THe 80s
Age 16 Woolworths Cafeteria Waitress (really good at eating the bits out of the middle of the doughnut fresh out of the doughnut machine and skimming on freshly polished floors).
Age 17-19 Uni Student/Barmaid …yep, that’s what we were called back then. (Skill note: really good at attending most classes stoned and knitting jumpers in rehearsals that could fit three people – at the same time)
Age 19-22 Actor/Barmaid/Surfie Girlfriend (really good at acting and barmaiding, riding around in a VW Kombie-van, shagging in back of said Kombie Van)
Age 22-24 Children’s Television Host (really good at saying yes to anything poo-your-pants dangerous – jumping out of planes, abseiling, driving monster trucks/rally cars, feeding crocodiles.) And…
Party Girl – well, didn’t get paid for that, but treated it like a serious vocation (really good at dancing on tables and vomiting out the window of taxis… particularly proud of the fact that I never vomited inside a taxi!)
Age 24 Cosmetics Consultant/Make-up Artist/Actor (really good at: applying eyeshadow, lipstick, and mascara with one hand onto random strangers in the middle of the cosmetics section at the David Jones Department Store, whilst holding a microphone in the other hand and offering passers-by a running commentary. Really good at auditions, too… and the roles I managed to land.)
Age 25 Media Sales (really good at taking very long lunches on the company American Express Card…. Don’t judge me: it was when Allan Bond owned the Nine Network and everyone was doing it.)
THe 90s
Age 26 Fashion Sales/Actor/Homeware Sales/Barmaid (really good at television commercials, folding men’s business shirts, wrapping oddly shaped salad servers, and drinking vodka disguised as water whilst behind the bar.)
Age 27-30 Receptionist/Barmaid/Waitress/Media Sales/Singer/Party Girl (really good at meeting people, greeting people, entertaining people, serving people, shagging people, nightclubbing, singing torch songs at recovery parties, and travelling on the London Tube.)
Age 30-34 Actor/Singer/Door Bitch/Party Girl/Emerging Comedian and Entertainer (really good at making people believe, making people pay, making people laugh.)
THe 00s
Age 34-46 Actor/Voice-over Artist/Corporate Entertainer/Comedian/ Writer/Singer/Party Girl/Wife/Mother (really good at being creative, social, funny, naughty, busy, proactive, married, confident, insecure, pregnant, happy, unhappy, a showgirl, and charming my way into business class upgrades.)
As I traipsed back through my life, picking up bits I thought might be useful while discarding others, bumping into things I’d forgotten about and coming face to face with things that in hindsight I felt I could have done without, I felt like I was looking at the finest work of ‘Jill of all Trades, Mistress of Sweet Fuck-All’.
At best, it felt piecemeal, and at worst, it looked like a deconstructed burrito bowl (delivered by Uber Eats an hour too late for anyone to distinguish the individual food groups from the biodegradable container it’s delivered in). A big, inedible (yet somewhat heavily invested in) mess.
Okay – so, that was all the shit I had done, but what the hell could I do with it now?
Luckily, in life, people see things differently, and my revelation came by way of a random conversation I had in a make-up room on the set of a morning television chat show, where I found myself sitting in the chair next to a journalist who was being interviewed on the same programme as yours truly. We were discussing careers and I shared my dog’s breakfast of a CV (an even more abridged version, you’ll be relieved to know) – to which she promptly responded…
“Wow, what a great, diverse career portfolio!” “Pardon?”
Apparently, this ‘diverse career portfolio’ thing… is a thing! And I had one! A great one, apparently. It must be a thing, too, because there’s even a book about it, so that makes it official. (Rethink Your Career by Joanna Maxwell if you’re interested.) This term comes in when you populate your week (or in my case my life) with income streams from several different avenues. Instead of being a hardcore specialist in one area, you are flexible and adaptable and (cue buzzword) agile! Oh my God! This book was only released in 2017, and I’d been doing this diverse career portfolio thingy for like thirty-five years!
Yes, folks, in one five-minute conversation, I went from zero to hero. They say your world can turn on a conversation, and I have to say that it’s true. Here’s another saying – ‘when the student is ready, the teacher will appear.’ I’m all up for that one, too. Because there she was, my Yoda, propped up in the chair in the Channel 9 make-up room, having a starchy blow-dry and sharing a bit of wisdom that would help me reframe how I looked at myself and what I could offer the world.
Even today, I wish I could remember her name. Thank you, whoever you are.
Okay, so, what was I good at?
I was good with people. More specifically, being in front of an audience. Really good at it. I had a level of comfort for dealing with strangers that many of my actor friends and colleagues didn’t have. Having been to fourteen different schools (being a chubby kid, constantly being wheeled into a class at mid-term in a uniform from the previous school, and having a name no one can pronounce will do that for you), I was match fit when it came to being able to enter a room of people I didn’t know (appearing to be confident) and make an impression. I can’t say it came naturally to me, but I’d done it so often that it no longer fazed me, so it was a strength. Tick.
Could I do something with this? My friends thought the answer was yes. Although this was a skill I’d taken for granted (I didn’t even view it as a skill), there are many people for whom the thought of getting up in front of strangers and (gulp) speaking is tantamount to voluntarily poking one’s eyes out with a fondue fork. I’ve always had a fascination with the voice, be it speaking or singing. The physical body as an instrument of human engagement is an area of immense passion for me.
So, now I’d found it. I’d found a fit, and teaching adults is way easier than teaching spotty, sullen, hormonal teenagers (mostly). Through my corporate contacts from my entertainment business and my friends, I began to get referrals to coach executives.
Executive vocal coaching, presentation skills, and personal impact (think Geoffrey Rush in The King’s Speech and you’re in the ballpark). Over the next few months, I registered my business name, built a website, started blogging, and began picking up a few coaching clients. Starting a business requires many things. A goal – tick. A desire – tick. Drive – tick. A winning attitude – tick. A strategy… mmm, kind of a tick? Some start-up capital…. mmm, okay, so I didn’t have everything sorted out.
A Slippery Slope
As a single parent attempting to get a fledgling coaching business off the ground, I found that money was hard to come by, and even harder to make go the distance (and I’ve only got one kid!). I’d been separated for about 12 months at this stage, and it was not getting any easier – it was the opposite, in fact. The reality of living on one income after sharing the financial load with a partner for so many years is that it’s fucking tough! I don’t know how other single parents do it. Andy was giving me money towards Leo’s care and paying half his school fees, but it still wasn’t the sort of amount that was going to allow me not to need a full-time living.
Thankfully (or so I believed at the time), through the various businesses I had had over the years, I had a good relationship with my business banking manager. Periodically, the bank would contact me to offer me an unsecured extension on my overdraft. Up to this point, I’d always just thrown the letters away,