This is the 6th in the “The Stages of Work” series where we are talking about how people’s working lives seem to have distinct stages which give them opportunities to reflect and pivot.
So your last child has left home to study or work. They have gone, gone off to do their own thing, develop their own lives and while you hope they come back and visit you know it is essential for them to move out, take responsibilities, make mistakes and learn from them.
What a gap your children leave in your life when they move out. Your whole life (it seems) has been taken up with running around after them and looking after them. Now what you ask?
With such a major change in your life it is sometimes hard to settle on what to do next, what is going to fill that gap in your life. Or conversely maybe you have been hanging out for this day so you can do something for yourself after so many years of doing for everyone else.
Whichever way it is, you need time to think about what you would like to do take it from me, really it is better to make the right choice than the quick choice.
For some parents who have been heavily involved in school and sport volunteer work, when their last child finishes school there is an even more dramatic change to their life. This can really reinforce the grief they are already feeling as this part of their life inexorably changes.
Other parents may have been working either in a career they love or for many in a job that put bread on the table. Either way the changes that happen when you suddenly don’t have to juggle school events in amongst work can really have a big impact on you.
This is another time where the changes in your private life can have a flow on effect to your working life.
Maybe there has been something you have wanted to do for a long time but you just haven’t had the time or the space to do it. This might be a cause you are passionate about, or work you really want to do. Or places you want to travel to.
What ever it is, make the most of this time to follow your dream.
Having the confidence to do something for yourself after so many years of thinking of others first and pushing what you want to do to the background can be a challenge but if it is important to you then take the first step and the next one will be easier and the one after that will be easier still.
Make the investment in yourself you deserve.
If you are don’t know how to go about finding this important next step the book a free 30 minute “Right for You” call so we can help you with this important decision.
The next article in this series will focus on the group called the “sandwich generation” the people caught between caring for younger and also older people .
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