting many states away. Rather than put myself through the stress of traveling when I was so emotionally drained, I’d resigned myself to participating virtually, and I found myself sitting alone in the most gawd-awful conference room you can imagine. It was very small. There were no windows. The walls were mustard yellow (faded, old, dirty mustard yellow), and the too-large conference table was chipped and scarred. A ramshackle assortment of old, stained and worn chairs were crammed around it, and some ancient, unused office furniture was piled up in one corner. In a word, I was in Hell.

The conference droned on and on as I sat slumped in my chair. Trying to stay awake, I’d pipe up on occasion so they’d know I was still there. When suddenly, something in me snapped.

I sat up like someone had just shoved a ramrod straight into my spine, smacked the “mute” button so my colleagues couldn’t hear me, and out of my mouth in a clear, strong voice came the words, “What the HELL am I DOING?!?!”

And in that moment, everything became clear. I didn’t matter that I didn’t know what job title I wanted next or what would be on the next name plate on the next desk I’d inhabit. So what? What became crystal clear in that moment was what I DID know.

I whipped open my snappy leather FranklinCovey day planner (well before the days of Blackberries and iPhones), ripped out a blank piece of paper, and what I DID know started pouring out of me.

Five years from then, I wanted to live a life that was flexible. I wanted to be in charge of my time, totally. I wanted to be able to go out into the world each day and drive from place to place. I wanted to have honed my skills as a facilitator, and I wanted to be doing work that involved writing, communicating, and working with others. I wanted to help people feel valued, motivated, free. I wanted to have gone back to school. I wanted to be outside more. I wanted to know I was making a difference with people who spent time with their feet on the ground and not with their heads in the proverbial Ivory Tower.

After that day, everything changed.

I asked to be taken off the fast track of title promotions and raises and, instead, to be in a role that had me working as an individual contributor. (Yes, you can do that!) I reduced my hours to 30/week (retaining my benefits) and went back to school. Ultimately, I quit the company I worked for and started consulting and contracting, doing the same work, getting paid twice as much by the hour, and working from home (often in my pajamas, and going to yoga at 2:00 on Tuesdays).  The story goes on and on, winding around a very curvy road until it eventually led me to the world of coaching. You can read more about it on my website. BUT, for today, here’s the point:

As you cast about for your next vocation, focus on what you DO know.

What are the skills and talents in you that just light you up?

Which of those would you like to continue honing and developing in the years to come?

What kind of days do you dream of having? How are they structured?

Who do you want to be working with?

What kind of work environment puts a huge smile on your face?

What’s the quality of life you want to experience? How will that feel?

You get the picture. Allowing ourselves to get stumped and stopped by one question keeps us stuck and keeps us from accessing the vast amount of information that IS within us and keeps us from answering all those questions that we DO have answers to. Try it. You’ll see. Even on those days when you turn back to your version of my gray cubicle, you actually know a lot more than you might think!

Related posts:

1. Time for a Change
2. On My 32nd Birthday: Purpose, Gratitude, Happiness, & Sparks
3. Motivation Monday: Raining & Rainbow

Tags: Great Guest Post

This entry was posted on Thursday, November 5th, 2009 at 5:00 am and is filed under Carousing Celebration. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.