Following Your dreams!

When I was thirty-two, something happened that changed the way I thought forever. My father was diagnosed with stage 4 prostrate cancer. Unfortunately, after a year he lost his battle with the illness. He had only been 57 years old when he passed.

The death of my father left me wondering about the meaning of life. I could not help but procrastinate on how short life actually was. It wasn't the fact that that he had died that had upset me so much as the fact that he had not achieved any of the things he had truly wanted to do once he had retired. Surely life was supposed to be more than working 70-80 hour weeks and paying bills.

The truth was that my father was a bit of a workaholic. Most of his life had been spent working long, intense, laborious hours; even when he had not needed to. Sadly, I remember not spending as much time with him as I would have liked and even when he did take time off for holidays, he was exhausted and it usually took him at least 3 days to relax and unwind.

No doubt the stress of his gruelling working hours helped lead to his declining health and early demise. Now I am an adult, I have come to understand that the reason my father worked so hard was because he felt the need to provide to support his family. The trouble was, he just didn't seem to know how to stop; a problem for many people in the western world. So it wasn't that the demise of my father that had saddened me as much as the fact that he had not managed to achieve any of his retirement goals. He had always put them off until his retirement, plans such as building a Kit car or travelling to places that he had always wanted to visit.

For many years, like my father, I worked 40-50 hour weeks. For several years, I had no qualms with this- I enjoyed my work. I experienced good job satisfaction and the wages helped me to treat my children to the little luxuries of life, such as family holidays and nice food. I felt lucky to have my job as a care worker on a dementia ward and I loved working with the patients. But when I was 32, as I have already mentioned, my father's death changed the way I thought forever. The job I had loved so much slowly turned into boredom. I had a longing to learn new skills, stimulate my brain and experience different challenges. My real desire had always been to train as a registered nurse but it seemed that was never meant to be. Gradually, I began to feel burnt out and felt a strong desire for change. By this point I had almost been performing the same routines for over 15 years. I felt mentally unstimulated and longed for something more challenging.

From this experience, one thing I have learnt about human nature is that not everybody takes too kindly to change. Well meaning colleagues and family members would say to me "You can't just leave your job to go to university, You have to support your children". Colleagues that had had always been supportive suddenly became distant as if they no longer wanted anything to do with me. Even though my decision was not being supported, I knew I had to leave. My children were much older now which gave me more time to try something that I wanted to do, which was something more creative. The workplace that I had used to love suddenly became a toxic workplace very quickly. Because I wanted to try something different with my life, I was no longer accepted like I had been before by my peers. It is a common saying, that you have to be made uncomfortable before you leave a situation and that's exactly what happened. I had a strong desire to go to university but at the age of 36, I wondered if I was too old and I might be better off just sticking with the job I already had. It paid well and had always gave me security.

After a lot of doubt and hesitation, I finally handed in my notice and started an undergraduate degree at university for a BA Creative and Professional writing degree, which I finished in June 2021. The truth is I have enjoyed every moment of my journey even though I still do not know the rest of my destination. I discovered if you have a little faith in yourself and do not take other peoples fears and limiting beliefs too seriously, that everything may well turn out even better than good. I strongly believe the universe rewards people who are willing to take a leap of courage and are determined to achieve what they are motivated to do, rather than what they are expected to do by society.

The fact that my father died without enjoying any of the activities he had always saved for his retirement forced me to rethink what was truly important in life and whether living to work in a job we do not enjoy is truly the way we are supposed to enjoy our relatively short journey on this planet.