Reflecting Progress

I've been preparing some handout notes for the journaling workshop during our reenergise weekend, and in the process I've been revisiting some of my own journals from the last couple of years.

At the start of 2007 I took a step back from the relentless promotion of my coaching business. It was beginning to exhaust me, and I began to feel my self-confidence flag.

I formed a new intention - to put goal setting and project planning to one side, and to get back in touch with the things that were, and still are, most important to me, and which made me feel most productive and fulfilled.

I was not surprised to discover that the thing that made me feel this way the most was writing. It didn't matter whether it was writing in my journal, or responding to thought provoking emails in online coaching communities, if I'd written a few hundred words in whatever medium I felt like I'd accomplished something. I felt calm, as if I'd brought of my best to a situation.

At this point my intention to open myself up to opportunities to do with the written word formed in my mind. I wouldn't set myself a goal, or write an aggressive plan of action, I would follow my curiosity, wait, observe and respond.

The clarity I had in the opening months of 2007 is marvellously captured in my journal from that time. Since then I've learned about the Law of Attraction, and, while I can't help scoffing a little bit at the sensationalism of The Secret, I feel on reflection that I was tuned in to that law without realising it at that time.

In two years the progress I have made as a writer is phenomenal: I'm now a freelance reporter, a prize-winning short story writer, parish magazine columnist, writers' group facilitator, journaling workshop leader - and there is so much more to come.

All through this transformation in my career from IT project manager to business owner and life coach, to writer, journalist and workshop facilitator I have kept my own journal by my side.

I would have done none of this without my notebook and pen - and reading back over the past couple of years I can't help but think that it's been a miraculous journey.