The snow is coming down again, in pretty white flurries. It started yesterday as I came home from Cruse Bereavement Care. I have been on placement with them for just over a year now and I have less than ten hours left to do, to meet the one hundred clinical hours required as the final part of my psychotherapy diploma. So I should have that box ticked by the end of next month. All that is left to concentrate on now, is the final placement report, which is a long, tedious piece of essay writing. But it is the very last hurdle of a long five years of training to become a counsellor.
The diploma is split into two sections, with two years of class lectures and the final year out on placement racking up clinical placement hours. So although I have passed all the academic aspects of the course, I still have this last little bit to complete before I am free of it altogether.
All of which means that I am starting to think about what I want to do next. I have already decided that I am taking the summer off from volunteering as a Cruse counsellor - my contract with them was for one year, so I have more than served it out, but I want a break from death and dying for a few weeks over summer, before probably returning to practice there in the autumn. I have enjoyed my time on placement. It suits my mind-set, because everyone is a volunteer, so there is no real hierarchy.
Someone once asked me if I saw myself as an Alpha or a Beta, to which I replied "Neither - I see myself as a lone wolf, so hierarchy doesn't really come into it. That's how other people might see me, but I don't really care what anyone else thinks of me. I just do my own thing." And it's true. I do see myself as a lone wolf. I have lived alone for nearly twenty years and worked from home for the majority of that time. I have a very autonomous spirit. That is not to say that I cannot work well as part of a team - being part of a team is one of the things I have enjoyed most about my placement. But I am not deeply entrenched in the Pack mentality.
By this I mean that I am quite happy to play my part in a Pack, providing they are heading in the same direction as me, we share the same ethics and values and we are working together to achieve similar goals or for the greater benefit of others. But I refuse to play any part at all in what I call a Bitch Pack - those groups of people who are all about gossip, drama, spitefulness and office sexcapades - life is too short to get caught up in that kind of juvenile behaviour and I avoid such Packs like the plague!
Its about finding your tribe and choosing your Pack carefully, because who you associate with is who you become. I am happy to assimilate with a positive Pack that is heading in the same direction as me, to enjoy the experience of team work and making new friends, but at some stage it is inevitable that our paths will part and I will go my own way. I need to do my own thing to be happy. I need space and solitude to develop my capabilities and explore my creativity.
Sometimes, a chance meeting with a lone wolf can be enough to make you question your own Pack mentality; to wonder if it might be time for you to go your own way a bit more. I believe that everyone could benefit from being more of a lone wolf, because existentially we are all alone in life anyway.
In some working environments it is an inevitable aspect of promotion and doing well - hence the saying "It's lonely at the top". If you have ambitions to break away from the shop floor and into the management suite, you will first have to break away from the shop floor Pack, in order to be seen as management material. The old Pack might well snarl at you for this, but you do what you need to do to get to where you want to be - they could well be happy enough on the shop floor, but that doesn't mean you have to settle for it. Start to assimilate with the Management Pack instead and you'll be more likely to work your way up.
In some professions, being a lone wolf is just part of the job. A doctor or health worker out on call is usually out on their own, away from the Pack of the surgery. This distance can be enough to satisfy those who have lone wolf tendencies, but who also like the support of a team as back up. It can be a happy compromise for those who feel the need to break out, but not break away.
In some careers, such as counselling, being a lone wolf is purely circumstantial, because there are no jobs for counsellors out there, so private practice is often the only option; it's less of a choice and more a necessity, which is why I'm thrilled that I am already a professional writer, as if nothing else, my training has given me a new area of expertise in which to publish my work! Writing is also a lone wolf career because you are spending long hours alone at your desk, building a world on the page that no-one else can see.
Autonomy is one of the greatest, most empowering gifts that you can give yourself. That isn't to say that you can never accept help - a young soldier once washed my car for me, fixed my bookshelves and re-tuned my TV, all in one day; and not because he questioned my capability, but just because he was a pal who wanted to help me and he knew I liked having him around. It was a fun afternoon and we had a good laugh, but I went straight back to being the lone wolf after he'd returned to Catterick!
If you see yourself as a lone wolf, hierarchy becomes irrelevant. No-one can lord it over you, because you'll just walk away and leave them behind. You never lower your standards, so people who want to be around you either have to be on the same level, or raise their standards to meet yours, and then maintain them. You are adept at survival and thrive in your own company, so you don't become needy and clingy. You make your own decisions and choices, which means that you're less likely to whinge and whine about doing things you don't want to do.
If someone else wants to share in your journey, that's great, but they have to be your match and your equal - you are not prepared to carry a free-loader or be drained by a narcissist.
If someone wants your skills for their Pack, they have to make sure that their Pack is up to your standards to begin with, because its not your job to make it so. You can only enhance a standard that is already there and if its not already in place, you simply walk away.
Committing to being a lone wolf raises your game to the next level and attracts only the Alphas for the long term. I keep my standards high, I'm not afraid to defend myself if necessary, and the Betas in life - wastrel men, spiteful women and time-wasting jobs - just fade away and give me a wide berth. They know they can't compete, they don't have what I'm looking for, so they slink away with a disgruntled snarl - and that's just fine by me! I wish them well in their chosen Beta lifestyle, but I refuse to diminish myself to be a part of it and I remain a lone wolf, neither Alpha nor Beta, just strong and powerful, going my own way, doing my own thing.
Autonomy is cool; independence is sexy; so why wouldn't you want more of it in your life? And if a man offers to wash your car, you can let him, safe in your autonomy, because it's a nice thing to do...and because it makes for a really nice view! 😏
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