Quarter Life Career Crisis?

I'm approaching the big 3-0 (well not until next year, but it's not far off) and I am no stranger to a quarter life career crisis, in fact I sometimes feel like the past eight years have been one big career crisis.  In saying that, I've always said that I don't think I'll do one thing for my whole life and why should I? We change so much as the years go on. I'm certainly very different to the person I was when I was frantically riffling through university prospectuses wondering what the heck I was going to study for my degree.

I've always envied people who know what they want from the age of 16 and have gone out and got it, climbing the ranks and ending up with a good, steady job that they enjoy, but it's not happened that way for me. I've always had a nagging feeling there is something else.  Most of my career to date has been in TV production which I have to say, on the whole, was great. It wasn't without it's struggles, as with any career, but I loved the buzz, the hard graft ethic it instilled in me and all the fun and friendships that came along with it too, but for many reasons, I always knew it wasn't forever.  

Before I knew it responsibilities and grown-up stuff crept up on me - a mortgage shortly followed by a marriage proposal and the realisation that I needed to do something about the little voice in my head telling me that there is something else out there for me.  Whatever I've done career wise I've always worked really hard but I think I became tired of putting in the hours for someone else and wanted all that energy to go into something I love.

I find that it's quite rare to speak to people who really do love their work and when you think of the number of hours you spend at work (a lot!) you're throwing a hell of a lot of your life down the toilet if you are not truly happy in what you do.  

In terms of my long term plans, they are very much still in the making but with regard to my mindset towards my career I feel I've come a long way, even if my actual progress is just a few baby steps towards my eventual goal of having my own business and having control over my time and the flexibility to live life how I want to live it.  

Everyone has their own list of what they want from their career and their life and if I could say one thing to anyone going through anything which may resemble a quarter life career crisis it would be to listen to yourself and if your chosen career isn't in line with what you want from life, change it. Changes don't have to be forever, I left TV and tried PR for a while which wasn't right, so went back to TV but who cares? Just because we are supposed to be 'growing up' at this age it doesn't mean we have to find the career that we are going to do until we retire.  I intend to try out lots of things, and for me that's what life is about.  There is so much out there and how exciting to have so many options and opportunities.

The starting point to tackling a quarter life career crisis, I think, is intention.  For example, the intention to have more free time, to earn more money, to get that promotion, to turn your hobby into your career, to love your work.  From there, your thoughts become focused on your intention and your goal, which in turn pushes you into action slowly but surely (if you want it badly enough).

I am a big fan of watching motivational talks on You Tube (seriously, I could spend hours listening to Oprah's words of wisdom!) If you find a good one, they can give you a real lift when you are feeling well and truly stuck, or even when you know what you want but just need a big fat injection of inspiration to go out there and get it.  If you have a spare 6 minutes have a watch of this one - Anthony Robbins: Find Your True Gift and Maximise Your Career

As well as being exciting and liberating, change of any kind is really hard, but then so is settling for something which, for whatever reason, doesn't quite cut the mustard.   

Oh a Life Coach…. What’s that?!

Hello and welcome to my blog – my first ever one – bit scary!  Since the age of about ten I’ve written a diary but have only ever done it for my own eyes.  Over the past year I’ve been training to become a Life Coach and through this process I’ve built upon my personal ‘toolkit’ which helps me live a happy life and tackle the everyday stresses and strains we all encounter.  I thought the time had come to share some of these ideas in a bid to make for some (hopefully!) interesting reading and an injection of inspiration to live the life you want and, most importantly, be happy!

Telling people I’m planning to become a Life Coach is sometimes met with a blank expression so in this first blog post I’m going to attempt to explain what a Life Coach actually is.  It may be easier to start with what a Life Coach is NOT.  Life Coaching isn’t counselling, it isn’t advice giving and it isn’t about solving people’s problems for them.  Whether consciously or subconsciously we all have our own goals and, with the best intentions, it’s not always easy to achieve them on our own and that’s where a Life Coach can be really valuable. 

It’s perhaps useful to liken a Life Coach to a Personal Trainer.  If you have your very own personal fitness coach you are much more likely to stick to that gym session and turn up every week, than if left to your own devices.  The same is true for a Life Coach.   They should be totally dedicated to helping you accomplish your goals by asking the right questions at the right times and listening to what YOU want to achieve.   A talented Life Coach will be that person cheering you along every step of the way as you work towards your goals, just as fitness trainer would.   

So, why use a Life Coach?  People can see a Life Coach for all manner of reasons. Coaching through times of transition can work well - career change, retirement, becoming a parent, the break-up of a relationship, returning to work after illness or maternity leave etc.  Life Coaching can also help those wanting some extra motivation to make changes in their lives such as healthy living, time/stress management, coping with anxiety surrounding public speaking or becoming more assertive. Something people often assume is that, to see a Life Coach, there must be big issues to tackle, but that's not the case at all.  We all have those niggling things which we want to work on to improve our lives and our general well-being and happiness (I know I do!)  There's absolutely no shame in having a helping hand and that's where a Life Coach could be of huge value.

My parents’ attic is FULL of my diaries and I’ve clocked up about 20,000 words on laptop from my various diary entries from over the years so it’s safe to say I have a tendency to ramble on so I’m making a conscious effort to leave this post where it is, now that I have given some insight into Life Coaching.

I’m excited to share more soon about all kinds of topics around self-development and well-being.  Thanks for reading if you got this far and I’ll post again soon.