Get Outta Your Comfort Zone!
In January of 2016 I finally moved out of my office space of over 10 years. I’d been wanting to move for several years. Every now and then I would look but there was no urgency.
I was comfortable. However, I needed to reduce my overhead costs. I wanted to move into a building that was better maintained. I also didn’t have therapists or subtenants anymore. Additionally, building management was not renewing leases or adding any new tenants.
The writing was on the wall.
When the Worst Happens
Finally when I was ready to take action (early 2013)…my world started to shift dramatically. My father started to get sick. It was Sep/Oct 2013 before we had a definitive diagnosis… he was dying from stage 4 cancer.
It was a nightmare. I wasn’t ready…but is anyone ever ready to lose someone that they love?
I couldn’t move to a new office when my world was falling apart. I needed as much as possible for life to stay the same or for things to get better. I felt like I couldn’t handle what was happening. There were many people relying on me…so as much as possible, I tried to maintain the facade… it was business as usual.
I saw my therapy clients and allowed myself to be absorbed in their lives. I facilitated my workshops and for those 5-6 hours I stayed as much as I could in the present. I wanted to block out reality. I wanted my dad to be okay and for him to be healthy and whole.
Unfortunately, wanting it to be so…didn’t make it so. Within 6 months of his actual diagnosis he was gone – March 1, 2014.
After my father died there was a new normal and that new normal wasn’t as bad as his being in pain and wasting away before our very eyes…but it was still very difficult.
Revelations
As a therapist and an entrepreneur, there was no one to step in to see my clients. There was no paid vacation time. There were no colleagues to step in to supervise my supervisees or consult with my consultees or lead my continuing education workshops. My dad’s estate needed attention and my mom needed me more than ever.
What I wanted was some time to re-group, but life doesn’t always work that way. I wanted to not feel like I was in it by myself. I wanted to magically have a life partner, a husband… a stable relationship…someone to comfort me…someone to lean on who would say “Everything is going to be okay.” Of course none of that happened and as a therapist I know full well that partnership and marriage are no guarantee of support during tough times.
While grief highlighted some missing pieces in my own life…I was very grateful to have had support from amazing friends and from my siblings. But what was so clear to me then was that my heart was breaking and the dismantling of my heart allowed some other truths to escape:
- “What do I really want?”
- “Life is short!”
- “I don’t have forever…no one does.”
So I turned to my supportive communities: spiritual, social and familial. I put one foot in front of the other. Despite his Will, the legal matter of my father’s estate and going through court took more than a year. It was mid-2015 and by this time my office building neighbors at Goodyear told me that the office building was being torn down. I was shocked. I had not heard anything from building management or the doctors who owned the building…those practicing right down the hall from me.
I had so many questions and concerns:
- When is the building closing?
- Will I have enough time to find an adequate space?
- Will my clients stay with me through the move?
- Now I have to have a deposit, pack up, pay movers and continue to see all my clients, supervisees and workshop attendees.
- What am I going to do with all of this furniture?
Change is the Only Constant
I knew that ultimately everything would work out…what I didn’t know was how much stress I would endure between then and now… “Who would I be at the end of it?”…not to mention “When will the transition and change end?”
Building management finally gave me a notice in October 2015 that we had approximately 6 months to move…I started looking for space. Everything I saw was either more than I wanted to pay, involved paid parking or didn’t have enough space for me to hold my workshops…
There is something about a new year approaching that always lights a fire in me. I wanted to be in my new space by January 2016. It was a licensure renewal cycle and I had lots of work to do. I didn’t want to move during the busiest part of workshop season.
Finding a New Place and Finding Myself
It was December 30th, 2015 (the day before New Year’s Eve) when I found out about a building around the corner from my old office. They were renovating two offices and one was still available. It is an interior space with one exterior smaller room that had one window.
It wasn’t necessarily what I envisioned but I could see myself starting anew in that space. I moved over a long weekend the first full week in January. I brought home mismatched pieces of furnishings from my old office and got rid of the living room furniture that I had had since I was in my 20’s.
In the meantime, I ventured into the world of dating (yikes)…my heart had been heartbroken at least twice by then and I was beginning to recall why I focused on success in work as opposed to success in love. Again, I found myself wishing that I had support during my office move…I could handle the hiring of movers and the logistics but what I had begun to learn about myself and about so much “doing” was the tremendous physical and emotional toll.
I had seen colleagues who did too much all of the time…riddled with chronic pain; or struggling at unhealthy body weights for their frame; or suffering from anxiety and depression.
I began to think of my life in a new way. My new office space is much smaller. Its mere existence was a suggestion to me that I could downsize…I could revisit the focus of my work…I could create more space in my life for my family, for friends and even to meet someone to share my life with..someone to help me look after my heart.
Take Time for Your Life
Today I take more time for fun…I go to concerts, I go out dancing, I get behind on my e-mail…today I take space for more than work in my life.
The truth is sometimes life falls apart. What remains will be something different. You will be different. What I learned when life fell apart was that I could no longer abandon the needs of my heart for the demands of business…even though I need my business to succeed so that I can take care of my basic needs, etc…
I learned that just because I give a spotlight to the possibility of love it does not mean that it will go smoothly or easily.
Lessons in Truth
- I’ve learned that what makes me successful in business does not necessarily translate to dating.
- I’m reminded that I have to spend time with my mom now, as neither of us is getting younger and as we both face health challenges of our own.
- I’ve learned that what I really need and what I really want…wants me too!
- I’ve learned that what looks like a setback or rejection is an adjustment.
- I’ve learned that life/the universe is conspiring to re-position me…it is allowing me to ask and answer the question “What do I want now?”
- I’ve learned that even in loss I’ve gained a deeper understanding of myself and how to have a fulfilling life.
- I learned that just because I saw an office space that seemed perfect for me but didn’t work out, or that I had one great or inspiring date with someone…it doesn’t mean that I’m home free.
- I’ve learned that my new building has its fair share of problems…and that no place is perfect.
- I’ve learned that being able to admit that I long for a loving, committed relationship – and that I won’t settle for less than I give in return – is not weak…it’s just honest.
- I’ve learned that even when the world seems to be falling apart, what my soul really and truly needs is finding it’s way to me. That if one office space doesn’t fit all of my needs…I could find a really nice adjunctive space to hold my workshops.
- That even if my colleagues missed my old larger office with the big, comfortable lounge furniture, times change and that requires letting go of those things that are no longer meant to serve us.
What I Want Wants Me Too
As 2016 rapidly comes to a close…I am selling my old office furniture…I will go into the new year giving my home interior the makeover it deserves…I am not the 25 year old that bought my house all of those years ago. She preferred bright colors and mixed ethnic designs (Santa Fe style furniture, Japanese lanterns, Indian wall coverings).
I am the 42 year old who now prefers muted tones and modern lines with luxe fabrics and dark wood tones.
I am now a woman who recognizes that saying “I am totally okay on my own” but meaning “Yes I am okay, however my life would be more fulfilled with partnership” is no longer a betrayal of myself. It is the ego and our individualistic culture that applauds going it all alone.
I don’t regret my journey…it all brings me to where I am today. My “lesson in truth” is that Fall is the season for letting go…I find no benefit in the facade…sometimes my world like yours is a beautiful mess…sometimes I want someone to stand next to me and hold my hand and say…”Look at the beautiful mess we made of it all…now let’s see if we can fix this together!”
Copyright © 2016 Ruby Blow. All rights reserved.
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