(I Haven't Made It Yet) Why I've Given Up On Big Visions - Ep 8

Big visions drive me. I've always had big ideas, whatever role I'm in. Mixed Attainment Maths curriculums in teaching, building a community of single women to end loneliness, and changing the way the world thinks through podcast, and those are just the career ones! 

And sometimes life demands come into play, and in the interest of doing at least one of them well, we end up having to give up on some of our big dreams and visions to make way for new aspirations to unfold.

It isn't just about the work I do, but also the other big ideas I've had to change direction on, and how my life has evolved over the past five years. 

Whatever I choose to do, I'm committed to making a difference—one small step at a time, holding my values of creativity, connection and fun at the core of everything I do.

Join me to learn why it's more than okay to give up on those dreams sometimes, whether that's forever or just on pause.

Want to start a podcast? Download the FREE Podcast Starter Checklist, a 15-point guide created specifically for entrepreneurs, life coaches and course creators.

Music by Kadien: Instagram | Spotify | SoundCloud

Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:00

Giving up on big visions is as important as creating and going after big visions.

Speaker 1: 0:09

In episode number four of I Haven't Made it Yet, I spoke about the big vision that I have. What's your big vision and how big vision has driven me to be on this path of what I'm looking for in life, and it comes through an entrepreneurship and business and making moves that I've made in order to start getting there and working towards that. But thinking about it just now, and on reflection of reading or listening to I'm an audio book listener more than a reader at the moment, even though I find that reading allows me to take it in more. But after listening to chapter three of ten times is easier than two times, or ten x is easier than two times, never quite sure how we're saying it it made me realise that I've been doing a lot that was in alignment with that book, that you have to say goodbye to 80% of the stuff to really focus on 20% of stuff, and when I'm growing this current business very much moving towards that and I've spoken about that concept moving from self-employed to business owner a number of times now. But also in doing that I realised that giving up on big visions, at certain points is necessary to pursue the other visions that form as a result of you being in those original visions. Sometimes they're completely given up on unreturnable, sometimes they're on pause and sometimes their evolutions that move, but when you really look back, the whole vision has changed. So I was thinking about this in a number of different ways and we find it really hard to give up on those visions that we've already created and I think the easiest one we can relate to with this one and that I will share and shared it all the time on.

Speaker 1: 1:58

Single girls go to life. But that is my previous relationship, the one in which I ended up getting married and after a year of marriage but having been together seven years and don't don't even go there with the seven year rich. But I know you're gonna say it anyway, but we ended it. I ended it, or initiated that conversation at the very least, and I realised that that vision that I had created wasn't one that I wanted anymore. I didn't feel I had created it, maybe myself, exactly that whole idea that we're given, this idea of what life should look like, what we should go after, and I think in your late teens and early 20s, and that can extend beyond that, but it's very prominent at that time. It's quite cookie-cutter, it's quite fit the model and follow those steps, which I did. But to me, that vision wasn't my own. I really felt that there was an element that I needed to make that vision myself and I wanted to start from zero. I really, really wanted a clean slate of like I just want to go back to the start and start over. Not that this is horrendous, but I just don't think I'm gonna be able to work out what I really want whilst I have any anything in my life a partner, a house. I didn't mind the pets, admittedly, even though that they were not taken from me, but I didn't have access to them. But it needed a reset. I needed to go to zero, to go right, wait, what is it that I want? And to create this new vision. And there's this uncertainty when you go back into that scenario.

Speaker 1: 3:39

So ending a relationship that had been there for the existence, of being 18 and a half years old, through to 26 or so and maybe 25, I can't remember now and then going back home, moving home. I hadn't gone back home properly since university. I even spent the last year of uni, living out of home but with my partner, and it was weird to do that bit, and so I had to work all of that out and I think I'm quite lucky that it still happened to me in my 20s, mid 20s, essentially. They got to make that realization to have not had children and to get to go. Oh, hang on right, I don't know what this is all about. I'm going to try and work it out and that's where this whole journey of personal development I mean reading every book under the sun came from exploring my past, deciding where certain patterns came from and then working out what my values are, my values that drive me and what I want to see in my life. But I had to give up on that vision that I initially had to do that, and we find that incredibly hard in relationships because we've invested a lot of time and energy into this person, into this situation and what's it really going to be like when they go.

Speaker 1: 4:49

Now, another scenario where a vision had to be given up on was not just the relationship and what I saw happening for the future for that, but was then as a result of doing all of this kind of reset. I thought certain things that I had a vision for were going to stay the same. I was pretty adamant I was going to stay in my job. I was very happy with what was going on. Teaching was great, going to move up, going to keep doing that. And unfortunately, it was only inevitable in the reality that I had to deal with the imminent things, the things that were coming up first the housing situation, what I wanted for dating experiences, finding out who I felt I was in terms of identity and values and what mattered most to me. It was only inevitable that at some point, career and work and what filled my time would be part and parcel of that process. And despite little inklings of things, little references, I said like, oh, I'm going to do that, but in the teaching world, I'm going to do that and bring that in. You could see it starting to trickle its way in with maybe the maybe this working setup isn't for me. And obviously COVID had an effect on lots of people, which was.

Speaker 1: 6:08

I know that many experienced this remote work, flexible work. I can confirm that as a teacher, I had had about a two month experience of that and from that point on I was back. From the May half term I was back in the office. I was in person doing stuff in a school. Were we socially distanced? There was probably some provision at times very blurry nowadays because once we were back in the September we had bubbles and stuff and hand sanitizing but we had 30 children in a classroom and I was at the front. Like.

Speaker 1: 6:42

My experience of COVID is, as far as I'm concerned, very different to many others, unless you were a teacher or any kind of NHS worker, I suppose. But we were not at home remote working for very blooming long at all, unfortunately. So mine actually came as a result of having an operation, having time off of work, because I actually worked throughout COVID. I was part of your key worker system. I was developing lessons for classes of 200 odd children, coordinating that and running some of them myself live on Zoom.

Speaker 1: 7:16

But mine actually came in this in the same way that I think many people had that realization during that time. I didn't get that chance to because I just didn't and I was solid working. I didn't actually have any space for creativity. We were knee deep in how are we going to get any provision up for these kids and it was great problem solving but it didn't give me any introspective time really that I think other people may have got. My time came when I was recovering from my operation and was signed off, initially just for four weeks, I think, but extended after that in basically into the summer holidays. So that then gave me sort of almost a full 12 weeks away from this working life, which I'd thoroughly enjoyed but had ultimately kept me distracted and I dabbled in the business stuff prior, but came to the realization that if I was gonna do this properly, I had to give up teaching.

Speaker 1: 8:10

And I don't miss teaching, I still do it. So I'm not completely out of it and what I do now is still teaching. It's just adult education in some way. It still has very similar elements. Obviously I don't treat the people that I teach like children, but I don't teach the children I teach like children either. They're young adults. But I miss some of the team that I work with. I think that's my biggest one, because people are the most important element to me in that they create the connection that you get in life, one of my values being connection and I was more upset about losing the opportunity to work with certain people than I was really losing the opportunity of working in school or in a particular place.

Speaker 1: 8:54

I believed in the vision we had there and I was upset to give up on that. But if I hadn't given up on that, I hadn't dropped that vision and that I arguably you could say dream I wouldn't be in the position I'm in today. And you can go. Well, you'll never know what would have happened if you stayed. Oh boy, I know what would have happened because I'm watching it occur. Now I'm watching the other people that I left behind that I was disappointed to be losing contact with, also leaving too.

Speaker 1: 9:19

So this is not, it wasn't a wrong move. It was very much the right move and I I had my instinct exactly the right time to go. You need to get out of here a sap, and the longer you're here then the worst is gonna get, and I'm glad I essentially what I call jump shipped at the time that I did and I had to give up a lot in that, not just that vision, but like the money I went from a very comfortable salary for a single person living on their own it was just just around 50k and went to a very uncertain number. I literally had no work beyond that and I was like, well, I'm gonna try for three months to work out what I was gonna do. Wasn't gonna get a job in social media? Was I gonna get a part-time job in teaching? That she didn't know what I was gonna do. I hadn't really thought that far ahead and thought that I'll just work this out when I get to it.

Speaker 1: 10:13

The reality of it wasn't too bad because the supply suddenly appeared and that became an option. I'd signed up to be an Amazon Flex driver. I'll talk about that some other time. I'm still a bit far away that. Now it feels like I've done it for a long time. I haven't done it for over a year now, but that was exciting.

Speaker 1: 10:27

But I had to give up that security and go solo and I had to give up all of that routine and that vision of. I had a vision for mixed attainment mass. I still have it. And then comes the other final time, which I think a lot of you might resonate with if you've gone through this experience. But I had to give up on the vision of Chantel the coach, the single girls club, the single girls guide to life at one point and that one is the one that's on pause, just like I suppose you could argue that I still have dreams to support mixed attainment maths and that's kind of on pause and less of a priority.

Speaker 1: 11:05

But since then I've developed more visions, like I want to develop a whole PSHE curriculum, because I now teach PSHE most more than anything else at the moment, and even just based on some conversation I had with some pupils today, they're like why do you not do our assemblies? Like well, because I'm kind of just a supply teacher in the context of the school. Yes, I have a lot of awareness of social issues and I'll communicate them to you in very fair ways. I'll listen to your point of view. I'll do those good things. So I would love to design something and then train people up or have a whole program that trains people up. I just don't know how much for priority is for people, but that's one of my new visions and my other vision.

Speaker 1: 11:42

If you've been following on Instagram for any length of time, you'll know that I desperately, desperately want a dog. But also I'm very aware that that's not a circumstance I can create for myself right now and I can tell you now that's in the big vision right to have a dog at some point. I've had one before, rip Mitzi, and I want to have one again, but I can't. So you might have seen that in the interim I sponsor animals on Danaha Danaha RSPCA, I believe, is a branch of in Braintree and therefore do it that way. But one of my new biggest visions is to one day I don't know the exact setup not run the animal sanctuary but basically fund one, or you know be the very significant part of that. So whether I am just a fundraiser for one, a significant donor, or actually set one up, I don't know, but there's something there that drives that.

Speaker 1: 12:34

Not just to have an animal myself, that's not big enough. I love the idea of having an animal, I love the idea of having multiple, but if I'm going to make real change, then I want to do things like that. And these big visions I mean ultimately I can't do them all, certainly not all at the same time. I have to think about the ones that are most prominent, to making everything else happen as a set of dominoes, and I have to leave certain visions and put them on pause. But that also includes one that I was very passionate and still remain passionate about, which is Chantel the coach, and working against loneliness across the board, because I think it feeds much of our depression, the issues that we have in society with depression even teaching that recently to pupils we were watching some clips of Stormzy, oli Alexander and James Arthur talking about, and the latter two both specified that they, at certain points in time, when they were experiencing mental illnesses and moments of ill mental health, expressed that they didn't feel like they belonged, and that, to me, remains quite precious, because I think when you're single, you can feel like an outsider to the couples, the way that society treats you.

Speaker 1: 13:46

You don't feel like you're worthy, and what does that feed then? This whole lack of self-confidence, self-belief, and what does that make you potentially prone to feeling more depressed or anxious about your life? What's going to happen in the future? How your life is now? Is it always going to stay that way? And as much as it pains me to do it, I didn't have the business model set up and I need to still work on that one to make that work, because to me that's vital as much as the animals matter too. That's really important still. So it's on the list, but to do it and to follow the other intuition that I have, it's to build this big vision now of what I can build out here. And okay, maybe I didn't have my business model sorted on this one.

Speaker 1: 14:30

Round two. Here we go. We've learned a lot more. Let's go again. Let's get the business model sorted, let's come up with it better this time and actually let's empower other people to have their podcasts and maybe they can help address loneliness all across the board, not just for single women, but for other groups of people, whether it's mums that feel lonely, men that feel lonely, whatever it might be. And actually maybe there's someone that wants to share a podcast about animal cruelty and adopting animals and can do that bit too. The more people that I can support to create their own podcasts, the more good there is and changing the world.

Speaker 1: 15:02

Even if I don't directly get to see that and don't know what impact I'm having indirectly, it's that domino effect in a different way. So if you're ever in a predicament where you're thinking I've got to give up so much to move forward with something else, sometimes that's necessary. It's just as important to give up those big visions sometimes for other intriguing big visions that are more prominent, more pressing, more urgent to be done. Now I'm 30 years old, I'm hoping. I'm hoping that I get to fulfill multiple of those big dreams and keep dreaming up even more new ones, with the aim of fulfilling as many of them as possible within the time that I have, and even if I just get to do one, that I'll be magnificent and anything else is a bonus. It can feel hard when you're giving up on a vision, but I have so far learnt that, in order to achieve the biggest visions that you're after, you sometimes have to give up on the original big visions that you've left.