Anniki Summerville is a broadcaster, author, journalist, and speaker specialising in telling positive and authentic narratives about women in their forties and beyond.

This is about the "shoulds" and how when we reach midlife a lot of us start questioning them. The invitation is to do that a lot sooner, and lose the comparisonitis that can follow us around.

Could the solution be to could encourage smaller sparks earlier in life, rather that one big midlife explosion when we hit our forties? Join Carlos and Laurence for this fun discussion.

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I suppose I'm kind of like a, is it a hybrid career?

I don't quite know what the term is, but I am, I

started sort of writing in my, probably in my

forties and sort of writing and getting published.

'cause those two things are obviously separate.

You can often write and not be published.

And I suppose at the moment, I would probably describe

myself as kind of being a consultant, a broadcaster and

author, stroke journalist.

And now I could probably add another string, which

would be content creator, because one of the things

that seems to be doing quite well on my Instagram is me

doing Reels where I basically hold up various household

items to my Ear and pretend that they're a telephone

and then have imaginary conversations on WhatsApp.

Um, and it's funny because I've tried so hard and

I've worked for different people doing social media,

but actually these are probably more popular than

many of the other kind of jobs I've been paid to do.

Um, which just shows you that sometimes you can do something

completely unintentionally and people just find it

funny and it resonates.

Um, so I, I guess I had children quite late, so it's

kind of worth saying that, you know, up until I think I

had my first daughter at 40.

Up until then, I was hard to the, you know, I am

trying to think nose to the grindstone career wise.

So I'd kind of climbed up the, the greasy pole and

was at the top of the greasy pole, but very much wanted

to slide that down again.

Um, and so a lot of what I kind of write about kind of, I

suppose, the disparity between expectations and reality.

So kind of expecting the world to be one way, expecting

success to be one way, and then kind of realizing

that it can be another way.

Um, and I think that's something that, uh, I'm now

in my late forties, I've kind of come to realize and

it's been a, a positive, you know, that, um, I, I kept

waiting for my life to start and it just didn't start.

And then I realized I had to start it kind of myself.

I'm curious about that, 'cause, you know, I've been

playing around with this idea of the midlife startup

and just messing around with some thoughts based on our

own experiences, myself and Laurence, in terms of just

taking the, the back roads of life rather than the

motorway in terms of the slow scenic route, and then what

that means in terms of just a kind of a more emergent

winging it approach to work.

When you say you were waiting for it to start,

what did start mean?

Um, it's, it's interesting I think, um, because I'd done

all the things that, I suppose it's all, you know, as a Gen X

kind of generation school kid had been told, um, I'd sort

of done all of those things.

So I'd kind of gone to university, I'd got

a fairly good degree.

I'd got into a career.

I'd stayed in a solid job for 17 years, actually

staying with the same agency and had worked my way up to

sort of managing partner.

So I was kind of managing an office with three

other people and, um, I still just kept projecting

into the future because I knew that I wasn't happy.

So I was.

Earning quite a lot of money at that point.

Um, so I had all the kind of materialistic things.

I mean, I wasn't massively wealthy, but

I was pretty privileged.

And yet I was also suffering from lots of

physical symptoms, so I was feeling like I had

headaches all the time.

I was feeling grumpy and drained.

I was constantly feeling like in meetings that, I

mean, I, I write quite a lot about this, how I was

almost disassociating so people would be talking.

I worked in market research and we did a lot of research

into big advertising campaigns or new products

that were coming out.

And I'd often be sat in meetings, just sort of

doodling in, in the kind of exercise, but often quite

sort of saying often quite ridiculous kind of doodles,

you know, like drawing, you know, often drawing the

clients and sort of, there was kind of part of my personality

that was very much, um, suppressed in that role

because I couldn't, I couldn't show up and be my real self.

You know, I'd been like a very playful child, very sort of,

I suppose, quite outgoing.

And then I feel like this kind of marketing career

capped some of that.

And so I was kind of pretending that I was

someone that I wasn't.

And so there'd be this inner voice all the time

that would be going, this is shit, you know.

This me all was talking bol, you know, all this

stuff will be going on.

And I think that's what was kind of causing

a lot of my symptoms, my physical symptoms.

'cause I was trying to squash that person down.

And actually I, I wrote a book, my first book

that I got published was about a woman who is

struggling in her career.

And everybody within that narrative was, was

based on people that I, I did actually work with.

So I kind of, I found that quite cathartic.

But I think it was, Part of why this is, you know, sort

of called exploding your life is that it was an explosion in

that it was this realization that I'm not, I'm not happy.

I don't really know what to do about it.

I know that what I'm doing at the moment

isn't making me happy.

And and gradually trying to sort of discover what

would make me happy.

And I have to say, 'cause some people might be thinking,

God, what an amazing position to be in that you can just

go and seek your Happiness.

It wasn't like that.

I didn't kind of drop out and go to Tibet for six

months or anything like that.

Afford to do that.

That's an option that's only open to a very

small minority, I think.

I had to earn money.

So basically I just started to segue, um, doing sort of

some sort of writing online that was turned into a blog,

trying to sort of, um, do some social media stuff that I was

interested in and gradually, gradually started to sort of

discover work that I enjoyed.

And I suppose the writing really, really helped.

And I'd, I'd definitely say if you are listening

and, and watching and thinking, oh, I'm at a loss

about who I'm and what I want to do, start writing.

And even if that's just a load of brain dump mm, it's often a

really good tool to help guide you into sort of finding out

who you are and what you want.

'Cause I sort of feel that that's what I did.

I sort of discovered, I rediscovered this

place inside myself.

Again, when I was writing, I realized I,

I really enjoyed it.

And that's kind of kept me going actually.

So I still work now.

So I still, I work at head of brand, uh, company.

It's another Startup called Jude who are amazing.

And I'm still kind of writing and I, but I think what's

happened is my attitude to work has shifted.

So I think now maybe other people will feel this

is true too, but I kind of feel like it's not

my core focus anymore.

There's like me, there's my personality, there's my

work, there's my writing, there's my relationship,

there's my friendships, there's a whole other

load of stuff that exists.

Whereas I think probably for the first 18 years

of my career, it, it was very narrow.

It was, it was really just work.

And a partner, but it was kind of shopping.

That was it.

It was traditional capital, you know,

things and that was it.

So I feel like it's much richer now.

So work is just one aspect of, of my life.

I think that's an interesting part there, this whole

identifying with work, and that being the thing

that we, you know, we have this narrow focus.

It's all about the career or the job or

the things that we do.

And I don't know if it feels like it's still a very strong

narrative, you know, while younger people are looking,

it feels like, um, new generation is just trying

to understand a different ex uh, relationship to, to work

and life and what it means to be successful, there's still

a very strong attachment to this idea of that work is

the thing that defines us.

From your experience, why do we get forced down that path?

What is it that just narrows Our view and focus

are purely on the work?

I think 'cause from, you know, when we are at school, the

first question that people ask us is kind of, what are

you gonna be when you grow up?

And we are kind of, we are not necessarily encouraged to say,

I'm gonna be a great dad, or I'm gonna be an amazing lover

to my partner, or, you know, I'm gonna do all the domestic

admin around the house, or, you know, I'm gonna.

I, I'm gonna have two cats and I'm gonna love them to death.

Mm-hmm.

Gonna write, you know, you're really encouraged to just see

yourself as your profession.

And we carry that on when we go to parties, when we

meet other people, um, we tend to almost immediately

ask them, what do you do?

You know, what's your job?

And we are still very status driven.

So there are certain jobs that we kind of.

Might give you extra kind of Brownsey points

and respect and some jobs that might less so.

And certainly with me, because I was in market

research, market research, a lot of people, when I

introduced myself and said I did that, they thought

I was one of those people with a, a clipboard who kind

of come and harass you in Tesco, you know, and ask you

20 questions about how your shopping has been that day.

And I used to always then sort of, I'd follow it up

with not that kind of market research, like I do other kind

of market research, and then I would try and name some of

the big brands that I kind of worked with and piggyback

onto their reputation.

So I'd be like, oh yeah, you know, so I'm like,

my big client is kind of like Estee Lauder, you

know, I do like loads.

So it's kind of, it was very much kind of, all of

my identity was tied up with work, but funny enough, I

didn't feel proud of, of that.

You know, I didn't feel, I would feel very empty inside.

So when I did use that as an introduction, I

didn't feel like, oh yeah.

You know, um, because I think part of the problem is, is you

can never, you can, once you go down that route of purely

defining yourself by your professional success, there's

always gonna be somebody who's better than you in the room.

There's always going to be someone who is, has got

more money, a bigger house.

You know, it's a, it's a very narrow definition.

And now I think once, one of the interesting things is when

I meet someone with a really impressive job, I always

think, oh, that's great.

What about all the other stuff?

What about what's going on?

And so, and, and often when I read profiles of people,

I'll notice that they leave all of that stuff out.

So they talk quite often about the daily routine of the,

the founder of the, you know, massively successful business.

But sometimes they, they leave the rest of it.

And I'm like, well, who feeds your cats?

And, you know, mm-hmm.

You know, what do you, what do you love doing with your kids?

And, you know, what's the thing that your wife gets

really irritated about?

You know, what's your, you know, why can't we

talk about those things?

'cause actually, the fact that you've done 16

conference calls while you were running on a treadmill

00 AM, I don't find that impressive, that level

of obsessive productivity is actually really damaging.

So I think, uh, hopefully now one of the things

that's happened, I think post covid is that people

are starting to think, I want more out of life.

You know, hopefully, I'm, I'm hoping that younger

generations are, are thinking, you know, I, I want to find

other definitions of success.

And I do hear that amongst colleagues

when I talk to them.

And they're all much younger than me, and, and

they do seem to be talking that kind of language.

Um, that, the trouble is, is that in London, you

know, living in London, you've got to earn a

certain amount of money in order just to survive.

So it's still, it's still a really tricky one.

You can't suddenly go, oh, I'm gonna start a business selling

beanie hats 'cause that's what I really wanna do inside.

Mm-hmm.

Um, so I'm always, yeah, I'm always cautious 'cause I sort

of think I, I still have to do, you know, and certainly

when I'm freelancing, I do a lot of work I enjoy and I

would, you know, I have to go and just do it just in

order to earn, earn money.

And I think we all have to do that.

Um, but it's just, if you can, if you could do a

sidestep into stuff you're more interested in, I

really think that's when you are more successful.

So, like my, you know, my books haven't made me

kind of a millionaire, but I feel, I feel more

successful since I've been writing and being published.

Um, much more successful than when I was a managing partner

and could you use that as a, as a term to describe myself?

So on one hand, there's this story or this narrative

about the, our self-worth and values defined by how much

we do or how much we have.

Then the challenge I'm hearing with that is then there's

always someone who's done more or someone who has more.

And I think we talked about this a little bit in our

conversation before about this idea of comparisonitis.

We're always looking to compare ourselves.

So I wanted to touch on that before we maybe just

think about some other ways of thinking about success.

So from your experience of this whole comparisonitis

thing, what, why, why do we fall into that trap?

Um, I think as we expect to get the payoff, you know,

so if we've, if we've done what we were supposed to

do, we, you know, we got the job and we worked really

hard, and then we got the, the family and the house

and the car, then we want to feel successful and we want

to feel fulfilled inside.

And so I think quite often we use that to judge other

people as well and to make ourselves feel better.

I mean, I, I think I sort of described it to you, I mean,

Miranda Sawyer, who wrote a really good book about sort

of being in your forties, she said, um, she's the only

one who doesn't have the box on the back of the house.

And, and the box on the back of the house effectively,

the kitchen extension that everybody has as another

kind of tick for success.

And they all look exactly the same.

So, you know, you go to your friend's house and you

go, oh, what house am I in?

Am I in the, am I in, you know, Jackie's

house or Jean's house?

'cause they both are exactly the same, but

that's definitely a tick box for success.

And I get caught up in it too.

So I spent a lot of time really mourning the fact

that I didn't have the box on the back of the house.

And then kind of realizing that.

In order to get that, I would have to go back

into probably a corporate kind of environment again.

And if I did my, my duty there and really got my head down,

I could have one of those.

And then I sort of thought I, I've started now sort of

thinking, do I want that?

And yeah, sometimes I bloody do.

Like, sometimes I do think, like at the moment we've got

a car and it's got gaffer tape holding the bumper on because

we've, we've not got round to fixing it and we've also

been budgeting and we've got loads of other stuff to do.

But I still find myself caught in that trap.

And we all have our personal triggers.

So your, yours might not be the box on the

back of the house.

It might be meeting somebody and realizing that they've got

a holiday home or they've got a brand of trainers on that

you can only buy in Korea and they're like 5 million pounds.

Or, you know, you are all gonna have your,

your flashpoints.

But I think I've got better now at kind of

taking a step back and thinking, what do you do?

What do you have to do in order to get that?

And what, what do I really want that, is that actually

gonna make me, make me happy?

'Cause you can still be miserable.

I've got plenty of friends who've got enormous houses

and their marriages are just bullshit and their

relationships with their kids are not great and.

Mm-hmm.

They're stressed.

And so I think we all know that that's true, but still

we buy into it, you know, because the messages are

so strong and pervasive.

You know, when we're on the tube, when we're watching tv,

that materialism and having a lot of material stuff is

what defines you successful and makes you happy.

And it's very hard actually.

'cause, you know, I, I, I was totally like that as a child.

I totally wanted to have all of that material success.

And I think it's only now that I'm realizing it, it

doesn't work, you know.

Within reason.

Because the, the thing is we have to be very cautious

that of course you need to have a roof over your head.

You need to have food.

You know, these are all.

The basics you need to have, you know,

I, when you say that, and you mentioned it before,

you like this being a very kind of balanced view

that I think of Maslow's hierarchy, hierarchy of needs.

You know, there's a certain, well we have needs for

material safety and physical safety, uh, in terms of

having food on the table and, and, and not feeling like

someone's just gonna walk into our house and steal stuff.

Funny because I'm still looking in the background and

I'm sort of thinking, I wonder what their kitchen looks like.

You know, I still, I mean, I'm still, I still have

that kind of schizophrenia a little bit where, you know,

I find it hard to not want, you know, not want those

things or not to wonder.

You know, I have to, if I go and visit somebody, I've, one

of my best friends has got amazing, an amazing house.

And I go inside and I feel myself sort of sink, you

know, I feel, I feel like, I have all those voices, like,

you're not successful enough.

You could have achieved this, but you haven't, you know,

you made some bad choices.

All those things are coming up.

And then I'm sort of looking around and then I'm like,

I walk away and I still feel this horrible kind of

sense of failure, really.

That's the only way I can describe it.

And then I sort of have to take a deep breath and sort

of go, hang on a minute, you're getting wrapped

up in that thing again.

Mm-hmm.

And you need to stop.

Well, you said before you take, you, you, you've

been able to take a bit of a, well, a step back.

And so I'd be curious to, to talk about that.

And I think given what we talked about, you know,

this, this magic number or magic number, a number.

We, we had some I.

Comments about the, using the, the, the 40 number, because

for some people that's still very young, so, okay, cool.

And on the, we have the majority of people here,

the overwhelming majority are here, are 40 and over.

There's this thing around, and I remember when I was

young, I couldn't wait till they get to the age of 40

for some reason in my head, once I was at 40, it would be

all fine, you know, sorted.

And, and there's this, like, up until then it is, I dunno,

there was, it was gonna be a rollercoaster ride.

And then you hit this age of 40 and you're

supposed to have done certain things or whatever.

It's, is it achieved, got the certain job, it's got some

certain type of lifestyle, you know, whatever trappings that

modern life is giving you.

But even then, like you're saying, we fall into this

behavior of thinking, oh, I haven't got enough, it

isn't enough because someone else has more than me.

It's funny 'cause I have a whole lot and I noticed that

Ray has said about kind of a thought spiral and sort

of when you, when you get caught, caught up in that.

And really, I, I mean I love self-help books and I've been

reading them from a very, you know, I probably was reading

self-help books when I was about eight, nine years old.

And through, throughout that period of time, I've kind of

gathered a whole lot of tools.

And some of them are things like, um, exercise, like

just going and, you know, doing a, a walk outside.

Some of them is actually being with my, you know,

being with my kids.

There's a kids just walk in here.

Some of it's just kind of like doing that.

Um, sometimes it might be doing some breathing.

Like I, you know, I do have an app on my phone and I

try and basically do a bit of meditation now and then.

So it's kind of, there's a whole variety of tools

that I kind of use.

And that gets me out of the catastrophizing.

That's what I would call it.

Well, there's, there's something for me there

about being present.

So the link I'm making to this whole comparisonitis and maybe

just, this, these unpleasant feelings that we may get

when we go and see someone who's got a nicer kitchen,

a bigger house, a nicer car, and more holiday homes.

Like you said, sort of like there's a self-criticism

or regret because of an actions that we

didn't take in the past.

Or there's a kind of a looking to the future of

like, okay, what does that mean in terms of where am

I gonna be if I don't have this house or this space?

These kind of like thoughts that take us out of like

experiencing what we're experiencing right now.

I mean, I've, I've written about this quite a lot,

kind of in the eighties there was this whole idea

that, you know, you could have it all, you know, you

could, as a woman anyway, that you could kind of, you

know, Shirley Conran wrote this amazing book, which

actually was misinterpreted, which was, I think it

was called Superwoman.

So it was all about, you can have the career, you

can have the kids, you can have the relationship, have

the friends have them, you can have the whole thing.

And I certainly kind of absorbed some of

that information where basically I thought I

could have it, have it all.

I do talk quite a lot about kind of people pleasing, and

I think that's, that's another thing about doing the things

that you don't love, you know, judging other people

on kind of material things.

It's all sort of tied in with that notion of

wanting people to like you and sort of judging

other people and stuff.

And a big thing for me, I think was just that post

40 I experienced a, you know, more recently I've

experienced kind of literal kind of losses in terms of,

you know, my dad died, um, very unexpectedly sort of

probably just two years ago.

Uh, you know, I had fertility treatment in my forties.

These, some of these kind of medical sort of things

and losing people, I think actually those things,

unfortunately, even though you don't choose them, they bring

you into the present because you are, you are having to,

and you're, you're basically gone from somebody who's

kind of preoccupied by the meeting that they've got that

morning to actually thinking about really big questions,

which is like, what happens if, if I die tomorrow, will I

be, will I be satisfied with what's happened thus far?

You know, with my parents dying now, are they, it it

sort of sets you off on a path of looking backwards

and thinking about their lives and were they happy

with the path that they took?

And so I now find that actually some of those really

deep, quite heavy things has helped me stay present.

'cause even with things, I mean, you know, even

things like grieving for example, um, it's a

very visceral sensation.

You know, you do, you kind of feel, you feel quite heavy.

You can be crying, you know, you can be very up and down.

And I sort of, I think now I'm much more, maybe

that is through practicing some of the mindfulness.

I'm more in tune with my emotions and sort of

like my feelings and, and not avoiding them.

And I think a lot of the behavior before I was

basically avoiding feelings.

So I was running all the time.

I think a lot of working people are that, you know,

people say that to me now.

They're kind of like, you, you, you find it very hard

to relax and that's true.

Um, and that's, that's something I learned from

my own parents that we didn't prioritize rest.

We just didn't, you know, you were only, you had

to be busy all the time.

Um, now I think I've probably got better

at noticing that too.

So sort of going, hang on.

You are really, you are, you are, you're getting really

sucked into that busy thing and you need to come back

into this, this moment now.

Um, something, I mean, it's very hard, but I think

you all, you just have to practice it, you know?

Um, and unfortunately life circumstances can

force you into it too.

Another factor around the busyness is that how, like

we were saying before, our value and our self-worth is

tied to how much we do and, and how impactful or how broad

the impact of that doing is.

Whether that's, you know, managing people in a company

or being a TED talker, But this whole idea of

not stopping, and being, because it then means that

we have to feel stuff or these feelings come up.

And, you know, talking about grief and how I think some

people try suppress it.

And I've been very, um, guilty of just like try to push away

the feelings because I didn't know what to do with them.

It's like that, ah, this feels really horrible.

How do I put, how do I, what do I do with this?

How do I, what, what is this supposed to, what value is

this to me to feel shit?

But then there's something around how I think I'm

seeing what I'm hearing is I like, actually it's just the

processes, feeling shit is is the what you need to do.

But also, I mean, that's something to not, I mean

it depends what your sort of spiritual beliefs are.

But the level of shit that you feel, certainly when you miss

somebody is really reflective of how much you love them.

So it's really comes back to, now I'm starting to

realize that now, is that my productivity, productivity

really took off after my dad died and I, in

lockdown, I wrote two books.

I launched a podcast.

I was just going mad in terms of doing stuff,

and I was totally trying.

I mean, now I look back on it and I think, oh, we

were just totally trying to avoid feelings and it was

a complicated situation in, in the situation that he,

you know, circumstances, it wasn't easy, um, because he

had a problem with addiction and he was an alcoholic.

So there was all sorts of other issues as well.

Um, but now when I get these heavy feelings, and I

do get them still, because that's the other thing with

grief is that people often think, oh, you get over it.

You, you never do.

I still strongly believe that, you know, 10, 20 years on, you

have these very, very strong feelings of, of, of loss.

Um, I'm now much better at recognizing, but you know,

that's, this is normal.

Not only is it normal to feel like this, this

is a reflection of the fact that you loved your

father, you know, and he loved you and that, and

you are missing that love.

That's the absence of, of, but the love is

actually still there.

It sounds really cheesy, but I'm still carrying that.

It's just that I don't have anyone to sort of

bo it back to me again.

Um, so I think once you sort of accept that it's, it's

normal and it's natural.

And I would say if anyone, you know, if anyone is grieving,

it's really helpful to sort of find resources that, that

are kind of filled with other people who are going through

it because there's an awful lot of kind of, yeah, you feel

so much better just knowing that it's a, the feelings that

you're having a a, a normal whatever that means, um.

Hmm.

But I guess, yeah, that's definitely, definitely

made me more present.

But definitely thinking about my parents and their

definitions of success.

'Cause they, I think both of them were kind of

workaholics pretty much.

Um, and so now I sort of think, well, it's not

surprising that you grew up to be a workaholic too.

Um, you know, and, and like you've already touched on,

we, we respect workaholics, you know, um, but we have

this strange thing where we sort of go, you know,

hope you're keeping busy.

That's another thing that people say, oh,

you're keeping busy.

And if you said, no, I'm not keeping busy.

I'm just sitting in the garden doing absolutely nothing, you

would be judged, you know?

Um, so there's this whole, apart from the kind of

what are you gonna be when you grow up, you know,

the kind of keeping busy.

And then there's this whole notion around kind

of judging one another by how much stuff they have.

You can see how we get caught in these narratives.

Um, and it's hard to, to jump out.

And even with my, when I write my books, I still

want to have success.

I still want to.

You know, I have mad fantasies where I wanna be on Oprah's

Book Club and you know, I wanna be, you know, I wanna

be as big as Marian Keys and, and what's that all about?

Why can't I just be happy just writing?

Um, so there are still, I still kind of wanting

to be successful.

But I guess what, what I want now is to be

recognized for the things that I really enjoyed doing

versus for something that didn't really feel like it

was me and my best work.

You know, I was, I was sort of trapped in someone

else's body for a long time.

One of the things that we, we've been exploring, um,

the Happy Startup School in our programs and our coaching

is this connection to needs.

And so, a way I would interpret what you're saying

before about the feelings, you know, the feelings of grief,

feelings of loss, feelings of sadness, 'cause there's

this need for connection with someone with your father

who's no longer around.

And then how identifying these things, these feelings and

what they connect to in terms of these needs are, are ways

to navigate our way forward and understand what, what kind

of actions we need to take.

And I'm linking that to this, you know, we're talking

about how do we navigate the second half of life, let's

put it this way, given that we've used a certain compass

in the past, uh, which was this objective measure of

success based on some kind of numeric, uh, approach.

You know, you, we, we talked about, we, we've been led

by other people's metrics.

What is your, now, now your process of defining

that and working with that?

You said about doing stuff that you love and

being known for that.

How you, how, what is it that's, helping you

define those things?

Um, it's an interesting one.

I mean, one of the exercises that I find really helpful,

like I said, is writing a lot.

So using writing, not just writing for publishing, but

just writing for myself.

What I've found is that when you write, there tends to be

a, a gut kind of feeling which points you in the direction

of the thing that you want.

You know, you're sort of like, oh.

The more that you write, the more you're kind of like,

oh, this is how, you know, this is what I love doing.

This is kind of how I feel.

It helps identify what you don't want as well.

I mean, I wish I kind of, what I wish is that

I discovered way earlier.

'cause I mean, there may be people who are listening

and they're kind of like, That little voice that's

on your shoulder that's going, this is shit.

I hate it.

I hate this, this, this jerk is driving me mad.

You know, I, I wanna, you know.

All those thoughts, listen to them.

Don't just go right, I'll have some booze and that

will shut that one up.

Or, you know, I'll go and have an affair with someone

and then I'll feel better about myself, or whatever

those things are that we use to numb or escape,

listen to that voice.

And I think all that's happened with me is I've got

better at listening to it.

And then I, once I, once I listen to it, sometimes that

voice isn't right, by the way.

'cause sometimes the voice can be like, you're really

shit and you are a failure.

This is another voice, which is really your

gut, which is kind of telling you who you are.

Um, and if you're feeling increasingly every time

you go to work, feeling like the real kind of, it's

not coherent with who you are, then listen to that.

Um, and I think that's all I've probably done.

But I've also had to take direct action.

So I basically had to, you know, I was lucky that I

was made redundant from work, and within that

redundancy I got a payout.

If I hadn't got that, I wouldn't have been able to

then embark on a sort of hybrid career of my own.

Now almost every decision I make is driven by the

fact of financially.

Is it rewarding enough that it's worth my while?

Or is it something that I would love to do?

So like, you know, if I love doing something, I will do it.

And does it feel like the gut voice is going yeah, that's

great, that's brilliant, you do that, then I do it.

Um, if it's really financially rewarding, I do it.

If it's neither of those things, then I don't do it.

Um, it's kind of the older you get, the better you

get identifying that.

So you're kind of, you know now, I used to spend

a lot of time because I was very much in the sort

of Instagram world where there were so many people

pre covid where it's like, let's go and have a coffee.

You know, let's go and have a coffee.

And I would go and have coffees with a million

different people.

And now I'm just like, no, I don't wanna have a coffee.

Like, I'll be completely frank with you.

But unless there's something happening out of this,

like, be it a friendship, I, we feel some sort of gut

risk connection that we're gonna be friends or there's

some work coming out of it, which is gonna be well

paid or it's gonna be some creative pursuit that I'm

really into, I'm not into it.

Do you know what I mean?

I won't, I won't do it.

And I think through using that kind of traffic light

system of red, you know, Amber Green for everything,

life gets a lot easier and you just find yourself

doing more of the thing.

And it's funny because I'm now at a bit of a

crossroads 'cause I've kind of realized I've written

five books and they've been published, but I'm not living

off the proceeds of that.

So I'm now at the point where I'm kind of, I could

write another book, but actually what I want to

do is take some time and reflect what I want next.

And obviously I'm working at the same time, but it's

kind of, am I gonna just keep on writing books?

Am I still happy writing books and not getting a sort of

salary out of it, you know?

Mm-hmm.

Um, what do I do?

Um, and it's interesting 'cause actually

it's the two things.

It's kind of the material, you know, there is still

that materialism about wanting to be a Sunday

Times bestselling author.

But yeah, I, I mean, I actually think for anyone

who's kind of in their 40, not 40 or is just in

early forties, I really do strongly believe that life

gets better as you get older.

Um, and I didn't believe that for a long time.

And for women, I think aging in particular is

a really quite a tricky thing to navigate.

But I do now.

I do, I sort of, I sort of, as long as you're lucky

enough to have your health, I think in terms of your

clarity on what you want, it becomes much, much clearer.

And that's why they call it the midlife crisis often,

is that it's the, it's the snake shedding its skin.

You know, the old, the old sort of skin comes off and the

new snake comes out, whatever.

Probably not a good analogy.

Um, but you do feel, feel.

You know, you're like, right, I've got no time for bullshit.

I don't wanna waste time having coffee with

people I don't like, you know, I don't give a

shit about your big car.

You know, you can drone on about your holiday, but

I'm not gonna listen to it because I know that's not

what I want at the moment.

And you sort of, yeah, I think you do.

You just become much, much lost, less tolerant of, uh,

certain things, which, which makes your life better.

Sounds like you are a point now of reflection.

You know, you're saying, okay, well given everything

I've done so far, where do I want to go next?

And I, I, I've come to value that much more

recently in terms of not the incessant doing and,

and, and just plowing on, um, though stopping and just

thinking, just feels, and I, I still have a bit of a

reaction to it 'cause it, it feels a bit too passive.

But there's something here around, given what you said

before, there's something here around feelings.

There's something about just, just checking in,

and then, then being able to, to carve out the, the

right strategy, the right path for the future based on

what you've learned so far.

And it could be a completely different path because

you think, okay, you know, this isn't working, so

I'm gonna do something else, um, which I think is

challenging for some people.

And so, a question I had was really around how

has your tolerance for risk evolved over time?

I think it's really interesting when we

think about risk.

'cause I think I was really risk averse, which is

obviously why I stayed in the same job for so long.

Um, but because I came from a, you know, we are all,

we, we are the way we are because of our childhoods.

And I think my childhood, we moved a lot.

We lived in different countries.

My parents were divorced.

Um, we had what would be described as a bohemian

sort of upbringing.

You know, I have something like upwards of, I can't even

keep count six to nine sort of step and half brothers.

You know, my mom's married three times.

I mean, none of that's judge judgy, but what I wanted

instability for a long period of time actually,

that's what I wanted.

And actually now, I mean, children come into it actually

is that now I'm probably more, um, open to taking risks.

You know, like now I'm even considering like, do I wanna

move to a different location?

But the children are now the big factor of kind of like,

is that gonna be okay or not?

Uh, what about that?

You know, I think they're much more cautious now.

My parents really did not, I don't think they, they were

not inconsiderate, but they did, they lived their lives

and children lived with them.

They didn't live their lives for their children, which

is what we tend to do now.

It's like everything we do is driven by what they need.

They've got a play date, we all go to the play date.

They've got an activity.

We all get activity.

Some of it, I think is not particularly

healthy, um, necessarily.

But yeah, I think to your question, I'm, I'm

probably, I wish I was, I could take more risks, but

I've now got, you know, I have to consider them too.

I can't just go off and do whatever I fancy, you know.

So maybe I'll take kids out of the equation then,

because that is a very specific pace, case in point.

'cause we have, uh, well, there's a sense of

responsibility, uh, not only for their physical wellbeing,

but also their emotional wellbeing and how these, how,

how the choices we make in the present will potentially

impact their futures in all sorts of ways, and I, and

that's, that's an interesting thing there for me.

But at a personal level, you said, you know, your,

sounds like your appetite for risk is be, is greater.

How has your relationship to risk changed?

Why are you feeling, forgetting the kids that

you'd like to shake things up or you're happy to

shake things up more?

I think basically, um, probably, the age that

I am probably losing my father had a big role in

that because I think I, I, I realized that I'd had so

many conversations with him around the things that he

was gonna do when he retired.

So he was like, you know, when I retire I'm gonna do

this and I'm gonna, he, he always used to say, when I

retire, I'll write a book.

He was a doctor in philosophy, so he was like an academic.

And he died without having, he didn't retire.

He didn't get to retire the year that he was supposed

to retire, that it happened.

And I think the whole notion of retirement is weird anyway.

'cause it's kind of like what you're gonna live your whole

life, not enjoying yourself, just so you can sit on a

cruise in a Hawaiian shirt or smoking a cigar and then die?

It's kind of, it's just weird.

It's like you're storing up just for

that retirement moment.

Um, but I think for me now, I've sort of felt, look,

you know, it sounds really grim, but you know, death

can come at any moment and we never really know

what's gonna happen to us.

And as we get older, we just, we have no, no idea.

And so it is a bit of that cliche of I've got to do the

things that are gonna make me happy and fulfilled now

because I can't, you know, I might be exactly the same.

I might retire and pop my clogs the next day, you know?

And then, you know, I'm kind of, I'm often trying

to keep that perspective now of, I think, along

with my own voice, there's also my father's voice now

sort of saying, listen Nik, you need to get a move on.

You know, do the stuff that you wanna do because

you know, you've, it's, I haven't got that long left,

you know, on the planet.

And so you can't keep putting off like thinking,

you know, I kept thinking, I thought, you know, when

I'm 40, I kind of had this idea that, you know, I was

gonna be living by the coast.

You know, I thought that might have happened,

it hasn't happened.

That's kind of one of the things I really wanna do.

I wanna go and swim in, like in the sea.

I haven't really, you know, I haven't done that.

I like the idea of doing that.

I like the idea of, you know, sampling

life outside of London.

I've lived in London for a long time, but I'm starting to

fall out of love with it now.

But the other problem is that I have this whole idea that

when I live there, I will have a different life and

my life will be completely different to the way it's now.

Suddenly I will turn into a very active sport, you

know, sporty, outdoor person.

There's something about having children that we also need

to consider when it comes to our work and how fast

we wanna move with work.

So I just wanted to just help invite you to touch a bit on

that to just, for anyone who, who is having, who does have

children and they are trying to do something different or

move forward with a change.

Yeah, I mean I found it really tough in that I'd had

so much of my life without children and then suddenly

to, I think a lot of men and women find it tough.

I think they traditionally, they always say it's tougher

for women, but I think it's for both in that you suddenly

can't, you have to slow down.

I mean, you've got to, they've got this little

thing that you've got to look after and you've got

to, everything's around their routines and stuff.

I still kind of haven't got it entirely sussed out.

The one thing I do know is that I couldn't, I

wouldn't be able to function if I was staying at home

with them all the time.

Like, I know, I know that for myself.

Um, 'cause I know that, and I'm lucky enough in that

'cause a lot of, you know, childcare's so expensive.

I'm lucky enough that I can earn enough to pay for

childcare, 'cause that's a big, that's a big thing for

a lot of people, you know, childcare's so expensive.

, I feel the eternal guilt all the time because I'm always

feeling like whenever I'm doing something for myself,

I feel like I could be doing something for them.

And the other thing which I think we're all familiar

with is there's just so much admin that goes around

looking after children.

This kind of, there's obviously being with them,

but then there's this, all this other shit, like kind

of, you know, we've got lots of WhatsApp kind of

channels, which is partly why I started taking the piss out

of WhatsApp on my Instagram because I was getting sort

of upwards of kind of 15 messages a day about is it

PE day, is it World Book Day?

Can you bring a card in for the teacher?

You need to log onto this platform and, and do a

donation, 'cause there's a workshop happening.

Um, can you, you know, I don't know, there was just so can

you volunteer for the PSA?

You know, all of this really quite, some of it's

really good, obviously.

We need to do that stuff, but I felt like it's a lot of

unpaid work and I'm sure if there's moms who are watching,

and I know we touched on this before, unfortunately, a lot

of that work can fall onto the mother rather than the father.

So the mom has a, a job then it's unpaid work, which

is organizing her kids.

You know, entire universe, every day, even thinking

ahead, it's boring stuff.

It's like, is there clean socks in the drawer

because they've gotta go to school tomorrow.

You know, where's the Brownsey uniform?

Um, I end up doing this thing when I'm at work

where I'm WhatsApping other mums, 'cause my partner's

at home and he's got to get one of them to brownies.

So I'm basically organizing his childcare at work

whilst I'm in a meeting.

And this is one of the bug bears where I think

there's loads of interesting books about it, where

that's a big distraction.

You know, if women, you know, I'm pretty sure that

Cheryl Sandberg doesn't deal with that, you know,

and I mean, I know she's a controversial figure, but

I think if you, women could probably achieve far more,

if they weren't continually being dragged down.

It's like having big, massive stones in your

pockets every day that you are sort of carrying around.

So certainly when they're, it's been a

massive compromise.

'cause I feel like I, I, I, I discovered what I wanted

to do and then I had kids, and the kids have slowed

me down significantly.

But, you know, I chose that and I was lucky

enough to have, you know, to be able to have them.

So, um, people keep telling me it gets easier.

Um, but I dunno if that's true.

I dunno if it is true.

I think that's a myth.

I

it is, it is true.

It is true.

It gets different and it does get easier.

Um, I just wanna bring in Laurence, 'cause it, well,

from my, I I had my second child when we just started

the Happy, Startup School.

And I think, um, my wife has a different opinion

as to whether that was a good thing or not.

Um,

We were lucky we both had kids around the same time

when we were growing our business or starting it.

And so, We were lucky.

I think that we had similar goals and visions for

how we wanted to work as co-founders together, which

I think is quite rare.

which probably helped that we were friends before.

Um, but yeah, I think it's, it's a new phenomenon.

I think this idea of, like you said, putting our kids first.

My dad always said, they've come to live with you,

not the other way around.

And that was one of the things that stuck with me.

Is like, don't change anything because you've got kids.

Just, they'll, they'll follow you.

So if you wanna go make a change, go make it.

Um, which sounds easy, right?

It sounds so easy, but I think it's really hard to.

Yeah, I love that.

I do love that advice though.

I think that's really, but that's how my parents

behaved very much.

Um, you know, so we did, we traveled a lot.

But it's just having that bad, it's like being able to

be free, but also offering them that stability.

'Cause I think, uh, that was something that I felt like I

lacked was, it was kind of, I, I I wanted to have a kind of

very traditional upbringing.

I wanted to have, you know, I used to say to my mom,

I'd go like, oh, you know, I want mum who's like,

wears a pinny and makes me cakes and stuff, you know,

a mum's got pink hair and a nose ring and is like going

off to Nicaragua, you know?

So It, it is hard, but I think it's good for them

actually a bit of change.

'cause they're gonna have to navigate change, you

know, numerous times.

And also, I think the final thing I'd add to that, I

mean, we work with a lot of people who are, like

you said, navigating this transition, let's call it.

I always just say to people, I always just think if you can

be the best version of you, then that's good for the kids.

Even if it means maybe they sacrifice something

in the short term.

You know, it might not be, they get all the, the best

trainers or the best of everything, but hopefully

you'll be a better person around them and longer

term it's better for them.

So, I don't know, I think there's sometimes we have

this responsibility of they'll expect everything as we

need to put them first, but.

Yeah.

Yeah, I don't think that's always good for them.

If the collateral damage of that is we end up doing

something we don't wanna do, which is not good for anyone.

Yeah.

And and then they're seeing you 'cause they're gonna

model themselves on you too, so they're basically seeing

you not living the life that you want and thinking

Exactly.

That's okay.

Yeah.

There's something here around any resentment

that colors anything that you do for your kids.

I think if there is any of that element of resentment,

then that's gonna come across and, you know, whether, if you

have to sacrifice going, doing something so that they can

do something for themselves.

Um, there's also the whole material aspect of things

and wishing that they could have certain things.

Uh, my, my feeling around this ultimately is if

they can feel confident in themselves, um, because we're

all destined to fuck up our kids some way or the other.

Mm-hmm.

But ultimately the, for me, if we can make sure that no

matter what, they feel that someone there loves them and

is always there for them no matter what and loves them

for who they are, they might not get everything they want,

but they will get what they need, which is essentially

a, a solid foundation of self-confidence and, um,

self-awareness even hopefully.

Yeah.

Is also the, the ability to apologize.

'Cause that was something that, I mean, I've screwed

up quite a few times.

I, I find that often in the mornings, yeah, I'm

struggling in the mornings to get them both ready

and out and everything.

Um, and I think sometimes when I'm in that position I

just apolo I do apologize, which I, I'm not sure my

parents did that often.

You know, they didn't, if they did screw up, um, yeah.

Well, it's, I think it's about being human and

letting them know that we are human as well.

'cause then they don't feel like a, we're on this massive

pedestal and though everything that we say is gospel.

Um.

Yeah,

I think there's an element of love, respect, but

also them to realize that it's okay to get it wrong.

Because if they don't think that it's okay to get it

wrong, you know, the classic thing you won't learn.

I'm conscious of time and then Laurence needs to go

and pick up his son to be a, a responsible father.

Um, is there anything that's happening in that you'd like

to point people towards?

If people wanna get to know you, where

would you like to go?

To the best place?

Well, if they could, I would love it if they

could go on Amazon and they'll, they'll see a,

an array of books there.

Um, they can pre-order one of my books, um,

which is out in August.

That would be fab, um.

Nice.

It's a big quit.

If they wanna just have a bit of a laugh, then I would

say, go on my Instagram, which is just at Anniki

Sommerville, all one word.

Um, because basically you can just watch a woman

in wigs tending to be different on WhatsApp.

Brilliant.

I think that's, that's probably, it's a

bit of light relief.

I mean, that's something we didn't touch on, but

that is very important too sometimes is not to take

ourselves too seriously.

Well, if we can't laugh of half, uh, half of the things

that we have to experience, particularly as parents and

the challenges we have to face and doing the Work Parenthood

balance, um, yeah, it's just, it gets desperate then.

Uh, so, well, thank you very much Anniki.

Uh, if anyone listening to this is curious

about, Anikki's work, the links are in the chat.

Being amongst other people who are navigating this

whole thing as well.

Um, to feel connected, I think is the other thing

we want to, to create with this conversation.

Awesome.

Thanks Nikki.

Thanks everyone.

Until next time.

See you everyone.

You take care.

Thank you.