Troubled, something missing (part 1)

I wrote the following post about my experiences on LinkedIn last week:

I’ve had a lot of emotions at work over the last 10 years. They have included:
troubled, feeling of something being wrong or missing; frustration and feeling trapped; lost and scared when not sure on my direction; excited when I found freedom with work that resonated; anger when my choices were closing down; exhilarated and energised when finding that elusive feeling of ease and joy — sometimes called flow.

I’ve spent 25 years working in large corporates in business and IT change. It has been a great learning experience but eventually I discovered that I had locked myself into a guilded cage.

Does this resonate with you?

After a journey which has been emotional itself I discovered a home in coaching. Most importantly I have found out how nature can guide with compassion and intuition through the journey of discovering our own nature.

I’m looking to help a few people find their way out of their guilded cage.
Or just hear your story if you’d like to share.

If this touches you, please message me directly.

I wrote another post with a poll asking which of these emotions most resonated with people.

At the time of writing this article, these three were equal highest :

Troubled something missing

Lost and not sure on direction

Excited with work resonating

So in this article I thought I’d share what Troubled something missing meant for me.

I was working for a startup in 2009 which was an exhilarating time for me although it only lasted 5 months or so. I had last worked as cofounder of a startup in 1999 and it had the same attraction from the uncertainty, unpredictability and volatile environment that tends to be the case.

When it came to an end, I decided that I needed to be the founder rather than the follower which is when I experimented by starting a blog for business analysts. As the advice goes, do what you know. And business analysis was what I knew.

I also knew something was missing — excitement and a sense of adventure (this comes up later).

As 2010 came and the decade progressed, I experimented with several business ideas in support of business analysts. I was trying to help business analysts but, more importantly, I was trying to help this business analyst. I was trying to buy freedom by creating an income which allowed me to leave the contract world behind. And then do ‘something’ new.

There was a ‘push’ factor in terms of what I wanted to leave behind but no ‘pull’ factor. As I was asked endless times on coaching or small business development communities, who is is your ideal customer? Or, what do you actually want to do, Alex? An increasingly frutrating but, actually, quite profound question.

I didn’t know who I wanted to be.

In fact, I didn’t know who I actually was. In a world where we are persuaded to shape ourselves to fit a pre-defined box to work seamlessly in a machine, this is a challenging question. (I wrote about the tyranny of job titles in 2018)

Who are you? And what are you here for?

Well, I had started to answer the second question by saying that I wanted to make a positive social impact. I didn’t see that happening in the banking or large corporate world where I operated. Now you can talk about the importance of ensuring the wheels of the banking industry keep turning. I won’t get into a conversation on that here but… let’s just say there are easier ways of making a positive social impact without have to go into verbal contortions!

But still… who is your ideal customer, Alex? How do you want to help them?

Somewhere in this decade and through coaching with Penny Pullan, I was introduced to the Strengths Finder. This helped me understand a little better who I am and… what my strengths are. And also, realize why I was frustrated. I was unable to exercise all of my strengths at work. In particular my futuristic strength had no real creative outlet.

I would highlight that Lost and not sure on direction also resonated with me during this period. I knew that I wanted to leave but I didn’t have much idea where I wanted to go.

I didn’t know where I was going so it was pretty hard to keep going forward.

This was brought home to me when I spoke to my brilliant coach friend, Rachel Bamber, about a new business idea which I was struggling to get the motivation to move forward with.

She asked me:

Would you do this if you weren’t getting paid?

Let’s just say my answer was pretty quick and very enlightening. And it became my new personal test for any new idea I wanted to start.

The follow on to this is: if you’re doing what you want or pursuing a vision that you’re passionate about, you will enjoy the journey regardless of financial reward.

So what does this mean?

It’s pretty simple.

We all have innate talents, our essential nature, activities where we transcend the every day and enter a state of flow.

If you want to know what this is, walk outside and watch the birds flying. I enjoy watching swallows in particular as they have such grace and I believe they are experiencing joy as they describe a beautiful path in the air.

In the next article, I will write about how I discovered my essential nature (or at least the most natural and honest description of myself) and also where I have got to with purpose.

(You can find out about and complete the Clifton Strengths Finder assessment here)