I was a “kite in the wind” for 10+ years.

What, you might ask, is a kite in the wind?

It's someone who has little say in what direction they’re heading and thus gets buffeted around left & right, up & down, side to side in whatever direction the wind happens to be blowing.

What winds am I referring to?

Think society, teachers, friends, circumstances and whatever else appears on your plate.

i.e. you’re not choosing your dishes.  They’re being served up for you.

A kite in the wind just lets this happen.

It's turbulent stuff.

I fell into everything from jobs, to how I spent my time, to habits, to certain patterns of thinking.

At one point I was about to uproot myself from a perfectly pleasant life in the fairy-tale city of Edinburgh to move to a new city for a job I was told I “should” be applying for but I didn't even want.

Luckily I flunked the interview.

I still look back and wonder what on earth I was thinking.

Of course, I wasn’t thinking at all.  I was letting others do that for me.

And before the whistleblowing begins:

This isn’t a dig at other people.  That’s not what I’m getting at.  Most of the time people are simply trying to help (even if their help isn't always helpful!).

This is more a comment about how I'd chosen to live my life.

But at some point, enough has to be enough.  It's time to stop being that kite in the wind, even if what we decide to do next will raise a few eyebrows or is counter to what people expect.

In a funny sort of way, this is one of the reasons I started coaching.

I know that airing thoughts & feelings which mean that 95% of colleagues, friends and family stare at you as if you’ve gone batshit crazy doesn’t leave you many places to turn.

Again: it’s not that these people don’t care.

It’s that they don’t get it.

And – let’s be honest – why would they? 

None of these ideas, thoughts and feelings are mainstream.

Yet for kites in the wind, they're exceedingly common.

I talk of ideas like:

*** Ignoring a nudge to do something different 

*** Suspecting you're not fulfilling your potential

*** Feeling like you’re not living a life true to yourself

*** Wanting to change direction, but not knowing how

*** Being carried through life rather than designing your own life

*** Seeing a disconnect between who are you are and who you want to be

*** Having a great life on paper, but feeling like there’s still something missing

*** Starting to wonder if the standard “life formula” is really the route to happiness

These are the sorts of feelings that if left unchecked can start to gnaw away like a maggot feasting on an apple.  

In my experience, that gnawing sensation doesn’t go away.  It only gets stronger.

But enough gloom-mongering.

I imagine this won’t click with a lot of people reading this email.

Perfect.  It’s not meant to.

If this does click, you'll be pleased to know that these ideas are slap bang in the middle of what transformative coaching is all about.

It’s almost like transformative coaching was invented to deal with these sorts of questions.

If you’d like to find out more:

https://waitinglist.followingfulfilment.com

That’s all for today.

- Tom