Episode Details

I used to suffer from this too…

And it took me a lot of years to get the past tense into the above statement!

* When I was in the corner at a family function, on the phone, frantically gesticulating that I would be done soon - my heart was torn in two. I felt I was being ‘less than’ at doing my job, because I wasn’t fully present, I felt I was being ‘less than’ at being a family member, because I wasn’t fully present.

I’d look around the room at everyone else and wish that I too could be like them, and not be the bonkers entrepreneur in the corner. I felt well and truly judged by them and found wanting.

* When I was in a Board Meeting and my phone rang with a school call - my heart was torn in two. I felt I was being ‘less than’ at doing my job, because I wasn’t fully present. I felt I was being ‘less than’ at being a Mum because I wasn’t fully present.

I’d look around the room at everyone else and wish that I too could be like them, and not be the bonkers Mother in the room. I felt well and truly judged by them and found wanting.

* When I was taking some time out for myself, maybe reading a magazine with a cup of tea, and someone walked in, I felt guilty. I invariably jumped up and moved ‘do something’, I felt I was being ‘less than’ in my household.

I wasn’t busy doing something to add value to my day. I felt like I was skiving and needed to justify taking some time out. I felt well and truly judged by them and found wanting.

* When I was…

I’ll stop here with the scenarios, I could go on adding to this list for you, because, believe me, there were many of them. I also think that you probably recognise yourselves in my story and that you too could add even more instances of feeling pulled in many directions at once to my list.

I couldn’t work it out, I couldn’t see what I was doing to myself, I had silently bought into the myth that I had to do it all, somehow be omnipresent and that the success of many elements of my life solely depended on me.

I could feel myself getting more and more frustrated by this, and also more and more run down. I was taking on too much and as our lives changed and my work responsibilities grew, I was still trying to do it all.

Having lost my father in my late 20’s, I absolutely knew that work shouldn’t be the be all and end all.

Having had pleurisy in my early 30’s and ending up off work for 8 weeks, because I pushed on through in the early stages of it I absolutely knew that work shouldn’t be the be all and end all.

But despite the above, I still believed I had to be it all…

Gradually, as life continued to layer in its lessons along the way, and I learnt more about me and how I tick, I started to realise that I was in an absolute ‘emperor has no clothes situation.’

Yes absolutely, in any of the situations I had been in and found myself wanting, someone in that room may well have been judging me, many of us have opinions about what someone is doing.

But I have no control over that, I don’t know what’s gone on in their life to lead them to have that opinion, but in reality it was probably nothing to do with anything that I was doing.

In fact, in most cases I actually had no clue about what they were thinking - in reality, the judge and jury in the room was me, and only me.

And I was judging myself harshly, I was speaking to myself in a way that I would never speak to anyone else…

The defining moment for me, was when my husband, affectionately known in my online musings as Mr W, held both my hands, looked me straight in the eye and told me, ‘You are enough…’

Don’t ask me why, but this particular time, it really landed with me and I realised that he was absolutely right.

I put my objective head on and stood back from my own situation and realised that I needed to change my habits if I wanted to remove this limitation that I was putting on myself.

I talk