Feeling Stuck

When I was a teacher, I had an overwhelming feeling of being stuck. Even though I had so much passion for the job, the time constraints were too much. There was no work-life balance. My cup was always full. So anytime anything out of the ordinary happened in my life, it tipped me over the edge.

I spent years looking at other jobs, wondering how I could make the move. But money always stopped me. How could I possibly start something new and maintain the wage I was already on? It felt impossible.

It took a bereavement for me to stand up and say “I can’t do this anymore”. So I unplugged the outside noise and finally allowed myself to be guided by my intuition.

I found groups where people felt the same. I watched podcasts. I listened to the advice of those who had left the teaching profession already. I thought about what I wanted from my career. I read books. I completed lots of self-help activities. I meditated. I started yoga. And for the first time, leaving teaching felt like a possibility.

I realised my dream was to become a life coach. I had always felt coaching was a powerful tool in supporting your own development. Finding things out for yourself leads to deeper and much longer lasting learning than being told what to do.

Knowing that it would take time to build a coaching business, I decided supply teaching would be a good way to supplement my income in the interim.

The next step was to say it out loud. I talked to my husband. I talked to my mum. I talked to my friends. They listened, they understood, they supported my vision. That gave me hope that I really was going to be able to leave my permanent teaching post.

My husband saw an opportunity to start our own supply teaching agency. As a headteacher, he had thought many times about creating a bank of teachers that he knew were skilled and competent to serve the local area. That was the birth of our company – Education Unplugged.