Becoming grounded in hard work

Since writing my last post a week ago I feel like I don’t even remember what my life was like then. I have since been pulled into a whole new world of working in a large grocery store five days a week, 5, 8, 10 hour days! My body aches, I am tired, and I feel like I’ve barely seen my children all week!

How can this be, some may wonder? I mean, I spent the last decade or so unschooling my children, in the hopes that they would not feel pressured to take any job just for the money, but to only do that which is true to their soul and life’s purpose. I shared many messages with the world that working hard every day was not the means to a happy life, and even wrote a book based around the message of following our joy instead of living it at a 9-5 job!

Luckily for me though, I have begun to realise that there actually is no rule book to following our path. This has been hard to accept, and I have noticed all those limiting beliefs lingering in the background about how bad of a parent I am, how “unspiritual” I am, and how I shouldn’t only do things for money. The thing is, something within me wants and needs this experience. How I can tell is the way that I feel on a deep level.

My family has experienced poverty and hardship on and off for many years. I don’t mean that my kids have ever gone hungry (except for a few hours while waiting for a payment to go into the bank to buy some food), but when they have I have blamed myself for it. There is nothing worse than having no food in the house and feeling like I didn’t budget enough or that I shouldn’t have bought the kids takeaways earlier in the week. The thing is, my kids rarely go without, but it has been a very tough couple of years.

Since a caravan crash in late 2020, things just spiraled out of control financially, the debt became unavoidable and up until a couple of weeks ago I felt completely out of control and swallowed by it all. My husband has been trying to slowly build a business that doesn’t bring in a lot of income, and I had been applying for jobs all over town, none of which I wanted, and I could feel that my actions and need to control things was not coming from a centered, trusting place. I had lost all faith in ever having an abundant life and was at my breaking point. Thankfully I had reached out for support to someone I trust completely to guide me on my path, and as I did I received news of the grocery store job; I was successful!

Out of all the jobs I had been applying for, this was the one I got excited about when I would think of it. I would show interest in other jobs and then ask my Angels and Guides to not let me get them. I was paying attention to the deeper feelings within me, and it didn’t feel good. I expressed to the Angels/Guides/Universe that I wanted the grocery store job which was advertising for Night Fill staff to stock the shelves late at night. I felt good whenever I thought of this job.

Well, it turns out that this job is the highest paying job I’ve ever had! My weekly wage is more than what my husband earns and has freed us from our hardship! Week one was easy, but it wasn’t until week two that I really felt myself being pulled into it and becoming grounded, as if gravity was bringing me closer to the ground. Before this job I felt so lost and as though I was floating in between worlds, and this job has brought me so much more into my body and connected to the material and physical aspects of life. I am sore, I am tired, but I feel good. I am paying attention to my inner feelings and I do not yet feel on a deep level that I don’t belong or don’t really want to be there. The constant moving and lifting is making me feel strong, fit and healthy.

As for my children, I feel I might be failing them by not being home as much and not being the main person to cook for them. My husband has taken over all the cooking and cleaning, while trying to run a business and finish a uni degree, and while stressful at times, he enjoys it. He likes taking care of things, being important and relied on, and thanks me every night for doing what I’m doing to help the family. I have never felt so appreciated! I ask my children how they feel about me being gone a lot and thankfully they seem OK. They like finally being able to buy the things they’ve been dreaming of for so long, and to have food whenever they want. It is their contentment with the way things are that says to me that it’s my own assumptions and fears that’s the problem; not the job. Fortunately, I am starting therapy next week to try to work with some of the fears that have been running my life for years.

I am aware that some of my co-workers don’t feel the same way as I do. They express dissatisfaction to me or that they don’t want to be there. I listen to them because I understand. I did live that life once. Before unschooling, my choices didn’t come from a place of awareness or deeper truth; I was just living life the way I believed it was supposed to be lived. I worked when I really wanted to stay home with the kids, I lived in a place I didn’t like, I interacted with people who didn’t make me feel good, and I followed rules I didn’t make.

Then I turned it all around. I did the complete opposite; I only followed my joy, I pulled the kids out of school, I never did anything I didn’t want to do, I lived everywhere that felt good, gave up secure income to do the things that felt true, didn’t work a job for ten years and spent every single day, all day with my children. I am happy I did, as they were much younger and needed me more than they do now. With my youngest being nine and the rest teens, they are at the right age to understand and accept me not being around as much, and they have a very hands-on dad. They will always need my love, of course, and I am slowly learning and accepting that this doesn’t need to look how I’ve always thought it should. One of the biggest things I am in the process of letting go of is this overwhelming pressure to be everything perfect for my children so they know they are loved.

So what happens when you’ve gone down both paths; the unconscious one and the conscious one? I found there to be just as many rules on the conscious path; they were just different. And it has left me with a sense that I now need to face some of those unconscious beliefs and fears on a deeper level. What I have come to realise over the last couple of years, and even more recently is that there is only one path, and the rules on that path are mine to make. I thought I was making up my own rules when I took the path of unschooling, and to a large extent I was. It was good for me to step away from the expectations of society and do things my way. Yet some of my choices were still based on what I thought was the right thing to do or how others might see me. I have learned that allowing both paths to merge as one has left me with the only rule I need in order to make choices in life that is best for me, and that is following my intuition.

The difference between myself and those who express dissatisfaction in their job is that I know deep within that I always have a choice. I know that I am not a victim of my circumstances, even when things get tough and unbearable. I always aim to find the deeper purpose in everything, and know that this job is temporary. I don’t see it as my life’s purpose with no end in sight. I know that the moment I begin to resent being there and feeling like I am meant to be somewhere else, I will leave-money or no money. But I won’t just be hasty and give up income that is helping us at the moment like I have before, because I have more than just my spiritual beliefs now about only following my joy and being with my children all the time no matter what. I have a balance between the two worlds. I know my inner truth is always with me, and I can also enjoy the material side of myself that is alive in me and can make things better for myself and my family. It also feels good to be able to help in a place that is struggling due to a shortage of staff; to give something back to a place I also take from.

I received some very important guidance recently that is it OK to do something that isn’t fulfilling to my heart and soul but is something I need to do right now, as long as I find time for those things that are fulfilling, and this is something I need to do right now. No, it isn’t fulfilling, but I like it. I can feel myself growing in ways that are different to when I don’t do something challenging. This job challenges me in many ways to connect more with my body and physicality, to engage with others who may never understand where I’ve come from, to be away from my children and feel worthy and good at the same time, and to find a balance between the things that are soul nourishing and the things I have to do, while being positive and having faith that I am on the right track.

I felt something was missing last night at work, and I began to feel overwhelmed and drained. I now realise that what was missing was that balance; I needed to still feel connected to those soul nourishing things and not just my job in order to feel good, and writing this blog is exactly what I needed! I still need to share myself in ways I don’t at work. So thank you to whoever you are out there, if you are reading this, for listening! May you find your own balance and know that you always have a choice. I find that working any job from this deepest place makes all the difference in my experience!

Many blessings to you,
Love Leisa ❤