I am definitely having a bad hair day do I care
not really today I thought we would throw it right back and do a raw
Wednesday I feel like I've not done one of these not a proper one for
so long so today I'm gonna sit down keep it raw
I've got barely any makeup on and I've got me cozy clothes on we're sat
chilling on my bed we're gonna have a little natter so I asked you guys on
Instagram for some questions and I'm just gonna answer them and hopefully we
will like get to know each other a little bit more first question I very
much appreciate what is your favorite Alice Merton song if you've watched my
recent vlogs you will know that I am currently obsessed with Alice Merton I
went to go and see her in Leeds with my boyfriend and she was incredible I
literally cried at her concert it was amazing and I listen to her album on
repeat pretty much and it really picks up my mood her album is so fun and
cheerful and just happy and I do love every single song no roots is obviously
like the most popular one and I do love that a lot but I also love why so
serious because she gave us a bit of a background insight into why she wrote
that one and it's kind of saying like just because we've grown up now why be
serious let's have fun
definitely definitely recommend checking our Alice Merton if you're wanting some
uplifting fun songs to have a boogy to - next question
best way to get over a heartbreak time is the best healer which is the worst
advice ever to be given I've been in that situation and it feels like nothing
is ever gonna feel better ever again and just know that that's normal
a lot of people felt like that and I've definitely felt like that but you've
just got to take time for yourself so you now are single you're free you can
do what you want so go out with your friends spoil yourself treat yourself to
like new hair makeup whatever you want and just look after yourself you know
because you now only have to think about you for a little while and it's time to
kind of heal your heart and look after yourself what is your dream holiday
destination I have many but I really would like to go to like Bora Bora I
remember seeing the Kardashians go there years ago can anyone remember that
episode when she lost her earring Kim lost her like million-dollar earring in
the in the sea um there I want to go there basically but I do want to go to
like city breaks and stuff so yeah I loved going to Budapest with my
boyfriend in January so I definitely want to go to some more cities I'm
actually going to Amsterdam in October I think so that'll be good how long did
you have to stay in uni for I went to uni for three years and it was a
full-time degree but what I find quite funny well it's not really funny it's
slightly annoying and that there's obviously 52 weeks in a year and we were
only at uni for 24 weeks out of that year so we paid nine thousand two
hundred and fifty pound a year to go to uni for 24 weeks but that was great
because we've got lots of holidays and it meant like for six months of the year
I could come home and chill but also it frustrates me a little bit because you
could literally get a whole uni degree finished in a year and a half if you did
it like solidly like school but yeah well I did it now I've got a few
questions about freelancing um did you work full time before going freelance are you
able to make a living as a freelancer I'm considering it and I'm a bit scared
how would you suggest going successfully freelance hiccup um basically I have
been self-employed since the age of 16 so when I was at school I started my own
photography business I'm sure a lot of you have heard this story and are so
bored of it but that's what kind of spurred me on I realized from then on I
didn't want a boss I wanted to be my own boss and then after getting into
photography I was hired on a part-time basis with a photographer did that for a
couple years and then wanted a new challenge so I went to uni so I've only
been a full-time freelance for this past year and I feel like I'm kind of
cheating it in a way because yes I'm a freelance graphic designer but I'm also
a freelance youtuber and at the minute the majority of my income comes from my
videos and I'm looking to kind of split it 50/50 that's why I'm making a website
if you haven't already heard about my website I keep talking about it a lot um
well yeah it's I feel like I don't know myself if I'm successfully being a
freelancer because I don't have rent to pay I don't have major bills to pay I
still live with my parents so realistically would I be able to
sustain myself on my own as a freelancer I feel like with if I put the work in I
could but it does take a lot of work because as a freelancer you're your own
accountant you're your own admin person you've just got a lot of job
roles so yeah it's a lot to juggle and you do have to be really really
motivated and there is days when I just don't want to get out of bed and
sometimes I don't and then I miss a whole day of work which is so bad but if
you've got the motivation definitely start doing a few freelance jobs
I'd recommend having a regular job on the side that's what I did when I used
to be a photographer I worked for someone so the money from that job kept
me going paying for my driving lessons all that kind of stuff and whilst I was
building up my portfolio but yeah I've only actually been freelance since like
April last year so it's not even been a year
yet although wait you asked you asked for tips
I'd say tips for being freelance teach yourself as much as you can
this is not a sponsored video but Skillshare who i have been working with
previously i will put a link in the description and they're doing a two
month free trial with me at the minute and you guys can get the free trial for
two months and on Skillshare there's so many different courses on like finances
becoming a freelancer and just loads of in-depth stuff that you probably haven't
thought about and this is stuff I'm learning every single day and Skillshare
has turned out to be a really good place for me to learn stuff like that and you
can print out worksheets and there's downloadables and it's just kind of all
collated into one website so yes I am working with Skillshare but no they're
not asking me to say this in this video but the first 500 of you to sign up to
the link will get to try that so I definitely recommend going over there
and seeing see what you think and getting as much practice as you can I
think that's what being a freelancer is all about how do you deal with
loneliness I don't deal with loneliness very well I'm such I think it's called
ambivert I'm an I'm an X I'm an introvert and extrovert or an extrovert
introvert I don't know but sometimes I just want to be with people sometimes I
just want to be around people not necessarily like making conversation
because I'm not the loudest person in the room I never really have been unless
I'm with my best friends but sometimes I just want to be in the
company of someone even if we're just sat not really talking but then other
times I get so frustrated when people are near me and in my vicinity and
talking to me literally I did it earlier my mom was just asking me a question and
I was just like leave me alone she wasn't doing anything wrong I was just
being an introvert and grumpy but loneliness I'm really really bad
with it I don't have I have a lot of friends but most of them all live really
far away because obviously when I went to uni that wasn't near home so everyone
lives basically all over the world I've got a friend in Norway and she was like
one of my best friends at uni and obviously I don't get to see her anymore
friend up in Newcastle and then my pals are like down in London and
Essex and just all over the place I do have friends but not in my immediate
vicinity so yeah loneliness is difficult texting my pals I usually text my pals
Hannah and Becca when I'm lonely we have like a snapchat group chat and we'll
just talk on there it's nice because they both also work freelance so
we kind of have similar experiences so yeah me and the girls regularly stay in
touch and it makes us feel better that we're not alone but I do want to get
into maybe like some networking groups with bloggers and vloggers in my local
area but I don't know if I exist and I'm not really sure where to go about it and
I'm that kind of person that will arrange a meet up and then wake up in
the morning and regret my extroverted decision you know
do you regret any of your previous relationships um in a way like yes I
feel like everyone probably regrets past relationships but also everyone says
this but they've shaped me who I am now and they have led me to find a
relationship which I know is the one I want and it's I know what I want in a
relationship now because I've had the things I didn't want and there's been
situations when I'd rather have not happened and things that I dealt with in
previous relationships or they dealt with and I just rather that I do regret
those things but in an overall sense no I don't regret them just wish you could
get the time back sometimes you know that'd be cool pros and cons of being a
freelancer pros you're your own boss you set your own hours if I want to go out
on a Tuesday in the week and treat my mom to lunch I can but that is also a
downside I set my own hours so if I don't want to get out of bed in the
morning I won't get out of bed in the morning I need to get better at that and
I also have to deal with all my own taxes obviously I could hire an
accountant but the minute it's I'm able to do it myself and there's just a lot
of things to juggle like and my own webdesigner on my own graphic designer
I'm my own like admin person there's a lot but the pros definitely outweigh
the cons for me because I like the freedom it gives although a big con is
the loneliness and not having I do wish I had like workmates and I suppose in a
sense I do I have fellow YouTube pals but like I said they live all over the
country and I do miss not miss because I've never had it but I do envy like my
boyfriend for example he's got work friends they all go out to the pub but
then I know that I'm such an introvert that I probably wouldn't actually go out
to the pub very often if I did have workmates so I'd be the antisocial work
mate so I don't know it's it's it's a mixture but I do love it I definitely
wouldn't I don't think I could ever get a proper job ever again what advice
would you give to your 18 year old self whoa what was I doing when I was 18 I
didn't go to uni straightaway I'd say don't feel bad for not going to uni do
you know what I actually lived my 18th year of life really well I went out
every Tuesday with my pal because that was the day of the student night we got like
so drunk on cheap drinks and I worked for my photography boss pretty much all
the time and I just say embrace everything you do and enjoy not getting
hangovers but I do I really liked my 18th year and 19th year because I left
school I left all the bitching and the bullying and anything that I think my
mental health at school was really really bad and I'd not really registered
it until I left school but the fact that I left all that and I could go out my
pals that was like a really good year for me what comes first exam results or
mental health or health it says definitely health for sure because think
of it this way if your health goes downhill it's harder to pick it back up
whereas you can always do that exam again at a later date and to be honest at
the time your exams are so important and that's all you're told about
teachers count down to exams week you're revising
everything is stressful and intense but exams are just stepping stones so once
I'd got my GCSEs no one asked me what GCSEs I got ever
again my GCSEs got me into six form and then after six form
I got a-levels I stressed about them and I definitely made myself ill during
a-levels like I said my mental health wasn't great and I stressed about them
passed and that was my stepping stone to get into uni but there's so many other
ways to go about it you can get an apprenticeship and work your way up you
can do it in a different way like there's so many other ways there's like
internships and stuff now and I know my school didn't promote them very much but
definitely look into them because that went on a really big tangent but exams
aren't the be-all and end-all of everything and if your health is
suffering I'd look after that and speak to someone about it
and hopefully they can help you out how do you stay so creative I think I don't
know I think what you guys see of me online is obviously my creative side but
you guys don't see the many many hours I sit and stress over the fact that I
can't think of what to draw or make or do or whatever so yeah I have many
occasion when it's basically impossible for me to force myself to be creative
and I usually will watch other people be creative I follow a few youtubers I
follow very little peach on YouTube she's really cool and I've got like a
bunch of people I follow on Instagram who create things and I'll maybe like
recreate their artwork or just do a bit of doodling on my iPad I won't put
pressure on myself and just try and get back into the flow actually last night I
created this little drawing of Emma and she well that drawing basically kicked
me back into being creative and I was up til like 1 am creating that last
night and and hopefully that's giving me my mojo back okay so the last few
questions are all freelance related and it's generally what's your advice what
do you find difficult I feel like I've covered what I
find difficult my advice for freelance creatives and staying motivated is to
constantly try and educate yourself and this is something I'm learning myself
like I feel a little bit of a fraud telling you guys what to do and I still
feel like I'm learning myself well I will take you along that learning
journey but yeah I watch videos like on Skillshare and I will listen to podcasts
and when I'm in a bit of a rut I do beat myself up about it to be honest like
those times when I'll just sit with no makeup on in my pajamas for like days
straight getting annoyed at myself because I've not got anything done but I
need to give myself a little bit of like a break because I am getting stuff done
and staying motivated is the difficult part but what I find is having
a to-do list I use Evernote on my laptop I have a weekly planner which is
actually up for sale on my Etsy site so that's always linked in the description
if you were looking for a weekly planner and like a notebook I love to do lists
to lists are great and I check them off as I get them done and it looks it looks
and feels really satisfying ticking off a to do this like physically ticking it
off um so yeah don't beat yourself up about if you're not feeling creative
because it's the hardest thing to be creative when you're told to be
generally a creative person is just that naturally so it's hard to force it and
so if you are in a rut and you don't know what to do go out get some fresh
air do something completely different and then come back to it and hopefully
you'll come up with a better idea than you did in the first place oh I don't
think I took a breath in that last sentence right that's it for this video
it's been longer than I thought it was gonna be actually I hope you enjoyed
this hopefully you learned a little bit more about me and my freelance life I
guess and let me know if you got to the end of the video actually let me know
what your career aspirations are so what would you ideally like to do as a career
don't worry if you don't know I still am not 100% sure I'm kind of vaguely
a graphic designer slash youtuber slash online seller of things so don't worry
if you haven't got a solid answer but yeah thank you so much for watching this
video I have talked myself to oblivion and I hopefully haven't bored you to
death I'll see you soon for another video
bye