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Hi, Christie Adams here recording this on the 7th of September. 

And can we believe I’m already on episode four, bringing you value. 

The subject I want to cover this time is one of the main reasons that I set up my whole coaching business, because I’ve been through redundancy and I’ve been forced into jobs and roles that didn’t really fit my skills. 

I got fed up with the corporate rat race, which is why I became a coach. I realised that for mid-lifers especially, it’s very hard to often separate yourself from your job title or your career, and you can get a little bit lost. 

I think that’s why people have the stereotypical crisis, which I’m determined to overcome, because they feel as if they’re being dumped and they don’t really know why. 

They don’t really know where they’re heading. I actually created an online course and I want to go through the first unit with you to help you start your path to finding yourself again. 

If you find that you’re a little bit lost, maybe stuck, possibly even scared, overwhelmed. 

I hear people saying, ‘Oh, I don’t know where to start.’ ‘It’s just not worth the effort’ or the dreaded ‘I’ve left it too late.’ 

Which as you know, I’m definitely a fighter against the ‘too late’ philosophy. 

So bear with me, we’ll go through a few points, see how we get on. And at the end, I’ll tell you how he can take it to the next step because this is just the first step on a journey. 

The course is called 

‘How to regain confidence and overcome fear by finding your future focus.’ 

And it took quite a bit of coming up with that. It’s quite a long sentence, but it does sum up what I feel about it, that it is to regain your confidence and it might take some planning. 

Instead of constantly being defined by your work and your job title, you know, we’ve all been, all of us, in a situation where the first thing somebody says to you is, 

‘Oh, hello, what’s your name? And what do you do?’

It’s very much a defining factor, especially in our culture. Anyway after paying the bills for years, working hard of keeping a roof over your head and your families heads, and bringing them up, it can be very difficult to sort of separate yourself out from that career driven, or debt driven, type of personality to find yourself. 

And it can become overwhelming. I do hear people saying I’ve left it too late, or I’m just stuck, or I just don’t really know how to get out of this role. And unfortunately people, rather than sort of plan the way out of it, sometimes do rebel. 

Totally. 

It’s not unheard of for people to go missing in this scenario because they just don’t know, you know, what to do next. 

They feel that they’ve got no value. Especially after redundancy or retirement, it can really feel like that. I know I’ve been there, I’ve done it. It’s horrendous. 

To face the fear of not being able to pay your bills or support your family is awful. 

If you are in a really bad place, know that there is lots of support out there and please reach out. 

I’m not a trained psychiatrist or psychologist, but please, please, please know that you can reach out and people will help you. If I could help you in just a little bit of a way, then that’s what I’m going to do now. 

The first step really on a journey is to find out exactly where you are right now, because it’s difficult to go on any journey if you don’t know where you’re setting off from. 

That’s what I want to go through today. To give you the foundations and the confidence to know that you can take a next step. 

You can pivot, you can change your path. You can do additional things. You can pursue your passions. 

If you’re feeling that you’ve just been ‘corporate rat race’ or ‘factory driven’ out of all your passionate creative side, then we’re going to re-find that. 

What I want you to do, first of all, is grab some sort of journal you don’t need to do at this minute because you can come back and listen to this again. I don’t want you to get distracted, but I’m a firm believer in getting a gorgeous journal and pen, something that you really like writing in. If you’re a geek, then it might an iPad or i-pencil or your computer keys. But there is something about a pen and a paper that put you in real contact with yourself and you can go and hide in a corner, carry it with you, use it on a park bench, whatever. 

But a paper and pen I think does work more effectively. I think if you get a lovely one that you like to pick all up, rather than a corporate sort of boring lawyer pad or whatever you call it. I think in America, they call them legal pads? Instead of getting something corporate, get something really nice that reflects your personality. 

It might be a little leather bound binder, or just something that you really like. 

It’s got to be tactile and that you’ve got to enjoy picking up. 

It shouldn’t be a chore. 

What you’re going to do, first of all, is write down all of your qualifications and I’m talking official qualifications really, write all those down. You may not have many, you may have loads, but write those down and also write down any gaps that you feel that you’ve got in that education that you would like to potentially look at.

Really it’s almost like the beginning of a CV that you’re writing down, what qualifications and what skill gaps you’ve got. 

The next one is write down, and this will take a little bit more thinking about, I think, write down what I’ve called, energisers. The things that really get to you, that you really love to do. Just the thought of them excites you. 

It could be art. It could be writing, it could be something outdoors, it could be finance, it could be accounts, whatever it is that really gives you energy that you really love doing. 

And then against that, I want you to, to also record things that drain you, that drain your energy. I don’t want to use the word negative, but some things that just drain you. I’m an introvert, I find I’m drained by people, if I’m in a big room or a big crowd. I didn’t realise this for years! 

I wish I had known at the time, but when I was in big conferences or meetings at the end of the day, I would feel really, really exhausted. I would know I’ve done a good job, but I would just feel totally drained. I never really knew why. It was the people aspect that I get my energy when I’m on my own, rather than in a group, you might be the opposite way round, but record things. Sit down and be really honest with yourself. 

You might find that the things that you really good at are actually the things that also drain your energy. You’re going to need to counteract that with something that brings that energy back, which is why we’re looking at energisers and drainers. 

So just to quickly recap, you’ve now written your qualifications, the gaps in those qualifications that you might like to fill things that energise you and things that drain your energy. 

Then the next bit is more fun. 

I want you to record all of your passions and your skills, and I’m talking soft skills as well as certified ones. You’ve already done your certifications with your qualifications, but things that you’re really passionate about, you might be really good at art. 

You might be really good at child education. You might have discovered that during lockdown, that things have really shifted in your life. You may have realised that you’re really passionate about education of young people, or that might be one of the drainers.  What are you actually good at? 

This is where it might be good to get a buddy in and ask, what do you think I’m really good at? It might be something that you’ve not accounted for because you’re too humble. Or you just take it so much for granted that you’ve not actually noticed that it is a real scale. 

You may think, well, I’ve not been at work. I’ve been looking after the kids and I’ve not really got many skills. 

You’ve got loads of skills. 

If you’ve been running a household, trust me, you’ve got a lot of skills. You’ve got money management, you’ve got multitasking, organisational. The list goes on and on and on. 

Identify your passions and your skills. 

Then against that one, I want you to write down or identify (you might need to mind mapping a little bit) the things that you’re really good at, but you really don’t like doing. 

They come against the drainers, against the negativity side. 

You might be the person in the office or in wherever you work, that’s always called on to do a particular job because you’re good at it. And your manager might be really shrewd and say, yeah, but you’re so good at it and flatter you, but you really hate doing it. 

You accept that you are good at it, but you really don’t want to spend your life doing it anymore. 

Write down the skills that you’ve got, that you really don’t enjoy and be honest with yourself. Again, if you love something that other people think you’re crazy for loving, that’s fine. 

This is the whole thing about being honest with yourself. The whole exercise is to do that. 

That’s why it’s in your journal. It’s not in the public domain. It’s just your private thoughts. 

The last part of this first step is to write down your support network and identify the people who are already there or can be there to support you in whatever you choose to do. It might be a current manager. You might have a really brilliant manager who is really supportive and helps you train and really sees your skills and utilises them. 

Whilst they are desperate not to lose you, they also want to see you do your best. That would be a really brilliant manager, they are very few and far between. 

You’re very lucky if you’ve got that, that might be somebody who’s in your support network. 

It may be family, but don’t worry if it isn’t because quite often we keep our family separate from career. We don’t like to worry them. And we don’t like fall on them for support. They might be your biggest supporter, but don’t worry if they’re not. So that’s your support network. 

I want you to really think about that and identify people. 

The last point on this is against that is possible mentors, that doesn’t mean people that you necessarily know in person. You can have online mentors. There are massive, big, highly influential coaches. Who’ve got books out who do the speaking circuit, who talk to arenas. 

They can be a mentor, you can read their books, you can study their words. 

You can watch their Ted talks. Identify possible mentors and especially forward facing ones.

Say you’re an accountant, you might have someone who is really good at accounts, and you followed them in social media, you like their philosophy. You’ve read a few of their study books, but you don’t want to do that anymore. 

Find some mentors who work more in the generic personality or confidence or motivation areas. If you’re looking towards all the passions, who do you follow on social media that you really like? You know, maybe an artist or there might be somebody in social care, or different areas that you would like to study or know about. Identify the possible mentors in that area. So really that is your first step. 

So I’ll just quickly go over it. 

Qualifications v gaps in qualifications, 

energisers versus drainers, 

passions and skills, as well as those that you don’t like 

Your support network and your mentors. 

This will give you a really good signpost as to where you are now. 

Be totally honest with yourself. 

This is the foundation for the next step on the journey. 

I’ve got an online course it’s free. 

It’s very much an introduction to these five steps that I have, this being the first one and in the notes for the course, I will drop the links in there on my website. 

But if you want to scribble it down, it’s on a company called Teachable, which is an online site and it’s called How to Regain Confidence and Overcome Fear by Finding your Future Focus. Don’t worry if you can’t find it, I’m dropping the link. 

So let me know how you get on with this exercise. 

I would love to hear if it’s actually sort of lit any candles in the back of your mind, somewhere that it’s given you a bit of a food for thought and that you can see your way forward.

That you are in a better place than you think you have got skills. 

There are ideas in there. 

You have identified the passions and the skills that you’ve got, and you’re now ready to take the next step. 

I really hope this has been useful for you and drop me a line either on here, either in reviews would be great, but drop me a line and get into, we can have a chat and I will speak to you again soon. So have a lovely day and feel positive because there is a really positive future out there for you. I know, I’ve done it, don’t worry about it.