The Journey Begins in Santiago

Just over two years ago, I began a journey that has brought me to today, a place I could have never predicted. But who can really say where they will be tomorrow let alone next year? Although, I packed for and trained to walk 500 miles across Spain ending in Santiago de Compostela, I discovered the real journey would only just begin there. This pilgrimage, “Camino de Santiago” or “The Way of St. James”, taught me how to walk through life gathering only what I could carry and letting go of burdens I no longer needed. One man told me, “The Camino will give you what you need and take away what you don’t need.” It was a visceral, physical experience of what you have heard us at M E Clarke Consulting call a journey by discovery. We do not know what tomorrow will bring and the best we can do is wake up, show up and face what the day will present, both in difficulty and in joy.

It was this journey that brought me to M E Clarke Consulting at a time and place where Meghan and I decided pulling together our unique strengths could raise both of us to new levels. And new heights were reached indeed! My experience at M E Clarke Consulting has further taught me how to lean into difficult conversations and facilitate others through them as well. Through the StrengthsFinder exercise we used for team goal setting, I have gained a deeper understanding of my own skills and strengths as well as how to both contribute them on a team and to identify and self modulate when a certain strength may be working overtime. I learned to navigate both changes around me as well as the transition within and to work with groups on an organizational level to navigate changes and subsequent transitions.

And now the road of my life takes another turn as I move into a new position at Mental Health America (www.mhankyswoh.org/) to build and grow their Mental Health First Aid Initiative for the Tristate area. This change and my own transition remind me again of the concept of journey by discovery and I am encouraged to take each moment and each day as it comes, while packing all that I learn along the way in preparation for tomorrow. Fear of failure, self-doubt, guilt, I do not need you and will no longer carry you. What do you carry with you that you no longer need?

Ask Meghan how her journey began in Santiago de Compostela.