writing

Seasons that don’t do what they’re told

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When you live in Melbourne, you can’t help but be overly concerned with the weather.

You can’t escape it. It’s not just another casual ice-breaker topic like in other, normal-climate parts of the world. The highs and the lows can be so drastic, so contrasting, often from one hour to the next, that us as Melburnians, cannot help but talk so much about our damn weather.

“Beautiful day today.”

“It’s so cold today.”

These aren’t just simple conversation starters with work colleagues. These are real, bonafide issues of debate my non-Melbournian friends. Weather is always, a serious surprise. You can never really know what is going to happen the following day – even the weather presenters guess half the time.

This is true ALL through the year.

One current theme running rampant has been this remark:

“Some summer we’ve had.”

You can’t hear my sarcasm, but we haven’t had much of a summer. Sure, there were hot days; but no real hot, long, drawn-out summer spells usually so characteristic of our humid state. No, we got a couple, at best, really hot days in a row, before a rainy, slightly humid low 20-something degree day came along. And then stayed. For like forever.

I was in denial all the way through. All through summer I kept saying “we’ll get a late summer, we’ll get a stinking hot spell late Feb right into March as usual” (observe my true climate guide for an accurate representation of Melbourne weather seasons).

We are now in March. For those of you who haven’t noticed, we’re actually on the cusp of April. And sadly, we’ve already had the heater on in our house more times than I’d like to count.

I’m a summer gal. I love the sunshine, the warmth, the socialising and the out and about. I love the ease, the mildness that allows you to dress so comfortably, the warm nights that let you dream and gaze at the stars outside, and I love the long, light-filled days. I got caught in the rain a month back, and it was actually fun, and pleasurable, because it was still warm. Summer is just so easy.

I HATE being cold. I hate shivering in the morning as I get dressed, fighting against the coastal wind as I charge my way through the doors at work, and I hate never being able to get the house, and keep it warm, for long enough. It’s always crisp, fresh, and biting.

However, something’s changed.

I constantly remind myself, that winter is always so much worse as we’re in anticipation of it, and that once it’s here, it’s actually not too bad. This concept has helped. But it’s more than that. Summer is easy, but summer means busy too, and finding time to catch up on stuff, to read, to write, has just been so challenging and trying in the last several months. I love to go out, yes. I love to socialise, yes. I love having things to do, places to go and people to see, yes, yes, yes.

But I’m kind of looking forward to chilling at home and hibernating through the cold.

I don’t know what it is that’s made me think this way, this year, and not every other year previously. Is it the fact that I have more on now? The fact that I’m a Mum? Do I need more time for myself and my stuff, because life is just busier now? Perhaps. I’ve always said that winter is only fun when you don’t have to go out, you don’t have to work, in fact you don’t have to do anything at all. Basically, if you’re a bear, winter is awesome. If you can just stay at home snuggled up on the couch with your favourite blankie drinking hot chocolate, reading to your heart’s content and watching all your guilty-pleasure trashy shows, well winter looks kind of rocking in a mellow sorta way.

I am actually looking forward to winter… a little bit. Staying in and lounging in your trakkies ALL day because you can, and the weather doesn’t make you feel bad for doing so. Watching the rain and feeling infinitely inspired to write, and write, and write. (I know I shouldn’t wait for the rain, in order to write, but you know, this shit helps). Using the cold as an excuse to not go anywhere and just basically, be a bear.

Don’t get me wrong, I was still reflecting today, on this gorgeously hot Melbourne day, the (lack of) summer that had just passed, feeling quite depressed that I only got two days at the beach. Just two. I bought new bikinis for this. Baby girl has 3 sets of bathers. 3. She is 19 months old, and she has 3 sets of bathers.

But never mind. It’s something we’ve come to expect, something that is a natural part of life for Melburnians. My most accurate representation of this comes in an early memory, of being a teenager lying on my parents’ bench out on the verandah in the midday hot sun, and then coming inside to green-vision thinking ‘am I going to be burnt?’ to then sitting in front of the heater that night, shivering from the cold.

That’s our city for you. Beautiful one day… screwed if I know what’s next.

How to MAKE it while doing it all

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This is the thing. I’m not aware of any writer out there, any woman out there, who has managed to achieve literary publishing success, while her children are young.

Young. Little. I’m talking 1 + children under the age of, let’s say 4-5.

Because really, when would they have time to do it?

Baby girl is not a baby anymore: she’s a toddler, 18 months to be precise. Life was already busy without her, and now that she’s here, it’s even busier. I’m fortunate in that if left to her own devices, she will nap for about 2 hours a day. This is great. This is unreal. The only thing is, I have so much to do, I don’t know what to do first.

There’s always some kind of cleaning, some kind of food prep or cooking. Today for example, I had phone calls to make. I’ll pay bills online. I always try to squeeze in some writing time though. Like today. I haven’t posted something non-food related for a while, and this post and all the contradictory thoughts that come with it has been stewing in my mind for months. I sit down during her nap, with a coffee, and let the caffeine take me on a journey.

I have so many thoughts about this. There is some way, that I could achieve publishing success, with baby girl, as is. Like, now. But if I were to have another baby, I don’t know where I would find the time. I have this small sliver of opportunity that currently exists during the day. I can, and I do often write at night when she has been put down for the night. But unfortunately on some occasions, I’m just too tired. I’m tired from the day, I’m tired from the constant running around and not stopping. I’m tired of everything.

So instead, I’ll surf the web, or watch something I’ve recorded on Foxtel.

(Tsk tsk tsk).

Two people spring to mind when I think of me as Author (because we all are Authors aren’t we, only no one knows of our impending success yet)… me as Author watching TV.

Stephen King and Jackie Collins.

In Stephen King’s On Writing, he talks about TV being possibly the worst thing to thwart an Author’s efforts to write. He tells us to unplug the thing, and to find places where you can read during the day…standing in queue at the post office for example, or while waiting at the doctor’s office.

Jackie Collins says quite the opposite. In a recent interview, she spoke of how much she enjoyed watching television, and the volume of television she watches. She finds it inspiring and helps her to formulate her stories and give her the inspiration she needs.

I think they’re both right. Stephen King is right, but so is Jackie. You should avoid the TV, just for the sake of not getting sucked into the tedious monotomy of fluff being broadcast to a passive audience, hypnotising the viewers into forgetting about the next 3 possibly useful and effective hours of the night.

But if you’re watching something brilliant, something compelling… well. I find inspiration not just from books, but from movies and television shows. When I watch entertainment on TV, I don’t just stare numbly: I break it down, I analyse. In my mind, when something surprising occurs, I think ‘Oh. See how they did that? It went from A to B and then C was missed and suddenly you were at M and you were like what?! How did they think to create that story?’

So I can’t deny my visual form of entertainment either. I just have to pick carefully because of my limited time.

My foxtel planner is inundated with movies and shows that are yet to be watched. I have DVDS and movies that I’ve bought, and likewise have not had the time to sit down and dedicate myself to it. I feel so bad to sit there, not writing, for approximately 40 mins to 2 hours, when I could be productive and working on my book. I really feel guilty about it, yet I feel like my desire to consume this screen action won’t go away soon either.

I was thinking of the whole theory that Mums don’t have time to make themselves a success while their children were young, when P.D. James died. The night after hearing the shocking news, I googled her and some interesting articles came up on her back story. She had had a very difficult upbringing with her Mother institutionalised due to mental illness while James was still at an impressionable age, and then her string of misfortune continued when her husband developed a severe case of Schizophrenia after returning from the war, resulting in frequent hospitalisation. She found him dead one morning in their home, due to suicide.

She’d had two children with him, and moved in with her in-laws after he died. She worked full time to make ends meet. And you know what she also did?

She would wake up 2 hours before work every day, and write.

I remember the strong emotional feeling I got when I read that. I got very teary in the realisation that she had done, so many years ago, what I’d always known I could do. But I hadn’t.

Basically, in the end, there are no excuses. If you want to write, you will find a way. Like one blogger wrote, you’ll lock yourself in the bathroom away from the toddlers just so you can have 5 minutes of peace and tranquillity and a moment to put your fingers to the keypad. You’ll get up early, you’ll stay up late, or you just won’t sleep much at all.

Didn’t Bon Jovi sing “I’ll sleep when I’m dead?” That sounds about right.

Like another blogger I follow recently posted about, Andrew Toy at Adopting James, he also gets up 2 hours before his work start, in order to get in some writing time.

There are really no excuses.

There will always be things to do. I’m such a planner. I think I organise and plan and think and create more than I can possibly achieve. I love being on the move, being busy, and hate the idea of boredom. So I do it to myself, really. But in the end, do I want to tick off all my jobs on my to-do list, or do I want to say:

“I’m a published writer.”

There is no question there.

And don’t get me wrong, don’t accuse me of procrastinating now. I have been writing my book, the second book in my series in fact. I finished the 1st chapter just the other day, and while I stir up some more creative juices as to what to do in chapter 2, I sit here, and add to my blog, and catch up on stuff, and just generally imagine the possibilities for my characters, for myself, and for life.

Sometimes I think this blog has taken me away from my book writing. Maybe I’m right. Maybe I’m totally right. But at the end of the day I have to write, and I have to write somewhere… and this kind of outlet, I wouldn’t give up for anything.

So in reference to the above heading… how to make it, while doing it all?

1. Prioritise

2. Decide on your goals, and what is important to you

3. Forget about sleep. It can wait.

The Difference

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I can’t remember exactly what quote it was that inspired my thought. Come to think of it though, upon searching through images on my phone, it may have been this one:

“The integral part of being a star is having the will to win. All the champions have it.” – Betty Cuthbert.

The thought came to me so clearly, I knew instantly it was true. I shared my musings with Hubbie that night.

What do all successful people have in common? They never gave up.*

It is so simple. Define successful, you say. Well, my definition of success comes from a state of achieving that what you want. Success then, comes from not giving up, from perseverance, from having the drive to keep going NO MATTER WHAT. No matter what the people say, no matter what society says, no matter what odds or obstacles are thrown in your direction. Despite everything, choosing to go forward and pursue your dreams, despite everything, and everyone.

To live life the way you want to, I also consider, success.

What do you define as your success? How far will you go to get it?

The next question would naturally be, how important it is to you…

(*Smikg – I’ll be in that group soon).

Food for thought on writing

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The challenge isn’t in trying to write when your circumstances back you. The challenge isn’t in trying to find the time, the opportunity, the inspiration or the drive, when you’re in the mood.

When your geared up on coffee, had a couple of glasses of red, or sitting by the window on a rainy day, your muse will come. In fact, in those instances, your muse will be waiting for you to jump on the writing train. The words will flow and the ideas will spring to mind faster than your fingers have the time to get them out. This is me, most of the time.

The challenge comes when you don’t have a 1 hour block (or 2, or 3 hours, however you work) to get into a real writing flow. The challenge comes when you’re tired, when you’re sick. When you’re just not feeling like it, when the ideas fail you. The biggest one for me, is when I’m sad. Anger drives me, frustration gets me writing furiously, but sadness…. This is a hard obstacle between me and my writing.

But I remind myself, this separates the real writers from the occasional writers. And I don’t want to be ‘occasional.’ I want to be there, on cue, always, showing up.

Besides, if I rely on the unpredictability of Melbourne weather, those rainy spells only really last for 5 minutes at a time, so yeah.

Write for life.

Scared to go Asleep

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S.J. WATSON – Before I Go To Sleep

“I would have a day of grief and pain, would remember what I miss, but it would not last. Before long I would sleep and, quietly, forget. How easy that would be (…) So much easier than this.”

That is one of the terrifying concepts explored in this exceptional thriller. What do you do when every morning you wake up, and can’t remember how you got there, what is going on, and who that man is in your bed?

Christine Lucas is a 47 year-old woman who deals with this extraordinary scenario, every single day. Having had an ‘accident’ that eventually developed into amnesia, she is unable to form new memories, as well as remember ones that have occurred in the last couple of decades. Her memory is wiped clean when she falls asleep, and on many days not only wakes thinking she is still a teenager, but also a child.

The horror of not remembering the last 20-30 years of your life I just find unimaginable. But the terrors don’t stop there. Oh no. Watson in his first novel, delivers a fine range of mind-f^&king shocks that make you truly feel sick, and lonely.

*What do you do when you can’t remember anything? How can you trust your mind, any memories that do come to you, when your mind has already failed you?
*How do you blindingly trust someone that you can’t remember?
*How do you deal when sudden and faint memories don’t match up with what you’re being told?
*And like the above opening line, what happens when you do remember something, but the pain is so harsh and frightening, that you’d rather forget it all ever happened?

The events that start to set things in motion for Christine is the presence of Dr. Nash, a neuropsychologist she’s started seeing in secret, and a journal she begins to keep in order to help her remember who she is, when she wakes each day. Her meetings with him are a series of tests to help strengthen and test her mind, to see whether there are any remainders of memory left in there, while her journal serves as a great narrative tool, not only propelling the story forward with its presence during most of the book, but it assists Christine by helping her to discover and compare what she is told day by day. Is an amnesiac a good person to take advantage of, when you know their memory fails them every morning? Hell yeah.

I learnt of this book a couple of years ago, from a work friend, who told me his mate in the UK had had his debut novel picked up and was going to be turned into a movie. Yep, a friend of a friend. Pretty cool. I didn’t get to pick up a copy at the time, but having returned from maternity leave and my work colleague asked if I’d gotten to it, I decided now was as good a time as any, buying it within a few days. It is, or recently was out in cinemas, with actors like Nicole Kidman and Colin Firth starring… you may have heard of those names. 🙂 The casting of certain actors actually made me change my opinions of some of those in the book, as it is quite common that actors have a certain reputation, and usually fit in quite nicely into the role of good-guy, bad-guy, avenger, or the romantic lead, to name a few. The casting of Colin Firth as Ben, Christine’s husband, threw me off what I was reading, but that’s all I will say. No I won’t. I’ll go as far as to say that I accidentally read the last line of the novel, and was spewing because I was only half-way through the book. But even that, although very clear, wasn’t what ended up happening as I expected, to some degree, even though the last line, and who says it, is fairly telling – BUT DON’T READ IT!

(How do you accidentally read the last line of a book? I do this thing whenever I start reading a book and get right into it, where I want to know how many pages there are and how far I’ve come in comparison… further to the look-at-the-book-from-the-top-and-see-how-far-the-bookmark-travels-through-the-spine thing I continuously do as I’m reading, I flick to the last page, and try to find the page number while trying to keep my absurdly insane and curious but don’t-wanna-know-any-spoilers contradictory eyes AWAY from the contents in the middle of the page. This time I failed. Hard when the page number was just below the last line. Damn)

It’s a fantastic premise, with real life amnesiacs having been the inspiration behind Watson’s idea. The twists and turns keep coming, and the hooks arrive quickly keeping you glued to the pages, as you’re just waiting, hoping that Christine discovers what she needs to know about her past, the broken pieces that will help her piece it all together. The last 80 or so pages I read in one go, as I just had to know how the book ended and couldn’t go to sleep until I did.

I’ve always thought of my parents and the older generation, and how it must feel for them, to know the things they know, and want to do some others, but be unable to because of their age. A young mind in an old body. This is Christine’s realisation when she wakes every day, and she sets about her day coming-to-terms with what she learns, reading her diary, and making decisions… only for it all to be reset the next day.

That’s tough. I did find it amusing how every day Christine had to read what she wrote previously, as well as write in her journal. It would take forever I thought, but it was something Watson thought of with mentions of her just skimming through certain sections. Lucky. He covered himself there.

It’s a scary thought though. There is one deliberate mention, where Christine comes back to her journal after writing of her intention to go out with Ben. She writes:

“I cannot say. I didn’t write it down and do not remember, despite it being only a few hours ago. Unless I ask Ben it is lost completely. I feel like I am going mad.”

Having to rely on others, who can be unreliable, or your journal, which if lost or you fail to write in it you have nothing to rely on, is a very lonely and scary concept. You are truly alone, with only yourself, yet no memories to back you up.

I loved his metaphorical mentions, external descriptions that expressed the real undertones happening below the surface, reminding me of what I try to do in my novels. Christine has just discovered a shocking secret and is looking at the TV:

“A remote-controlled submersible craft was exploring an underwater trench with jerky twitches.”

There is sadness too, not just with Christine wanting to forget some things she’s learnt, but with the thought: how does your family deal with you? How difficult would it be for your loved ones, if you were scared of them every day, and they had to talk you through your history, every single morning? A very sad thought emerges when Christine is having dinner out with Ben one night, and when he says he loves her, she doesn’t respond. He says “I know you don’t love me,” and Christine later thinks:

“He is a stranger. Love doesn’t happen in the space of twenty-four hours, no matter how much I might once have liked to believe that it does.”

Christine’s point-of-view is written in a very spell-it-out fashion, but I believe this is so due to the case at point – amnesia making her want to record everything, and not miss a thing. Watson’s ability to write on some very telling matters, in specific scenes, like a woman, is impressive. It makes me think he had a real good go-to girl for those points. Either that or he’s a superb transporter.

The one thing that wasn’t explored, also the one thing my cousin asked after I told her about the book, was the thought of trying to stay awake. One thought I intermittently had was why doesn’t she try to stay awake? I guess there was nothing too pressing to stay awake for, but wouldn’t it be something you’d want to test? If your memory was wiped clean every morning, would you perhaps consider only letting yourself sleep a couple of hours, to see how your memory responded then, and then only have short bursts of sleep to get through the day? I try to stay awake when I have a million jobs to do, let alone if I knew my memories would be gone the next morning!

The surprises and shocks keep-a-coming, way after you think they’ve stopped… so beware. My notes all over the second half of the book reveal how many radical theories I had, and I started to very subtly guess at what ended up eventuating, with one other main thought/hope coming true. Even so, I was on the edge of my bed every step of the way.

One line towards the end of the book, one question… it equals Terror. Pure Terror. I remember the hairs on my body standing.

Must read thriller!

Please let me know your thoughts on Before I Go To Sleep in the comments below, I would love to discuss with you 🙂

Up in Lights

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I just had a weird thing happen. I just saw the title of my yet-unpublished-bound-to-happen book as part of a title of a television series.

It was, without saying too much, only kind of, yet exactly the same as my title, though there is another section to my book title that wasn’t there, as simultaneously there was something in the TV series title that is not in mine.

Still. I just kind of stared, letting the image of the name burn into me, recognising that the name is there, out there, in television land, in this other medium, in a media form as such… it exists.

Just not as mine. Not attributed to me. Not yet.

Writing about Yourself

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Writers are a bit of a self-indulgent bunch. I came across this realisation, properly, whilst talking to a work colleague. I was talking about the book I’m reading “Before I go to Sleep,” and in the same conversation was telling him that he MUST watch the new movie “Gone, Girl,” that Hubbie and I had watched over the weekend. Freaking trippy it was.

Anyway. It occurred to me. Here is the main character of Sleep book, Christine, who discovers herself to have amnesia to the point that her memory is pretty much wiped clean, bar some odd earlier memories, EVERY SINGLE DAY. In the part that I’m currently up to, she discovered on one such day, that she used to be a writer. Case 1 in point.

In Gone, Girl, both main characters are writers too. Case 2 in point. It got me thinking, and though I can’t recall any to mind I just KNOW I’ve read/heard other stories where writers write about a writer as one of, or their sole, lead character.

Other similar examples spring to mind. Stephen King’s Misery, where a writer has a car accident and is found in the situation to be held hostage by a crazed fan of his works until he rewrites his latest book to the ending of her choice. That is about a writer, albeit a writer’s nightmare.

J.K. Rowling made Harry Potter’s birthday the same as her own. And in a different medium, the cartoonist Matt Groening, named the main characters of The Simpsons after members of his own family: his parents were Homer and Margaret, and his sisters were Lisa and Maggie.

There’s a little bit of a perception that writer’s shy away from the public eye, they don’t crave the attention or perform outlandish acts, dress in bizarre outfits and get drunk at the corner hotel only to take home a prostitute at 2am on a Saturday night and get snapped by paparazzi, like other entertainers out there. That’s not really the norm you see of people in this profession, and yet still, they’re putting their stamp, their mark on their work, in the most subtle and natural way they know how.

Through their characters.

I think it’s bloody fantastic. In fact you can expect to find me in all of the characters of my book.

Writers are doing it for themselves

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Better to write for yourself and have no public, than to write for the public and have no self.
– Cyril Connolly.

Cyril was an English writer that penned the above quote, which I can’t help but wholeheartedly agree with. Although the task, the goal for a writer is to have his writings read, it is not necessarily the same as having his writings AGREED with.

Once you are concerned with the public, and what they think, and what they will like… your voice is lost. This is one of the hardest realisations I’ve had to fight against since beginning this public blogging process. Before this blog, I had an anonymous blog that was quite frankly, fantastic. I wrote about whatever I wanted, with very little censorship, because I knew out there, no one knew me. I didn’t promote it and I didn’t care. I had 3 followers, and I don’t even think they followed me all too passionately – it suited me just fine, knowing I could say whatever the hell I liked.

It’s a very different ball game now. I think of discussions and ideas and issues, and some sadly have falled to the wayside over my fear of ‘what will happen when I press the publish button?’

Fiction isn’t as hard to stay true to. Because you are creating a pretend world, even if you are expressing your thoughts through your characters, the end product is that your protagonist thinks that, not you.

In bloggerville, your blog = YOU. There’s no getting around that fact.

The answer? I don’t think there is one truth for all writers. It all depends on what kind of writer you want to be. Do you want to please the masses with your safe expressions, or do you want to be revolutionary and in the process be slaughtered for your frankness?

Or do you wanna dance in the middle, giving them all some pleasure, and some pain?

I’m going to try my damndest to not give a shit, all while dancing away from the pitch-forks…

Take a walk in my shoes, Baby

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Today I’m tapping my fingers together in cheeky anticipation, Montgomery Burns of Simpsons-fame style:

Excellent.

While I’m at work, Hubbie has the entire week off, so he is doing the looking after baby girl duties.

Changing nappies.
Feeding.
Cleaning up.
Preparing meals.
Rocking to sleep.
Amusement and Play.
EVERYTHING.

🙂

My happiness is two-fold. One is attributed to the fact that I am so comfortable in the knowledge that she will be at home with her Dad, bonding with him, and because he is my Hubbie, of course as with many things he and I do things the same in our house, and I don’t have to worry about other people coming in to look after her and doing things different.

It’s a comfort thing.

The second has to do with the ‘let’s see how you do it’ approach. I am so fortunate to have a husband who is truly understanding and accepting of how hard it can be to get anything done during the day, even though at times I’m ‘just’ at home, all day. He won’t ask, but I find myself explaining why –

dinner is late/the house is a mess/I haven’t burnt the cds he’s wanted for 2 months/the laundry is drying all over the house 2 weeks after the fact

again and again and again. And the most common phrase out of my mouth is “be quiet, I don’t want her to wake up,” more common than your everyday usual “hi’s” and “bye’s”.

I am gaining so much satisfaction sitting here at work, wondering how he is tackling the looking after baby duties whilst getting everything else done.

Tee hee hee.

Just yesterday we had this convo:

Me: “You’ll have to do the grocery shopping tomorrow.”

Hubbie: “But I’m looking after baby girl.”

Me (with raised eyebrows): “so does that mean I don’t ever have to cook and clean when I look after her?”

(Another moment later on).

Me (breaking down baby girl’s schedule): “And then you feed her, and change her nappy…”

Hubbie: “So when do I do the shopping?”

Me (smiling with obvious glee): “in between changing her nappy and lunch. Everything you do has to work around HER.”

Excellent.

Despite my clear joy at Hubbie doing my usual job today, I am truly rapt with the arrangement, and I think to myself that this could really work: me working, while Hubbie looks after baby girl.

I don’t know if I’m looking forward to the end-of-day report from Hubbie (mischievous anticipation), his holiday vibe rubbing off on me (because who doesn’t love time off), whether it’s the recent re-introduction of alcohol into my life (last night’s red wine still in the system) or this morning’s coffee (coursing through my veins), but, all things considered, life is feeling pretty freaking good right now.

🙂 🙂 🙂

The Happiness Project says that one instance of happiness derives from the state of learning, discovery, growth. It’s the journey, not the destination, and boy are we on the journey of a lifetime right now.

This is life, and we’re living it.

Ahh. The over-analytical life of an aspiring writer.

Freedom, the ugly face of

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I’ve recently come to the terrifying realisation that I can do whatever I want.
It’s rather an odd thing to be fearful of, isn’t it? Don’t get me wrong, I am no ‘natural’ pessimist: I am a self-proclaimed glass half-full gal, I’m infinitely inspired by the beauty of nature and stunningly warm days (of which a plentiful amount of posts will be subject of here no doubt), and just in general I like to smile, have fun, go out and socialise. The ability to do whatever it is I want to do should be something desirable, especially from a person of positive nature. It should be a good thing, right?
Lately I’ve been thinking a lot about my future career goals. A lot. Doing-my-head-in A LOT. Having been on maternity leave for 10 months, I really don’t want to go back to my old job. The reasons?:
– I need a change
– I don’t see myself moving up in that field
– I want a more flexible workload, work that can fit in around me and my family’s needs
– I want part-time work (and I don’t know if my old employer can offer it)
– I promised myself I’d never go back.

That last line was what I said to myself on my last day there, as I entered into my year-long maternity leave. It’s no secret to people that know me: I want to write for a living. It’s my love, it’s my passion, and it so conveniently ties in with the lifestyle and the life that I want to live.

Do I go back to my old job, requesting part-time work, or do I move onto other, more flexible projects… like the direct sales position I’ve been researching?
I never in a million years dreamed that I would want to go into direct selling. But it fulfils my ‘flexible life’ requirements, it means I’d be my own boss (and don’t we all want that?) and I’d actually be promoting a product that’s been popping in and out of my head for years, something I’m actually genuinely passionate about.
Look, my old work may just tell me they have no part-time positions… I’m kind of hoping they do. Because then they’ve made up my mind for me. That’s what it is I’m looking for you see. A sign. A universal sign that will tell me which path to go down… the old familiar path working part-time at my old job, or the new, more flexible path promoting a product I know nothing about in strangers homes, while also continuing my writing dream in my other spare time?

Yes, I could write in my spare time at my old job too. But, but, but… I’m looking for excuses. I think my time there is up. I just need to be sure. I need to get a sign that this is it, and I’m making the right decision.

I’m so scared of making the wrong decision. Either way.