Dear Readers,
Before you read my latest blog, I want to take a moment to thank those of you who have been reading these blogs over the years. It’s hard to believe it’s been seven years already since the first one.
What started as a way of making sense of my own life has become an ongoing conversation with people from all over the world. Some of you have been here for much of the journey so far. Some have written to me at exactly the right moment. Others have quietly read along without ever introducing yourselves. You may not realise it, but you have all contributed in your own way to the courage it has taken me to begin again. For that, I am deeply grateful.
Turning sixty has given me an opportunity to pause and ask myself a simple question: What happens next?
Like many people, I have spent periods of my life waiting for things to improve before giving myself permission to move forward. I told myself that I would be happier if certain relationships improved, if old wounds healed, or if life became less complicated. But life has a habit of continuing to challenge us in ways we simply can’t anticipate.
What I have learnt instead is that, while I cannot control everything that happens to me, I do have a say in how I respond. I remind you of one of my favourite quotes. This one is from Holocaust survivor, and psychiatrist, Viktor Frankl:
‘Between stimulus and response there is a space. In that space lies our freedom and our power to choose our response. In our response lies our growth and our freedom.’
With the experience that time offers us, we get to change how we see things. I am a very different person at sixty than I was at forty. My husband and children certainly notice the changes in me in recent years. I am calmer than I used to be and less inclined to react to every emotional storm that passes through. I put much of that down to the wisdom that comes from experience, but also to something else: learning to listen to myself.
For many years, I looked outside myself for answers. I sought reassurance, approval and validation from other people. I often measured my worth by how loved, appreciated or included I felt. It was exhausting.
These days, I’m far more interested in whether I’m living in a way that aligns with my values. Am I being honest? Am I being kind? Am I showing up for the people I love? Am I keeping the promises I make to myself?
Those questions matter more to me now than whether everyone approves of my choices.
As I’ve written before, one of the practices that has helped me most is meditation. Not because it magically solves my problems, but because it creates enough space for me to hear what is really going on beneath the noise. Over time, I have come to believe that we all possess an innate wisdom. A quiet voice that often knows the answer before our minds have figured it out. The challenge is that many of us have become experts at ignoring it.
Whenever I am wrestling with a difficult decision, I ask myself a simple question: What do I know deep down to be the truth?
The answer is rarely dramatic. More often than not, it arrives as a gentle nudge rather than a thunderbolt. But it is usually there.
This year, that inner voice encouraged me to persevere with something I had been putting off for decades. Since the age of seven, I have wanted to write and publish a novel. Yet for most of my life, fear had the louder voice.
What if nobody likes it?
What if people criticise it?
What if I fail?
Those questions stopped me for a very long time.
You’ll be glad to know they don’t stop me anymore. Not because the fears have disappeared, but because I finally realised that creating something meaningful is worth the risk.
As you know, my debut novel will be published in September.
Writing it has taught me far more than I expected. It has reminded me that confidence does not come before action. It comes from taking action, repeatedly, despite uncertainty.
Showing up day after day to write, edit and rewrite has changed me. It has strengthened my belief that it is never too late to become the person you were always meant to be.
The truth is that every morning we wake up offers us an opportunity to begin again. Not because yesterday didn’t happen or life suddenly becomes easier. But because we are still here.
As long as we have breath in our lungs and blood flowing through our veins, it is never too late to take a different path, pursue a long-forgotten dream, or rewrite the story we tell ourselves about who we are.
Beginning again requires courage. But in my experience, it gives far more than it takes.
Thanks for being here today.
Love,
Gill 💚
