Don’t Cry Over Spilt Milk

By profession I am a bookkeeper. Those you know mefrom childhood, know that this was not my original plan whereas those who I have gotten to know in recent years and see me as a creative person, don’t understand the connection to the numbers. I think that I am equal parts rational as well as creative, which gives plenty of opportunity but sometimes also seem to bring me all over the place.

I have learned early on that life takes you places you don’t expect and shows you sides of yourself, you didn’t see before or knew you had. When I, by chance, got into accounting, I realized that I love the numbers! I love the rationality, I love the simplicity and I love how it all adds up perfectly (if it is done right).

Almost 4 years ago, I left my job after having been in a couple of steady a bookkeeper for more than a decade. At that time, I felt that I was fed up with the profession and decided to look elsewhere, for a new work direction. I didn’t stray that far and did a lot of financial counseling for couples, single parents, young adults and while I enjoyed it partially, it just wasn’t “it”. It took me a while to realize that bookkeeping is what I love, what I am good at, and is what I want to do. I finally figured out that the problem was never the profession but the setting and I realized that if I can do it my way, being self-employed, I can work, earn money, and enjoy what I do.

So that is where I am at; building up this business and working hard to make it happen. There are days where I feel regret that I didn’t realize earlier what it is that I am supposed to do, and that basically I “wasted” a few years. Maybe, if I would have known sooner what it is that I want, my business could have been much bigger/ profitable already, I wouldn’t have spent so much time being frustrated and so on.

While that is certainly true, I do also realize that this kind of thinking doesn’t really help, not in this case and not in any case. I cannot cry over spilt milk and time wasted I cannot get back. What I can do, if to look forward, be happy that it didn’t take longer to figure things out and hope that I will also soon be able to figure out how to incorporate all the creative in the mix as well.