I heard someone mention the poem “The Dash” by Linda Ellis on a podcast.
I have been thinking about it ever since.

 

I work with people who want to make changes in their lives.
One of the most important questions I ask my clients is:

How do you want to live your life?

I think there are times we are so worried about the future and where it will take us, we don’t stop to look at what we really want in our lives. We don’t take time to think about how we want to live that life.

We get into a career and it becomes all about work, work, work.

“What matters is how we live and love and how we spend our dash”

I recently heard this poem but it is how I have been living my life. It started when I made the choice to change my career the first time.

In “Black Magic”, Elizabeth Gilbert says that there is always a shit part to every career. And she is right. We have to decide if we can deal with the shit part, if we want that career.

When it comes to film production, it is a fun, high paced, creative job where you can make good money.

But for me, these were the shit parts of the job:

      1. Job security fears: In the beginning I would take all jobs offered, because I didn’t know when the next one would be offered. There were times I would worry about not getting calls. It always seemed to work out that a huge job would come in, if I booked a vacation. And if I said no I worried if they would ever call again.
      2. No personal time: Once I start the day of work, I can’t leave until they say it is over. I didn’t get to go to the store, get a haircut or run an errand on work days. Once there, I did not have the option to leave.
      3. Work start time extremes: I never knew what time I would start until I got the call sheet the night before. At times I would find that job was being shot at night, the day before the shoot. Then I was working from 5pm to 7am in the middle of the week. Not easy to adjust my sleep schedule for one all-nighter.

I considered these the shit part of the job.
But for other people, they are not an issue.

I started to look for a new career when I wanted a different lifestyle.

It took me awhile to take the leap to my next career. I had to figure out what that was going to be first. In my search, one of my top requirements was a flexible schedule because that is important to the life I want to live.

What is most important in your life?