How was your weekend? Glad to be back at work for a rest?
Me? Well, I was caught off guard yesterday when I stumbled upon my divorce certificate while hunting for other documents.
Maybe it was because I’d been having such a delicious weekend. On Saturday I’d done a wicked Bodypump class, met up with an old friend and gone window shopping. Sunday morning I’d hung out with Steve drinking coffee, talking shit, and having a laugh. I’d just been saying how happy I was with life right now when it struck.
It wasn’t at all the memory of the divorce itself. At the end of the day that was just a bit of paper that landed through my door one morning without ceremony. No, it was the memory of the years of empty Sundays that had preceded it.
You may well be thinking that this is not the kind of experience that you’d associate with generally upbeat and positive me? And perhaps that’s all the more reason that I want to share it with you.
See, I’d got married when I was 24, right after my mother died. I’d undoubtedly confused love with needing security, but after the frenzy of organizing the wedding, life began to feel flat. Of course, I was mourning the loss of my mother, but everyone else had moved on, so I imagined I should have too and blamed it on my job at the time. Andrew was also bored, so we hatched a plan to get ourselves “down south” and into more exciting jobs. He ended up getting work near Horsham, where we bought a house: I joined Amex in London and began commuting.
Last week I was writing about stories. The one I’d written for that part of my life was more like a fairy tale. Poor orphan girl is rescued by her knight in shining armor who carries her off to a foreign land where she has a wonderful career, owns a detached house, has two cars on the drive and takes a couple of foreign holidays every year. To the outside that’s probably how it looked. But, as Roxy Music says: “In every dream home, a heartache”.
For a start, Andrew was no prince charming. Far from being my hero, he leached me emotionally and financially. Monday to Friday he was a catering manager. But most weekends, even in the depths of winter – in fact, especially in the depths of winter – he was at some windsuring meet-up in some or other part of the country. I’d tried to join in with that crowd, but it wasn’t my scene. There is nothing more boring than freezing your face off for hours watching small dots on the horizon; or standing in bars all night getting off your head drunk watching men in their twenties and thirties acting like school boys.
So, increasingly I spent my weekends in this odd situation where I was married, but was always alone. From time to time I’d touch my sense of isolation. I’d feel sorry for myself and wonder what I was doing. I’d consider how my reality didn’t fit my fantasy. But for the most part I avoided really looking at it. It was easier to hold things together than to confront things and kick-start a chain of events that might lead to God knew where.
I escaped to work as a way of numbing out
Yesterday as I sat there awash with all those feelings again, and the sadness for myself that I’d had to endure them at all, I asked myself “How? How did I do it? How did I get through these awful days and survive?”
I suppose I’ve known this for some time, but yesterday it came home to me with more felt force. I’d completely numbed myself out on what was happening. And work was the key thing that allowed me to do so. Although it was always a shock to the system when the alarm went off at 6.00 am, Mondays were always a relief. At work I knew who and where I was. I felt confident and capable there. I could throw myself into deep waters with a strong degree of certainty that I’d find my horizons sooner or later. But the same was far from true in my personal life.
It’s ironic that I chose to work in Human Resources. I like to think that I did so from a very caring perspective and that I was a good leader. I certainly had a lovely team of people around me, and some great colleagues; people who felt like family. But there was safety in that too. I could give all of myself Monday to Friday and withdraw on the weekend. At a level, it didn’t have to touch me.
Of course the whole thing fell apart. It was always going to. The first domino went down on discovering that Andrew’s playboy motto – “windsurfers do it standing up” – was now referring to more than just his sailing pursuits. I’ll spare you the detail of the battle for my sanity that went on around all of that for another day. Suffice to say that my corporate career was at its peak as I went through a painful and protracted divorce on grounds of infidelity.
Why am I sharing all of this? What’s its relevance to the blog?
Well, work can play a hugely important role in our lives. When we put who we are to the service of the world the sense of engagement and satisfaction can be enormous. But it’s also possible to use work to vicariously meet needs in us that we’re currently unable to address elsewhere.
I’d love to tell you to stop doing so and to concentrate more on what’s really going on. But I fear that’s coaching bullshit, and that, if you’re pouring yourself unduly into your work, and avoiding your self in the process, it’s because at a level somehow you need to right now. For me, finding my way back to my self was not a decision, but a process that took time. Indeed, it’s one that’s ongoing. Instigating divorce proceedings was only the beginning of me doing my own different kind of work; an inner work that would allow me to resurrect my soul.
And yes, I’ve done a lot to get to the point of having a very rich and happy life. But even now I have days of being drawn down into my feelings and wanting to escape from them. It’s just that, this time I decided to share it.
How about you? How do you use work as a way of escaping from your self? What one small thing can you do today to give your self some space?
photo credit: HikingArtist.com
In the past i have worked tooo much. I don;t think I ever saw this as a means of escape, but more just the fact that I was doing something I enjoyed. The problem is that after 6 years of working for myself and countless years working full-time, it had a stranglehold on me.
In an almost opposite way to you, work wasn’t as much a way of forgetting my life, and the loss that came about as a result of this way of life, was the kick up the arse I needed to stop being such a workaholic.
There are of course other factors in the equation, but I think what is borne out in your story, and in mine, is that a healthy balance of personal and professional life need be found, and the sooner one realises that balance the better.
.-= Vincent Roman´s last blog ..Time To Check Out =-.
Hi Vincent and thanks for your great comment. I think wherever it comes from that “kick up the arse” is often the wake up call that something somewhere is not right. Well done for seeing your own workaholism for what it was and addressing it. I like your point about “healthy balance”. Healthy feels like a good word here.
Thanks for the reply Christine.
Healthy is a good word for sure. I wish employers recognised more that a healthy, mind, body and spirit were conducive to better work, but that’s another story. Unfortunately for me, the kick in the arse is only the second thing I regret in 30+ years on this planet, but no point in dwelling on it.
Has taken a good year or more to make serious changes and kick start a healthier lifestyle … any improvements of course have to be for life, “not just for christmas”.
That’s a great attitude, Vincent! What really comes across is how you’ve used your most recent kick up the arse, painful as it undoubtedly was, as an opportunity for serious, positive change. Fabulous!
Breaking habit is hard, and keeping at it is harder, especially when you have familial demands, but at some pint you have to know how to draw the line in the sand, and get others to respect that.
Twitter: HeavenandEl
says:
What did they put in that chocolate cake last week Christine because this is brilliant! Yeah, OK, brilliant is the wrong word to describe what you’ve just shared but as a piece of brave, honest, compelling soul sharing it’s awesome.
I use my ‘work’ as a catharsis for the rubbish stuff in life. I help make others smile and it lifts me too. Or at other times I express the crap so we can all empathise together.
.-= Eleanor Edwards´s last blog ..Do you have this common blogging disorder =-.
I love that description of what you do, El: “a catharsis for the rubbish stuff in life”. I’m all for that, and all for empathy. It’s what makes us human at the end of the day!
Twitter: JulieWalraven
says:
Wow, Christine… I am a bit speechless but you are right, we use work different ways… and for different reasons. I’ve been analyzing that with myself for awhile… thought-provoking as always, my friend!
Thank you, Julie. We do indeed use work in different ways and for different reasons. Vincent used the word “healthy” here. That feels like a good one to be using in the equation.
Appreciate your being here as always, my friend!
Thanks so much for sharing this honest and touching post Christine – I imagine it can’t have been easy but there illustrates your point perfectly and was really moving to read. A few years ago, before I met my OH I was working 60 – 70 hours a week. I enjoyed it mostly but I know that below the surface I didn’t really feel like I had a life as such so thought I might as well be working. It was a good experience and maybe what I needed at the time but eventually I realised I was avoiding ‘real life’ and moved on. Work can definately be an easy way to avoid what ever is going on, but as you rightly said, sometimes we need that.
Thanks, Jen. You hit the nail on the head in your comment about things not being easy. Don’t you think there’s a pile of stuff out there that make it look as if the difficult things in life should be easy, and then leave us feeling less than because that’s not our experience?
I so relate to what you say about doing all the hours because you didn’t feel you had a life. And I’m delighted for you that you went after “real life” and got it!
Twitter: CoachScotland
says:
Christine
This was a really touching, honest and beautiful post.
I need to have meaning and purpose in my life and sometimes I find that I am working because there is nothing else that gives me that – especially in winter.
I find that balance in life is not the easiest thing to maintain and so for me the best thing I can do is to plan out my week and plan for balance.
.-= Marion Anderson´s last blog ..Money Matters – How to find the path to Financial Freedom =-.
Curious that you should say that about winter, Marion. I often have the same thing.
I don’t necessarily plan my week in the same way as you do, but I have similar boundaries about when I will and won’t work. Or, more positively, when I will work, and when I will do other things
Twitter: Caileagh
says:
I zoned out on work once too. I got up at the crack of dawn to go to work. Work all day. Go home to cook dinner and then go back to work until at least midnight. It was too painful to go home and see an abusive alcoholic and realize what a horrible decision I had made. I got lost in my work instead.
All it did was postpone the inevitable in my personal life and left my employer with the impression they could work me to death and never pay me a dime more.
You provided good advice. Hopefully people will take heed and avoid the pain of the mistakes we made.
It’s so easy to numb out on work, Caileagh, isn’t it? Puts us into a kind of zombie state where we don’t have to confront reality. Still, it sounds that, like me you’ve been awoken from it whether by choice or by circumstance. Doesn’t make life easier, but it means we look it straight in the eye now. There’s a strength in that for me.
Twitter: adrianswinscoe
says:
Hi Christine,
That was a brave and honest post. Thank you for sharing it.
I agree that work can be a distraction that I throw myself into sometimes to avoid dealing with other stuff that is going on in my life. However, I am happy to say that is less and less the case now that I am chasing my dream and I feel that I am doing it with my partner.
Thanks for the tap on the shoulder its always good to check that we are really seeing where are at.
All the best,
Adrian
.-= Adrian Swinscoe´s last blog ..What can modern business learn from the Little Black Dress =-.
Thanks for your honest comment! I’m so happy to hear that, although work has been something in which you’ve hidden, that’s less and less the case as you follow your dreams and share life with your partner.
For those of us who love work, I do think it’s sometimes good just to check with ourselves that that love doesn’t have an unhealthy underbelly!
Thank you for the honesty Christine – that’s not an easy story to share and I can feel the emotion in it.
I think we all escape into our work during times of uncertainty in our personal lives. When the level of certainty in our lives drops to a point that is unbearable our natural (and subconscious) reaction to drift to people and place that can fulfil that need.
It’s interesting though, knowing what I know of you my friend from reading your blog, that now you have that certainty you once craved so much in abundance. In your relationship with Steve, in your work, in your blog here and even with your nephew.
.-= Ben´s last blog ..5 Top Tips for getting back on the change wagon! =-.
Thanks Ben, appreciate the empathy and the feedback.
When times are tough we do migrate to things that are giving us a less difficult time, or people who appear more supportive. For a long time, Amex was my family and, although I made many wonderful friends there, most of them I only saw Monday to Friday and in the office. It’s not the same…
If I have certainty now, it’s in who I am. No one and no thing will take that from me again. And, you’re right, I do have abundance, in my relationship with Steve, my work, and my nephew. And with the lovely friends I have made and continue to make from being online, yourself very much included!
Twitter: lionslinger
says:
We all have forms of escape or distraction and work is one of them. At one point in my life I have resorted to work to escape witnessing the suffering of my father. During those times he had a terminal illness that make it difficult for him to even breath normally. Those where horrible times and I can’t bear to witness his slow faltering. Most of the time it’s much easier to escape than to face reality.
.-= Walter´s last blog ..The most worthy investment in life- Self awareness =-.
My heart goes out to you, Walter. Witnessing someone we love with a terminal illness is harrowing in the extreme. I’m not surprised you escaped into work and thank you so much for sharing.
When it’s tough to deal with our emotions, work can give us a big sense of okayness and normality. Some of that’s good, but it’s not always healthy.
Hi
A tough journey to share for sure. Been through two divorces, remained friends with both ex-wives! but Ill not do that again..
Work is a way to 1) get meaning in ones life 2) something to do! 3) make cash to do fun things.
I too have buried myself into work with little or no outside interests and I enjoyed it. I retired for 7 years in my 40′s and wandered. Im now back to work both on personnel projects and through a J-O-B. What i learnt over those years is not so much that i need a “life style balance” (more internet bullshit) but that by engineering my work life (life style design Yikes), so that i’m internet based, then at least i can change locations and get variety in my non working hours.
great blog found you via your post on Chris Duckers site.
regards
Thanks for coming across here, Steve, and indeed for sharing so much of your story.
Work is a strange animal. So necessary for our well-being and shaping our identity on one level. On another, we can use it so destructively.
All kind of corporate and internet bollocks – work life balance – don’t help. But it’s great to be able to come back to ourselves a bit, figure what’s going to work for us, and set out to make it happen.
Power to you, sir!