As I sit here writing i think about this question it keeps popping up in my mind and subconscious, I have an image of my subconscious ( who is of course dressed like a garden gnome ) playing a whack a mole game and every time I think “ What the F “ he runs over with a very large mallet and whacks that thought so hard that it gets buried deep back down there, thing is I have been thinking it so often over the last few months that the poor guy is just plain exhausted & I think he has finely given up and now it’s his turn to think “What the F am I doing this for she is just not listening or learning”!!! So he has let my body loose on me, mainly in the form of a big Red Rash on my FACE!!!!
Now as long as I can remember I have never had a rash on my face. In general my skin is in pretty good condition it gets a little dry from time to time & in my early 20’s I did have 1 or 2 bad self-tanning experiences that left my skin in patches of white & bright orange so bad that my friend made me promise to never take it upon myself again to try DIY tan again & to always a seek out a professional !( yes it was that bad) Any way back to my face rash so here’s the thing we can try & try to push or in my case whack our Fear back down in the deep dark hole of my mind & hope to never hear them again but thank God my body is Healthy enough to give me a massive red rash signal that I need to stop & see what happening , Now I want to say thanks & I’m grateful Body but I really thought we were better friends like could you not have put the rash on my arm/leg /I would have even settled for my Butt , but you went straight for the Face THANKS!! Guess I need to work on that relationship!
So why have I been asking What the F have I done?? Well its funny cause it started as one thing & has now changed in to a complete different F***, so it started more as What the F am I DOING? I am busting my ass off to go to work every day in a job that is over 170km round trip away on a road that happen to have major works so it can take up to 2hrs each morning to make it in on time, to a Job that just isn’t paying anywhere near enough to put me through the torture of stop-go morning rush traffic. After studying over the last 7 years in Aromatherapy, Massage, Reiki, & Herbalism in my spare time, what was I doing in an office Job?? That was the question until it changed last week when the time came and enough was enough it was time to says the words I had whispered over the last year to myself out loud for all to hear (ok mainly to just my boss lol) I QUIT, yip it came spilling out just like that & I immediately wanted to follow it up with ha I’m just joking but I didn’t … & that when What the F am I DOING turn to What the F have I DONE!!!
So I will tell you what I have done: I have given up a stable job working with some great people to go out into the world with NO PLAN , yip read that again NO PLAN this coming from the women who loves to plan much to my husband amusement when we are going on holiday I know the best restaurant to go I know which way to turn when you come out of hotel to get to the nearest beach ( thanks google map & on I side note to google , it might be nice if the little yellow map man had a smile or a dress/hat every now & then) . I’m a planner!! but hey why not stop planning on like the most important decision you have made in like a decade Sure you’ll be grand, but as the days since saying I quit have passed I have an urge to tell everyone I have quit in the fear that I might go back on my word because if the women in the local wool shop knows hey I can‘t let her down. So as each day brings new people to tell I get the question asked back to me Oh so what are you going to do?? To which I have put the smile on and answer I don’t really know I will look for work again somewhere closer to home & I will work on doing more in my herbal work. That answers seem to satisfy everyone involved or so I thought until the blasted face rash. I started off blaming a new washing powder but hold on I haven’t changed wash powder then maybe it just something that will go away in a few hours to finally mentioning it to homeopathic friend of mine to which she answered with one word FEAR!! What I thought I am not afraid what have to be afraid of but it took about 10 second for the Garden gnome to see through that lie and hit me right in my big red rash face that I am afraid in fact I’m so afraid that I just can’t even get 1 thought out clearly from start to finish!
It goes something like – shit I am leaving work, how will I pay for heating, wait don’t worry about that I have fire I can burn the table & chair oh wait what will I sit on then ah it’s ok I have a car I can sit in wait how will I pay for car Tax, do you think the Gardaí will stop me and ask why I have no tax can I really tell them I have no job that I gave up a job after 8 yrs. just on a whim ( ok more of a long 2 year whim ) & that now I sit at home in my cold house with just plants to talk to all day ( ok honestly other than the cold house I would love to sit and talk to plants all day lol ) anyway you get where I am going I spiral and spiral ,so if I was to have my FEAR at a good low level those thought would be more like Shit I’m leaving work woo hoo go me , Finally I get a chance to start to build on something I love to do & isn’t it great that I have a very supportive husband with a great job with good money that will allow me to take a small break before starting off on another new journey! Now that thought process would have kept my Head garden gnome quite happy he could sit back with his fishing rod catching all the positive thoughts swimming around my subconscious heck he could have even gone for a cocktail. But I chose the Fear way it was and is much harder , I reckon it shown on my face (rather than my ass) because I am finally putting my face out there as a herbalist this is the career path that I longed for the idea that with a little help from me I get to play matchmaker with plants & people & they both get to fall in love the people with the idea that we have this abundance of healing on the doorstep & even if they just learn about one plant my job as match maker is done. The plants also win as the more people that learn about them no long will a dandelion be looked at like a pest but more like a very nourishing friend, some might even go a step further and actually plant their favourite, even a mint plant and even if you just want the mint for Mojitos, my job is done the more we learn the more we plant that is my Mission & promise to the plant world.
As for my Red rash face well I am just going to put it right out there in amongst all the other herbalist & finally instead of What the F have I done I am going to think Hi my name is Laura, I AM a herbalist & I love plants (I also have a slight obsession with Kermit the frog whom I always have room for thought on). And to help the process along from Red face to normal face I will of course be taking herbs a List of which I will do up in the next blog or if you want to know just reply below.
So all that is left for me to say is Thank you for taking the time to let me share my journey with you & I look forward to seeing where this journey takes us.
P.S. Hi my name is Laura, I am a Herbalist. Hi my name is Laura, I am a Herbalist (the Garden gnome is back from his cocktail break have to keep him happy)