Identification & The Accountant Yogi

Who is I? (No this is not meant as really bad grammar – but I would expect some of that too).

I’ve always been career driven, not that I really knew what I wanted to ‘be’. My earliest memory of what I thought was that I’d be a nurse … but not standing the sight of blood was a sort of sticking point & after that I genuinely had no real idea.

I remember doing one of those tests at school, where you tick a lot of boxes & computer says ‘Accountant’. Which, after getting my GCSE’s and going onto A-Level’s, I determined Law was my path (I’m sure this was completely unconnected to my Love for Alley McBeal at the time) and on I went to University. I will always love my University years, they took me way out of my comfort zone to Liverpool, an absolutely fantastic City, but couldn’t have been more of a departure from my small town home. I found 6 unbelievable girlfriends who are still a part of my life & I decided Law was both boring in real life & constantly changed – so what the F@*k did all the learning matter anyhow.

So in some; either bizarre twist of fate, or genuine this is your path calling (we did try to tell you), I became an Accountant. Honest. Not all accountants are 😉 The reality was, I needed a job & my father was very clear that my return home (to his house) was to be temporary and I had no clue what I wanted to do, so I applied for an advert that included on the job training. I failed the maths test … and got the job. Genuinely, I FAILED the MATHS test, so either they were desperate, or someone REALLY wanted me to be an Accountant.

I qualified 12 years ago now, even have my fellowship (insert twinkle on teeth as I smile) & I am very happy to say I Love it. I always say I’m lucky to love what I do, because I did sort of fall into it, I’m not sure anybody’s destiny is to be an Accountant. But I’ve never dreaded Monday mornings or spent my days clock watching … well my last job I can’t say I loved, it was painful, stressful & thankless! I tried to change it, but I couldn’t & so I left. I know that’s just me, my mindset, my way of dealing with things, I stick to my principles & don’t put up with any shit, & if something isn’t working I take it upon myself to change it, I don’t expect the world to owe me one. I 100% trust my gut. Doesn’t make it easy, but it makes happiness a permanent resident in my life.

So I found a new job … & in my usual, want to prove myself, show up & deliver single minded way, I figured I needed to be prepped to work every evening, perhaps weekend’s – at least to get up to speed & then to change the world, one VLookUp at a time. I planned for the 1st month to have nothing on at the weekends – so I could devote all my time & energy to it, seriously.

But I found the office got locked at 5 and well with focus, there wasn’t real need … & I just didn’t seem to have the desire to ‘go above an beyond’ … so I suddenly had all this, Time.

I’ve always been one of those ‘busy’ people, I keep a to do list on my phone, so that I can be productive with every waking minute and go to bed feeling like Little Miss Accomplished. Whether waiting at a coffee shop for that friend who’s always late or just on the loo (I mean how long in our lifetimes do we spend there?! Sorry to every person I’ve ever replied to whilst sat there #sorrynotsorry), productivity has just been my mindset, for like, forever. From my geek days at school where I think it stems from just wanting to compete with my sister (see previous post), to being the first person in the family to go to University … and well it just never stopped. Wow that’s like 25 years of ‘doing’ & if I live to the average age in the UK these days, I have maybe 50 WHOLE YEARS to go.

So I was looking for a hobby I guess, with a feeling of wanting something else & all my friends having babies (which I categorically, 100%, without a shadow of a doubt, please don’t say I’ll change my mind I might have to punch you) know isn’t for me.

I’d always enjoyed Yoga & been practicing for about 2&1/2 years at this point & it just kinda said ‘pick me’ & (now this is where I change my tune & say I do really believe in fate), I saw a Yoga Teacher Training, starting soon, by the teacher of the 1st class I ever went to.

What Yoga has taught me thus far is ‘My job is as an Accountant – I am not’. This is actually a massive realisation for me, this career has been such a marker in my life, it lets me know & helps me understand ‘my place’ in the world, it has been my engine & my path maker. Almost to the point where I’m not really sure I have truly thought about what it is I want to ‘be’ since that first time I cut myself and couldn’t withstand the rising need to be sick in me.

It’s crazy: Female or male, age, short or tall, birthplace, size 8 or 28, birthplace; a set of markers that I thought identify me, what I am & a set of rules to help me pigeon hole other people to feel comfortable in who I think they are.

Yoga does not relate to me as an accountant, or my sex or my age & very beautifully makes it non discriminatory by default, but that is not it’s purpose. Yoga is teaching me to strip away the layers of identification and seek out what lies beneath – the True Self. That is Yoga’s ultimate goal, enlightenment; to go beyond the shell we present ourselves in and to phrase it in a western sense – find our soul.

Whoa … hold up. That got deep, quick.

I guess the moral of this little ditty is: I’ve spent my life to date trying or thinking, I ought to be something, or thinking I might not be doing enough to be that something. & Day to day I need to function in this world we identify ourselves in, to pay the mortgage & put prosecco in the fridge. So can I be enlightened but also an accountant? Pause to insert your own joke here …

I heard a stat yesterday, that 89% of people who meditate, don’t believe they will find their way to enlightenment* (meditation being like the #1 of paths to it). If that is true? (& whoever knows with all the fake news and stats bollocks that marketeers manipulate us with all the time). Why should I not just be a busy accountant?

To be continued …

Namaste 🙂

*I heard this on: https://chat-and-chai.blubrry.net/2018/09/25/alexandra-santos-on-dhyana/ which is a fun intro to the world of meditation.