Coach Liz Scott shares a story she tells to clients in today’s guest post.

Re-energise your life and get a service

By Liz Scott

The other day my vacuum cleaner stopped working. It was half way through cleaning a rug and it suddenly died.

It wasn’t a surprise, as it hadn’t been working well for a long time. In fact I’d been picking bits of the carpet and stuffing them down the nozzle to help it out.

When it started making a funny noise I had thought to myself, “This vacuum cleaner needs a service”. That was when it stopped working all together.

As I looked despairingly at the broken machine and the half cleaned carpet I realised that for at least a year now I’d been promising it a service.

For months it had been limping along. The noise of the motor had sounded strained. But I had kept putting off a service; it had always been inconvenient.

We took the vacuum cleaner to a repairman. He took one look at it and asked when we’d last changed its filter. It’s three years old and we’ve never changed its filter. He looked aghast and made no promises that it was mendable.

He did get it working again and when we sheepishly picked it up he said he was surprised that we hadn’t burnt out the motor, the filter was so dirty. Apparently these filters need to be changed twice a year. Woops!

It was great having the vacuum cleaner back, we’d been without it for nearly a week and the house was crying out to be cleaned.

Switching it on it leapt into life with a purr of the motor. It was like we had a brand new machine. It was practically sucking up the rugs it was so powerful now. I couldn’t believe the difference.

I tell this story to some of my coaching clients. Everyone I work with is busy. These are people who have lives that are stuffed full of ‘doing things’ and they feel stretched to the limit.

They often have a glazed look of exhaustion in their eyes. They know they are working flat out, they know they are not very efficient in what they’re doing because they’re so tired; however they keep fighting on.

What we don’t realise when we get into that cycle of busy-ness is that we are quite literally wearing ourselves out. Like the vacuum cleaner, we begin a slow decline. Tasks, which we once breezed through, become arduous; decisions that seemed easy are now unclear.

We are still able to function and do our job, however the passion is gone and our hearts sink with the effort.

Like the vacuum cleaner, we need a regular service. This year make sure you take time for yourself – give yourself a ‘service’. In other words do things that re-connect you with life.

About the Author/Further Resources

Liz Scott is a leadership coach and trainer. She is currently working in schools helping to develop coaching cultures; coaching helps bring back fun and passion into teaching and learning. www.smartcoachingforschools.com

Find Liz on Twitter at @smartcoachliz