Somebody <-> Nobody

It's been a while finding the inspiration and time to blog. So it's been building, the on/off need to write and now, here it is. Today, I have been stunned by the somebody <-> nobody dilemma- I really don't know where I stand. For a while in my life, I was somebody with a job title, a role, a wife, a wanna-be mother, a daughter etc. then it seemed like everything dropped away- piece by piece. First of all, the corporate job, then the shattered dreams of being able to have children, then the shattering of 'family' as I knew it- so gradually, piece by piece, I became a nobody. Then, almost out of the blue, I decided to go ahead and present on my own at the IODA conference in Budapest and then one thing after another, I persuaded myself that maybe there is still something left to be done in the corporate world- in my version of what happened, my story is that 'corporate work isn't done with me yet'. On that basis, I re-emerged from the world of being on the fringes to re-engage with the consulting world once more. In doing so, I became somebody again. But now and again, I wonder to myself, is this all an illusion? It was the anniversary of my mother's passing on the 13th, yesterday, and it is now officially five years since she died. Five years. FIVE years. Still feels like three. Reflecting on her life, she was utterly normal and ordinary and she was perfectly happy. Speaking with my dad yesterday, he said he was grateful for truely happy years he had with mum. Curling back on my somebodiness now, am I happier by being a somebody? Maybe I am totally deluded. I think that the truth is that I am a somebody by being in a foreign land where there is a hunger for people who have something to offer. I think there is a price being a somebody. That price is a sense of responsibility and a sense of reponsibility limits the space and freedom I had when I was a nobody. I read somewhere recently 'stop asking what life has to offer you. Start asking what you have to offer life'- somehow that struck a cord- it tapped into my sense of responsibility to give myself to whatever need is 'out there'- but what of the 'need in here'?