Here i go again

“I don’t know where I’m going but I sure know where I’ve been” (Whitesnake)

Recently I have found myself using words, phrases and language that seem very alien to me and my image of who I am, one of these is “My journey”. I have found that I have used this often in the last five months and it has become a bye phrase for what I am trying to achieve.

The question for today is “What is my journey?”

Damn, I have asked myself a tough one.  Short answer, to be who I want to be. A Cliché? maybe but in short it is the foundation of all I am doing. It is shaping my thoughts and actions and building the first part of my journey, the focus on self-discovery and self-improvements.

Now to a lot of people, this would seem irrelevant as that has always been their focus, not me.  For the last couple of years, all I wanted to do was exist to get through the day and maybe find one that didn’t suck and hopefully hate myself a little bit less in the process.  “Hate myself less” seems a strange concept but it was my core focus when I started therapy 2 years ago. I couldn’t hate myself any more than I did right then, and I was aware that this self-hate was shaping me and everything I was doing, which had to change for me to continue. Slowly piece by piece I have been chipping away at this hate of me. It is a slow, difficult process, so much to change, so many thoughts to correct, so many things in me that I need to improve. It is hindered by my mental health and personality issues; however, I am slowly changing, slowly improving, baby step by baby step and recently I had one big change that is shaping my future.  I mention it at the end of my post Getting fixed.  For the first time in 2 years, I see a future and want a future.

Part of this has come after a conversation in the safe room of therapy where I came to the realisation that I wanted to change my career path, I wanted to do something that would give me more self-worth and also give back to others who needed help.

I have always found myself drawn to be a listening ear to those that need it. In the army, I had two jobs that were very much based on the model of listening to those that need help then assisting and signposting them to get that help.  The military call this “soldier welfare” I recently described it as mental health triage.  Never focusing on the individual for too long but listening and assessing them before passing them on to the right care path whilst monitoring their care.  It was a job that had real highs and real lows, but one constant was that I knew I was helping people and this made me feel better about myself. There was a downside, despite having done nearly 4 years in this field, the Army is what it is had never given me any training and I had zero qualifications to use outside of the army.

This brings me nicely to the second part of my journey.  To switch career paths, I need to retrain and qualify as a counsellor, not a short journey but one that, I have taken the first steps of. In September I started my level 2 in counselling skills.  This was a course that I didn’t think would give me much, something that I didn’t think needed to do, boy was I wrong.

The course was an eyeopener it gave me insight to me as a listener and helper. I meet and made friends with some wonderful like-minded people.  There were sessions on Egan’s and other counselling skills and all of this and more confirmed that it was a path I wanted to follow.  Step one on that path was completed in January and I am now waiting to have confirmation of a place on a level 3 course in September.

My journey on a new career path has helped focus me on my personal development, it has given me a reason to be. As with all Journeys I know this one isn’t going to be easy, it is going to have twists and turns, ups and downs.  I will have my focus and drive challenged but I believe that the journey is worth it.  It is worth it because I want to change.  As the late great David Bowie sang “Turn and face the strange (Ch ch ch ch changes) Just gonna have to be a different man”. A different man is the goal. A man that I can hopefully like. One that I want to call me.