BACK FROM AMERICA!!

Poorly Face C/O: Me. Adidas Crop-Top: Urban Outfitters.

 

I'm back! My feet are firmly back on UK soil and it feels so good to be home.

If you follow me on instagram you'll have been inundated with snaps from all of the places I visited - but I'll be writing about all of it on here too, so keep your eyes peeled for that.

It really was the trip of a lifetime and something I'd love to film a video on too, i.e. the process of booking it, how much spending money you'll need etc. So if you have any questions about it, please leave them below and I'll make sure I answer them.

But today, I wanted to talk to you about the reality of being your own boss.

I arrived back in Heathrow airport last week and realised I didn't have a 'job' to go to. My office was my home. If I didn't work, I wasn't getting paid. Simple.

I took a few days to recover from jet lag and let myself have that time to get back to normal before setting up camp at my desk.

Then I woke up on Friday morning, sick as a dog. With quite possibly the worst fever I've ever had - dripping with sweat, an achy body and a full of cold. Excellent.

And all I could feel?

Was guilt.

I needed to work. My inbox was bursting with emails and my blog had never looked so lonely. It just didn't feel right to leave it any longer. I felt bad that I wasn't tweeting about everything I had planned, or writing bunches of blog posts and filming videos. So I spent a day working through my inbox, replying to every email since I'd left for New York back in July - and then responding to their responses to my replies and so on and so on. I arranged shoots to get the ball rolling for the next month and got myself ready to go and take some initial outfit shots, drove to a location and had to go home because the heavens opened and I got drenched.

And basically, I just felt, really really shit.

I went to bed feeling crappy but I woke up today feeling even worse. Not being able to move my head off the pillow this morning for the blinding pain in my face, I'd only gone and landed myself with a tooth infection too.

So I thought to myself - would I be pushing myself like this is I was still working in a 9-5 office job? The answer was, in short: absolutely not.

I've found my passion, something I feel so strongly about. That I get excited to get up every day and work makes me feel like the luckiest girl alive. And in my head, there's no way I can sacrifice even a second to let it be anything but all guns blazing.

But that doesn't mean my health should suffer because of it.

My lovely friend Tami said something so brilliant to me on Twitter today:

You do your best when you're feeling your best. Sometimes you've just got to put yourself first.And she is so right.

Whilst it's positive that I feel so passionately about this new adventure, I still need to look after myself. Make sure I'm healthy - because if I'm not, I won't be my best self and it certainly won't be my best work.

It's going to take a while to adjust to only having myself to answer to. Being my own boss. I'm lucky that I won't struggle with finding the motivation to get up and at 'em, because this is exactly what I want to do - but I need to take time for me, too.

This is the industry that never sleeps, but it's important to remember that we must.

So I'm taking the hit, admitting I'm too poorly right now to have all of my shit together. It's okay to take a few days to recover. And when I'm better, I'll have double the hunger to kick that days ass. And most importantly, and why I'm writing this all down in the first place - is because I know I'm not alone. I know there are heaps of you, doing it full-time or not, that beat yourself up over not having enough time to do all the things you feel you must. Or not letting yourself have a day off to recoup with family or friends because you feel like you're letting people down on the internet if you do. So here's a gentle reminder:

It's okay. It's okay not to be okay. It's okay to take a break. It's okay to step away and reflect. And it's definitely okay to rest and be healthy. No apologies needed. Don't feel guilty for your body telling you to take it easy. It knows what it's doing :-) and know...

Believing in yourself is one of the hardest things to do.

But acknowledging you're not invincible is even harder.