My perpetuum mobile
Sometimes one song, an ordinary conversation and a few strands of hair on the salon floor are enough for a person to notice they are standing on the threshold of a new chapter. Between what they know well and what is only beginning to take shape, a space opens for questions we often miss in the everyday rush. This story, too, is about pausing, about change, about the courage to trust your own pace, and about looking for inner calm.
I sat in the hairdresser’s chair and looked into the mirror. Strands of hair were slowly falling to the floor, as tired from the past months as my head. We talked about life, about work and about what I want to do next. About questions for which I did not yet have clear answers.
At one moment my hairdresser put on Ewa Farna’s new song Perpetuum mobile. I listened to the words, watched the reflection of the woman in the mirror, and suddenly it struck me how much energy I had given in recent years to managing everything, solving everything and keeping it all in motion. Thoughts began to unwind in my head that had been tangled for a long time, just like my tired hair.
That was the first time I felt I wanted to remember this period of my life. Something was ending, something new was only being born, and between the two a space was opening that I had long not allowed myself. A space to pause, take a breath and listen to myself.
Perhaps that is why this article came into being. As a small reminder for my future self. And perhaps also for anyone who has ever found themselves between what was and what is only just arriving.
When we no longer need to run faster
More and more often I hear conversations about work. About the Sunday tightness in the stomach before Monday. About a tiredness that is not about one demanding week, but about many months and sometimes years. I meet people who stay in the same place even though they have long since stopped being content. I understand them. They have their reasons. Families, commitments, duties and a responsibility that cannot simply be set aside.
These conversations open questions in me that I am now asking myself as well. How do you know when it is time to stay and when it is time to step somewhere else? When is a person acting from fear, and when from trust? And how do you tell the difference between an instant solution and a decision we will still be at peace with in a few years?
I am in a period when I do not yet know some of the answers. Instead of looking for quick conclusions, I am giving them time. Some things need to ripen, like fruit on a tree. They cannot be hurried or planned down to the last detail. I am allowing myself to stay for a while in the space between what is ending and what is only being born.
My professional path belongs in this space too. For many years I gathered experience, learned new things, led projects and looked for opportunities to grow. None of that has changed. I still know what I can do, what value I can bring, and that for work done well I want to be fairly recognised, including financially.
But a life is not a CV.
Experience, successes and work stories are part of who we are. Beside them there is still something that does not fit into any CV. How we feel in our work. The people we share it with. Whether it gives us space to be ourselves, and to come home in the evening with the sense that we are in the right place.
A step aside is not a step back
Perhaps we have grown used to looking at working life as a ladder. Each next position should be a little higher, each change should look at first glance like a move in the right direction. Life rarely happens in a straight line. When I was deciding what next, I was surprised how often people automatically assume that every next job must be better, bigger or more prestigious than the one before. As if a person’s value grew together with the job title on the business card.
Today I am looking for something else. I need to occupy the body as much as the head. I need distance from the projects that have accompanied me for many years. I need to experience something new, get to know a different environment and, for a time, step out of a role I had inhabited for so long that I had almost stopped noticing it. I do not see my current part-time job in a shop as a step down. It is part of my path, an experience that will bring me new people, new situations and a new view of the world. A chance to get the body moving while the head gets space to breathe.
This period stirs curiosity in me rather than fear. I do not know all the answers, and I have no idea where the coming months will take me. I only know that some paths make sense only at the moment we actually set out on them.
Looking for a professional home
When someone asks me today what is next, I answer differently than I used to. Only a few years ago my answer would have pointed toward projects, plans and work goals. Today what comes to mind are people, an environment, and the feeling with which I get up in the morning and fall asleep at night. In my life I have passed through various roles, learned a great deal and come to know environments in which I could grow. Each experience gave me something and helped shape the person I am today. Thanks to them I know my strengths, I know where I can be useful, and I value everything I have gained on the way and everyone I have met on it.
Beside experience and work results I more and more notice one more value. The feeling that you belong somewhere. A place where it makes sense to be, where you have people around you whom you understand, work you are glad to stand behind, and an environment in which you can be yourself. A place you arrive at with energy and leave with the feeling of a job well done.
As the years add up, my attention naturally moves from shine to substance. I still enjoy learning new things, taking on challenges and growing. Human relationships, trust, respect and ordinary inner calm now carry the same weight for me. I notice the atmosphere of places far more than the names of job titles. I am interested in how people speak to one another, how they help each other, what energy they pass between themselves, and how a person feels in such an environment. Somewhere among these thoughts a picture is slowly being born in me of a place where I would like to be. It has no exact outline and no concrete address. It does, though, have values that are close to me, and a feeling I will recognise at the moment I meet it.
A rite of passage
Every culture has had its rites of passage. Moments when a person was leaving one stage of life and only looking for a path into the next. Such periods were given attention, because the journey between two shores had its meaning too. Life is made of moments whose meaning we recognise only with time. I wanted to capture this one at the moment it is still being written.
A Calmory pause
We live in a world that teaches us to add, to speed up and constantly to prove our value. Less often do we hear that sometimes the bravest step can be precisely to pause.
Calm is not something that arrives only when everything is finished.
Calm is the space in which we find the right direction.
And sometimes it is enough to allow yourself to pause for a while, to find that you are not looking for another peak. You are looking for a place where you can be yourself.
Calm can be learned.
A Woman Who Writes About Life As It Really Is
Antonie is a woman who knows the power of human stories and isn’t afraid to write about them. She has gone through burnout, loneliness, and the search for a balance between caring for others and herself. She is a mother who shares custody of her children, a partner, a friend, and a woman who sometimes doesn’t know what comes next. But it is this authenticity that gives her the courage to address topics that others often hide behind smiles. She herself says that writing is her way of naming things aloud and perhaps helping others feel less alone. In Antonie’s writings, you will find honesty, perspective, and motivation that you can rise again, even from rock bottom. She believes in the power of friendship, love, and simple rituals that help manage everyday reality.
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