27/09/2021
Our recently engaged maintenance man quits. In response to my wishes of good luck he writes,
“Thankyou for the reply to my email. I really appreciate the words of encouragement, as this is very much a “leap of faith”.
Without boring you with a huge, long story I’ll try to summarise.
I worked for Coles for nearly ten years before growing a bit frustrated with the way I was being treated by people higher up the ladder, and so decided to leave and bought a franchise. This change was at around the time that I got married, and soon after we started a family. We had a wonderful marriage and together had 4 children (now aged 11, 15,18 and 20). The job suited me for a long period as it gave me the flexibility to be heavily involved in my children’s upbringing. I wasn’t intending to remain in this type of work for as long as I have, but life was busy, and I probably got a bit comfortable in my routine. My wife was a stay-at-home mum for around 16 years, but then returned to work in 2016. Sadly, in so doing, she enjoyed socialising much more with new, younger work colleagues and began to become a bit distant from me and the kids. I thought it was a phase. Unfortunately, I was wrong, and late in 2017 she told me the marriage was over, and in early 2018 moved out. To say I was devastated would be a massive understatement. From that time until really probably late last year I struggled with depression. Somehow, I managed to work through all the difficult processes of settlements, divorce, custody etc and maintained my business. I tried sporadically last year to apply for some other jobs, but with no luck.
By the beginning of this year, I started to have a much clearer head, and had to a reasonable extent improved my self-esteem, which had been destroyed by some of my ex-wife’s words and actions. I knew I had more to offer the world than I had been. I think I had accepted my work life as it was, and hadn’t really grown, if that makes sense. Since January this year I applied for 53 jobs with no luck. I was successful with my 54th application. Ironically the new job is working with people with sleep disorders and that type of thing, and sleep study is an area I had been interested in when I completed a Bachelor of Science way back before I started with Coles. I am very nervous about the change, as I’ll obviously be working with colleagues that I’ve never met, and in an area that has made many advances since I was studying. I guess that is normal with a new job. It’s also hard to leave my current work as I have many long-standing terrific relationships with customers. However, I needed to change as I felt very stuck after my divorce. I’m keen to challenge myself even though it is uncomfortable. I’m turning 48 next month and I was increasingly aware that I was just sort of drifting along, almost on auto pilot. As they say, nothing changes if you don’t change anything.
On a side note, when I met you Rex a month or two back, I was curious when I saw your email address. I looked a little bit into what you do and read a little about everything you have achieved. I am being absolutely truthful in saying that it inspired me to continue trying to make the change, because I was becoming a bit frustrated with constant knockbacks from jobs, I know I could have done well in. So, without even knowing it, you have helped me achieve my goal! Thankyou.
My apologies, this email turned out to be a bit longer than I was intending to write.
I appreciate your interest, and I am grateful for you sending me your book, DevelopThruoghLeadershipThinking which I intend to read very soon.
Thanks again,
