Girlbooker's Tea and Toast

Readers of this blog will know that I have been looking for my ‘forever job’ for a few months now. Although I am currently working, it isn’t full time, so I have been getting into the groove of  a slower pace. Yet I am surprised at how busy life still feels. A few reflections on what that so called slower pace looks like. Life is simpler. Because I don’t have money to splash around, I am conscious of not spending unnecessarily. Apart from a couple of times, this has generally made life a whole lot simpler. I am spending way less time agonising over what to buy, how much to spend and whether I need one or two of something. The default answer is ‘no’ and it saves a lot of mental energy. When I do spend money, I really relish it as something special, even if it’s just a muffin as well as a coffee . I’m also doing quieter things, like staying home and reading, and the extra time to read has been such a beautiful gift. I have read more in the last six months than I have in the pre...

A few years ago, I did one of those 5 minute online tests, designed to discover what kind of work I was best at. The results showed my inclination toward creative work was so strong that there was no room for anything else. I wasn’t especially surprised, but it did make going back to my data entry, cutting and pasting, Excel sheet-laden job the next day particularly depressing. Insert oversized sigh here. I didn’t have a solution to the problem right then and there, but I tucked it away to ponder on at a later date. Fast forward a couple of years and I found myself in a job that looked terribly corporate from the outside. After a couple of months I realised that something felt different; I could no longer hear the quiet yet insistent voice inside me plaintively asking to be fulfilled. I was surprised to discover that I actually liked my job! When I examined it more closely, I realised that the large amount of time I spent in problem solving was immensely satisfying, and compl...