As I reflect on 2024 I’ve decided that my motto for the year in retrospect must have been Choose to Dare .. and then get the chance to Dare to Choose!
It’s been quite a year and I make no apologies for taking this December blog to reflect and share a bit more personally; there will still be some tips from me that I think can be helpful for any of us as we navigate life and work!
It’s actually the culmination of 3 years that leads me to where I am now.
Back in late 2021 I chose to dare to join an online dating site. That felt like a daring thing to do back then as a woman in her 50s. I met a man named Andy and we had our first date at the end of that year.
Fast forward to just over a year ago, and Andy proposed to me on New Year’s Eve at an 80s disco where the song playing was Queen’s ‘Won’t anybody find me somebody to love”. We are both Queen fans and one of the things that meant that we connected on the dating site was that Andy had written that he wished he had been able to see Freddie Mercury live with Queen … and I did, at Wembley when I was 17.
And my answer to the proposal? I chose to say ‘yes’.
From there, 2024 was a whirlwind. We were already looking to buy a house together and to both sell our individual houses, Andy’s in Cornwall, and mine in Wiltshire, to buy something in Somerset. It felt a little bit daring to up-root having lived in Wiltshire for the majority of my adult life, knowing that we would need to build connections, make friends, and navigate living together.
Andy was also qualifying in a new profession at the same time.
Those first few months were exciting and stressful in equal measure as we got closer to finally buying our home. We moved in June 2024.
I then wanted to join a hockey club but my inner voice was telling me ‘you aren’t very appealing to a club at your age’. I coached myself to consider an alternative assumption… ‘my experience and relative fitness would be welcomed’ and I dared to go along to a summer session at Bridgwater Hockey Club where the welcome couldn’t have been warmer.
As a result of some positive self-talk, and choosing to focus on my fitness, I made it into the first team, and I’m also attending trials for the West of England for my Masters age group.
As I reflect on how I’ve chosen to dare to do things that part of me was nervous to do, and then dared to choose in a way that took me out of my comfort zone but has brought so much happiness, I take away three key lessons:
- With a strong, fleshed out vision of what could be that is aspirational, you can find the inner motivation to make change happen
- When times are tough, and motivation might wane, discipline plays a part instead… when my house sale almost fell through and I needed to keep working to make sure it happened… when I got injured just as I was feeling at my best in hockey, discipline in doing my physio exercises has seen me making a return
- Having supportive people in your life, whom you trust, and who want the best for you makes a big difference whether professionally or personally. For me, those people include Andy, of course, but also my sister, and some of my work peers who I may have known originally as work colleagues but have become great friends (thank you to you all – you know who you are).
If you were to write yourself a motto for 2025, what might it be? What could your 2025 look like if you choose to dare, and dare to choose?
Leave a Reply