- any thing/person on which something/someone depends on vitally.
- the person in a line, whom the others use as a point about which to wheel or maneuver.
- of crucial importance.
- a player who is at the centre of the offence.
There are moments in your life that are pivotal, times when everything you thought you knew gets tilted on it's axis and you are left a little (or a lot) off kilter. These are the times I relish.
I have had a few of these amazing moments when my entire plan & path were changed monumentally. Somehow I was able to take these crazy, tilting, shifting, abrupt realizations and run with them.
One of those times was at the age of 19. I had travelled as part of the Canadian team to Denver & San Francisco with teams of the top 5 equestrians from Canada, USA, Hong Kong, Japan, New Zealand & Australia. Up to this point I had ridden horses and competed in the Maritime provinces successfully but had never thought I had what it took to compete on an international stage.
The spine tingling, hair raising moment happened as I stood on the podium as the flags were raised and the National Anthem was played. I had never had such a clear vision of what I wanted to do before that moment, I wanted to see that maple leaf on display on the international stage and I wanted to (and actually felt I could) be the athlete who brought it there.
Reaching the top level of my sport wasn't so much a moment as it was a collection of realizations while competing alongside Olympians and heroes I had grown up pouring over in magazines and on VHS tapes. As one of only a tiny percentage of athletes worldwide that have been able to achieve at this level, I was overwhelmed more than once to have had the support and perseverance to make it that far coming from a very small town of a couple thousand residents in the Annapolis Valley.
One such awakening moment was the decision to move home to Nova Scotia after being away for a decade. I had thought my fortune and fame (and happiness) hinged upon living somewhere more opportunistic, and the east coast of Canada could not provide that. The realization then had a little bit to do with coming to terms with a partner that wasn't right for me, but much more in seeing that opportunity doesn't reveal itself to you, nor does it depend on your external circumstances. In fact the revealing must be done yourself. Whether that means you do the digging and sifting to find it, or perhaps you have to take chances and allow yourself to be exposed to reveal what you are ultimately capable of as an individual.
A more recent turning point was during what could have been a completely devastating moment in my life. My partner (now husband) and I had purchased out first home a few years before and were working diligently at making it our own as it was a bit of a fixer-upper. While preparing for bed we heard something strange and realized we needed to call the fire department, there were tendrils of smoke wisping from the eves of the house.
We couldn't have imagined how significant it would turn out to be. As we stood wide-eyed in the snowbank late at night in November and watched helplessly as thick, black smoke billowed from the four corners of the roof, I realized that I wasn't doing what I wanted to be doing on a daily basis. I wasn't completely fulfilled at my job (although I enjoyed it), I had been putting off a dream I had been fantasizing about since we bought the house. The next day I decided that I wasn't going back to my old job, I was going to take this time while the house was being rebuilt to invest in myself and get my real estate licence.
I suppose I should say that perhaps it's not the actual moments that I relish, but that they provided me with the complete clarity and ability to step back to assess what was/is legitimately important. Don't be fooled! These moments can disguise themselves as failures or have negative overtones, but the results of those times have provided me with the most amazing opportunity to fix things that I had let slide or brushed under the rug.
This is why I can say that occasional pivoting and abruptly changing direction can be the best possible course of action.
