It's Amazing What a Change in Pace can do.

Things good things happen when you change the pace in which you live your life. As busy as you are, or as scary as your every increasing work load may be, forcing yourself to pause and take stock can open your mind to possibilities you wouldn't normally consider.


For the last few months it has felt like I have done nothing but work, don't get me wrong I love my work but sometimes I let it get all consuming. Our domestic arrangements don't help either, sometimes it feels like my husband and I, have my daughter on a time-share arrangement. I'm up at the crack of dawn, while my husband works late into the evening, so we only spend time together at the weekends. Consequently we haven't been getting the quality time together as a family or to do the things we love.

Well some thing changed. During the well needed Christmas break, my daughter and I joined my parents down at their cottages in Cornwall. Just crossing the boarder into Cornwall acts like sedative  to me and I start to relax and that combined with spending time with my Mum, which makes me revert to the secure and comforting feelings of childhood (actually it's because I enjoy my Mum looking after me again for a while and I become very lazy. I know, I know we should be looking after each other equally now but something about being there with her turns me into a kid again).

St Nectern's Glen

We had a smashing time, just the right mix of exploring Cornwall and cosying-it-up in front of the fire. The inner hippy in me always surfaces at some point and a trip to St Nectern's Glen was needed. For those of you that don't know, St Nectern's Glen is a beautiful waterfall set deep in glorious woods up near Boscastle. Many myths and legends surround the falls and it does feel like a truly spiritual place. In more recent times it has become a shrine to loved ones, a place to forge wishes and a place for you to just be. After tying ribbons to the trees in memory of my loved ones past, my thoughts turned to more self indulgent thoughts of me and what I wanted. In a more whimsical state of mind, I thought, yeah I wish for more financial security but that didn't feel right. That's not what I need, I need for my family to be able to actually be a family not a time tabled rota for people that happen to live in the same house. So I wished for us to be a family.

It was back to reality and back to work, back to school, back to living for the weekends. A few days later I had a chance conversation with a friend. She mentioned a Playground Mum she knew was looking for someone to join her business. I inquired and very soon met with the Director. An entrepreneurially type that lives her life at a 100 miles an hour but absolutely had the right attitude to life. Incredibly driven and passionate about her business but equally determined to dedicate time to her family and outside interests. She offered me an exciting opportunity. I was so excited, fabulous new company, a new boss with whom I shared so many interests, within walking distance of home, everything seemed perfect,  but at what cost? I would leave a place I had worked for more than thirteen years, I would leave some great work colleagues and I would leave the safe, the known, and the security that brings with it. Not to mention the change in finances.

I knew I had some soul searching to do, I knew I wanted to take the job but my sensible head kept throwing in doubts. At half term we were lucky enough to be able to escape back to the cottages and this time my husband was able to come too. As well as our adventures on the beach we took him to St Nectern's. While I stood in the gushing stream, my right welly leaking away as a generous hole had appeared in the sole, I thought 'why on earth am I still hesitating? I asked for change and the opportunity has been given to me'. So there we are, after all those years getting up at 4am to commute to work  I'm not going to do it any more. I'm so excited about my new job but I'm even more excited about getting our family life back. Already I feel different, it's Sunday morning and I don't have that feeling of impending doom associated with the next day being Monday. I even spent a couple of hours painting with my daughter yesterday, without worrying about all the things I still needed to do. (I wonder why I always revert to Poppies when I feel a creative urge?)

So this is a long winded way of saying, every now and then force yourself to slow down, give yourself time and space to ask 'what is it you really want?' because when the answer comes, in veritably the solution tends to follow.