Finding Your Own North Star - Feeling Light

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I took the the day off yesterday. It was raining cats and dogs and no one was really looking for me so I made and executive decision to just stay home. I felt like a kid pretending to be sick and getting away with it.

I think my situation with work has put me into temporary grieving mode. The death of a dream. I had imagined that my partner and I were going to build something together like sisters and the work would be fun. Two creative people doing what we love and getting paid for it. But that was only my dream.

I realized that this situation along with the death of a close friendship around Christmas was the beginning of yet another grieving period. I couldn't really see that it made me not want to do this any more. I thought it was the design work and not the circumstance that was making me so unhappy.

From the time I was big enough to move furniture I rearranged my room at least once a month. All 60 lbs of me would sit on the floor against the wall and push my furniture around with my feet. Thankfully my mother didn't mind my reoccurring decorating sessions from black light posters to beads in the doorway. It kept me out of trouble just as it does today.

The problems I have been having made me doubt my love for design and my ability to be a entrepreneur. I have always been a entrepreneur even as a child when other kids played house I played restaurant or store. I always had a money making enterprise on the side that made real money. I loved the whole process of coming up with something someone wanted and would be willing to pay for.

I have also been doing a lot of reading this week which has helped me find my way. First a Martha Beck book Finding Your Own North Star and then The Power of Now. Martha's book is about finding something you love and the money will follow after a lot of work.  She says if you listen to your essential self instead of your social self you will be led in the right direction.

It is really about aptitude but she has methods in her book for first identifying what it is you don't like about what you are doing now and then how to find what you do like. I have read this book about four times it is way more than a book about careers it is about seeing how we cave to what is expected and become depressed because we are doing things we don't want to do. This book is also about the grief process and actually has a chart of the stages and what you might be feeling. It also help to show you the difference between grief and depression.

I went to bed night before last and ask God to help me find joy in my life again. To restore me to sanity once again and show me which way to go. I can no longer live the way I have been living in fear all the time. I decided to surrender and let the chips fall where they may. My sponsor says ask God to either " lock it or block it."

I woke up yesterday morning feeling light. I decided to stay home and my heart was singing. I watched design shows and just did whatever I felt like doing. After watching a few shows I thought "who are you kidding you are already doing exactly what you love." It hasn't been fun lately but that doesn't have anything to do with design itself. It has to do with the people I have been working with.

This is a creative business with a lot of technical stuff on top of that. Then there is the emotions of the customers and meeting every one's expectations. Having problems with fellow designers and contractors has added and extra layer that pushed me over the edge.

I have decided that I just need a little time off to find some inspiration. Even just not being here yesterday made me feel great. I actually worked on my new business plan. Just realizing that I do still love design made me feel like I am no longer on the fence. I can move forward and put my energy where I need it

Why am I always surprised by grief? If it doesn't come in the usual package I don't always see it. Losing a friendship and realizing my business partner and I don't want the same thing is a big loss. Even if I know I am better off it still hurts. I am no longer emotionally dead like I was before the program so I have to feel my feelings. What a bummer. It is why I have done all this work to be human.