I’ve spoken a lot about my journey on here and in talks on stages I couldn’t dream I’d stand on. Recalling the pivotal moment in 2020, in a suburb of Brisbane, a town called Mooloolaba, Australia, where I realised I needed to make a huge life change. A story I’m reminded of today with a lens I never thought I’d have, and wanted to revisit.
My life had become a constant cycle of work, drink, sleep repeat. I worked very hard and played even harder. There wasn’t much sleep. I hated my life, my job. I hated myself.
On this trip, I’d spend every morning at The Colombian Coffee Co., a small cafe on the beach frequented by surfers before they went about their working days. Every day I would go and enjoy a cup and watch these people in awe. How carefree they seemed. How full of energy they were at 6am, ready to catch the next wave. I saw them return to the cafe after a surf or swim and open their laptops. Every day the same routine. I was confused. But they were happy. They were calm.
One day, I struck up conversation with the people I’d been keenly observing on my trip. Every single one of them worked in tech. They owned their own digital businesses, worked for large companies like mine in global teams, were contractors or consultants, web designers, engineers and strategists. I was fascinated. How could they do both? How could they earn income passively? How could they innovate and scale whilst taking breaks whenever a wave came crashing they wanted to be on?
In that moment, questioning these strangers about their life, I realised I craved balance. A word I was deeply unfamiliar with. So unfamiliar with that when I returned home, these people I’d met seemed like fragments of a distant dream.
But it stuck, and I changed my life. I taught myself to code, I left the only career I’d known and started again, chasing that feeling, that idea I’d sparked on the beach cafes of Australia, inspired by strangers who probably won’t remember my name.
Fast-forward four years and my life isn’t quite the surfer digital nomad aesthetic I’d be introduced to in 2020, but it’s not far off. I’ve traveled the world with my new career, I’ve made good friends with people I’d never have met otherwise, I’ve worked from many a beach-side / mountain view cafe, and, recently, I left London – my home of 28 years – and got sober (read more on that choice here).
When I left London in summer I was terrified. My life had become unmangeable. My career was flourishing but my personal life was stuck. Stuck in a different cycle of sobriety, relapse and depression. But, that woman sat in the beach cafes in Mooloolaba was in me. I wasn’t going to achieve that dream, become that person, stuck in the same (mental) place I’d been all my life. So, I took that final step I needed. I admitted defeat to my illness, my addiction, and I left the city.
I started this new chapter near family in Surrey (read about that here), surrounded by the love, support and guidance I desperately needed. I got back into skating again, I spent my weekends hiking in the hills, I made new friends and started learning who I was underneath the chaos. My life became manageable.
Today, I sit writing this in my beachfront apartment on the south coast of the UK. Home-brewed but delicious coffee in hand. One step closer to that dream.
I might not be surfing everyday (though I am now a member of the local wind surf club), but I wake up every morning and take a sunrise stroll or skate on the beach. I watch the waves go in and out. Sometimes chaotic, sometimes calm. Much like my life. And it all makes sense.
In Mooloolaba, I got a tattoo of a tidal wave to remind myself of the feeling. As a commitment to myself to make a change. They say when a surfer gets up on a wave, they enjoy the present moment, even though they know with certainty that the wave will eventually end. That’s how I choose to live today. No longer in a dream, no longer chasing the wave, but living in it.
This too shall pass.
If you identify with any of the thoughts shared on my site and feel you would like to talk to someone, please reach out to your GP. Information, services and helplines for those struggling with, or impacted by someone else’s, addiction can be found on the NHS website and a list of UK and global organisations to reach out to here. If you ever feel like things are too much, please call Samaritans on 116 123.
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