On Being Busy

I normally post one, if not two, blogs per week. But this last week I have been incredibly busy, and have not found the time to sit and write. I usually have a number of blogs in draft format, but I felt that I didn't have the time to turn these drafts into finished articles.

This led me to think about a conversation I had earlier in the week with a fellow coach. She had been disturbed by a comment from a coach within her network who implied that clients only go to coaches who are "sorted". My friend felt that as human beings, we can never be "sorted" one hundred percent of the time. In fact, if we give off the notion that we are always "sorted" then perhaps that makes us appear superficial. In the course of our conversation, I said that I agreed. This post is my testimonial to my friend.

How did I get to be so busy? Well, one of my clients has recently asked me to take on a huge piece of work at short notice with a tight deadline. I have a number of work commitments with another client that I need to prepare for. Although I have known about these commitments for some time, the brief had not been finalised and so I did not want to commence any work until I knew exactly what was required of me. Earlier in the week, I had a business meeting regarding another of my business ventures. At the end of the meeting there was considerable work to be done: I am passionate about this particular venture and so want to invest my time in making it a success. And on top of that, my daughter turned four. We ended up celebrating the event all week due to all the different family and friend events that we had to "stage-manage".

One of the aims behind setting up my own company was to ensure that I had a manageable work-life balance and I promised myself that I wouldn't work too hard. This last week I put in about 60 hours of work. It doesn't look like I'm keeping that promise to myself!

And the thing is, this isn't the first time in the last year that I've suddenly found myself working all hours. The difference this time is that I'm in control. The only milestone I missed was posting a blog. In previous occasions, I found my stress levels rising, I wasn't paying appropriate attention to my children, and I generally wasn't a fun mum / wife / friend to be around. But the fact that I recovered from these difficult periods, reflected on what had happened and thought about how to avoid it next time means that I've grown stronger as an individual.

I don't think that I'm a "sorted" person, but I listen to myself and those closest to me. I grow from my own personal experience. And that's one of the aspects that is central to my coaching practice. I think this makes me more credible to my clients than appearing to be "sorted" all the time.