I started life knowing I was meant to do important work. Even though I didn’t fit in and life felt hard, I also knew I was connected to some life force greater than me and that I needed to keep going.
The times I felt most myself were with chosen friends, carefully selected for their own respective ‘oddness’, which to me shone brightly in each of them as humour, intelligence and great resilience.
I felt like myself when I was in the theatre, performing under lights, feeling a rush of adrenaline and revelling in the applause.
I loved working as a TV presenter. It was a performance of sorts but usually only for the film crew of three and I never knew who or how many people may have watched. Often the message I was imparting was less than inspiring but somehow this still fed a part of me that wanted to be seen.
Essentially though I chose a life where I was not visible. As well as cultivating my therapy and energy healing work since I was 21, I have predominantly worked in corporate environments. Mostly I worked in PR — propelling others and their projects into the spotlight. Running large attention-grabbing events on their behalf, always with me grafting hard in the background.
I have worked in business with my husband over the years too. We’ve created some extraordinary business success, from which I’ve learned a lot and had many valuable life experiences. However, throughout our ventures, I have mainly fulfilled a support function, and when pushed into the business spotlight I have struggled. I know now because this is ‘not my thing’. I can’t confidently stride out and thrive in an environment where I do not fit.
I have had moments of pushing through my invisibility, namely running groups for women where I took the plunge to give voice to my deeper knowing, and I’ve been thrilled to watch as this touched others and allowed them to become more visible. These were wonderful opportunities and I always craved more. Usually, though, these groups were sacrificed because the demands of the businesses I was involved in required more of me.
A constant in my life has been people regularly forgetting my name, or completely forgetting having met me. People mistake me for someone else and I’d love a dollar for every time someone said “Claire, you look exactly like my aunt / my cousin / my friend!” Fortunately, this happens less these days but only because for the last 10 years I have chosen to live in a sleepy hollow in a foreign country where almost nobody knows me. Now I’m really in the shadows!!
What has this all been about, this long invisibility journey? Why, when I knew, and still know, that I have something important to share, have I been in an almost permanent holding pattern where fulfilling this purpose never works out, in fact, doesn’t even show up as an option?
This is NOT me feeling sorry for myself. This is a stock-take and a realisation, and yes, I am sorry to the ‘me’ that has never been given a chance to claim her all-important purpose.
Claire, I am sorry.
The worst thing about invisibility is that it is isolating. We are never more truly alone than when we aren’t seen.
I have made some big achievements in my life. I have been recognised for some of them. I have earned six-figure salaries and been given some amazing opportunities. I’ve learned to follow my intuition and to manifest quite organically. It’s taken time, but I’ve become fairly comfortable in my own skin.
I have been grateful for everything I’ve experienced and in return I have endeavoured to share as much of my experience and learnings with others. I love to share!
Yet my accomplishments have largely felt empty. For the most part, they did not represent my deeper calling. Somehow, with almost steadfast dedication, I have remained in a lane where I did not fit but decided I must stay.
Fortunately, today I work more as a therapist and less as a businesswoman. I am focused on providing a safe and healing space where people can share openly and make their own discoveries and breakthroughs.
Even as I do this important work, my inner voice says “There’s more, so much more”. This part of me wants to play in a bigger arena. She wants to be seen and heard, she wants to participate, influence and play her part.
But at the moment, this voice is still calling in the dark and at a distance. I have not yet welcomed her in and given her a seat at the table. Still at the head is the younger, smaller, more fearful version of me.
When asked what she needs she trembles and says “Support”. I’m so glad I asked because that one word speaks volumes! I receive all the nuances of what it is she truly needs: encouragement, kindness, stimulation, fun, and most importantly to spend time with like-minded others.
She craves interaction, eye contact, conversation, and above all, connection!
And in this moment, I know what I’ve been missing and what has kept me invisible for more than half my life. The company of others. A strong network. OMG, I have a support deficiency!
I, like many women, have bought into the old, flawed myth that true success comes from doing everything ourselves, on our own. But strong and successful women know that there is strength in numbers. When supported by like-minded others, women thrive. We do not do well when we feel isolated.
So many of us have sentenced ourselves to solitary confinement and are drowning in a box of open space.
The question is why did we put ourselves there? What story did our fledgling self buy into that kept her small and unseen? Getting close enough to hear what she has to say is our mission, should we choose to accept it. Only then can we reconcile what that part of us still needs so that we can start to construct a new, more meaningful story that represents more of who we truly are.
My work is to hold space for women and their vision — in most cases a much larger vision than they may be able to hold for themselves — just until they are able to claim it for themselves.
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