Getting down to business...OFFICE SPACE

Most of my family and friends will know that when my babes go to bed, I like to spend a good hour in the tub. There are two very good reasons for this. Number one...I am alone, our bathtub is large enough for one adult and one adult only and we have a lock on the door, so I repeat...I AM ALONE! Deep, hot and full of Epsom salts, my tired, jungle gym abused, physically exhausted shell can breath and recharge allowing my muscles to take a sigh of relief...It's not because I love packing my kids off to bed, it's not about that...but because quite frankly, I need it. Mummy needs some mummy time. It's also lovely to wake up looking forward to seeing them as well! 

NOW as not to waste any precious time once out the bathtub, this space in daily time has become my "office". To explain, as my body recharges, my mind starts to re-organise the "admin" in my life. Those conversations that I started with pals but didn't get chance to finish, the photos I've snapped that really need to go on Instagram so that I can lap up all the lovely comments about how wonderful my children are which make me feel really warm and proud. A spot of online banking, amazon buying and yes, spending time apologising to the the friends/family that I have simply ignored. Ignored because their calls or messages came at a time when it was too difficult to reply, albeit mid nappy change or during witching hour or when I quite simply couldn't find brain power to think of anything interesting to say in response. This is probably a good time to admit also, that I am indeed one of those people that believes I've replied to someone, because I did reply...it just didn't go any further than my head, thus it isn't until weeks later that I have in fact realised, I've cold heartedly, blanked someone, probably someone that I really care about...

So...when I met with my first potential client, we chatted for 2 hours. I was full of ideas about how I could improve the presence of her business online and they just came spilling out of me one by one. By the end of the meeting it seemed to be a done deal that the client was happy and we were to move forward...as I drove away it suddenly dawned on me, the one thing that i needed to make this work, the one thing that was going to be the make or break...was MY OWN SPACE!!! I realised that I probably wouldnt have time for long bath soaks anymore, that was a sacrifice that I am more than happy to make. When you set up a business you need to give it 110%, it's really time consuming and I am learning this the hard way, already this week I have had nil bath hours! (I have washed and showered). But, seriously, from here on in the bathtub isn't suffice. Not unless we are at that stage with modern technologies and I don't believe we are. As a mother of young children AND a daydreamer, to work in the living quarters of my family home would be a disaster. I suffer with minor OCD (not diagnosed) and if I see something out of place or if there is an opportunity to sweep or get my hoover out for some shapes across the floor I will take it...I will take it with a smile on my face, a groove in my step and I will keep going. I will keep going until I realise I've sung through the whole soundtrack of Les Miserables and am in fact being beckoned by a small person who desperately needs my attention because a raisin is stuck somewhere it shouldn't be or because there is poo on the carpet. Because tidying/organising helps to clear the space in ones head. Therefore, if I am to provide a service to people, I need a clear, organised space to work in. And that my friends, needs to be my space to be made ultimately into my place! 

Lot's of marvellous stationery, an hour shifting furniture and delivery of a monster whiteboard later...I have my office! In The Practice of Everyday Life by Michel De Certeau explains...

“To walk is to lack a place. It is the indefinite process of being absent and in search of a proper. The moving about that the city multiplies and concentrates makes the city itself an immense social experience of lacking a place -- an experience that is, to be sure, broken up into countless tiny deportations (displacements and walks), compensated for by the relationships and intersections of these exoduses that intertwine and create an urban fabric, and placed under the sign of what ought to be, ultimately, the place but is only a name, the City...a universe of rented spaces haunted by a nowhere or by dreamed-of places.”

Now that I have my cove, my working place of four small walls and an atmosphere in which I can indeed make my own desired fabric I feel I can move on...Over the next couple of days I shall be creating spreadhseets, writing up contracts, creating a tailored marketing strategy and spending many minutes staring helplessly off into space as small, grey, clouds drift pass my overflowing mind...and as the sun creeps back in again, reminding me that I am facing a challenge that can be succeeded, I shall feel that little bit more confident knowing that I am doing it in the pleasure of my own office space. Ultimately, setting up this business is about me trying to find a happy medium for me and my family, finding my place in the world. The place in which I create my work and make this happen, is exactly the same, just on a smaller scale, but needless to say, very much just as important. 

Laying Down the Line - eHive is Born!

It's definitely a cliché but “In order for people to take you seriously, you need to begin by taking yourself seriously.” Coming from me, this is quite something. For the best part of my life I have pretty much been the biggest obstacle in it. An obstacle which indeed knows how to ruin a moment or a compliment without even knowing I'm doing it.

A couple of months ago I returned home from work and within a few minutes my 3 year old son approached me and asked “Mummy, are you happy?”. My immediate reaction to this was to lie, and say “Yes, of course, Mummy is happy”. To this, he smiled his biggest smile, the kind of smile that a parent yearns for, he grabbed the sides of my mouth with his chubby, dirty, waffle ketchup smelling hands and pulled upwards with all of his gentle strength. At this point I knew I resembled a sorrowful clown that had a happy face forced upon it. He looked me in the eyes and said “See Mummy, this is how you smile!”...it didn't take much more than this to know, some changes needed to be made, and it was going to be down to me to make them.

It's easy to get warped into a spiral of miseraballness, a word not entirely grammatically correct, but for now, miseraballness is the word we shall use to describe the bubble we experience just before breaking point. I know about depression. I've seen it, I've lived with it through family and friends and I know how to recognise the signs. Thankfully I have a little fight inside of me to recognise those signs. I know that unless control is taken, unless a conscious shift in patterns takes place, then things could spiral uncontrollably into a dark pit of numb, bare, bleakness.

We have all read the articles, the joys of being a stay at home Mum (and, actually this applies to fathers too). The self defying content that describes how staying at home looking after your children is the hardest and yet the most rewarding job on the planet and who on earth can argue with that? I certainly can't. It IS the most wonderful job and yet...the lack of personal space, the day shift that runs straight into the night shift, the inability to express ones wild side which was second nature before tiny fingers and toes came along. The endless hours wondering what happened to ones identity...it goes on and on and on. Nothing more so than the GUILT that comes with parenthood! As a new parent the GUILT that we feel. GUILT for ignoring the cries for more than 3 minutes, the GUILT for desperately needing time alone and the GUILT for wanting more...more than the company of your own children. What's not to be GUILTY about?

There is no greater privilege than having the advantage to stay at home with ones children. There is no question. Millions of women don't have that choice so to complain about it, to want anything else...selfishness? I thought so. I thought so for a long time. So much so that I have disliked myself for too long thinking that desiring more than being a full time mum should even enter my brain, my mind, my soul and now my face too! However, THANK GOD my little boy felt the need to remind me what a smile was, to make me realise how I was feeling inside was now seeping its way out of my pores and onto my exterior.

It's time to put things into perspective. My two amazing, beautiful, headstrong little bear cubs are the best part of me. Its unquestionable. When I am with them I cherish them, when I am not I miss them. They are my life, and yes...dare I say in it's cheesiest form, they are my sunshine! Yet, they are two human beings needing me, and so am I, I need me too. If I am happy then so are they.

I returned to work when my second son was a mere 12 months old, a fact of which I have felt GUILTY of for an entire year. The decision to do so based on my own sanity. With a husband that works away and denying post-natal depression, it seemed the best move. Time passed and things were not right, the juggle, the sacrifice of time, the GUILT of saying no to either my children or to work commitments. The balance was wrong. A new approach was needed.

I am what I am. Rightly or wrongly, I do not possess the character, the mind nor the stimulation to not work. I have to accept that it is not an option for me, I need to work in order to keep motivated. I have worked since I was 13 years old. Albeit, my first job was for £10 a day on a Saturday scraping up dog poop on the spookiest little dog breeding farm in Dundry with a chap that wore funny shoes...but it was work. The feeling of independence simply grew and grew from there. I like working. It doesn't make me an alien. It is simply who I am. But now I will erase all obstacles and make working, work for me and for my children! Now, I am the boss!

So, here I am. This week I have registered my new business, eHive Digital Marketing Ltd. I have secured my first client and I am more determined than I have been for an incredibly long time. I have had to stop and ask myself a few questions. If there were no obstacles, no barriers inside of my ever wandering mind, what would be my ultimate aim? My answer to this is simple, for my children to grow up with a mother who is happy, who makes them happy and to be recognised by them as a fun, creative and hard-working soul. That is all. Why can't I be what they need, and be what I need all at the same time? Well, it is time now to give it a darn good try. I know, as their mother, if I am happy then ultimately, they will be too. I want to walk through the door, and my son to be enlightened by my face, not worried by it.

To all mothers and fathers out there, no matter who you are, what you are and what your dreams are. Never let any preconceived ideas get in your way, and as I started with a cliché, let me at least end with one...always stay true to who you are and believe in it what you are doing!

The word GUILT is from now on forwards...RELEASED from my soul! 

My little rays of sunshine!