For those not in the know:

After two years of gainful unemployment, I returned to my old banking job at Lloyds Bank on the 31st October last year.

While the irony of quitting my job then returning two years later on Halloween (of all days!) isn’t lost on me, in a lot of ways it’s been one of the best things I’ve done.

I used to think that unless you were lucky enough to have a job you loved, freedom & fulfilment could never come from the 9 to 5.

I also thought that corporate life itself was sabotaging my own freedom & fulfilment.

Anyone reading my daily emails since Day 1 will’ve seen me go to town on the “rat race” and all those who sailed within her.

But I’ve done a complete 180.

This is all thanks to the last couple of years and, in particular, studying with the American coach Michael Neill.  I’ve learnt a lot about how change in people happens and I've got a completely new understanding of how the mind works.

And, more to the point, I've seen how all my thoughts about the 9 to 5 were just that.

Not facts or truths, but simply my thoughts.

i.e. I was creating all my ill will about the 9 to 5 myself.

I never would’ve returned to my old banking job if I hadn’t seen just how made up all my thinking was.

And I can’t overstate how big a shift this has been.  A few words in an email like this doesn’t do it justice.

I know it might sound hard to believe, but I’ve figured out a way to enjoy my job in a system (the 9 to 5) I used to constantly bad-mouth.  

And in an industry (banking) I used to rag on too.

Some of how I’ve done this is obvious.  

But some of it is much less obvious, some is really esoteric and some of it didn’t click for a long time.

Some of it is still clicking.

Whatever the case...

Now that I’ve learnt so much, I want to share it.

I know exactly how frustrating it can be sitting behind your desk, staring at your screen, doing ho-hum work and thinking “is this really how I’m going to spend the next 30 years?”.

I know how stressful it is to be given a same day deadline from nowhere and have your MD & teams of people waiting for you to deliver on a project when you already have work and other deadlines spilling out of your inbox.

And I also know how the thought of quitting a job can tear you up inside.  Especially when you try to balance the fear of quitting with the security of a job and realise you’re probably never going to quit but that you also desperately need a way to make your job more manageable (or, dare I say it, even enjoyable).

It’s because I know how painful these feelings can be (I lived & breathed them for years) that I want to help other fed up 9 to 5ers who feel the same way.

What I’ve learnt has been a gamechanger for me.  It’s taken me from exhausted and angry to energised and having fun.

And I think it could also be a gamechanger for anyone who feels like I used to feel.

I’ll be writing a lot more about this in the coming weeks.

So stay tuned.

That’s all for now.

 - Tom