Point it out in a way that resonates
As 2023 approached, I knew I had to change my lifestyle. I had far too much on my plate. On days off, I'd either crash, sleep endlessly, or worse, try to sleep the day away, fighting the thoughts of everything I felt obliged to do. The idea of doing nothing seemed impossible.
Sometimes you know deep down that things aren't right, but you need someone to point it out in a way that resonates. Just saying the obvious isn't enough. For me, that person was my mentor.
I always thought that life has a funny way of bringing new people into your life when you need them most. Surprisingly, although we worked in the same company and were from the same city, we hadn't met before. He was funny, successful and family-oriented - a quality I admired but didn't embody. He also liked to draw. And I am a very visual person, I could remember anything better if it was visualised or written down. I think it was our first or second meeting when we talked about "What are you doing in your life".
He drew a simple wheel of life representing 3 areas of life - friends & family, health and career - and said to me, "How are you fulfilling these 3 areas of your life?"
Here is what my simple life wheel looked like:
Friends & Family: ?
Health: ?
Career: (1) student, (2) president of a student union, (3) assistant to an account manager in an advertising agency.
"You invest a lot of time in your career, but what about the other areas?" he asked. "Life is more than a career."
It wasn't that I wasn't healthy, but I wasn't taking the time to train and do something good for my body. And it wasn't that I didn't have a good relationship with my friends and family, but I wasn't putting them first. The best way I could describe it is as Glennon Doyle did in her book, Untamed. There was one part that stuck with me - she was talking to her son, saying that it was not right to neglect home chores for football, teaching her children the value of contributing to the family unit. And that's what I was doing - I wasn't contributing to the family unit.
I started to make changes. I signed up for recreational boxing and started to be more present with my friends and family. Making an active contribution to their lives. It was not easy at first, changing things around and cutting back on the hours I used to devote to my professional commitments. But it paid off.
I realised that when you are at your healthiest, you can achieve more. And you're at your healthiest when you invest in activities that are fulfilling and empowering rather than draining.
I'll end with a quote from 'Untamed' by Glennon Doyle: "Every time you're given a choice between disappointing someone else and disappointing yourself, your duty is to disappoint that someone else. Your job throughout your entire life is to disappoint as many people as it takes to avoid disappointing yourself."
So, the next time one area of your life overshadows the rest, remember: "Your job in life is to disappoint as many people as necessary to avoid disappointing yourself."
Nina Brauc on 26/12/2023
