Recovery Career Navigation

Helping you start over.

Crash-and-Burn

So you crashed-and-burned. You flew too close to the sun with the help of chemical compositions; you floated on a wave of vodka, gin, beer, wine or a mixture of all; you worked that internet until it worked you over; you shopped until you were all sold out; you loved so much that you were left loveless. It was your fault; it wasn’t your fault. It doesn’t matter because what really matters is that you crashed-and-burned. And you need to get up again…and stay up.

Safe, comfortable landing

If you’re fortunate enough to afford a stint in an addiction rehabilitation facility you will gain insight into the disease of addiction, learn life-skills to enable you to take the first steps forward, gain a view of your self-defeating behaviors’ and hopefully make amends with your nearest and dearest and enlist their support. You will most likely be introduced to a 12-step Recovery Programme – an AA, NA, CoDa or SLA – that will provide invaluable support as you journey on your road of recovery.

Safe, albeit less comfortable landing

If you didn’t get to rehab but you got sober anyway, either through therapy or religion or going to AA, NA, CoDa or SLA or something else miraculous (because let’s face it, it takes a miracle to get sober whichever way) and you want to continue on your journey without tripping yourself up, life and career coaching with someone who knows about the unique challenges that recovery addiction entails will provide support as your walk your path (or run your marathon).

Either way you might have had extra support from friends and family as you forged the New You but chances are they won’t always be as available as new challenges take precedence for them. At some point they’ll consider you normal (which is wonderful and desirable) and expect you to conduct your life like a “normal”, which is totally possible but it can be difficult at times without a co-navigator.

The Real World

Either way, there comes a point when you’re out…in the real world. You need to get a job, determine a future beyond the safe walls of your sober living facility, your counselors care, and/ or your family’s protection. You need to do life on life’s terms.

Burning brightly, burning bridges

You remember the reason you self-medicated was your crushingly low self-esteem or your acute shyness, a mental health problem such as depression or bipolar disorder, your deep sense of injustice or your unfortunate life circumstances. Whatever the reason, you realize you made judgment errors when you were burning brightly and you understand that you burned bridges and damaged your reputation as you arced into drunken, drugged or spent oblivion.

Starting Over

So many questions…

How to start over?
How to return to an industry that drove you insane?
How to map a path to a future work life that will be sustainable and emotionally rewarding?
How to get up to speed on industry trends that occurred while your attention was elsewhere?
How to conduct yourself and answer difficult questions during the job interview?
What to say when asked “Tell me about yourself?”
Wait…how to get an interview when you don’t have a CV or a job history worth speaking of?
Or, you have a CV but it’s all a lie, a fabrication, and you’re working an honest recovery programme?
How to write a CV when your work-life history is more chequered than a chess board or when it has more blanks than a clean A4 page?
How to explain your situation to an unforgiving and prejudiced world that think that staying unstopped is a moral failing and who believe that stopping is a matter of exercising willpower?

Is any of this even possible?

Why Can I Help You?

Having had my own journey through the dark night of the soul many years ago I’m an experienced navigator of life on the other side of the living-dead.

As a career and life coach I have worked with countless people in recovery – from addictions and breakdowns, both in and out of rehab – who face all the challenges and questions outlined above. I help people recover their working selves, their sense of purpose and their rightful place in the sun, and make choices from the infinite and sometimes bewildering galaxy of career choices.

How Do I Help You?

Through a structured, tried and tested approach, combining Career Management practices with Integral Life Coaching methods and 12-step Recovery Programme principals (or not if you’d prefer):

I help you remember who you were before you sought to forget.
I help you re-invent and re-position yourself, restoring your reputation if required.
I help phrase things you felt were too small and insignificant to even mention so that they help differentiate your offering to the workforce.
I help reframe past objectionable jobs to find the transferable skills that will take you on a new path.
I make it my goal to help you lift your head a little higher with more confidence than you can muster on your own.
Using a combination of coaching modalities that suit your preferences I will be there for you, every step of the way, until you feel confident enough to walk on your own.

Navigation Skills

Things I have helped people do since they got sober and well:

get their first honest job ever
return to secondary school or achieve tertiary education with an end in mind
rewrite their past so that their future looks bright
restore their reputations and redeem themselves
write CV’s, covering letters, apply for jobs, get jobs
motivate for internship positions to obtain new work experience
change careers mid-life
leave toxic employment relationships
process workplace dynamics and learn how to play the ball and not the man
gain understanding of their part in relationships that went wrong

Gaining Courage

I assist my clients regain themselves at work and play and help them find courage:

to pick up the phone and make an enquiry or reach out for assistance
to send an email introducing themselves and what they can do for a future employer
to expand their network of people who can help them move forward
to resign from a non-serving job
to leave damaging relationships
to initiate healthy relationships
to ask for what they need

To find and keep courage where previously they had none.

To find the courage to take baby steps towards big steps that makes life changes. That makes life happen. That makes life continue happening: happily, rewardingly, satisfyingly and meaningfully.

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gwyn@gwyneddtheron.com

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082 494 2284

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@gwyn.theron