My life in three charts
I was getting ready to give the talk of my life.
It was May 2015 and I was prepping for my visit to west Wales where, in four weeks’ time, I’d be standing on stage in front of 100 people at The Do Lectures telling a true story I’d never told before. The stakes were high. It was going to be filmed, recorded in perpetuity.
In the meantime I had the chance to try out a talk where the stakes were low. My friends Michael and Mike had started an informal speaking club to give people an opportunity to try things out. So one evening in early summer, in a church hall two minutes up the road, I stood in front of a crowd made up of ten friendly faces and I experimented with some ideas.
There was no screen or microphones in the hall so I took along these three pieces of A3 paper glued on card to use as visual prompts.
And I began the story of my career, in three simple acts.
Act 1 begins with me starting out climbing a ladder. In my twenties, I made a rapid ascent in my roles within the TV and radio industry. My career followed a linear path. For some years, it went well.
Then in Act 2, I came unstuck. My health wasn’t great, I was struggling. I left to work for myself. The linear path was gone. My life was now about making the most of the twists and turns working as an independent.
Act 3 is a bit of a phoenix moment - rising from the ashes and realising that to make the best of this ‘spaghetti’ tangle of a worklife, I’d have to follow my own compass. There were no longer any rules. The only guide I had to doing my best work was myself. I now have an internal compass that leads me in the right direction.
It’s significant that these three charts are - and continue to be - still so incredibly relevant and true seven years on from that talk. I still use my own compass today to carve out the right path for me. In fact, I’ve since realised that it was when I wasn’t following my own compass that led to the issues I had at work and with my health.
Thanks to Mike and Michael for giving me the space and time to test out my talk. And if you’d like to see the real thing, you can watch it here.
