I’m not short and pithy like James — I write like I speak, so forgive this more verbose style if it isn’t your thing and settle in with a cuppa. This is a long piece of work.
It feels punchy to be writing about my own mental health since I work as a coach, and I worry that humanising myself in this way might make people think I can’t hold the space for them. That said, I think it’s more important to debunk the myth that any of us are free of this stuff, and to role model how we can be real people, with our own mental and physical health and still be able to hold space for others.
It used to be that when I talked about my mental health, I talked about stuckness. When I was leaving the world of democracy and human rights I used to be in, I felt so stuck in uncertainty and fear of making the wrong choice that I was paralysed, feeling like I couldn’t make any decisions in case it was the wrong one. Simultaneously — and anyone who has experienced this kind of stuckness will know exactly what I’m talking about — I felt time was like sand, pouring away through my fingers. Which meant it was even more important for me to make the right choice because I couldn’t waste any more time, which in turn dug me further into my stuckness because I didn’t know what the right choice was. Rinse and repeat.
That stuckness led to a whole host of things — not being able to make decisions about anything because everything felt so important, feeling anxious, not sleeping, waking up at night thinking, what the F am I doing with my life??, not going off and doing things I enjoyed because I felt like I needed to stay home and figure it out, not actually doing much with my time at all, feeling like no one else was grappling with this, not wanting to see friends or tell people because all I wanted to talk about was, ‘what the F am I doing with my life’, and yet that was the last thing I wanted to talk about because it triggered all of my fears.
Fundamentally I was pretty unhappy, even though I was doing all the things they say you’re supposed to do if you’re feeling depressed — running, meditating, journalling, listening to affirmations, making homemade granola. I even pickled olives — does anyone have any idea how time consuming pickling olives is when you live on a boat?? And yet not feeling better.
Now I could reel off how I ended up getting unstuck, which did happen — and how other people can too — and after working as a coach for the last two and half years, I know an awful lot about how people get unstuck. But that would be me moving away from talking about something that makes me feel a bit vulnerable in this context, and I want to honour all of the glorious and brave people I see through Sanctus who trust me enough to hold the space for them and show up fully, so I am going to trust you enough to hold it for me, even though it feels uncomfortable.
A few months back George and James said they’d like me to come on board to help them grow the coaching side of things at Sanctus. I was (and sometimes still am) terrified that I am SO not the right person for this job and that they (and all of you) will find me out as only mediocre and be disappointed that I’m not as good as they thought I was. That makes me want to hide that information away, not risk showing myself or trying, so that if I fail, if it doesn’t work out or I’m not particularly good, I can tell myself (and all of you) that I didn’t even really try.
What I’ve learned over the last few years is that in those moments where you want to hide some dark secret about yourself, the hiding doesn’t actually make it go away.
Without holding it up to the light of day to really get a good look, without being willing to share with other people, it can feel even more true, hold more power over you. Whenever I share or open up in a real way, risk being vulnerable — I open myself up to connection, and from that place I’m able to show up fully and actually start to accept myself as I am.
I have a coach, who I love, and who I’ve known for several years. And when I was looking for a coach to supervise me, at first I didn’t want her to coach me. I like her so much and so wanted her to like me and to think highly of me, I didn’t want her to see what a mess I can be on the other side — unsure, not that good, chaotic, always late — insert any idea about yourself here. My instinct was to hide the parts of me I don’t like away, as though that would make them less a part of me. I didn’t want to be messy around her — didn’t want her to see that I wasn’t whatever she might have thought of me from a distance, because I like and respect her, and I want her to like and respect me too.
In fact, hiding those bits away makes them grow to gigantic proportions, with nothing to counter them. What’s amazing is that through having to show the warts and messy bits, and being accepted and liked and thought well of even with them, I start to accept them a bit more too.
This is something I get to see on a daily basis through my work at Sanctus, but it’s so easy to forget when it’s your turn to show up. One of the things I love about being a coach is that you get to see how normal all of your own baggage is, and how its the imperfections in the wood that make us beautiful, whole, interesting, lovable creatures, not the lack of them.
When I notice the urge to hide whatever I think my inadequacies are from the other coaches, or from James or George or whoever else, I know that’s my ego talking. That actually, to not share what’s real for me would be stopping me from the thing I actually want — which is to connect, and on some level, to know that I’m ok, even with that stuff.
So voila — here’s a little radio signal from the shadows of one imperfect person hopefully to some others ;)
