High Performance & Productivity Coaching
Lose guilt and find yourself
About Me
Hi, I’m more than happy to tell you about me. I am passionate about coaching and performance. I know all high performance coaches are. So what’s different about me you might ask. Here’s my story – and you decide…
I have had a unique and challenging life, some of it unavoidable and other bits tragically didn’t need to have happened.
I have moved forward and been clear that I wanted to be the very best I could be, all the way through, and you will see that I have used adversity to propel me.
A Welsh beginning
Now don’t get too worried when I start this tale with “When I was one month old…”, I am not going to give you a month by month rendition of my life. But it is significant that when I was one month old I moved with my family from the North-East of England, to Cardiff, South Wales.
When I was 10 we moved back.
That was the first significant thing really, or maybe it was being diagnosed as Epileptic at 3, but being medicated and in the remedial class at school that was significant.
The point is when we moved back I was different to my peers. I was bullied, more mentally than physically, however I discovered a love of reading as a means of escape and that was to transform my life. About this time, three things happened pretty much all at once:
- Despite un-diagnosed dyslexia (diagnosed another 11 years later), I started to study.
- A change of hospital lead to an epilepsy medication review and change
- Re-covering subjects in school I had already done in Cardiff brought me breathing space to learn and learn I did.
I still read a lot now although my books of choice are often around performance, productivity & personal development.
I got a Degree
Fast forward and I went to university. I was awarded a degree in Chemical Engineering despite being quite ill in my final year.
I hadn’t found university easy – a poor choice of degree on my part and a newly discovered love of partying meant I needed to resit a semester.
I was permanently skint , worked three jobs and every holiday was also working. I ended up ill.
This is where I had my first “F*** You” moment.
On 2nd September 1997 I had a fit. I hadn’t had one for 11 years and was unmedicated and cleared to drive. In an instant everything was gone: my future, my present, my identity.
It triggered a depression and 5 month continuous migraine, I had problems with my sight, I dropped my grades. I was told could leave. I was told by the career adviser that I was unemployable.
I decided to show them all!
An unhappy Marriage
In 2002 I decided to train as a coach. I had read a book on coaching, made some changes to my mindset and my life; loved the outcome after participating in a group coaching programme and wanted to be able to deliver it.
I also met my future husband the very same day as I signed onto the course.
Sadly, he didn’t want me to thrive. He wanted me to bring home a good salary but also be the little woman indoors. Six years in, I had no self-confidence, no identity, but fortunately I had some instinct-level preservation and I remember, after yet another verbal battering, thinking “F*** You, I deserve more.”
Leaving him meant losing my bonus daughter but for my sake I left. I grieved. I felt so guilty about putting myself first, but I needed to do so to be me.
Salt was added to my wounds a few years later when my family was fractured by my sister’s death following a long battle with Cancer. Yet another “F*** You” moment; I decided life is too very short to be unhappy.
Starting again, with someone in my corner
Up until this point in my life I had never had someone on my side, I was fiercely independent and didn’t trust anyone who showed me love or affection. Pretty damaged right?
Then I met my now husband. I have no idea what he saw in me (although I have a good pair of boobs!) but he was patient. He was kind and he encouraged me to spread my wings whilst I had the assurance he held a safety net below me.
Having someone in your corner is so significant to your success, think Dumbo’s friend, Timothy the mouse, always encouraging, gently challenging, helping me believe.
I got another degree
This is significant.
All along at the back of my mind I was aware that, although I’m pretty bright, my degree didn’t really align with my interests or values and was a lower grade than I expected because I had been ill.
I was working as a Project Manager in corporate but always felt like an imposter. I recall this being made worse by an obnoxious male colleague commenting that exceptions had been made to all the female engineering recruits to permit them entry and somehow we had been recruited to ‘tick a box’ and we had less merit on the graduate scheme than the males (that still burns).
I always wondered if I had been a charity case? I ticked a lot of the diversity boxes at the time; female, state school, first in family to university, chronic health conditions, diagnosed learning challenges…….
I had something to prove, so I opted to apply for a Masters Degree in Project Management, whilst working full time and planning a wedding! (I like a challenge).
Getting too big for my boots
There have been many times when I have been told I am too big for my boots, that I should just settle.
That’s not my style.
Hence my Masters degree and subsequent Chartership – I chased pieces of paper until there were none left to get, to be assured I was ‘good enough’
I have had ideas stolen, been bullied and undermined at work. I was taken into the office once by my manager and told to ‘reign yourself in, you are making your colleagues look bad’ Needless to say that company and I had different values, after we had parted ways I was approached and asked if I wanted my managers job. I did not, our values still did not align!
I’ve been told I am too aggressive (after matching tone and language of male colleagues) and too soft (for being more feminine). Your typical no win situation, guaranteed to make you wonder how the hell you get it ‘right’. Spoiler: ‘right’ is to be authentically you.
Once I realised I could forge my own path, things became so much easier.
There are some things that I have believed require me to work hard to achieve. There are instances where it doesn’t matter what I do – I cannot influence the outcome. The third kind blew my mind; until I was coached, I never realised that some goals could be easier if I did less.
My Mission
Do less to do more.
Do you ever think about your mission? What you really need to do to be happy? My mission is to help people realise that they do not need to burn out to be successful, that they can be guilt free and put themselves first.
Sometimes you hear it referred to as ‘ease’ or ‘flow’ when everything aligns and all of a sudden life becomes easier. If you are used to life being so hard, this change can potentially be unsettling. But what a glorious place to be: where life is easy, being successful is guilt free and looking after yourself is top of the list.
This is how I live my life now. From losing my job at the start of the pandemic to being able to work remotely on a huge project and running my coaching business, having refreshed my coaching training with ICF. I am more fulfilled than I have ever been and guess what, I have less stress and more fun than ever.
Wonder what your life could be if it were easier?
Are you resonating with my story? Being held back by guilt and lack of confidence? Ever wonder what could happen if you tapped into your essence and unlocked your potential? Get in touch to have a no-obligation chat about coaching with me.