Archive of ‘Personal development’ category

If at first you don’t succeed, get back up and try again

www.kerrierycroft.co.uk

There was a time in my life when what other people thought of me really bothered me.

There have been TONNES (hahaha) of times in the last 3 years when I have considered quitting because those people who dislike me would find me, leave me crappy comments and tell me and the rest of the world what a bad person I am.

Because I had a business that failed. Yes, it failed and caused a whole pile of heartache. Yes, it was my fault. Yes, I made tonnes of mistakes. But that was years ago and I truly believe that people are allowed to make mistakes.

Those same people now still read all my blog posts (this is for them really by the way in case you didn’t get that) and criticise everything I do.

And I don’t care any more. I really don’t.

I actually think it’s quite funny that so many years after I had an impact on their lives that they are still watching my every move and wasting so much of their time and energy on me. Makes me feel quite important sometimes.

And so this is to tall anyone who has failed that you can get back up and try again. You don’t have to stay down just because you made a mistake once. You don’t have to listen to what anyone else thinks of you and you do have the right to keep on going.

You can use words like hustle and tonnes and if people don’t like it well that’s their problem really.

If you had a child that was in trouble for bullying (for instance) and who made a huge effort to get away from that reputation and turn their life around would you still torment them about it 3 years later? Would you say to them “well to be fair my lovely 14 year old you deserve to be treated badly by your friends because you did bully that child 3.5 years ago, remember?” Of course you wouldn’t - except maybe these women would.

Anyway. Moving on, and I have moved on. It’s not nice to think of every step of your life being analysed by people who are just waiting to see you fail. But it makes me more determined to not fail.

December is shaping up to be my best month this year, and I’m proud of what I’ve achieved over the last 12 years since I first dipped my toe into the water of self employment. If I could do it all again I would, but without the mistakes of course. That’s the benefit of hindsight.

The whole point of this blog post is to say it’s OK not to succeed first time. It’s OK to have people who hate you. It’s OK not to care about them. And it’s OK to be amazingly successful second or third or one hundredth time around. Which I will be.

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How do you manage it?

I used to be scared of people asking me how I managed everything, because I really felt like I didn’t. I had a big company, a house to run, 4 children and from the outside everyone thought my life was perfect, but it wasn’t - it was one big fat juggle of a mess that left me crying myself to sleep most nights.

Over the past 3 years I have learned a lot about how to manage to do everything I do. I am one of life’s big achievers, yes. But I also have a fair amount of the lazy bitch inside me, I love to do nothing as much as the next person!

What I’ve learned is that it’s OK to be me. In fact, it’s great to be me.

I currently have 2 busineses that I am building, 4 children, a partner, a big 5 bedroom home with a huge garden to look after, 11 pets and still have time to myself to read, run, go out with friends and just be ME.

I’ve never realised that there was anything special about this, until I have been more in touch with myself recently and have learned to stop and listen to what is being said to me.

This is what I’ve learned :

- Feeding a family of 6 on a budget of £80 a week and consistently not spending more than that and being able to buy whatever you fancy and cook lovely homecooked meals from scratch most nights is not normal. It is a superhero skill and it is something that I can teach other people how to do.

- Being able to go from building a lego house to building a business and back in the space of just a few minutes is awesome.

- The same principles you might apply to growing your business can be applied to growing your life. To growing your relationships. To growing YOU.

My personal development and growth has been huge over the last 3 years. I have learned so much about myself and now I want to share it with you. I built a business from scratch to over 1 million pounds, and lost it. I suffered serious cyber bullying. I split up from my husband and parented my 4 children alone. We were technically homeless for 2 months. I have had to go to foodbanks to feed my family. I have lost everything, and still been able to bring my children up in a way that makes me smile and be thankful for every minute.

If you want to know more about my story and to hear about how I can help you if you feel that you are juggling family, house, business, relationships, children and more than please join my webinar list, I’ll be running the first one next week and will confirm the date and time as soon as I can.

Hugs
xxx


Lucky Bitch

So we’re all still fitting into our new normal here, today my eldest was supposed to get on a bus to school for the first time. So I drive her to the next nearest town, she gets on the bus she was supposed to and 30 seconds later I look in my rear view mirror to see her off the bus, standing at the side of the road crying. It was the wrong bus. No big deal.

I took her home with me and instead of being stressed that this was going to cause problems and delays and changes to the routine my first thought was “brilliant, she can help me do the little girls hair when we got back” which she did gladly. She walked the small 3 to school with me and then I drove her straight to school.

She was late. I missed my morning run. I had to drive an extra 20 miles that I hadn’t planned for in terms of time and petrol.

Usually this kind of thing would stress me out seriously. Today as I drove back through the beautiful countryside all I could think of was how lucky I was to not have a 9-5 job so that I could be there for the children and run them around like this, and how much I liked having 1 on 1 time in the car with her to talk about friends, life, the universe and everything.

I am a lucky bitch. Who is now running late for most of the day but it doesn’t really matter, it will all work out in the end.

I love being a lucky bitch and you can too, check out the bootcamp that I am a member of here and begin making changes to your life and luck today. I made back my investment in the first month and it has changed my life. (affiliate link)

Who I used to be

I used to be someone who would do anything for a quiet life. Who wanted peace and was prepared to sacrifice her own happiness to get it. I still want peace but I understand now more than ever just what I gave up to get it in the past and I am no longer prepared to sacrifice myself for the sake of someone else. This has made me a harder person to like in my own head because part of me sees this as selfish. The rest of me tries to persuade me that its not selfish to put yourself first, and then I go round and round in my own head.

I’ve spent a lot of my life being controlled by other people, or by what I know they want of me. This doesn’t mean that they have deliberately told me to do things which I have done, but it means that I knew what they wanted me to do and did it without being told to because I knew it would make them happy. This kind of control is hard to get away from, they didn’t necessarily realise why I was acting the way I was and now that I am not acting like this any more they are confused and don’t know how to react.

I dont react well to being told what to do.

Love, after all I’ve been through

Its so hard to be where I am, at nearly 40 with 4 kids and a very broken heart and to ever trust anyone again. I struggle to make new friends because if my old friends who were in my life for many years could walk away from me just like that then why can’t new ones?

And as for falling in love again, I spent a long time persuading myself that would never happen. I am too broken for that. I will never allow anyone else to hurt me in the way that I was hurt before. If someone who I have 4 kids with and loved for over 14 years could like and hurt me and not know who I am or what I need, then surely anyone can. It took me a long while to let someone else in, and then it was only because I wasn’t looking for love and had persuaded myself that nothing was ever going to happen.

I’m still very emotionally broken, loving me is never going to be easy - for me or anyone else - but I’m open and I’m trying and I’m getting there. I found this poem today online and it really spoke to me.

http://www.peacelovefree.com/2014/01/08/all-the-proof-i-will-ever-need/

Especially this part :

so when the love comes

and it does
it does and it does and it does

when it comes
if we are brave enough
to lift our eyes
and hold out our hands
and listen to the universe
when she whispers
this one.
this one for you.
and we say okay
again
again, I will try

no matter the risk
no matter my fear
no matter the grasp of grief
no matter the ridiculous odds
no matter that this one too
may leave me shattered

The rest of the poem is beautiful too.

This is story of two souls
Who are all of us, really
Who will stand today
And promise
Not as naïve children
But as fully formed hearts
Composed directly from a hundred thousand breaks
and love stories too many to count
And those two
They’ll stand there with all of that
And say yes

Yes we will love
Yes we will try
Yes we will fight and bleed and hope and live.
Yes we will slow dance and run away, and return.
And she’ll say yes, your broken is part of your beautiful to me.
And he’ll remind her that her scars
are map that tell a story
that he loved before he heard a word.
And they’ll know that they alchemy of loss
Was part of the magic that brought them here
To this space today
And they will give thanks for all the ways
They were brave enough to break

Planning for Christmas

 

Photo by Forever Imagery

I can’t believe how quickly this year has disappeared. Its been my first full year on my own since I split up with my husband and its been harder than I ever thought but for all the right reasons. This time last year I was holding the kids hands through their first Christmas without mum and dad both together on Christmas day. Now we all seem to be in the groove of handing kids back and forth between homes. They see both of us a lot and although this year has seen tears from each of them over the new structure of our families I think that we’ve handled it well and we’re all relatively unscathed.

They’ve had a lot to deal with this year including meeting new partners on both sides and dealing with having extra children and people in their homes, but my kids make me proud each and every day and I’ve never been more sure that they are going to be OK.

We’re busy planning Christmas and the main focus for me is that they are both happy and surrounded by people who love them. That’s what this time of year is all about to me. That and reflecting back over the last 12 months and planning the next year. I’m looking for stability and simplicity in my life in 2014. Shouldn’t be too much to ask for, should it?

 

My Goddess workbook 2012

I’m working my way through My Goddess 2012 workbook and I’m on the page about how would I like to celebrate my birthday this year.

I love my birthday and its not until June so I have plenty of time to plan and decide how I want to spend my day.

The picture above was the strawberry margarita that I made for my birthday BBQ last year. I think that would be a good tradition to uphold, let me go and put that on my page quickly before I forget! The ones I made at Christmas weren’t quite as good, but still did the trick.

Klout

One thing that I want to do in January is to get my Klout score up to above 60. Now its hovering at 58.

I know some people don’t value Klout scores and that there is a lot of general unrest about the whole “who’s popular on the internet” culture but it suits my competitive nature to have a number next to my name. Its suits the control freak in me to be able to post lots on twitter and fb and here and actively try to connect to people and open discussions and see what effect that has on my Klout score. I like it.

But I’d like it even more if I could get my score up to over 60.

2011 - a brief recap

With only 6 hours to go until next year its time for my mini recap of 2011. I’ve spoiled myself with lovely Marks and Spencers food for this evening, I almost can’t wait to get these kids to bed.

A lot has happened this year. Business wise we’ve had some good times and some very very bad times. Personal wise its been OK, but next year needs to be better!

The best thing that has happened this year :

Launching Handmade Living and seeing the amazing response to the magazine that Charlotte and I have dreamed of for the longest time. Mum and I saw a lady in WHS in Cambridge today who picked it up off the shelf to buy, I think we scared her though when we announced who we were and practically stalked her to the checkout!

The worst thing that has happened this year :

KAL Media going into liquidation.

What am I most proud of?

Keeping going. When I’ve wanted to curl up in a ball and quit so many times these last 12 months I’m really proud of every day that I manage to get out of bed and get on with it.

What have I learned about myself?

That its OK to admit to making mistakes and its OK to hate yourself for making them, but don’t dwell. Move on.

What new skills have I learned?

How to run! This time last year I had never even run for a bus. Now I can run 5 miles. I was also reminded by clever mum in Cambridge this afternoon that you can only rely on YOU to make YOU happy. If you’re happy then anyone else can come along for the ride but you can’t rely on them to make you happy.

Here’s to a successful 2012 for us all!

Happy New Year! xx

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