WORKING FROM HOME – EXPECTATION VS REALITY

So it’s been just over a week since I embarked into the world of self employment.

Wow – what a journey and what a week it’s been!

Without a doubt it’s been one of the BIGGEST week’s of my life, as in true Jemma fashion I threw myself headfirst into it all and scheduled a tonne of meetings, events and other work all into the week (my original plan was to have a quiet first week – that definitely didn’t happen).

I’ve wanted to work for myself for quite some time now.

For some reason I thought my first week of self employment would involve me sitting in my home office planning out my business, pre writing blog posts, getting on top of client work and forecasting and searching for new work and business development opportunities.

Boy was I SO wrong.

My first week involved running around from meeting to meeting, hardly eating anything as I had little to no time to stop and eat, constantly trying to juggle appointments in my diary, getting no business planning or writing done, having two breakdowns, and working all weekend.

But you know what?

This is what I love doing.

Even though there were times last week where I barely had time to even go to the toilet, I still enjoyed every single minute of it all. Why? Because I was free. I was free to control my own hours, and my own workflow.

And even though I have worked on and off this weekend, it’s not because I had to; it’s because I wanted to.

If it wasn’t for Sam reminding me that there is life outside of the four walls of my office, then I would probably stay here all night and day doing as much as I can. Which is why having the right balance with it all is so important (I’m definitely not at that stage yet, but I know I’ll get there once I’ve settled in to it all).

I thought I’d share with you a few working from home/ self employment expectations vs reality scenarios that I have found have been SO relevant to me this past week.

You have loads more time to do things you couldn’t do when you worked in an office full time

WRONG!

In fact, you’ll have LESS time to do things. You won’t even have time to eat or head out to the mailbox to check the mail…

I was silly and thought that I’d have more time to do housework, attend more gym sessions, head to cafe’s and take time going places – yep definitely not the case.

An hour goes by pretty quickly these days, and now before I know it, it’s time to head to bed and get ready to do it all again the next day!

You will get distracted…very easily

Here I was thinking that it’d be fitting all my to-do lists tasks into one day without any distractions.

God I was wrong (yet again).

I have been finding it a little difficult to stay on track with tasks, especially when I am at home and there is housework that needs doing, a fridge full of food that needs eating and a dog that likes cuddles…

A friend recently put me onto an app called Tide that helps you focus and stay on track with tasks – I am yet to try it but am hoping it helps me!

You’ll be able to set proper hours for yourself and will have weekends off because you have more time to work during the week

Ummmm who was I kidding? This is DEFINITELY not the case.

When you own and run your own business you’re constantly working, and at random hours of the day.

Case in point: It’s currently Sunday evening at 9pm and I’m working. Proper work hours are definitely not a thing around here.

But you know that? Even though these are things that have recently changed for me – I couldn’t be happier! I am sitting here doing exactly what I want to be doing. I don’t care if I’m up late on a Sunday evening writing blog posts, or if I have an inconsistent income – I am doing everything that I love and I am running my own show.

I really want to keep you all up to date with how I’m going working for myself, as I have found that many of you are quite interested to hear how I’m finding it. So, I’m thinking I’ll do more regular blog posts or maybe even vlogs where I show you exactly what I get up to in a day?

Watch this space…

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