A Reflection of 1 Year in Business

It's Thursday morning and Sean just left for work. I'm sitting in our comfy Poäng chair from IKEA in the corner of our apartment, above a blue and white rug, nearest the window and sliding glass door. Our two sources of natural light in this tiny space.

I've got a restorative yoga playlist running in the background while I sit here, and a cup of hot green tea steeping on the kitchen counter. It's cloudy this morning and I'm pleased about that. I've been enjoying all the sunshine we've had but I've always loved a good grey day. There's nothing quite like them. I hope we get a big thunderstorm soon.

Q1 and Q2 of this year (as I now call each quarter since running my business full-time) have been very busy for me. The end of July will mark 1 whole year of being self-employed, and it's been nothing short of a dream come true. I didn't know what to expect after quitting my job last summer. Would I be able to make enough money? Will I have enough work to do? What's my plan B if this whole business thing doesn't work out?

But a year later and I've got more on my plate than I anticipated I would. I've reached a place where I feel like I can't quite seem to catch my breath, actually. I've inundated myself with (exciting) projects and varying deadlines, not to mention keeping up with the backend of things or managing an online community of over 150,000 people by myself.

I am in love with what I do. I wouldn't trade it for the world. But it certainly is a lot of work running a business (alone in my case).

Content creation is one of my favourite things about what I do. I get to use my passion for creativity and combine it with the things that matter most to me - wellness, simplicity, natural living - and transform concepts into something useful or inspirational for others. It can also be a little draining at times (like any line of work).

Social media and businesses built upon them such as my own require a constant output of fresh new material almost every day, or at least once a week depending on what platform you're referring to. Although for many, myself included, it's multiple platforms. Such material isn't just a single photo and you're done for the day, it's everything that goes along with it.

If it's video (my primary platform being YouTube) it's brainstorming a concept, gathering/researching information, writing a rough script or outline, filming, directing, producing, editing, and then distributing to the world which involves a whole separate set of steps. SEO, descriptions, associated blog posts, sharing relevant resources, engaging with viewers. And this is just one of the things I do.

I also coordinate and negotiate brand partnerships, create online products and services, manage accounting, email, and email marketing. There's also website maintenance and graphic design, recipe testing and creating, writing and photography, and managing content for multiple social media platforms and their associated communities, incoming messages, questions, and comments.

No matter what your line of work is, there are times when you just feel a little overwhelmed. Although, as I reflect on this past year in business, it's not that I feel like I need a break (okay, maybe I do), it's also that I've needed to improve my organizational skills. My time management has also been a disaster of late, but I've been in dire need of a good re-hashing and streamlining of my processes. Juggling things alone this past year has made my brain feel messy.

So Sean sat down with me last night and together we took a thorough, objective look at my business, the areas that are working well, the areas that need attention, and the areas where I'm feeling a little frazzled. I wrote down a big long brain-dump list in a word document of everything that's felt messy and overwhelming for me, and voila! Some simple day planning and scheduling was re-born.

Somewhere along the lines this year with all the projects I'd been working on (such as creating and launching an online course), I lost sight of the schedule I used to have and instead, my days have been uncoordinated, inefficient, and all over the place. It felt like a physical weight was lifted off my shoulders just by re-creating a simple schedule for me to follow.

And that's that. Here's to another year in business!