Ruth Sanderson

As a child what did you want to be when you grew up?  Nurse, fireman and teacher were the hot options at my infant school.  Then of course you somehow realise there are more options out there.

I’m still surprised at the number of people who tell me what they do, listen to what I do and then wistfully say “ahh but I’d love to ….or as a child I always wanted to be …” as a profession.  What stops them from pursuing this desire? - being sensible and responsibility are the 2 most popular answers.  Apparently I am blessed and lucky to be able to do what I love.  Well so I’m told.   So why do I get to do what I love, and others don’t?  Especially as I’ve never thought of myself as unsensible or irresponsible.   What is it that causes one person to choose to remain in an unfulfilling job and another to go out and pursue it?

I have a hypothesis, just as “I don’t have the time” is very often an excuse rather than the truth, responsibility and sensibleness are also acceptable excuses.  We can trot them out in public without fear of ridicule or being called on them.  These are socially acceptable ways of skirting the real issue of why someone has chosen to stay where they are.  And choosing to stay where you are is not wrong, but what about a bit of authenticity in the answer, how about “I’m too scared”, or “I can’t be bothered”, or “my job is currently funding my kit car and once that’s built then I’ll think about it”.  Well at least we wouldn’t be having a superficial conversation trying to smoother some simmering passion.

Then again some of the answers I’ve had include “you need a degree, or you have to be charismatic”.  In both cases I didn’t agree so I found out how they knew their reason to be true, and we shared our evidence.  I’m pleased to say that upon hearing contrary evidence they went off with renewed vigor, the stumbling block removed.  Sometimes what’s stopping us is real, other times it’s all an illusion.

So now I am asking myself what else would I love to do this year, and what’s stopping me, is it real or an illusion.  The real blocks will take a bit longer to break down, but the beauty of illusions is they lose their power as soon as you see through them.