What If….A Perfectionist Threw Caution to the Wind
Two or three months back I was thinking 2012 should have been my year, the year of the Dragon, my Chinese astrological sign. My year for wonderful things to happen. Dragon the fearsome, loyal, kind and hard working, the traits that could lead me to greatness.
In the last two weeks of 2011 I was made redundant from my job of 8 years. If you’d asked me to sit down and think about what defined me, my job would probably not have made it to my list. But losing it undermined my very core. For me it was about security in a world in recession, an income, getting out and meeting people, and in holding down that job, a belief, that what I did, I did very, very well.
At first I embraced the opportunity for change but when the shock was replaced with the reality, my optimism seemed to die. I reeled through the emotions like a woman possessed. Fear, frustration, helplessness and a loss of control over my own destiny, anger, so much anger, mainly towards my employer, someone I’d once counted as a friend and a sense of betrayal. My demon was the alter-ego who has dogged me most of my life. She ridicules me, second guesses my intuition, stamps all over my dreams, she takes me by the hand and leads me down the path of the worst imaginings my mind can create, and devours my confidence. And she always shows up when there’s a flicker of weakness. “What’s the point in trying, you know you’re going to fail”, my perfectionist/procrastinating nature chimes in.
If only I had been left to my own devices, I could have coped. Lunarcy the everyday and my alter-ego Lunarcy the superhero, righter of wrongs and with the ability to take flight and soar, working together we could have been amazing, we could of risen to the challenge, but my demon was in her element.
The turning point, my 48th birthday, end of April, all I wanted to do was sleep through it. Friends though had other plans, a surprise party (the surprise bit I spectacularly messed up – no point being a perfectionist if you don’t do something spectacularly). I went begrudgingly, annoyed with them for forcing me to acknowledge the event. Sometime during the night though something wonderful happened to me. Something shifted in me, what it was, who knows, I still don’t. Maybe it was just being in that room with people who just wanted me to be happy. I wonder do they know how important that night was to me, how much strength I gained from their presence, thoughtfulness and warm friendship, and how it helped to turn my life around.
I now have a direction, I won’t say plan, for me now, plans imply something set in stone. A direction allows me to move forward and allow for change. I’m going back to learning, am I scared, hell yes, but I won’t allow that to derail me. I want to explore an area that intrigues and energizes me. Psychology and Hypnosis, the mind, infinitely creative and destructive. The power to conquer and defy our past or to bring us to our knees. A text delivered a selection of books to me, “some summer reading” he said. Light summer reading it ain’t. I laugh, but I’ll enjoy them so much more than some soppy novel.
I still struggle with this desire to be nothing less than perfect, but the dream is strong, and hopefully enough to push me out of my comfort zone.
I know now that losing my job wasn’t the beginning of the end for me. I was never going to jump, I had to be pushed and glorious new starts often include pain, fear and doubt. Perhaps 2012 will be my year to shine after all.
Where do I see myself in October/November and beyond, will it be with my hand shooting up to answer yet another question, teeth grinding behind at the Noddy Know All in the front row, or standing behind the toilets smoking trying to look cool but in reality just terrified by life. I’m hoping closer to the know all, but without the ‘me being annoying’ bit.
For now I’m reading my books, swotting as it were. A challenge presents itself, deliciously tantalizing and I’m poised and ready. I sit relaxed, a smile comes to my face, and a sense of excitement and the beginning of my path to fulfilment, as the words swirl into my brain, like fingers massaging the little grey cells long dormant, I think ……..
“I wonder does he have any copies of these books in English”.
lunarcy 
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