I’ve never experienced a year remotely similar to this one. Over the past twelve months, I have faced new challenges and opportunities but being honest not only am I still standing I’m actually a better person for them so here are my 3 lessons I’m taking with me as we head into 2023.

If You Love What You Do, You’ll Never Work A Day In Your Life

”The only way to do great work is to love what you do,” Steve Jobs

If you asked me why I love my job, I could go on and on about how mental health is my passion, how rewarding it is to make a real difference in people’s lives or how I believe it is what I am here to do…. My Purpose. I feel genuinely fortunate to make a living where I can use my own journey with mental health to help others and be surrounded by good, decent, like-minded people that focus on empowerment and lifting people up.

This wasn’t always the case, though, and like many others I did jobs purely because “they paid the bills“. For 10 long years I worked in cooperate offices tapping numbers into a spreadsheet for 9 hours a day and I can tell you the difference is life changing.

As soon as we discover that personal connection then work stops being a job. It becomes a source of inspiration and we find we are able to inspire those around us. Ultimately, it’s about our time and how we choose to spend it so why choose to spend it doing something we hate?

Keep The Good Ones And Let The Bad Ones Drift Away

My personal life over the last few years has changed quite a lot, specifically the people in it and although I’m not totally comfortable with all the changes I’ve made I do understand the reasons behind them.

If you want to know the reason, it was a realization I made that the people in my life, both family and friends might not always want the best for me and in fact they might often bring out the worst in me….. And if this was to be true what impact was it having on my life?

Well….. Nothing good that’s for damn sure.

So a decision was made to focus on quality and not quantity. If I wanted to succeed and be happy both professionally and personally I needed to be surrounded by those that also wanted that… so regardless of the self doubt and loneliness I felt I slowly started letting the bad ones drift away to focus on the good ones….. the good eggs.

And ultimately if the measure of a person is the people around them, then I’m happy with the choices I’ve made.

Own Who You Are

Happiness has only been a recent thing for me and although I can’t relate to my life being miserable me really being at peace with myself has only been a recent process. For a large part of my life I’ve been seen by some, and party by myself as a disappointment…. A guy of wasted opportunities looking in from the outside desperate to feel part of something…. To feel connected to something. What I now realize though is that I was never looking for acceptance from others I was looking for acceptance from myself.

……And in this process of understanding and accepting myself I have found health, happiness, meaning and purpose allowing me to look past people’s judgments and expectations to carve my own path in life.

I know who I am and why I’m here and I’m not afraid to show it, and ironically, after everything I have found connection and acceptance of others.

As we move into a new year, each of us is bound to encounter a fresh set of challenges that will test us but it will also bring us joy and laughter.

Remember life is our creation to make so dream big and keep going.

Rob xx