I wrote most of this post last Monday but have not had time to finish, which really illustrates the point I was trying to make that you can read below…..

I just clicked on my blog and saw the title of what I posted last weekend and laughed at how this weekend is the complete opposite.

This weekend I worked till nearly midnight on Friday, and roughly 12 hours a day on Saturday and Sunday.

I then proceeded to work 12 hour days for most of the following week.

Let me explain why I am telling you this…

I am 49 years old and I am trying to work out what I want to be when I grow up.  Actually I think I have worked out that I might not grow up at all. Instead just find out what it is that makes a life a good life and do that.      

I have done all the things society expects (and quite a few they didn’t!) and things haven’t quite worked out like the brochure suggests it’s supposed to. 

In the list the brochure suggests I worked hard, got married, bought a house, had children, studied, continued to work hard, saved money, tried to pay of the mortgage….

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In the other list, I have been a single parent and been financially up the creek (without a paddle obviously cause I couldnt afford one), separated, divorced and had a little bit of cancer amongst other things… 

Rest assured this is not a woe is me situation.  I actually feel incredibly lucky in very many ways.  If nothing else I have great fodder for blogging, you know what they say, pain + time = humour!.  

One thing I am very grateful for is that after years and years of rushing around like a lunatic, I have had a little forced slow down. 

I don’t think that cancer was the big epiphany people talk about that has changed my life.  I was already doing that to some degree. But it did give me permission to listen to myself more and do what I needed to do for me.  

No one argues with the cancer chic who says she needs… anything! 

I have been listening to lots of slow living podcasts and I think they are onto something.  Although the term “slow living” is not exactly the term I am looking for.  The fast pace can be fun and definitely has it’s place but its not sustainable all the time.  We need a balance.   We need time to do what feels right for us at the time, fast or slow. 

Weekend work is not my norm and I was not very excited about doing it.  The problem is I am working on a project that finishes in November and it’s a little panic stations at the moment to try to get everything done we want to get done.  I strongly suspect that is a common issue towards the end of every project ever.  

I have only been on this project for about 6 weeks.  There was a particular job that has been dragging on for months and it needs to get finished because it is now holding up other things.  

Management we able to approve a bunch of resources to be thrown at the problem but someone had to take responsibility for it.  I am not very good at sitting on my hands in those circumstances and so I put mine up and that resulted in me working all weekend. 

I guess this is my point to this post… how do I reconcile taking responsibility for a crisis that was not my making and working on a weekend when I don’t want to to resolve it with my need to care for myself and having time for the things I want in life? Is this just me reverting to my old ways?

It is now the third weekend in this posts story.  Interestingly the gods have made me slow down again. 

I had booked Friday off as compensation for two long weeks.  I came home on Thursday night and within 10 minutes of me sitting down I thought “gee my throat is sore….”

So a much quieter weekend again this weekend, but not as pleasant as the first because I’m too sick to enjoy it. Can’t see the people I want to see or go or do the things I want to do…perhaps I should have listened…found a better balance.