Walking bare foot into a Rose bush.

I have been able to establish a sense of calm that I have never been able to achieve in my life before.

It comes from being able to sit here a year after Mum’s death and a year and a half after I split from Jake who I spent nine years of my life with and see that dispite feeling like my world was crashing down and that there would never be a time I could breath again, everything is ok and always will be.

I feel a deep sense of gratitude to have been able to get a perspective about life that can only be achieved when you experience so much loss and confusion within a small space of time.

I used to sweat the small stuff far, far more than I do now. I was so obsessed with everything going to plan and when a curve ball was presented I would become so overwhelmed.

Through out my career I have been in control but there are snippets of my career path that definitely did not go to plan and funnily enough those points in my life are the ones I look back on and think “Thank God that happened”.

In 2014, I worked at a marketing agency for a very short five months before I, along with 20 other employees that had not yet hit their six month probabtion period, got let go, a week before Christmas. I was so angry. I had no savings, no plan B and seemingly no hope of getting through the summer holidays in tact. I swore to my self that I was going to quit sales forever.

That same day, a girl I used to work with caught wind of the mass redundancy and called me assuming I needed a job, stat. Despite swearing only moments earlier that I was done with Sales I decided it would be foolish for me to not investigate this suprise opportunity.

I was in no way prepared to be interviewing that day. It was a Friday and I had gone into work thinking this would be a regular day. Being Friday, I was casually dressed in shorts and a Sydney FC jersey. I also had some temporary blue dye in my hair because I was heading to a big game after work that night. This is how I met my future boss, the one who changed my whole career path and in part the trajectory of my life.

I never in a million years would have applied for this role, it was a step down from what I was doing at the marketing company and was paying $20k less, but given my circumstances I of course took whatever I could get.

A year later I got flown to America to recieve a top achivers award and the following year was flown back for another top achiver award. I, shortly after my second year, became a manager and stayed there for almost three more years and created so many life long memories and made so many friends. I was making so much money that I managed to save for a six month trip overseas within a matter of months. This job allowed me to achieve my dreams and I’ll never forget how it transpired.

They say life is like a box of chocolates but I think its a bit more like walking bare foot into a rose bush. You might get stung by a bee, thorns stuck in your legs and a bindi in your foot but you also get to see a field of roses ahead of you, enjoy the georgeous aromas and take a lot of beautiful pictures. There might even be someone else trudging through that same rose bush who you can share the pain and beauty with that will change your life forever, if you give them the chance.

A year in from losing my Mum and whilst I cried a fair bit in the last few days I know now I can overcome anything if I just open my eyes to see the good in life. Even when at times it seems there is none. It’s always there.