Gratitude to Self-employment
This first working week of the year is always a big one mental health wise. I am forever grateful that I don’t have to do that awful commute into London and return to the job that I REALLY did not want to do.
Reflecting back to those feelings, at their worst in January 2015 is interesting. I hated my job, really hated it. And it was making me ill and affecting my self-esteem. That first week, or even the first month of returning to work was awful. I hated the journey to work, dreading walking in through the door.
I remember that feeling of dread and am forever expressive of my gratitude to self-employment and the path my life took. Remembering that feeling makes me hugely appreciate the life I have now. My self-employed life where I no longer have that feeling of dread in the morning going to work, or the night before work.
I wrote before Christmas about some of the difficulties of being self-employed. The many financial benefits that we miss out on. For this post I want to focus on the positives. Everything that makes me so grateful being self-employed.
I chose what I do everyday
I love being my own boss, managing my diary and workload as I see fit. Its my decision what I say yes to and what I say no to. I love creating my own path for Mrs Mummypenny and seeing it develop as a growing business from one year to the next. I have a direction, but then I go off on a different course and its okay.
It fun to never really know what I will be doing from one week to the next. Of course, there is some routine to my business and work that is planned well in advance but then the occasional curveball comes in. Maybe its an invite onto the Victoria Derbyshire show or a radio interview.
Flexibility with the children and Life
The other huge benefit of working for myself is that I have no one to ask if I need to take a day off or have meetings to attend. I do the school run every day (okay not my favourite thing to do!). I can attend all the school sports days, carol concerts, school time meetings. Exercise during the daytime is perfect and I have no problems taking time for medical or self-care (massage!) appointments.
I work the hours I want. If I have lots of work on, I can choose to work an 18-hour day, or I can take a day off.
Working from home saves you money
I really enjoy working from home and especially love the fact that I have no commute to get to work. In fact, I save a lot of money now. I have no commuting costs, no lunch costs, no fancy clothes for work to buy and fewer after work social costs. I can use these savings to put toward the things that I am missing out on from the employed world!
Writing is my therapy
I love to write when I am stressed out and just let the words pour out onto the laptop. Sometimes those posts make it onto the blog, sometimes they are not relevant or appropriate. Writing is an incredibly powerful way of taking all those thoughts whirring around your head and getting them onto an external source.
Writing about my debt repayment journey was a huge help and really motivated me to repay the debt and stay accountable to my readers. There were dark months where it felt like a never-ending journey, there were months when the debt balance got bigger instead of smaller. But as long as I wrote about it, it felt like progress. The messages of support and encouragement were amazing, I NEVER felt judged only supported.
Making a real difference
I worked for 16 years in the corporate world for big companies like HSBC, Tesco and EE. Ultimately, I was there to make more profit for the company to reward their investors. I tried to make a difference, I would get involved in customer service projects, staff well being projects. But really, I wasn’t making much of a difference to peoples lives, except getting them to spend more money on phones, groceries or financial products!
The difference I make now is huge, a difficult one to measure. A huge number of people visit my website each month an read my money saving content. Two of my most popular posts are how to save money when on maternity leave and new year money saving ideas.
I receive so many messages from people about my debt story, they often discover my story from the pieces I wrote for The FT and The Sun. I have so much content I can send them to help with tips for debt repayment and the psychological side of the repayment.
And I save and make people so much money, be that with energy saving deals, or cash back recommendations, or mystery shopping to name a few!
I made the right decision and love what I do
Most of all I love my job. Every day is different, and I really do express gratitude for living the life I want. That decision to invest my redundancy money into paying the bills for 18 months whilst I built up Mrs Mummypenny from nothing to a sustainable living has worked.
