some thoughts and reflections
I’m not sure if it’s because I’m a freelancer, or because of the type of person I am, but I rarely take time to look back. I’m always rushing onto the next thing - wondering about what’s to come, or making plans around things I want to achieve further down the line. Always looking forward also means that I rarely live in the moment, and take time to look around me. I’m partly writing this for myself, to remind myself of what’s important, but also for others who need it, too.
Success is never linear, even for the most successful.
As creatives, and those who work with creatives, we work in industries that are fiercely competitive; where we always feel like we need to tell others who we occasionally cross paths with that we’re doing great, even if we’re not. It’s as if we force ourselves to hold onto the idea that ‘success’ has this linear trajectory: believing that once one thing works in our favour, that it can only go up from there.
In real terms though, success comes in waves, and most often in small packages which we only allow ourselves to open in retrospect, if at all. Whilst comparison to others is often the scale we use to quantify achievement, this isn’t something we should use as the default. What we choose to broadcast to others is heavily curated. If we constantly at others’ posts thinking its a mirror of their reality, we are left with more blindspots than we started with.
Accomplishments are subjective.
Self-inflicted comparisons also force us to remove the light from achievements that are significant to us, which might not even cross someone else’s mind. A great example of this for me, links to my sometimes-complicated relationship with my physicality: recently I’ve made some quite significant progress with my range of movement and strength - I can now sit up straight against a wall, with my legs out straight on the floor. That’s something big for me but small for others, and something I want to build on going forward.
There are always things to be grateful for, even if they’re not right where you’re looking.
In the world we live in, achievements and accolades are most-readily associated to what’s going on in our work lives and careers. While this may be great in some ways, to help us keep track of our bigger goals and ambitions, if we don’t feel like things are going our way at one time or another, this one-dimensional way of perceiving milestones can lead us to be consumed by doubt and negative thoughts more easily than most of us would like to admit. So what can we do to try and change this train of thought? I know it sounds tired, but there are always things to be grateful for in our lives, even if they’re hard to find on the toughest days - even if it’s something simple like a meal we’ve eaten, or a thought we’ve had.
Stability doesn’t exist. It’s how you handle instability that matters most. Our resilience gives us power.
I find myself thinking a lot about the idea of stability and what that means in my life. For most self-employed people, the idea of stability is focussed around our finances - thinking about how we are going to pay our bills, where our money’s coming from, and the source of most frustration - when we’re going to be paid. If you know a little about me, you will know that I came self-employed after leaving one of the most ‘stable’ careers out there. I used to work in government policy. This kind of public sector career in a specialised area is synonymous with job security, benefits and is a respected profession that you could progress in throughout your life. Oftentimes, when I am experiencing intense moments of self-doubt, I look upon my previous career and accomplishments through rose tinted glasses, thinking that I should have stayed put. However, as we all do when we look back at situations we’ve been in before, we dismiss forget the reasons why we left them. I think the lack of the controlled environment which I’d grown so used to intimidated me a lot and I was overwhelmed. I still get overwhelmed sometimes.
Going forward, I need to remind myself the reasons why I left my previous career more often, to fuel myself. Okay, being self-employed means that there is less stability in financial terms, but I was also restricted. Almost two years after leaving that career behind, I am forging a role and space for myself that simply didn’t exist before. That is something to be incredibly proud of.
Where I was being given direction before, I’m now able to steer in my own direction, guided by momentum. I am determined to make more use of this freedom, rather than uselessly wishing for the reconstruction of walls that I worked so hard to knock down. It seems stupid when I put it like that.
I’ve learnt a lot about myself since becoming my own boss - about how strong I am in the face of uncertainty. If I’ve survived something before, I’m more than likely to get through tough times again. Besides, I have achieved things that weren’t even on my list for achieving which I think is amazing. The role which I made for myself is taking me in directions that never crossed my mind, too. Now I want to explore things and develop my skills thinking ‘why not? I wouldn’t have been able to otherwise.’ It’s my life and I can do with it what I want. As long as I honour my responsibilities, why should I feel I always have to listen to my inner voice and what it deems to be sensible? Most often, this results in me sat in my flat and shutting the world out. This is something that I need to work really hard to change.
Be kind to yourself - have faith, be excited, know when to rest.
I know for a fact that I am my own worst enemy and critic. I stop myself from trying new things, or taking great ideas to the next step, all because I tell myself that I won’t be able to do it, or it won’t be good enough. I know from experience that it’s easier said than done, but developing my relationship with myself will be a true marker of success for me. I’ve recently come to terms with the fact that ideas can often have expiry dates - just because an idea is good one day, doesn’t mean that it will still be a good idea six months from now: someone could beat you to it.
In other words, I need to make the most of when I feel truly inspired. It doesn’t happen that often, but I know if I just let a few more of my ideas into the sunlight instead of shutting them down straight away, my sense of creativity can grow and present me with more opportunities - just like it has done so far. It can for you too. If we are kinder to ourselves, this is how we can also make the most of that instability that we’re all so scared of.
On the flipside, career culture has taught us that we need to thrive on business - and while things might be at their most exciting while we’re the busiest, this doesn’t take away the fact that we need to rest and replenish. We know our bodies best, therefore, we need to listen to ourselves when we are burning out. Burning out isn’t useful for ourselves or anyone else.
Even small actions have value.
For the days when we struggle to do anything for whatever reason, it’s really important to remember that even if we do something tiny for ourselves or others, this still has equal value to everything else. I think about this to bring me back to the short term, when the scale of what’s going on in the bigger is too much, and I still need to feel like I’m pushing forward. This is something that I have learnt recently, and is especially important for people with disabilities and chronic illnesses, whose capability and capacity can vary everyday.
Don’t think, just be.
At this time of year, a lot of people set resolutions which are often hard to stick to - we then also have to deal with the disappointment. A close friend of mime recently told me that we already set ourselves enough goals in our every day lives - what I’ve been talking about here is evidence of that! My biggest ambition then, is just to be. Be the person I want to be, do the things I want to do and how I want to do them. This is how we continue to make space for ourselves, and the rest will follow.