I’m delighted to present this guest blog – particularly in early February when we’ve been exhausted by a deluge of articles and posts on goal-setting.
My experience – and that of this anonymous author’s is that change begins when we consciously acknowledge and get clear about setting intentions!
The Universe Has Ears
Twenty-two years ago, I was working as a computer programmer developing financial software, but I had a deep interest in the possibilities that technology could bring to the fabric of society.
As part of our annual training allocation, I decided to take a presentation skills course. The course was interactive and fun and throughout the day we gave short presentations that were video recorded and then reviewed and critiqued to try to improve our skills.
At the end of the day, we had to come up with our own pet topic to give a presentation on.
I decided to address the topic of home-working.
Technology was, at that stage, less advanced than now but I felt that advancements in this area could offer some wonderful opportunities to combine remaining in the workplace with stay at home parenting, the biggest hurdle to overcome would be trust, i.e. the idea that employees need constant supervision.
In writing my presentation I needed an opener and a tag line to round it off. There is an old saying, “A bird in the hand is worth two in the bush.”
I decided to use this, with a little artistic license, to make it seem that the bird in the hand is more valuable because you can watch it closely. My speech went on to weigh up the advantages and disadvantages of home working and I tied it up at the end by rewording the saying to “A bird in the bush is worth two in the office.”
We were given the videotape to bring home and mine was put in a cupboard with the rest of my videotape collection.
Years passed, I married and had a baby and found returning to work difficult. I did another course “Who am I” to discover what my authentic self, longed for.
I concluded that I would love to live in the countryside, close to the sea, and raise my child while continuing to work.
A couple of years later with the outcome of both courses very far from my mind, we were on a weekend away. I saw a for sale sign and said to my hubby, “Let’s follow that sign and see what’s for sale. Really, all I wanted was to go for a drive to a random location, I wasn’t looking to buy a house.
We arrived at the house and both instantly fell in love with it. Within a week, we had viewed it and put in an offer. We sold our own house very easily and moved to our new home, in the countryside close to the sea.
I returned to work part-time and initially did a daily commute to Dublin. Eventually, I discovered an office in a nearby town where I could go and access my company network, so I worked from there a few days a week. Management realised that my work didn’t suffer through a lack of supervision and following on from that I was permitted to work from home.
A few years later, while doing a spring clean, I came across the video of the presentation and popped it in the VCR and hit play. As I watched the speech, the hairs on the back of my neck stood on end.
I had made this presentation as a young, single city girl and it was long forgotten.
But now, here I was, a mum, working from home and doing exactly what my presentation promoted.
Not only that but my tagline was so accurate it was startling.
You see the name of the place I ended up living was the Bush.
I am now that bird in the Bush. The universe does indeed have ears and is always listening.