Auteur archief: Sagittarius Rising

Before moving on to the sixth house theme of health, I would like to dedicate one more post to work. More specifically the work environment where I am my own employer; my coaching and my creative practice.

Both are slow burners. Which may well have something to do with the sign in my natal chart presiding over my sixth house: Taurus. I will explore the qualities of this fixed earth sign in a separate blog and see if any of those qualities show up in my work habits.

At this moment, in May 2022, I only have two individual clients and two organisations I work with as a coach. I generate most of my income via freelance projects, and have done for quite some time. When I started my coaching practice, I had no funding in place, no savings to put into my business. And yet, I had to pay the bills, so I fell back on other skills and experience and took on projects I described earlier in this blog.

Thankfully, I will soon have a little window, a few months where, unless energy prices and inflation keep rising, I do not have to worry about my income, but can focus on acquiring new coaching clients instead.

What do I need to do to facilitate those acquisitions? What should I get in place to ensure it will all run smoothly once those new clients sign up? Firstly, I will have to update my website. I have just designed a new series of workshops, aimed at creative entrepreneurs and artists, which I still have to describe as part of my offering. I would love to try this series with a few creatives and ask for their feedback to use in this description. And I would like to update the feedback previous clients have shared, so people can see how these clients have experienced working with me. Some other things to update are my intake questionnaire, terms and contract.

Apart from these writing and admin tasks, I would also like to spend some time preparing the content of my sessions. Each client is different and will be given the support and assignments they most need. However, there are some tools that are really useful for most people. It will help me to help them when I already have those tools prepared. The two individual clients who I am currently working with, have been with me for a long time. Our sessions are often counselling sessions and I use very few assignments with them. I would therefore like to brush up my toolbox and redesign some of my favourite assignments, use my new lay-out etcetera. And I also look forward to diving back into books and podcasts that inspire me.

Finally, and perhaps most importantly, I myself like to really be present with my clients, whether these are individual clients or teams. Thankfully, this comes naturally to me. But I know that the better I look after my own physical, emotional and spiritual health, the easier it is for me to really show up and the more powerful one coaching session can be. So this is where diving into the health theme will probably be really helpful and beneficial for my work.

It will also greatly benefit my creative practice, which is another thing that simply takes a while to develop (again because there has been little financial wriggle room). Once I have more coaching projects, my work week will become much shorter, allowing for more time to spend on writing, drawing, photography etcetera.

Other than carving out time and looking after my health and well-being, there is very little I need or that I need to get in place in order to work on my creative projects. I have my laptop, my art supplies, my camera and plenty of ideas. Perhaps in the future, I would like to take classes, but that is not a priority.

One final thing to look at, is the physical work environment. As probably transpired from my previous post, I am considering leaving the place where I currently rent my studio. I intended to use it for coaching and creative projects, but haven’t really settled there yet. My home is not big enough to create a proper work space in, so if I were to give up the studio I would either have to really declutter or find an alternative location. Actually, moving house might be on the cards this year or the next, and I would really love to have one room (or shed in the garden) for my creative projects in the new place. I would use it for remote coaching too, but arrange other sessions in cafés, parks or meet my clients in their office.

However, I will likely keep my studio for at least another five to six months. July and August are the months when I can focus on acquiring new coaching clients and also on my creative projects. Already at the start of this year, when reflecting upon property and belongings, I realised I had to give both my present home and my studio a drastic declutter. I say declutter, but I do not really have that many useless little objects to get rid off. What I am speaking about are actually files, folders, boxes and books that I have carried around move after move, materials and objects that I no longer use. I do not want to dispose of all my keepsakes and of the things that are really dear to me, but it will be lovely to travel lighter in the future.

The sixth house speaks to work and health and a list of topics connected to these themes. It also tells us something about nutrition and our attitude to food, about self-improvement, about the way we serve others and the way we treat the animals in our care.

In my inventory I will first focus on my work environments and then I’ll look at my health. Once I have described these aspects of my life as objectively as possible, I will explore what I would like to let go or see less of and what I would like to keep or invite more of.

One thing to note, is that there is a separate house which speaks to our career and our public roles: the tenth. So those topics will follow later in the year. In the sixth house inventory we are specifically looking at the job(s) we have, the tools we have to do them, our work habits, our colleagues, our work environment and they way this is set up.

As I mentioned in my first inventory for this blog: I am self-employed. I am not on the pay roll anywhere at the moment, but there are various organisations, mostly in the arts, I do long term projects for. These are projects I have taken on alongside my coaching practice.

I would like to start by looking at the work environments that I am part of at the moment. Even as a freelancer, I do have colleagues and to a certain degree I am part of the organisational structure. I have written before about my sensitivity and hyper alertness; the latter is a temporary state which, thankfully, I am healing. The first is simply part of who I am; atmosphere in places and the way people interact always has an effect on how I feel. I cannot not notice them.

Some of my present work environments feel lighter than others. I would like to take this opportunity to explore these differences and – in the next steps – see what changes are required to experience more ease.

Work environment A is a very large educational organisation where I teach one module to the first year students. After some bureaucratic hassle at the start, I now have all the information and tools I need to do my work as well as I can. The impression I get, is that the organisation is doing its best to look after both its employers and its students and it is generally a good place to be. The contact I have with co-workers is limited: I go there, I teach, I leave. Not socialising or getting to know more colleagues is a deliberate choice; I need these boundaries right now. Not because the environment feels off, but simply because I have many different projects to tend to at the moment and don’t have much time for socialising. Also, I am still working through some difficult issues in therapy. Those issues sometimes leave me feeling a little fragile and insecure, not really up for meeting new people. What I very much appreciate about this work place, is the fact that I do not have to mingle or take part in meetings. I have a lot of autonomy and they trust that I am doing a good job. Which, I am fairly confident, I am.

Work environment B is a smaller, but still rather large cultural organisation where I am co-curator of an event, or rather a play, with music, poetry and film. I am very grateful for the opportunity to create this magical program and hope more projects will follow in the future. Here too, there is trust and autonomy. And even more: there is space to create. I have been working for this organisation for a while, and am more part of the team here, but still an outsider who does not have to attend meetings or take part in social gatherings unless I want to. At the moment this suits me very well for all the reasons I described above. I am actually glad to be able to keep my distance and have little to do with the inevitable office politics and challenging interpersonal dynamics. From the sideline I do notice that those are at play, but on the whole I see, and have experienced, that this too is an organisation that looks after its employers as best as they can. No remarks and certainly no complaints about the tools at my disposal, the organisation or my colleagues. Out of all six organisations in this inventory, this is the one I am most eager to keep working with in the future.

Work environment C is much smaller. Unlike A and B it is not based in a large city, but in a little town. They are a cultural organisation offering different types of creative courses to children and adults (music, theatre and visual arts). My role is to review their external communication and offer advice on how to improve it. I have yet to find out what the atmosphere is like there.

Work environment D is a similar organisation to C, based in a small city close to the little town. It has been run by the same person for a long time. She is someone who has dedicated her life to supporting the arts, not only at that centre but in the entire town. I much admire her idealism and dedication. She’s very well read and incredibly intelligent, which makes her an inspiring person to work with. Some time ago, she asked me and another freelancer to help set up a platform for people in the local creative industries. There is a little funding for about one year which means we can invoice for some of the time we dedicate to the project. We are given a lot of space, trust and autonomy, which I very much appreciate. And the director looks after us well, is very thoughtful and generous.

As the coordinators of the platform, we organise sessions where people can meet other creatives, share ideas and experience. Our purpose is to connect artists, makers, creative entrepreneurs and organisations with each other, as well as with new audiences and local governments. The other freelancer happens to be one of my dearest friends and is as inspiring as the director. Having these two ladies as co-workers is what brings joy to this project. However, building the platform requires patience. Most people are less inclined to dedicate time and energy to the organisational side of it than I was hoping they would be. I am generally a very patient person, but for some reason I really struggle here.

The director, my friend and I have already discussed ways to engage the other participants and agreed to focus our attention on involving them in the next few months. I hope this will result in others stepping forward and taking on more responsibility. I have already decided not to stay on once my one year agreement ends, whether there is a potential new coordinator or not. I am not someone to leave without knowing who will take my place, but this time I feel very strongly that it would be counterproductive for me to stay. I have other priorities to tend to in my career and private life.

Work environment E, based in the same town as environment C, is a small cultural organisation, run by volunteers who are, in most cases, much older than I am. I have revised their communication and stayed on to implement the suggested changes. First this was paid, but now I am volunteering, just like the others. They are a really lovely group of people. Many of them have just retired and it has been such a joy to see them rise to the challenge, step up the pace and really grow. In a relatively short amount of time they have taken some major steps. There is little more I can teach them about communication now. They have been very generous, gracious and thankful. All this has made organisation E one of my most favourite work environments in the past year. This too is a place where I am given a lot of trust, space and autonomy. I can take the lead when and where this is appropriate in a way that feels relaxed and natural. Yet it feels like the time is coming for me to move on. Over the next few months, I will be delegating my responsibilities to new team members. Ideally, I would like to leave by October or November. I have done what I am best at, and trust that the others can easily keep up their good work. This feels very different from leaving the platform, which is still new and actually needs more time to develop. In the case of work environment E, my departure will not be a problem. If anything, it will help the new team members grow.

Work environment F is based in the same city as work environment D. Strictly speaking, they are no clients or employers. They are a collective of artists who share an old school building. I have my studio in one of the former class rooms and, like all the other creative entrepreneurs there, take part in running the place.

The organisation started off in another school building, guarding it against squatters. Over the years they have become a permanent feature in the regional creative scene, providing high quality arts education and participating in all sorts of theatre productions and festivals. Their housing was not permanent though, and this put a lot of pressure on the collective. When I joined them, they had just moved to the present building. We negotiated a two year lease, which allowed for some time to revise the organisational structure. Because I already had experience with creating a healthy structure in similar spaces, I stepped forward to assist in this process.

An external board was installed to take some of the pressure off the individual members of the collective. At the same time, one of my colleagues and I secured funding for a neighbourhood project. These changes were not welcomed by everyone. There has been, and still is, resistance from a number of people within the collective.

This is not uncommon in times of transition and transformation. I often see it in my team coaching and I do understand why people can react like this. The problem is though, that as a member of the collective, I am not in a position to guide my colleagues through their resistance. They have not asked me to, neither was I given that role: I am not their employer, not their coach and I am not their friend. Sadly, they are not willing to discuss the tension and take responsibility for their part in it.

Thankfully, something is slowly shifting. As part of restructuring the organisation, tasks have been redistributed. More people in the group are taking responsibility for the project as well as for the organisation as a whole now. It remains to be seen if this will tip the balance. The people in ‘resistance-mode’ can be rather strong in their communication and presence. From what I gather, this has led to tension before. As a result, part of the group has developed the habit of looking away and falling quiet whenever there is a disagreement. They don’t speak up, don’t try to work it out. The atmosphere remains tense.

The situation is not unlike work environment D where very few people are really committed. They do put time and energy towards the ‘common cause’ but they don’t fully identify with the organisation. On paper they are as important and responsible as any other person in the collective, but in reality they do not (or no longer) feel that what they do or what they say matters. This obviously impacts the way they show up.

All of this will not change overnight. But even if they begin to experience that they too are the collective, that they matter, the work environment is unlikely to change enough for me to settle in. The others need time to take in information, weigh options, decide, plan and take action. That is neither a good thing nor a bad thing, but it is something which affects the degree to which I myself experience a sense of belonging, feel safe and at ease.

Of all places, the studio in which I write, paint and draw is where I really want to feel safe and at ease. If circumstances I have so little influence on make it too hard for me to really feel at home in this work environment, then the best thing for me to do, might be to leave.

PS: tensions at work environment F this week have shed some light on why certain behaviour triggers such a strong reaction in me that I start thinking about leaving.

I find it very hard when someone in the work environment is extremely tense, when they brace themselves and are afraid to make mistakes, afraid to be criticised, to not be in control of what is happening around them, to not be in control of the emotions that are raging within them.

I find it hard when one of my colleagues is unable to take responsibility for their own inner turmoil and when they leave it up to others to deal with the turmoil. This may show up as them being controlling or even by being unkind to others, or it may be them positioning themselves as a helpless victim, despite this not being the case.

What it looks like to me, is that their energetic negativity is transferred to others. I often struggle then. I find it really hard to ignore such energies.

The reason I find this difficult, is because on a subconscious level, certain memories resonate; as a child I was confronted with emotional tension too, but was unaware of it and, simply put, it got stuck.

I would soak it all up, but did not process it. First of all, I was too young to put things in perspective and understand that I could still be safe and alright even though someone close to me was clearly not feeling that way. Also, I had no idea what it meant to be this sensitive and have such fine wiring. I wasn’t aware of other people’s moods and energies ending up in my system. But they did and now that I am more aware of what happened, it feels invasive and painful.

These days, whenever I have to work with someone who is very tense and who shows no self-accountability, an alarm goes off. Part of me feels frightened and either freezes, wants to flee or it tries to fight it by rationalising it all away and explaining why the other person cannot help it and doesn’t mean it like that.

There is also a part that feels angry and wronged, that knows boundaries are being crossed and wants the other party to back-off and apologise. This is a relatively new part. And even though it helps me stand up for myself, this doesn’t always make a difference; I have, in recent years, left working environments because another person was not going to take responsibility for their emotional turmoil anytime soon and I could no longer be around them.

I am aware this might sound rather dramatic, but my reaction in such situations is very much the default reaction of a child that cannot fend for themselves yet: she feels frightened. Hence the fight, flight, freeze response kicking in. My therapist and I are looking into this and we will try to get to the root of this reaction, to the moments when it all got stuck in my system so to speak. If I can go back to those moments and bring my adult self to the situation, the grown up who does know that she will be alright, then we can take away the anxiety and the fear and I will be much more calm and free in the present when I encounter such tense and controlling people. I will be able to witness them, without absorbing any tension, so to speak.

The fourth house is the part of your chart that is all about your roots. It speaks to our parents, home and foundations – and a range of topics connected to these themes.

When exploring your fourth house, you might want to spend some time thinking about the family you were born into and/or the family you grew up in. What do you know about your ancestors and your family lineage? What have your grandparents or their grandparents lived through? What have they passed on, either consciously or subconsciously to their children? What were their beliefs, fears, hopes and dreams?

You might ask these same questions about your parents or caregivers. It is said that the fourth house mostly speaks to the mother or the more maternal caregiver, but I personally like to look at both parents at this stage of the practice. If either or both of your parents were absent when you grew up, you might want to look at those people in your life who have been like a father or mother to you.

The fourth house speaks to our connection to the past. I would therefore encourage you to not only take stock of your present relationship with your parents (and, if you like, family), but to also see if you can relate this present relationship to the past.

For example: when my father grew up, his own father was literally working night and day to provide for his family. My grandfather worked in a factory as an electrician, often taking the night shifts. To make some extra money, he helped people move house over the weekends and put his carpentry skills to use whenever he could.

By the time my sister and I arrived in the family, my grandparents had earned more than they would ever spend with their modest lifestyle. We had no idea that money had ever been an issue. That there was ever a lack and that this may well have been stressful for my father and his brother. When I grew up though, I became aware of a certain nervousness with my father when it came to income, admin and securing a pension. This made me feel that all those things were extremely important and you were not allowed to fail when it came to making enough money. He never said it out loud, but in my mind ‘being on top of your finances’ equaled ‘being worthy’.

As I have written about before, my own income is not always as steady. This has, in the past, led to feelings of unworthiness and doubt on my side. Once I understood where my father’s nervousness came from, I was able to put things in perspective and stop being so hard on myself. It also became much easier for me to speak about my own financial situation with him. And it even turned out that he did not judge me for not having a steady income at all – he had not been aware of the message he had given by worrying so much about his own finances.

Another aspect that might interest you, are cultural or family traditions. Which of those play an important part in your lineage and how do you relate to them?

The next area that can be focused on when making an inventory of the fourth house, is your home. This can be interpreted as the material house you live in, the real estate you own or rent, as well as your home life. Some questions to ask here are: what about the house I live in feels good, what does not feel right? Do I feel at home here?

Feeling at home has a lot to do with feeling safe. And this brings us to the final fourth house theme: our psychological foundations and the sense of security we do or do not experience. Now this can be a very broad and abstract topic, particularly when you are relatively new to exploring your own state of being.

The best way, I believe, to explore ‘safety’ is not by thinking about it, but by listening to what your body has to say. A simple body-scan, as can be found in meditation apps I have previously mentioned, such as Buddhify, is a very good place to start. Learning about our body’s response to threat can also help to recognise where you are holding tension as a result of not feeling safe. There is plenty of material on this topic to be found in very accessible blogs, books and podcasts as well as on an academic level.

The mind-body connection is central to many ancient Eastern philosophies and healing traditions. It has been studied and used by scientists and psychologists in the West for decades, but the pandemic has really helped bring their work into public awareness.

For me personally, listening to Bessel van der Kolk speak to Krista Tippett about his book The Body Keeps the Score in her On Being podcast a few years ago, was a revelation. At the time, I was very aware of not feeling safe, but was unable to grasp the root causes of this feeling. Learning to listen to my body and what it remembered, helps me find my way back to the natural state of calm and peace we are in when we feel safe.

All this not to say that your own exploration of the fourth house needs to be a deep dive into your past! You may very well decide to focus on what the house you presently live in needs to make it feel even more like home.

Or you might, instead of looking at the past, explore what the present is asking for: what are the basics that you really need? How can you look after yourself and your (chosen) family amidst the global turmoil that is more likely to increase than decrease? The crises are accumulating: geopolitical power struggles, humanitarian crises, health crises… and all the while the devastating effects of climate change have become impossible to ignore.

To those who, after reading this enumeration feel despondent and dispirited: please read the wonderful letter by E.B. White, in which he says ‘man’s curiosity, his relentlessness, his inventiveness, his ingenuity have led him into deep trouble. We can only hope that these same traits will enable him to claw his way out.

Hang on to your hat. Hang on to your hope. And wind the clock, for tomorrow is another day.’

To which I would like to add that we cannot all wait for others to be inventive for us. It is up to anyone who is not immediately affected by war or illness to act, to help and put their ingenuity to good use. We must all provide these basics to others and ourselves: shelter, water, food, medicine, connection.

That and something else: I believe it is essential to ‘keep the hoping machine running’, to provide the hope that E.B. White tells us to hang on to. What often helps me is to remind myself of this definition by Anne Lamott: ‘Hope is not about proving anything. It is about choosing to believe this one thing; that love is bigger than any grim, bleak shit anyone can throw at us.‘

Before moving on to the next house and its themes, I just want to take a moment to look back on the starfish and the steps of the third house.

The lists are based on the inventories of my daily life, communication and my relationship to my sister and close friends. They describe what I wanted to do less of or stop doing altogether, as well as the activities I wanted to keep, do more of or start doing. I made these lists around the new moon in Aquarius and I will come back to them in the Summer, when the full moon occurs in the same sign, on 12 August 2022.

Looking back on these past few weeks, the first thing that strikes me is how my daily life wish list is urging me to take my sensitivity seriously. Which is a good thing. My fine wiring has many benefits, but it does mean I need a significant amount of time to process and recalibrate. What happens is that I sense and notice a lot of things and will quickly analyse information in great detail. My mind operates at a very high pace. At the same time, digesting all the information takes ages. All those details and sensations will keep buzzing around even if I do not need them. I know this, but have not really acted upon it before.

Consciously changing the way I go about my days is helping me to create more opportunities to digest the input. And as I take more time to meditate, potter, exercise and sleep, I automatically spend less time absorbing information. It is a real challenge, because my mind is quite dominant and loves to be active, but hopefully in time and with more practice all this will become easier.

Thankfully, writing this blog is both a nice way to engage my mind, to give it something to do, and a way to relax. I am glad that, after the short break when world events and worries about work took centre stage, I am typing up new posts again.

Another thing I am glad about, is the new perspective I have found on my professional contacts. It is a big and important shift, which is freeing up energy to further build my business. Because although I love my work as a coach and teacher, part of me was still holding on to the creative industry, the ‘world’ where I started my career. Now it feels as if I am releasing sandbags and the hot air balloon can finally rise.

When I reread my reflections on the industry and the dynamics at play there, the words that stood out were ‘comparison’ and ‘external validation’. The issues with self-worth I described in my House II inventory came to mind. The root cause of those issues does not lie in my previous work environment, but I do believe it may have further aggravated them.

The focus on my professional communication this month has also lead to more clarity on my offering as a coach. As well as helping me figure out what it means to be very sensitive, this practice is also helping me figure out what it means to be self-employed and how to successfully run my own business.

To which I would like to add that all the processes initiated in January as talents, assets and resources were in focus, are ongoing. I have been delegating more tasks and am clearing more and more time for the projects that really energise me and that allow me to do my best work.

Which is the type of work where I can put some of the qualities of Aquarius to use. As I wrote in my blog post on the sign:

I have heard it said that understanding the placements in your natal chart can help you work with it rather than against it. Now that I know more about Aquarius, I can draw strength from its outlier qualities in those areas where I need it (work, media, social media). And I can balance its mental focus and coolness in other areas (family, friends, daily life) by allowing my heart, body and spirit to join the conversation more often.

I have a feeling that my emotional, physical and spiritual self will also be part of the exploration that I am about to start. The fourth house deals with our foundations, ancestry and sense of safety after all. Although I might not write about all my findings – I want to be mindful of my family and loved ones – I will try to find a way to share the highlights here in this blog.

This is the third out of three check-ins I had scheduled between the new moon in Aquarius, early February, and the new moon in Pisces, early March. In my natal chart, Aquarius is the sign where I have my third house of (among others) daily life and rituals, siblings and close friends and communication. After making an inventory of these themes, I identified what I want to invite into my life and what it is I am prepared to let go of. You can find both these inventories and my list of things to keep, do more of, start, do less of or stop, right here.

Although I made lots of notes and scribbles for this post since the final week of February, it is already mid March now. Checking in was one of the steps I had scheduled to do. I didn’t. So it is important to ask: what did I do instead? What stopped me from keeping my promise to myself?

We ask these questions not to be hard on ourselves, but to understand how we can support ourselves even better in taking the actions we planned. But before we dive into that, let’s look at what did happen and celebrate those successes.

I have – finally – started decluttering the house. There is still lots to do, both there and in my studio, but with ‘home’ coming into focus now (it is a House IV theme) I should be able to make more progress.

Another thing to ‘tick off’ is the starfish on means of communication, which can be found here.

Also scheduled for week 8, the final week of February, was a ‘letting go ritual’. This seemed exactly what was needed as I planned it, but upon closer inspection it was not. I wrote about this in a separate post:

You might identify something you wish to change and give it a name. You translate this something into a small actionable step. And as you are coming closer to the step, the thing you wish to change turns out to be a little more complex than you thought. You even begin to wonder if you described it properly in the first place.

My aim was to feel less confused, sad and sometimes even intimidated when seeing names of people I used to worked with in my digital lists of contacts.

What I needed was not a ritual to let go of them. Exploring the topic more closely, I came to realise I actually had to say goodbye to an industry, a ‘world’ I was once very much in love with. And this required treating it like a relationship that had ended: take distance, practice radical self-care, focus on other things. Writing the post was a very conscious start to doing just that.

Practicing radical self-care did not prove that easy in recent weeks though. For the same reason I did not write this check-in sooner: my focus was on the external rather than my own centre.

One of the most powerful men in the world is waging war on the country on his southern border. He ordered a brutal invasion in the final week of February, which was, and still is, met with extraordinarily heroic resistance. Thousands of innocent people have, however, already been killed and millions are fleeing their homes. As I am writing this post, the capital of the invaded country is under fierce attack. I am closely following this news, and have been for the past two weeks.

It is shocking to experience that the closer to home a disaster takes place, the more we seem to care. This is certainly not the first armed conflict nor the first genocide happening in my lifetime. People are fighting in other parts of the world as we speak. I feel sickeningly privileged to live where I live. I feel guilty for caring more about this war than I have done about any other conflict in the past. But that is what is happening now.

The leader of the invaded country speaks directly to the rest of the world. He is right in saying that they, we, are effectively under attack too. Anything he says is shared widely and instantly. His people are not anonymous. The media show their stories, their names. They themselves use social media to share information and images. Even when not using any socials, you can read their posts on various news blogs. This war is less abstract than others. The chance of this conflict escalating even further and spreading wider is very significant and at this moment it seems unlikely that the agressor will be stopped any time soon.

In one of the House III inventories I mentioned how I had lost the habit of reading newspapers. Little did I know that I would be glued to The Guardian live blog a few weeks later. Turning to my own writing and blog felt absurd. It still does, actually.

For a while it also felt absurd to pick up my work projects. And certainly to worry about deadlines and about the group dynamics hindering the growth of an organisation where I work. But I did and I do.

Many of my current projects involve encouraging people to visit cultural activities. Although most restrictions to slow the spread of the pandemic have been lifted, theatres and cinemas have reopened. Events are allowed to take place again, but people are not flooding to attend shows and films. That will take time. They have just spent two years at home and got used to the slower pace of life. And besides, many people are actually ill or in quarantaine still – the restrictions are gone, but the virus is not.

Multiple clients however, are becoming frustrated. The want to see higher attendance rates, more ticket sales etc. Sensing this tension, my default response is to push on and work harder, hoping this will have an effect. It would be much better though to pause, take a step back and open up the conversation. Making sure that we both know that I am doing the best I can, and that their frustration is not very helpful at all.

In the upcoming blog posts I shall write more about being clear, setting such boundaries and creating pockets of peace. These themes for me are closely connected to the fourth house topics ‘foundations and feeling safe’. I hope and expect that diving deeper into this matter will help me get back to center sooner and not spin out of orbit as much as I have in these past weeks. That, and returning to the daily routines and rituals I have explored last month. Because despite the recent ‘relapse’, I have been making good progress. Before launching into the themes of House IV, I will reflect briefly on this progress in the next post.

Now I was not expecting this either. But it might happen to you as well if and when you follow this practice. So that is why I am taking some time to write about it here.

You might identify something you wish to change and give it a name. You translate this something into a small actionable step. And as you are coming closer to the step, the thing you wish to change turns out to be a little more complex than you thought. You even begin to wonder if you described it properly in the first place.

This is what happened for me with the topic ‘contacts and connections’, part of the theme of communication. I noted: ‘I have a feeling that it is time to make space for new people, new experiences and new memories.‘ And at the same time, I sensed ‘a reluctance to let go of what I had built up over the years.’

This reluctance made itself known again when I sat down with my inventory to explore how I felt about all the notes I had made. Something was telling me: ‘deleting accounts or crossing names out of digital address books will not bring the relief you seek.‘

In that case, I thought, there is nothing else to it but to take time to grief and be sad about the people whose email addresses or profiles I might decide to remove from my radar. And so the steps I scheduled, were:

• take time to grief
• let go of former friends, colleagues and connections with a ritual

About a week later, I was talking to my coach about professional communication and the types of projects I wished to focus on. When we came to the third type, the public interviews with artists, I blocked. I felt a strong physical respons, in my chest and stomach, which said: don’t go there. It is not safe. It is not a good place to be. And this had nothing to do with the artists, but everything with the creative industry that helped them produce and sell their work. The same industry where the people worked who I was considering to delete from my digital address book.

This worried me. And so I took the topic to my therapist for further exploration. In an earlier post I described how she and I untangled my conflicting feelings around those people and the creative industry. I now understand why that ‘world’ felt like an unsafe place for me. There is a certain dynamic, a certain code which puts status, network and success above who you are as a person. Your assets, talents and unique gifts are valued as long as people can relate them to their industry. It is not really about you, it is about your output, the people you know, the people who know you. I remember former colleagues who asked: ‘What do you do?’ and began to look over my shoulder for someone else to speak to when I said: ‘Teaching’ or ‘coaching’.

Although perhaps this dynamic is shifting, as it is in other parts of society, and kinder, wiser, less self-centred people are now in leadership positions, creating more horizontal structures and encouraging different communication styles, the ‘old way’ is still present.

If I were less sensitive, I would perhaps not even have noticed all of this. And I would perhaps not have cared. But I do notice and I do care. And I am so painfully aware of the code of conduct, that almost each time I speak to someone in that industry, particularly if they are a woman, my mind begins to compare. Where do I stand? What is my rank? Am I good enough? All this does not mean I agree with this code, just that I know it still applies. Which hurts, because I do not stand anywhere in that industry anymore, but part of me is still in love with it.

And that is the problem.

When I started working in that industry, I loved the number of creative, visionary, forward-thinking people I met. I felt at home with them and with the artists. I loved the international aspects of my work. There was so much to discover, to learn and there were so many beautiful works of art to put out into the world.

And yet. It didn’t work out.

The industry and I turned out not to be as compatible as is required for a long-term relationship. It is as simple as that. Analysing the dynamics and codes has helped me understand why we were not compatible then and will not be compatible in the future either. This will probably also help me process the break-up. But given that the industry and I were together for quite some time, it might take more than an analysis to heal and move on.

What I realise now, is that the real reason why part of me wanted to cross all those names out of my address book, was to not have to see them anymore. As long as I am still a little heart-broken, I am not strong enough to resist the Pavlovian response I have to people, particularly women, who are doing the kind of work I used to do. The part of me that still wants to belong to that world, automatically falls back into those dynamics of comparing and seeking external validation. Which is of course awful.

So what does one do to recover from a break-up? Often not seeing the former beloved for a good amount of time helps. Clearing out the things that remind you of them. Reminding yourself of why it did not and will not work. Reconnecting with people or pass-times you had not paid attention to while you were in the relationship. Radical self-care.

Now, let’s look at the steps again.

• take time to grief
• let go of former friends, colleagues and connections with a ritual

Writing this post is how I took time to grief. And this is my ritual. Not so much as a means to let go of people. Because I have come to realise that what I really need to do, is to say goodbye to an industry, a ‘world’ I was once very much in love with. Today I have made a conscious start with that. And I will now, with equal awareness, take my distance.

On a practical level this means that I will, for the time being, not actively seek new interview projects with artists related to this particular creative industry. Should anyone approach me and ask me to do one, I will certainly consider it, but I will take some time to think about it properly and check in with myself to see if I am ready for it.

Over the course of this year, there will be more opportunities to take this process of grieving and clearing out further such as the lunar eclipse in Scorpio mid May and the entire month September when my tenth house of career and public roles comes into focus. I am putting a note in my calendar now, to come back to this post then.

Communication is one of the major third house themes. In two posts (inventory three and four) I took stock of all its aspects: ideas, data, language and the various means of sending and receiving information.

When I got to the means I use to communicate, I decided not to go into great detail, but simply write them down and further explore them later.

This list below includes all the forms and platforms I use for both my personal and professional communication. At this moment, part of the latter includes supporting cultural organisations with their communication, hence the press releases, posters and such.

• meeting up in person
• video calls
• phone calls
• What’s App
• sending phone messages
• email
• newsletters
• press releases
• flyers, posters, brochures
• Facebook and Instagram
• LinkedIN
• blog
• website
• sending post cards and letters

The purpose of this extra exploration was to discern what does and what does not energise me. I can then use this knowledge and awareness to make different choices. Although I might not be able to cut out certain means of communication, because I am bound to use them for work, I can still see if there are other ways to go about it.

The model I used is, again, the starfish. You can find a more detailed description of this tool in the second house section. The questions I was asking myself while looking at the list above were: how does this way of communicating make me feel? Do I enjoy communicating like this? What is the benefit?

In listing my answers, I will specify the three different areas in which I use the type of communication:

• personal
• for my own projects
• for one of my clients

It is necessary to differentiate because I might, for instance, want to keep using a certain way of communicating in my personal life, but no longer spend time and energy on it professionally. This is what I scribbled on the starfish:

Stop

• Facebook and Instagram (all)
• LinkedIN (all)
• newsletters (projects/clients)
• press releases (clients)
• flyers, posters, brochures (clients)
• website (clients)
• sending letters (clients)

Do less of –

• What’s App (projects/clients)
• sending phone messages (projects/clients)
• email (clients)

Keep –

• video calls (personal/clients)
• What’s App (personal)
• sending phone messages (personal)
• email (personal/projects)
• blog (projects)
• meeting up in person (clients)
• phone calls (clients)

Do more of –

• meeting up in person (personal/projects)
• phone calls (personal/projects)
• sending post cards and letters (personal)
• video calls (projects)
• website (projects)

Start –

• sending post cards and letters (projects)

The next step is, of course, to ask: what does it take for me to create these changes? What small actions should I take and in what order?

Actually, the change I wish to see, is what I described when looking at talents, assets, money and resources – the themes of House II. This year I want to see a shift in the type of work I do: less ‘operational’ tasks, more ‘helicoptering’.

At the moment I am training various people so I can stop doing those practical things such as writing and sending press releases and regularly posting on social media. I am not taking on any new publicity work, so in a few months from now, I should have freed myself from those responsibilities (and from a few work email addresses too).

In the mean time, I am creating my own website (separate from this blog) where people can read about the three types of projects that are most in alignment with my talents: (1) one-on-one coaching for creative entrepreneurs and artists (2) team coaching and consultancy for organisations in the arts (3) public interviews with creative entrepreneurs and artists. I will refer to my website on my LinkedIN, Facebook and Instagram accounts, but that will be it. I had already stopped using these social media for my personal communication and cannot imagine myself being very active on either platform in the foreseeable future.

Most things I want to do more of or start are related to those three types of projects I just mentioned. I will be using them to find new clients and communicate with them. With the arrival of spring and the release of many restrictions to slow the spread of the pandemic, in person communication will become much easier than it has been. Which is wonderful, because the way I picture myself building my business, is via referrals and actual live meetings rather than via news letters or emails.

In the month of May my sixth house of work and health comes into focus. This is ideal, because it is exactly when most of my current projects finish and it will be time to acquire new ones. In the mean time, I will keep a screen print of this post on my desk, next to the stack of postcards to be sent to friends and loved ones. More in person, less digital communication – except of course for this blog.

Daily life and rituals. Now I always thought, that it would be wise and good to get into the habit of doing things at a certain hour, in a certain order, one day after the next. That a rhythm of daily rituals would automatically lead to more structure and calm in my somewhat chaotic work schedule, house and emotional state.

What I have noticed this week, is that this is not what works best for me. Because each day is different. And what I need is different each day.

This reminded me of an interview with Elizabeth Gilbert where she says: ‘Life is an extremely agitating event. And I vibrate at a slightly higher frequency than is necessarily healthy, I always have done. I’ve always been kind of anxious. I’ve always been super emotive. I feel things harder than is good for me.‘

If I need to explain to people what having a sensitive system is like, I often use those sentences: vibrating at a high frequency. Feeling things harder than is good for me. The words that followed, are etched on my mind too. Liz Gilbert goes on to say what helped her feel more at ease, relaxed and calm: a set of practices, ways to create pockets of quiet to rest and restore when necessary.

‘…when I find myself spinning out of orbit, there’s a tether […] that pulls me back and reminds me: do you really want to make a big production out of this, or would it be better for you and everybody around you if you just found a way to accept what’s going on? And that has just made life very much more pleasant.’

‘And if I can define my spiritual practice today, it is the maintenance of that. It is doing whatever is necessary to keep that system healthy and working. And you have to be a little bit nimble and a little bit flexible to figure out what each day requires in order to keep it going.’

Be a little bit nimble and a little bit flexible to see what each day requires. That really resonates with me now. Over the past two weeks I have incorporated rituals into my day that together are beginning to form a tether, a life line that helps me stay centred and balanced and, if I’m spinning out of orbit, helps me come back to centre.

I like to think of these practices as tools that I keep in a toolbox. I am still learning how to work with them, still figuring out which ones I want to keep in that box, and which ones I am not really using. I am also checking if there are any tools missing… but what I already notice, is that rather than squeezing everything into a regime, asking myself ‘what do I need right now?’ is much more helpful.

So the daily meditation moment at four in the afternoon… it didn’t happen. But I do turn to the app with guided meditations regularly: sometimes to help me focus and feel present, sometimes to help me feel calm or go to sleep. So I’m happy with that. The nadi shodhana pranayama hasn’t found its way into my day yet, but I will give that some more time and see what the next week brings.

I already feel much better now than I did a few weeks ago, because I have a new sense of agency. I have a choice. When I notice that my mind is very active, but not in a productive way, I can just get up, leave my work for a little while and make sure I eat well, drink enough tea and water, use some essential oils – whatever is required.

Sometimes what is required to calm my unproductively active mind is actually to give it something else to do. Indeed, this was my go-to option, which easily led to working too much and only added to the overwhelm. That is why I listed ‘mental activity’ as a ‘do less of’. But it is different now, because, again, I am aware that I have a choice. It is now a tool. It is like taking an active, excited dog out for a proper walk so it can run and release energy.

My ‘daily life wish list’ remains a work in progress. One winter storm after the next made spending time outdoors and gardening rather difficult, but I am still going for a run every few days, and that feels really good.

And also, as I mentioned in my reflection, this pratcice, with the houses and inventories, the new moon intentions, is not about getting it all right at once. It is not about getting it right at all.

Some of the things on the wish list remain on the wish list. I already knew this would happen, and deliberately left some of the list out of the schedule. There is no need this time (as was the case when I was working on House II themes) to explore why I did not do the things I promised to do.

What I do want to mention in this check-in, is the part of my steps that I labelled keep doing the work. This entailed exploring conflicting emotions around people who were once much more present in my life than they are now.

Those emotions already made themselves known as I was working on my House II topics. They came up again in this house when I looked at my professional communication. I longed to clear out my list of contacts, but something was holding me back. First it was sadness. But then there were also feelings of unworthiness and powerlessness. Indeed, I feel things harder than is good for me. I am aware that not everyone finds it this hard to say goodbye to a former work environment. I also know that this is simply how I am wired and I have no other option but to honour those feelings and take time to process them.

When I took all of this to my therapist, she was able to help me understand the issues with power and self-worth. I wrote about this in a separate post. That still leaves me with two questions. The first is: what about the sadness? And the second: how do I proceed when it comes to my professional communication?

I had already scheduled a letting go ritual for the upcoming week. And even if I have not come up with one yet, this is a prompt to further explore those questions. Bearing in mind what this practice is about: inviting more ease and light into my life.

This part of the practice is not strictly necessary, but I find it very helpful. Creating an essential oil blend at each new moon was already something I had gotten used to. The idea is that you set an intention at the start of the lunar cycle, which, like a mantra, you repeat a few times a day. The blend serves as a reminder. You keep it somewhere where it is visible and where you will easily open the roller bottle and put some on your skin.

Before starting this practice, I would follow the advice of those who taught me about the oils and who adjusted the blends to the qualities of the sign the moon was in that month.

Now, I pick the oils based on what comes up in the inventories. I read over what I have written, sometimes sit with it for a while and tune in to how it makes me feel. Then I scan the texts once more, with one question in mind: what do I most need right now?

What stood out as I asked the question this time, was the desire to connect to my body, heart and spirit and not give the mind center stage all the time. This is why I added clove, which helps to set boundaries, as well as grapefruit and fennel, which help connect to the body and vetiver, which supports in grounding and feeling centered.

I also wanted to add oils that would invite the soft, calm and gentle part of me to be more present and some that would encourage creativity. For this I added geranium for trust, marjoram for connection, tangerine for creativity and ylang ylang for feeling joyful.

So these are the oils that make up the blend I am using right now, mixed with a basic coconut oil. The descriptions added are taken from the Essential Emotions guide.

• Clove – the oil of boundaries
• Vetiver – the oil of centring and descent
• Grapefruit – the oil of honouring the body
• Fennel – the oil of responsibility
• Geranium – the oil of love and trust
• Marjoram – the oil of connection
• Tangerine – the oil of gladness and creativity
• Ylang Ylang – the oil of the inner child

I keep this blend in a roller bottle in my bathroom. I put it on my wrists and heart a few times a day and repeat my intention:

I am actively listening to what my heart is telling me.

This intention came to me intuitively. Last month I was better able to explain how I found it, but this time, it just happened. Perhaps it was inspired by things I had been reading. Listening to my heart has been a theme for a while.

What I had not yet been reading about, were the qualities of Aquarius. Interestingly, what came up when I did, was how important it is to temper the Aquarian influences by connecting to your heart.

Although the destination might be wonderfully bright, inviting more light into your life is not always an easy breezy journey. You will sometimes have to look at difficult aspects of yourself, process painful feelings and find new ways of dealing with situations and people. If at anytime you find that this becomes too challenging, please take a step back and consider asking either a friend, coach, counsellor or therapist to support you.

At this moment, I regularly speak to both a coach and a therapist. If the topics I bring to those sessions are relevant for this practice, I will write about them here. Sometimes you will already see me plan exploring a theme with either the therapist or the coach in the steps, the schedule or the check-ins.

From the House III inventory on communication a topic surfaced that felt too big for me to explore on my own. Although I longed to clear out my digital address book and social media accounts, something was keeping me from pressing ‘delete’. Part of me even got upset and sad at the thought of saying goodbye to people I used to work with, people I used to see a lot more often than I have in recent years.

Although in my inventory I also mentioned friends I made when living abroad, the ambivalence mostly applies to work related contacts. In a coaching session about professional communication, these conflicting emotions came up again: wanting to be free, not wanting to let go. They were accompanied by two other feelings: the unworthiness and also the powerlessness I mentioned in January whilst exploring House II.

Some days ago, I took all of this to my therapist.

I told her that I was wondering if the feeling of powerlessness had to do with experiences some years ago that I had not properly processed. One was a situation where I was made to believe that I was the ideal candidate for an interesting position, only to be rejected at the very last minute in a very blunt way. Another was a situation where someone I had known for a long time, someone who I really trusted, introduced me to a client for a freelance project. The idea was that they would be involved with the project as well. However when it came to negotiating the complex contract, dealing with the rather difficult client and meeting an extremely tight deadline, the trusted someone was nowhere to be seen. They sided with the client and pretended not to know me. This has hurt me deeper than I care to admit.

I shared that I was wondering if the feeling of unworthiness was related to any past experiences in my personal life. Were the comparisons and negative thoughts that I described in my House II inventory at play here?

But no. There was something else going on. And it was my therapist who spotted it. In order to explain what she detected, I shall give a little bit more context.

Before I trained as a teacher and a coach, I was on the pay roll at a few organisations, some large, some small, in a creative industry. I was offered my first job while I was still at university, and gladly accepted it. For about a decade I worked in this field, both in my native country and when I lived abroad. When I returned home, there weren’t that many positions available in this industry, at least not for the type of work that would allow me to really use and develop my talents and skills. I found temporary placements and freelance work, but that was it.

I was sad, but at the same time curious and open to discovering what else was out there in the world. That is when teaching and coaching came into my life. I still missed the creative industry, but also loved how this new work allowed me to make a difference. I could see the effect it had on my clients and on my students that I was there, offering a safe space for them to be themselves, to figure things out, to learn and grow.

After a few years, I stopped teaching full-time to properly set up my coaching practice. This is when I looked at the familiar creative industry for work to pay the bills. Again, there was no real match. Despite being OK with that on a rational level, emotionally it felt anything but alright. Often when I was in touch with people in the industry, I felt unworthy, insecure, hurt, intimidated, confused, jealous and a bit lost. I did not feel safe at all.

I recently found myself looking at my LinkedIN contacts, thinking: so very few of these people actually really know me. There are too many people there who I have never had a real conversation with… Most of these people work in an industry, a ‘world’ that I used to be part of… It is a relief not to be part of that ‘world’ anymore. It is not a safe environment for young women to work in. It seemed so creative, forward thinking and visionary, but at its core it is still very old-fashioned and hierarchical. And yet… It hurts to no longer be part of that ‘world’. Look at how successful and beautiful those people, all those young women, are. I am not part of that ‘world’, I am not good enough.

I really believed that this was my fault. That something was wrong with me. That I needed to work on my confidence and self-worth, get over those minor disappointments and show up with a smile. Or, failing that, never interact with the industry again.

This was until the therapist asked me to describe the dynamics in that ‘world’. How does it work? How do people interact? What are the expectations? What are the codes?

The following description might be a little abstract, but as I have said before, I want to be mindful of people I write about. I think it is enough to know that the organisations I used to work for, are part of a creative industry.

Like most of the organisations in this particular creative industry, they were based in one of the largest cities in my native country. I mention this, because it seems relevant that the competing organisations are all in the same bubble together.

The people who work there each have their role in the making, advertising and selling of a creative product. These people are facilitators: the products are not created by them, but by artists. The majority of the consumers only sees the artist and the product; they are not aware of the facilitators.

The amount of these particular creative products that is made on a yearly basis, vastly exceeds the demand. No matter the value, originality, beauty and importance of the products, there are simply not enough consumers to buy and use them all at once. Particularly as there is an influx of these products from other countries as well.

The way the products are made has hardly changed in decades, perhaps even centuries. In each and every one of these organisations, people follow similar schedules and work with the same job descriptions. It is therefore relatively easy to pick up a job in another organisation. It is also rather easy to compare employees to one another, not only within the organisation, but throughout the industry.

They all work very hard. Always racing against the clock. Never enough hours in the day. From time to time, as a new product is finished, they celebrate with the artist and colleagues. Other social activities are occasions when the work of multiple artists is presented, either directly to consumers or to those who will later sell the products on. This is when the employees meet colleagues from other organisations. And last but not least, there are international gatherings where people from the industry meet to exchange ideas and look for products to take home and introduce on their own market.

Although there are some positions in this industry that require little interaction with other people, the majority of jobs is very outward oriented. You will be engaging with the artists, with other people on the team, with people who help you advertise and sell your product. You attend events where your artists make an appearance. There you meet other artists as well. And finally, you get to know the people who are doing similar work for a different organisation, either in your own country or abroad.

When I was new to this creative industry, I loved meeting all these people. There were literally hundreds of them. We all had the same purpose: putting those beautiful works of art out into the world. I enjoyed discovering new artists and supporting them in their process. I spoke passionately about their work to the press and to colleagues abroad.

But that was the icing. The cake underneath had gone stale. The way the organisations (large and small, established and new) operate, puts a lot of pressure on its employees. People work against deadlines that are too tight, are expected to be ‘on’ all the time and spend a lot of their time ‘off’ attending work related events or preparing for their next working day. When one project is finished, the next three are waiting. It is never enough.

And it is never up to the people who facilitate the artists in their creations to decide when the product is a success. No matter how often they tell the artists and themselves that what they made is beautiful, transformative and wildly different and new, there will always be someone who says: but you should have sold more. Success is defined by sales figures, reviews, awards. It is defined by what consumers, critics, judges and colleagues say.

Now, I am by no means saying that this is right. Personally, I am a huge believer in the words of Theodore Roosevelt, brought back into collective awareness by Brené Brown: It is not the critic who counts… But what I am trying to explain, is that the creative industry I immersed myself in for about a decade, is one where public success is what counts and validation is more often than not external.

Not only does this apply to the product, it goes for the people as well. Between the words ‘creative’ and ‘industry’, the emphasis lies on the second. Sales figures are extremely important, as are the artists who generate most sales. The value of an employee essentially depends on how much they contribute to the successes: what matters is their share in the production process, delivering high quality work in as short an amount of time as possible. But also the way they interact with the most successful artists and make them feel appreciated, keep them happy. This, to any of you working in the corporate world, will sound very obvious. What strikes me though, is how particularly in the first part of their career, most employees are given very little space to grow as a person, to make mistakes, to develop their own creative talents and to take time and work on artistic projects for the sole purpose of creation, not limited by any targets or deadlines. Instead, they are often considered relatively cheap work horses who are expected to deliver really good work from day one. And if they are not cut out for this, someone else will take their place.

What matters is your output. Which products where you involved with? Were they successful? And what also matters, is who you know and who knows you.

Even in my native country, where horizontal structures are said to be the norm, the creative industry I just described is an hierarchical one. You have to work your way up the ranks and there you will find the top positions are often held by men. And if they are not, the women at the top tend to have a masculine communicative and leadership style. Thankfully, this is slowly changing. And I do believe that the new generation of men in leadership positions in this industry have a different way of presenting and behaving themselves than their predecessors. Although in their field they may not have had the best father figures, most of them at least had a strong, often working, mother at home who taught them that women are no less than men and deserve to be treated with respect.

When it comes to patriarchal and misogynistic behaviour, this industry is no different from other parts of society. I am actually surprised that relatively few stories of harassment have surfaced so far.

Personally, I have only felt unsafe in retrospect and once I was able to look at it from a distance. In the moment, I did not allow myself to really register what was going on: a handful of people, either men or women behaving rather masculine, were calling the shots. They did not always have the best interest of their employees or even artists at heart, but were more concerned with their own self-esteem.

I remember the atmosphere in a room at an event would change once the ‘bosses’ trickled in. Puffed up and arrogant they would walk past, kings of their world. Artists looked up to them. Employees looked up to them. Many of these dinosaurs stayed on long past their retirement age. Their egos probably would not have survived a day without their humble subjects.

When I immersed myself in this environment, not only did I soak up all the good things (meeting interesting people, travelling, working on creative projects, putting my talents to use), I also swallowed a lot of dirty water. Porous and sensitive as I am, I internalised the rules and codes of that ‘world’: it is good when people like you; people tend to like you when you dress nice and look pretty; it matters who you know; it matters what successful projects you were part of; it matters that people speak highly of you – etcetera.

I had no idea. And I do not even agree with any of those ‘rules’. Somehow though, when I am interacting with people who are working in ‘the industry’, particularly ones I do not know very well, there is a Pavlovian response and my mind begins to compare. It suddenly becomes very concerned with where I stand in that crowd. Am I good enough? How can I prove that I am worthy of belonging?

It is the most primitive response: stay with the flock or else you will fall prey to the hyenas. Part of my mind still thinks that this creative industry I was once part of, is ‘the flock’. And so I need to adjust and try to fit in. Well, perhaps I do not want that anymore. I would rather choose my own flock, thankyouverymuch.

The one remark my therapist made, that helped me look at this entire situation in a new way, was: ‘They seem awfully concerned with status. Sounds a bit like high school, doesn’t it?’. And she added: ‘They sound confused. They don’t get it yet. Perhaps that will help you hold your ground and stop listening to those “rules”. Because external validation is not what really matters. What matters, and you as a person, a coach and a teacher, you know this, what matters is not your output, it is who you are inside.’