I’ve been asked, variously: how do you know when it’s time to move
on? How do you pick that delicate juncture between opportunity lost and
opportunity ready to be gained? How do you know what’s right? How do
you… know?
Often it looks like I just jump, often from a grand height. I guess I
do. But in the past few years it’s been to the beat of some pretty cool
imagery I was given a few years back. I thought I’d share it.
You see, I used to see a “spiritual coach” (called, appropriately, Sky) years ago. I was editing Cosmopolitan
at the time and I charged Sky with “grounding me” and keeping me real
in a world that I really didn’t want to get lost in. We had a weekly
appointment on a Thursday.
When it came time, four years in, to leave the job I had a really tough time making the decision. Not that anyone knew.
I was really unwell (I had adrenal collapse and hashimotos, but
didn’t realise) and struggling, but it was a friggen great job. Should I
dump everything – quit my job and enter the unknown? Surely it has to
be better than the quagmire I was dragging my limbs around in. Or do I
persevere? After all, most people just have to. They have kids and
mortgages and dropping out of a job just isn’t an option they can
consider. I envied their lack of choice. Was I being indulgent?
It was the unknown bit that daunted me. The lack of guarantees.
And the fear that I was being unnecessary. That the starving children in Africa didn’t fret they were living an existential lie.
I remember thrashing it out with Sky: What if it’s just me and not
the circumstances…and I quit my job and things only get worse? Because
what if I had this wrong? What if life really was about getting a secure
footing on the conveyorbelt and neatly passing from school to job to
partner to holidays in Port Macquarie? What if this is as meaningful as
it gets?
What if I’d overcomplicated things and when I do pursue the unknown,
it’s no better? Wherever I go, there I am. A cloud of over-thinking and
deliberation in my wake.
I’ve asked these same questions so many times in my life. I asked it
when both my previous longterm relationships came to an end. I fretted
whether I’d ever find anyone better. At 27 I was willing to take that
risk. At 34, I was more tentative and I doubted myself and whether I was
doing the right thing, which made the post-breakup pain more
protracted. As an aside, that’s what long recovery periods are. They’re
rarely a reflection of the love you felt in the relationship. It’s more
closely related to the level of self-doubt you emerge with. It can take
years to recalibrate and realize the unknown is OK, that you were not
wrong. It took me three years to recalibrate after my second love.
I went through it when I deferred my law studies to travel for a
year. What if I was wasting a year in which I could be getting ahead?
Our default position is safety. We’re programmed biologically to not
expend unnecessary energy. Unless, of course, something bigger than base
survival instinct tugs at us.
But then Sky shared this:
“The thing about life, sweetheart, is this.
When we take a leap from a secure place into the unknown, we’re always carried to the next stage safely.
“When we finally get the courage to just jump, we freefall for a bit.
But then, as we’re falling, we grow angel wings that carry us on to the
next solid platform, to the next stage.”
I’m not much of an “angels wings” type. But I got the gist. Life supports us, it just does.
Sky added this:
“The
problem is, we all want to go out and buy ourselves a set of angel
wings first, before we jump. But there’s no such thing as an angel wing
shop.”
There most certainly isn’t.
When I jump I always feel alone and naked.
Sometimes we just have to trust the tugging and jump. We don’t know
why and we won’t until we’re falling. We just have to hope the bloody
angels knew where we’re heading.
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