Sometimes in life it feels like a set of circumstances collide in a way that was never part of your plan and it can create so many difficult emotions.
This is exactly where I have found myself in the first half of 2025. Redundancy on the horizon, being unable to face the toxic environment of work, husband being unable to drive due to a new diagnosis of epilepsy alongside so many other elements of life that I would normally take in my stride.
Work has always been a massive part of me, strange to many people I know but when I made a decision 35 years ago that I would be a full time working mum that started a journey. With a few rare exceptions I have loved working and had no plans to stop working anytime soon. I love the people, the achievements, the constant learning and supporting others to grow.
That love had disappeared in recent years confirming so much of what I know about the negative impact toxic environments and appalling leadership can have. In February 2025 I sat broken and knew I had to walk away. I had been put at risk of redundancy (the circumstances are another blog as it’s still too painful) and I felt totally lost. My confidence was rock bottom and I couldn’t see a way forward. As a 58 year old woman I knew only too well the cards were stacked against me in a world full of bias.
Deep down I knew I had to find a positive way forward. I slowly reached out to people who had been a massive impact on me at key points in my career. We met for coffee, walks and an occasional cake. They provided beautiful spaces to reflect and consider what next. Sat in The Green Estate in Sheffield was definitely a turning point as I took in the view and listened to the birds, I started to believe.
Everybody reminded me of the things I had achieved and confirmed my worst fears. I had spent too long in an environment that had stopped letting me be me so I was no longer able to add any value.
This along with spending time on my own thinking, walking, listening, watching and reading provided an amazing opportunity. How often do we just let our mind go where it wants? I started to dream of the perfect job, the way I wanted to spend my time, the things that make me happy and the things that I love.
There were some clear leaders in the list:
- Family
- Close Friends
- Walking Max the dog
- Football especially Womens and Disability
- Community Projects especially the Knitting and Crochet Group (maybe another blog)
- Learning
These were all expected and others could have probably written the list for me but there was something else slowly building inside. I had started to enjoy writing poetry, poems had been appearing from nowhere in recent years. I had started to share them more publicly and had even used one for the abstract of my dissertation during a recent period of study. I started to think about the impact they had. People had laughed and cried when they read or heard the words, the impact was much greater than writing loads of text or waffling on for ages. I started to think about the power of poems in a range of situations and how they could be used more widely. At this stage I parked it as just that – a thought.
As the weeks off work got longer and it became harder I knew I needed a project to get my mind working and my confidence growing. On one of my many walks I started thinking about writing a book but what could I write a book on was the question I kept coming back to. It was another thought among so many.
Slowly as I talked to more people, started working with a coach and importantly gave myself time my set of random thoughts started to join together. What if I could publish a book of poems on the subject that I loved but had created me so much personal pain – Leadership.
Leadership is a massive subject with millions of books on the subject, research across the world and many a discussion in a place close to you. How could I make it stand out. I went back to the things I have really enjoyed over my career and top of the list was chairing a Womens Network. This was the final piece of the jigsaw, why not write a book with a group of women to share their thoughts on leadership, what is their heart telling them about leadership.
It felt so right and at last I had something to make me want to get out of bed in a morning.
A poem in your heart was born!
It was now time to work out how to make the dream a reality.