During the 15 years when I ran my first business – Juicy Glass Ltd – I also spent many happy weekends hill walking and talking with a friend who was a GP.

Climbing mountains we chewed the fat about life, work, relationships, and parenting. The whole juicy shebang.

When things were stressful in my architectural glass business, I found perspective talking to her, and coined the phrase “It’s only glass” as shorthand for, unlike her work, it isn’t life or death.

No problems can ever be that important in the world of luxury art and design.

As you can imagine, as well as being hugely enjoyable, both the hill walking and the conversations supported me to handle the demands of life and work with more vigor and serenity.

That memory came to my mind with a jolt recently on hearing of a client’s close shave with death.

Due to “work pressure”, she had ignored symptoms of illness that literally threatened her life. She was told so by more than one exasperated consultant.

Feeling into how I plan to help her use this scary experience to change her trajectory, I realised with some horror that the journey I help some of my coaching clients on these days is indeed a matter of life or death!

Tragically, one client held on so long to a way of over-working, he didn’t make it to his visioned retirement with family and hobbies.

Another was cut off in her stride, having finally begun to prioritise her own passions after decades of doing for everyone else. Though these cases are extreme, I notice a pattern.

We are all human, flesh, and bone. There is only so much hammer (stress, constant demands, rushing, bad food, alcohol, lack of sleep/ exercise/time for connection etc) a body can take.

It’s no good having striven to achieve status, pension, life, and career goals if we’re not around to enjoy them.

If this is ringing uncomfortable bells with you, I suggest it’s time to take stock and see what really matters.

Identify what change of perspective, priorities, pace, purpose and practicalities are necessary to enable you to live what matters most to you, here, now.

With certainty, I can say the biggest hurdle for a high achiever is deciding to put well-being above results. Once that decision is made, with the right support, creating a whole new experience can happen more quickly and less painfully than feared.

And guess what, it is possible to make the impact that matters to you AND have time and energy for yourself.

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