Being your best version of you

This is what it's all about really, isn't it?

When we really get down to it, this is what's really going on.

We have this yearning inside, even if don't recognise what it is.  

This feeling that something's not right, that it's 'off'.

When we're not fulfilling our potential it, somehow irks, it niggles away at you ... sometimes (like me, for YEARS) and you kind of know things aren't RIGHT, but then again, well, they're not WRONG are they?

You're going through life like everyone else, going to work, going on holiday, passing the time, but y'know, as time passes (and passes), that urge gets deeper, that feeling that there MUST be something more.

And for us? It's even worse isn't it?  We always KNEW there was going to be more, but never knew what it was going to be, waiting for it to happen.

And now, realising that it's not going to happen.

I'll just keep turning up for work, keep doing STUFF to fill the time, not even GOING THERE with what that deep deep down LONGING is trying to say, that's trying to come to the surface.

When we were younger we just KNEW we were destined for more, but we thought destiny would find us.

After what, 20-something years of living a multiple-choice-life ('I'll choose from this, this or this that I can see in front of me) we realise ... hold on ... what do we REALLY want?

We can CHOOSE.

We can choose our lives, our reality and we can then make that happen.

THAT is being the best version of you, the one that allows those feeling to come up, searches them, finds what we really want ... and then we start to go down that path.

For me, it was both big (leaving a job to create the mind-space and time to play with, have fun with, finding what I loved) and small (what I started with - I just started a blog about Thai cooking - but oh goodness that was HUGE for me - the first creative thing I'd done for years, the first thing I was excited about, the first thing I'd done because it was truly because I HAD A MESSAGE and it wanted to come out and I wanted to share).

The best version of me was to give myself - for the first time probably since a child - time to create and share - sharing was important to me. 

I look back now and despite having had an on paper great life with great friends and family and relationships ... I was a bit stuck. I was bored, to be honest, bored with myself.

And I didn't really give anything either, this is a two-way thing! I don't think I gave much in hindsight. Creating and sharing helps with GIVING and giving makes you more open and being more open leads to more creativity, more love, more people, more ideas .. just more LIFE.

And then there was the unsaid unhappiness with the weight gain.  I put it on I think now because I was stuck in other areas of my life - it's definitely 'chicken and egg' on this one.

So if you don't want (yet) to start digging deep and working on finding your real inner motivations and creativity but you're unhappy with your body, your fitness, your food, your relationships, your weight ... well, I'd say start with tackling one of those ... 

When we start confronting, being honest about, tackling, taking control of ANY ONE area of our lives we're not happy with, it starts a ripple effect.

Taking ACTION at one area of becoming YOUR best version of you, that's all you have to.

For me, as I started creating and sharing ... I became even more aware that I was unhappy in my own body.

I had started to believe that when I DECIDE something and choose actions that will help me get to my goals then that's what happens.

DECIDING is the main thing.

BELIEVING it next.

SETTING THE GOAL and then just EYES-ON-THE-HORIZON focused just taking the actions and choices to get there.

You have to choose. But only most of the time - some times you make other choices (of course it's not a straightforward linear process - we're human!).

But once you've made THE BIG choice, you just focus on the goal, the horizon, and go for it.

Little changes, small results = huge happiness at stepping into being the figurehead of your ship.

One area of life moves to another, you see changes and feel excited and empowered and 'why didn't I do this before?' - and you know, that doesn't matter. You're (we're) doing it now.

Life leads us to THIS point and NOW is the only point that matters.

There is nothing wrong with wanting to be the best version of you (whatever that looks like to you). 

Mine included losing weight and feeling really happy in my skin ... and starting to achieve that lead to wanting to be fitter and stronger.

All of it comes together for my big vision for myself as the very best version of myself - I now KNOW I can have it all (as I define having it all for me).

I think we have a tendency - and I don't really know why - to think we can't have it all.

We can be successful in business ... but not look after our health.

We can have healthy, happy bodies .. but maybe our relationships suffer. Etc etc etc.

NOW ... step into IT ALL.

Set ALL THE GOALS! Decide and choose and go for it.

Choose one at a time - I promise, one will lead to another.

Or choose all at once.

And especially for those of us with a few decades of life experience ...

Well, I think once we choose to hear the calling, listen to that little voice, refuse to accept that the weight gain is inevitable, that it's 'too late' to achieve our big goals or whatever it is ... we know ourselves well enough to just go get it all.

In the way that best works for us. 

It can be easy. It can be fun.

And step-by-step, keep going, keep taking the steps, be bold, be brave, become YOUR best version of you.

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So, what do you do?

I've been thinking about this a lot recently.  For a few reasons.

And there are a few things that have struck me, that I wondered then if it's just me who does this or whether more of us do.  (Or don't, really).

And that is, actually put a name to it and SAY who they are.

It's been bugging me for a couple of reasons.  

Firstly, a while ago, well two years ago when I started blogging actually, I also started becoming very aware of the language used when you meet new people.  Small talk convention means that pretty soon in any conversation with someone new you'll be asked ... 

'So, what do you do?'

And I think most of us, also out of convention, then talk about 'what we do to make money/make a living'. 

I suppose the question could be posed differently, but even as it stands ... WHAT DO YOU DO?

Many, many people have things they DO outside their work that they love, that's their passion, that's actually what they work in their paying job to DO.

But no one (well, hardly anyone) answers the question with, 'Oh I'm a circus performer, a trapeze artist' ... and then, 'oh, you mean what I do for a living? I'm a marketing manager for a beauty company - and currently it allows me to follow my passion, the trapeze'.

I was thinking about it two years ago when I started my blog and recently I've become really interested again in the language I used and use.

Two years ago, I changed my public 'profile'  description (on social media) and I added my hobbies/passions/projects to that description.

So I'd say things like:

'Magazine publisher by day; foodie and supperclub founder by night'

And honestly, even that felt a little bit ... well, brave ... for me, to start talking about the things I love doing for me, after being so confined by 'what I did to make money'.

Of course, once you start challenging your beliefs and thoughts, you keep on doing so.  

I started thinking more about whether, when asked in a social situation, 'what do you do?', whether I could turn it round and answer FIRST with what I love to do and THEN with what I do to make a living.

(I do have to note here that unlike many people in 'jobs' that pay the rent or mortgage, I have a career that I love and enjoy and am proud of what I create and make happen there.  So this isn't about someone hating their job and wanting to be defined as something else. I've been - and am - more than happy to say I'm a magazine publisher and I can (as many know) talk about it 'til the proverbial cows come home). 

But it's no longer, 'what I do'. 

And I see now that progression when I look back again at those social profiles.

OK, I moved on a bit - calling myself a 'foodie' and a 'blogger'.  

But actually, aren't they a little bit ... nothing?

There's no passion there!

Recently, I decided to drop the 'day job' info completely. For now - as I said, it's still something I love and am proud of.  

But I need to stand up and say who I am.

And why, why, why ... has that been so hard and taken so long?

As of last weekend, I updated my profiles to say that I'm a ... 

'Writer, cook, creator of the Tiniest Thai supperclub and eating plan'

AND ... WHY WAS THAT SO HARD?

To be honest, I've further to go on this - in naming who I am/what I do, owning it, NAMING it and sharing it.

But I'm sharing now as this has felt important to me - announcing (not without fear, of course still with fear that somehow I'm bluffing), but announcing who I am and what I do.

And next time at a party and someone asks what I do, I'm really practising not defaulting to my (interesting and sounds great) 'magazine publisher' job.  

I'm practicing saying what it is I DO. That I spend every spare moment doing. That I do with or without payment.  

It tells more about who I am and what I love.

I am (right now) a writer, a cook and a host/salonniere of my Tiniest Thai supperclub and salon.

And If I can do it politely and in a way that opens up interesting conversation, I'm going to be challenging others to talk about their passions when they answer that question ... 

'So, what do you do?'

... with details about what they spend their days doing to pay the mortgage.  

And hopefully, lots will love their careers.

And others will start talking with passion about their passions.

SO, WHAT DO YOU DO?

WHO ARE YOU?

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