FACING THE MUSIC

A couple of months ago I wrote about some of the things I was doing in order to achieve my goals. If you remember, I formed a kind of ‘club’ with a few friends and by meeting regularly and supporting each other we were doing our very best to achieve our objectives. My goal was to make money in my sleep, to which end I would beef up my Inspirer ezine, spruce up my website and rebrand myself as The Book Cook. As you may have noticed – I did it! And when you consider that the first meeting of the goal-setting group was less than 10 weeks ago, I did it pretty quickly. But now I’ve had to face the music. As you noticed. My pretty new ezine did not work. It was unclickable and I felt such a fool. With hindsight I recognise that the glitch was nothing in the great scheme of things, that my readers are human – and to err is human, after all. I also learned that goals can change.

You see, at our last goal-setting meeting (I wrote in March about the goal-setting group I belong to), two weeks ago we were all reassessing our goals. Jacinta said that while she realised we were there to help with professional goals, what she really wanted to do was to sing well enough to put on a small concert in a public place.

Something flicked on in my brain. Not just a light switch, but the main power supply to my soul. I was a fraud. Setting and achieving professional goals was a piece of cake for me. I love to work. I would rather work than do the washing up. I would rather work than go for a massage. In a nutshell, work was easy. It was doing something for myself that wasn’t work that was really tough. In fact I had virtually no experience of doing anything for myself. I thought I was both lucky and clever to have turned my hobby into a career. The trouble is I had not allowed another hobby into my life. I wanted to sing too. Not to put on a concert like Jacinta, I just wanted to feel able to contribute to an informal singsong now and again. To sing Summertime and be able to look people in the eye while I did it. I wanted to be able to sing karaoke with a smile on my face, rather than run from the room in fear.

When I told the group that I wanted to sing I found myself looking at the table, fiddling with my rings, looking out of the window. Anything rather than look them in the eye.

‘So, Jo, how are you going to achieve that goal?’ asked Jill, one of the group’s two professional coaches.
‘Book a singing lesson?’ I squeaked with my head bowed. What was happening to me? Where was the confident, creative, ‘I can do anything if I put my mind to it’ me? Instead I had become a shy, scared and vulnerable person I scarcely recognised.
‘So, when will you book it?’ continued Jill.
‘Soon.’
‘I need a date,’ Jill kept on at me.
‘Today?’

And so my goal that month was not to write an entire ezine or redevelop my website. All I had to do was to book a singing lesson and take it within a fortnight. It was one of the hardest things I have ever done. So hard that I admitted that unless someone came with me I was likely to sabotage that first lesson and find a way not to turn up. So Becky agreed to come too. Now I had no escape. Becky even gave me the number of her own singing teacher there and then. It took me 24 hours to dare pick up the phone. And when the teacher was out I heaved a sigh of relief!

Well, folks, you will be pleased to know that I went to that lesson a week ago. Filled with fear, and feeling like a fish out of water, I did it. Having to stand there, alone with a teacher, made my back ache and legs freeze solid from the tension. But after 40 minutes something clicked. I was okay. Really okay. And singing felt so GOOD! So good that I have booked another lesson.

So, what I have learned this month is that we need to choose our goals carefully. Real goals, the ones that will probably do more for us than any others, are those that make us leave our comfort zone. For years I had cheated at goal-setting, setting myself targets that I knew I had a pretty good chance of achieving.

And then this morning I lay in the bath reading The Road Less Travelled by M Scott Peck. It fell open at the essay called ‘Work and Attention’. I read that to truly love something or someone you have to nurture it and do things towards its spiritual growth. To love something you have to take action. It is easy enough to show love to my children by doing things with them and paying them attention. And perfectly simple to give attention to all aspects of my work. But to myself? Hey, I find it almost impossible to give myself permission to take a day off or use body lotion.

Which reminded me of my friend, Perfect Helen. We all wonder at how she manages to take herself riding once a week, have a monthly facial and go running every day. We all wonder how she can be so self-indulgent when she has a family to look after and a demanding job working with the handicapped. So, one evening, suitably bolstered by wine, I asked her how she did it.

‘I do it because it matters. Because I’m worth it. If I look after myself I’ll live longer than you and that is the best thing I can do for my children,’ said Perfect Helen.

My jaw dropped. She sounded like the L’Oreal advert. Now, I realise Perfect Helen has a point.
So, my new goal is to pay myself attention and to nurture and love and spend time with myself, doing things that do not further my professional goals. It was high time I faced the music, don’t you think? What about you?

Believe in blue sky

Jo Parfitt © 2005