Perspective

Throw me a lifeline.

This one is deep and meaningful, but is hands down (no pun intended) one of the most useful tools for understanding yourself, particularly if you’re feeling like you’ve lost your perspective on things…perhaps at the end of a long week, when everything (and quite possibly everyone) is pissing you off for no good reason.

It’s the Life Line. But this is not the palmistry version - although I do live near Glastonbury, so am totally into having my palm, runes, tarot or tea leaves read. Maybe a topic for another day.

Anyway. Take a large piece of paper and a pen. Draw a line across the middle from left to right and plot the key moments of your life along it. Soaring high above the central spine are the highs, the triumphs and the successes. The things you’re proud of, that you’d celebrate in an interview or that would be in the speeches on your 70th birthday. Below the line are the shit bits - the failures, regrets, heartbreaks. The stuff that really hurts, and that probably isn’t on your socials, your CV or your Linked In profile.

You can contain it to the highs and lows of work if you like, or if you’re feeling more vulnerable and open to the experience, hurl everything on there.

As you plot the line, just bring your awareness to yourself and to what you’re doing, and simply notice yourself in the process. Ponder things like…

• How do you feel?

• What do you observe?

• What comes easy? What’s harder?

• What (if anything) did you want to phrase very carefully, or even edit out?

Sometimes then it’s best just to sit with it for a bit and do nothing. Let the experience percolate. Return to it when you feel ready, and then ask what it might be teaching or telling you. Coming back to it after the process, you can then ponder questions like…

• What patterns (if any) do you see?

• How have these experiences shaped who you are today?

• How do they impact or play into your current behaviour?

• What have these experiences given you?

• Is there anything unresolved that you would like to face into?

And yes, of course, you can share it and talk it through with your coach, partner, therapist or another trusted human if you feel comfortable to do this. But it works just as well doing it solo, showing no one and burning it afterwards if you prefer to keep your darkest secrets from the world.

I won’t share a photo of mine for the entire internet to see, but I will share a couple of things that I noticed when I did it.

My first observation is that time and distance change everything. Had I in front of me the version of my lifeline that I drew back in 1992 in the moment when I didn’t get into Oxford this low would have been so devastating as to require a new piece of paper to be glued clumsily to the first bit to even fit it on.

But here in the 2025 version of my lifeline, that moment barely even registers.

And it’s eclipsed by a massive high - a cracking offer to Brum Uni that came a little later, took all the pressure off my sitting my A-Levels, led me to some of the best years of my life, and some of my very best friends. And that’s my second observation - for me, the greatest lows have often been followed by or somehow turn into the greatest highs.

So there you go, the lifeline. Give it a try if you fancy, let me know what you think in the comments! And if you like my writing do please share.

And as a very random footnote, just because it’s in my head and I can’t get rid of it, my favourite song featuring the word “lifeline” is Ribcage by Elbow. Great band, cracking song, seek it out. If you are not specific enough in your googling though I warn you, you’ll get pipe fittings or anatomical references.