Sunday Scribblings included!

This week, over at Sunday Scribblings, the theme is Work: First job, worst job, dream job... and this struck me as apt, because the reason I've been largely absent from Blogland over the past couple of weeks is work. I won't be saying a whole lot about my new job here, but after a lengthy period of training, preparing and planning (since April, with holidays in between, of course), I've finally started the work I was hired to do - with young people, counselling in school settings. And it's great to be doing the actual work! It's not easy to be in a job while not actually doing what you're meant to be doing!

While this work (right now) is taking my full-time attention and is a full-time commitment, it is, in fact, a part-time job - seeing me in schools 4 mornings a week, so I am able to do other work as well: I'm continuing an afternoon's voluntary counselling in a women's centre. I'm teaching a psychology class one evening a week. Some weekends, I'll be doing workshops in SoulCollage, and next Friday, I get to do one of my favourite things - a poetry workshop with 11- and 12-year-olds in my home-town library as part of a poetry festival.

This is what I've wanted for a long time (and wrote about, as a dream-future, during The Artist's Way), and now it has fallen into place - a range of work, in the fields of therapy and creativity. I've heard the exalted term for it is a "portfolio career". I cannot believe at times that it has come to pass in my life. I have the space for flexibility. I can still see clients to work with them with Bach Flower Remedies. I'm wondering about taking level II and III of Reiki and offering that as a complementary therapy to my other work. There are a whole range of possibilities still available to me.

Right now, I feel I am doing what I'm meant to be doing in my life. Maybe the balance is a bit unsteady, as I am so much in transition into this new pattern, but overall, it seems there is space in this worklife for all the things that are important to me. Much of what I do doesn't seem like "work", in fact, even if it is something for which I may earn money; and some of what I do (writing, volounteer counselling) doesn't provide an income, but I approach it as seriously and professionally as I would if it did.

I feel immensely grateful that the journey I've taken in the world of work has led me here, through accounting and administrative jobs that didn't feed my soul in any way (but from which I learnt much about being systematic, about detail), through 21 years of motherhood and years of study in a new field, to now, on the cusp of my second half-century with the feeling of being of use in the world, with the sense that what I do is important for me, and useful to other people.

I have suffered from feeling inadequate, incapable and totally lacking in confidence. I have experienced the imposter syndrome, (and don't doubt that any or all of those experiences could await me tomorrow, next week, next month or next year) but right now, at this moment, I'm glad to be asked to reflect on Work, because right now, at this moment, I feel good about it. This feels good.

Want to visit other workers? Head over to Sunday Scribblings!

September Changes & Poetry Changes

September is here. I will soon be spending my days following a schedule, a structure. I will be leaving behind my days of freedom to amble about the house in pyjamas, eating orange-yogurt ricecakes and reading blogs until 5 in the afternoon. From next week, I'll be rising at an early hour, pairing the right shirt with the right trousers (or trying to), making sure my shoes aren't scuffed, and my hair is straight as I leave the house. I'll be sensible about breakfast. I'll check that I've got my paperwork in order. I'll be a grown-up, a member of the workforce again.

But only for the mornings. I'm planning to get to the gym some afternoons. And to nap in others. I'm thinking how precious my weekends are going to be; how I'll be wanting to use those days for all the things I love best, and how necessary it will be to maintain order around me if I'm not going to have to spend my weekends just restoring order. I'm reminding myself that I have good habits established in using my calender and diary, and that I just need to keep that up, so things don't get lost, so I can see what my commitments are, and not feel I'm losing touch with my life. I'm wondering what will be good coffee-times for my friends, if I'm no longer free for mornings or lunch. I'm wondering about alternatives. I'm just a little bit anxious moving into this new phase of my life (again).

And just when this change comes along, along come others. Last week saw the demise of Poetry Thursday, and now it seems that the efforts to install a replacement project aren't going ahead. There are plans for the community to take it forward by posting a poetry piece in their blogs on Thursdays, and for one person to 'host' comments linking to their post. The wonderful Delia is going to be the "Blog-Momma" for the first round tomorrow. I don't know how much blogging time I'm going to have over the coming months, but I really want to continue the connections with all the wonderful poets who appeared in my life via Poetry Thursday, so I'm committing to doing something each week. Last week, I mentioned that, along with Poetry Thursday, I'm part of two "real-world" writers' groups, and very lucky I felt to be. Well, this is changing too.

Life just IS change, isn't it? Things happen to cause people to move on. - Work, education plans, relationships shift in our lives, and so our lives have to move to accommodate the changes. In one of my groups, too many members have reached times of change all at this time. The group couldn't hold, and a graceful goodbye is being said to Glass Apple Writers. Then, at the first post-summer meeting of my other writers' group, we learnt that two members are moving away for a while, - but another, who had taken some time out, has returned. Enthusiasm for the same type of projects we've done in the past is flagging. There's a feeling that something needs to shift, a need for a new energy - for change. Yes, I can take change, but not too much. After we'd had some time discussing business, checking in, we got to the work of the evening, - sharing our writing, and oh, that was when I breathed, that was when I realised that This is what draws us together. We love to write, we love to read , we love to get inside the piece of writing, or to let it get inside us. This is what feeds my soul. This won't change. I know that this won't change.

Now look what you've started! And Other Things

Yesterday's Sunday Scribbling post started something. I can't stop thinking in Trixie's voice! What would she be saying about that? What does she make of this? And then Alexandra said she should have a blog, and I think, as an experiment, she should. So Trixie will be blogging (for a while at least) HERE. That was great fun, allowing her her say, and I've gotten so much out of reading the posts that were already up by last night - Saturday. See, it wasn't even Sunday yet, and the thing was having a big impact.

That came at the end of a week that's been busy and productive. I said that when I got back from my last trip away, I'd be beginning the grown-up business of putting a life together (as in means of income. Work. That sort of thing), and I began, and it's been wonderful that things are beginning to fall into place in very strange ways. It's another application of the If You Build It They Will Come principle. I just started to put my CV (resume) out there, and I've been getting very positive responses, and already some offers of work that suit me very well. It's not going to be as easy as having a full-time job, but what I want to try to do over the coming year is to build up the range of courses and workshops I can offer, and promote them, and this week I've had offers to do four different things. - It makes me feel very positive and hopeful and motivated to take the next steps in putting this life together.

I went shopping for something to wear at my niece's wedding in September. I got an outfit that I like. That sounds very blah. It is a very blah statement. Fact is, I've been steadily gaining weight during this summer (There! I said it! and the sky hasn't fallen down!), and I don't feel particularly good in anything. BUT - there are three weeks to go, and what I've decided is that I can't lose the weight in that time, but I can eat healthily during that time, and not feel bloated and Ugh-y when it comes to it, so I have some hope of feeling good in my new outfit. I can begin going to the gym again. (Interesting, the weight-gain began at just about the same time I abandoned my thrice-weekly visits to Curves - any connection, do you think?)

And I'm going to start something I don't do enough of. I bought the yarn to knit a pretty little bolero for my little niece, who is to be flower-girl at the big niece's wedding, and am looking forward to getting into that.






And I'm sharing a picture from a walk I took with my sister two weeks ago in a peaceful spot where we watched dragonflies and herons, and regretted we hadn't realised how pleasant the day would be, because it's just the spot for a picnic, and if we're lucky, before Summer is completely over, we'll get back there, with a flask of tea and some sandwiches!