Mindset

I knew, when embarking on this career change, that I would have a hurdle to get over in terms of mindset. 

When I worked as an Office Manager previously it was always with the goal of starting my own creative business as a gleaming beacon ahead in the future. I really loved my office job. I had wonderful colleagues, a great boss and the work was varied and interesting. I was also good at it and consistently went home with the contentment of a job well done. But ultimately it wasn't what I had ever seen myself doing. It didn't fit in with my sense of myself as a creative. I stayed in the role for seven years and may have stayed longer had I not had children but I could always tell myself it was temporary.

I have changed career before now. I spent all my early years and 6 years of further education working towards a professional acting career. In the end it only took me 5 years of working in theatre to realise that it wasn't for me. That I needed more structure and stability than the rollercoaster of life as an actor would ever be able to give me. Leaving acting behind was something I had never anticipated having to do and there was a grieving process for a future that I had imagined since childhood that now would never be. But I made the change safe in the knowledge that I would never allow myself to be desk bound. That I would remain a creative - it was just a matter of working out in what way.

I began a process of self-examination and drilling back down into my other passions. That process led me to cake design and all the time I spent in administrative roles I was working towards that new goal; doing courses, making cakes for anyone who would let me, designing, baking. Looking back I know how rewarding I found my office role but at the time, if I hadn't had cakes in my future, I would have struggled to accept that working in an office was the right fit for me.

This change feels different. It is tricky because it is hard to disentangle my motivation in terms of whether I would have been making this move if it wasn't for the pandemic. I think that I probably would but I will never know what choices I might have made if 2020 hadn't been quite so extraordinary. I used to think that my work defined me. I couldn't contemplate spending my days doing something that wasn't a driving passion. But now I am in my 40s I think that contentment is hugely underrated. If you can find a rewarding role that enables you to live a contented life, to pursue hobbies and afford little luxuries that warm the heart then I think that is an extremely good path to be on.

And of course going back into an administrative role now doesn't mean that is where my career journey will end. But for now I am looking forward to free weekends walking in woodland with my family, time to decorate the house and, maybe not fireworks, but the warmth of the glow from a job well done.