Lifeless Ordinary

Despite the trappings of a successful career I was one of the increasing band of debt-laden people in respectable, well-paid jobs that could not support themselves and forced to seek second incomes.

Debt is currently running at an all time high with the average liability of a person in the UK contacting the Consumer Credit Counselling Service (CCCS) for advice standing at in excess of £32,000 ($55,500).

In addition the number of people earning more than £30,000 ($52,000) a year who were seeking assistance has risen by 257% in the past three years.

Personally I saw my second job as a means to an end but it was an enlightening experience. For five days out of seven I had to be up at 4.15am for a two hour shift which started at 5.00am and an hour later on Sundays. I got Fridays as my day off when I could have a lie-in until 7.00am. Whoopee-do.

On the plus side it was interesting to be wandering in a supermarket before dawn. During the summer months I had the gorgeous aroma of fresh peaches for instance but you have to weigh that up with the split bag of cat litter or one of those toxic air fresheners with the essence of Chernobyl stream.

Everyday was different despite basically having the same tasks to complete each morning. For instance, one Sunday I had to clean ice cream off the windows - honestly!

Even though I was going without sleep for money I don’t regret the direction my life was taking back then. After all, the only constant in life is change and the cleaning job is now very much part of my past as I quit at the end of 2006. However, it’s worth looking back now so that you can understand how the change occurred.

The job was very much a solitary and unchallenging activity but the major benefit it gave me was that of essentially two solid hours of quality thinking time. Can you honestly say that you devote that sort of time in one hit into working out your situation, making plans for the future, developing schemes and new ideas etc? It is a strange experience and fantastic to have that freedom.

I was up before dawn in a place that is usually heaving with chattering people and yet I was pretty much alone in an eerie quietness. Apart from the floor polisher that sounds like some distant aircraft taxiing to an airport terminal there’s barely a sound.

It was in this atmosphere that I was able to let my mind wander off all sorts of different directions. I used my surroundings to stimulate ideas and I continually asked myself questions to get to the roots of my situation and where my future was taking me.

A DIFFERENT PERSPECTIVE

As 2006 drew to a close I made the decision that I wanted to take a day out for myself to go through, in depth, some projects I was working on in a different environment away from the city where I live. I decided the place to do this was Wells-next-the-sea, a coastal town in Norfolk on the English East coast where I’d spent many happy holidays as child.

Basically what I wanted to do was give myself the opportunity to have some time to myself away from daily distractions and use the break to write up my ideas and make plans for my personal and my family’s future. Through this process I was encouraged to enroll on a course in life coaching myself and I have since gained a Certificate Personal Performance Coaching from the Coaching Academy. I vowed to quit by the end of that year and reclaim my life whatever the consequences and that I did.

Perhaps surprisingly I do not regret the experience of those early mornings because I am thankful for the opportunity it presented me. I was able to meet new people from different backgrounds and it allowed me to evaluate my place in the community as a whole. I’ve even learned new skills and helped others as result through the coaching course.

I would recommend the experience of doing something completely different in addition to your usual routine to give yourselves a wider perspective of the world. It doesn’t have to be cleaning but a task that takes you away from familiar surroundings that refreshes your mind and makes you think about where you are headed in life.

In these tough financial times it’s a challenge to go from one pay day to the next but by stepping off the usual path may lead your life into an entirely new direction. If you are unhappy now, what have you got to lose?

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