My Story – Chasing Change

If I was to give this as an ice breaker speech for Toastmasters it would take 4 to 6 minutes… that is how long it takes to get an insight into me!  

With the title of my talk ‘Chasing Change’  I don’t want you all thinking this is about cutting out coupons or hunting down the back of the sofa to find lost pennies.  I’m going to talk about a tough subject for many, books have been written regarding ‘coping with change in our lives’ but for me, I feel change in my life has been exhilarating, exciting and inspiring bringing both highs and admittedly some lows.

I will tell you about 3 of those changes. But first let me tell you how I learnt to be a chaser of change, let me tell you about the greatest Chaser I know, 1^st generation change chaser for me  – my Father.  At the age of 50, Marketing Director of Rank Xerox, father of 3, (yours truly being the youngest), he announces to the family that he was ready to retire, put our family home, in the suburbs of London, on the market and move to deepest darkest Wales (a tiny country on the side of England).  To a plot of 7 acres to start the ‘good life’ a life filled with a house cow, ducks and chickens.  His enthusiasm was infections, the simplicity of his idea exciting. Yes possibly naïve but at the age of 13,  I swapped my private school, the family nannies and chauffeurs for a pet pig and learning to drive a tractor.  We were excited for the adventure that was to unfold.

By the time I was 19 I wanted to chase change by myself and chase it I did – straight back to London to be the youngest premises manager known to the 5^th largest advertising agency in world.  I ran their many buildings round London, had a staff of 30 to manage the kitchens, conference rooms, offices moves, offices parties,  and much much more – change brought excitement yet again.

My second chase was into the arms of my life partner, my husband, award-winning British magician, comedian and speaker Keith Fields. Personally for me as a married women now Sarah Jane Harfield, I enjoyed the change of removing the hyphen and apostrophe in my name! (I was born Sarah Jane O’Brien-Gore). Plus starting my own business in the world of e-commerce.  For Keith at that time, change came (not only being married to me of course), in the form of his career expanding to theatres, comedy clubs, TV shows, and the world of comedy celebrity.  If that wasn’t enough we embarked on having a couple more partially formed adults, by having Oliver and Felicity our now 26-year-old and 24-year-old son and daughter.  Our eldest son, Matthew had found his own change now with a wife, children (our grand children) and a home in Wales.

This leads me into my 3^rd example of how life has moved on.  Several years ago we had the opportunity to pursue a whim, an idea, and found ourselves in front of an immigration lawyer who told us how, the likes of us are called ‘Aliens of Extraordinary Ability’ and there is a visa for folk like us.  We may have to wait a minimum of 18 months to be approved, and we may only get a visa for a year we were told, but ‘hey let’s put the papers together and see what happens,’ we answered.  After only  6 weeks we were informed that we were in fact acceptable to you Americans as ‘Aliens of Extraordinary Ability’ and that we could come and live in the USA. We packed up and moved within 5 months, leaving loved ones behind – an aspect of change that is not so exciting or exhilarating.

Our visa turned into Green Cards for all, which turned in to duel citizenship (no we cant give up on The Queen), so change for Oliver and Felicity results in the opportunity of working, living, studying anywhere in the USA and Europe.  And the next generations of Change Chasers takes over.