The good and the bad things about being self-employed!

Hey, was it obvious? Did you guys predict that my post would be titled this?

I hate being obvious, but okay there's no harm in dropping some hints :D 

The world has all types of people, there are those who love their jobs (hah don't roll your eyes, there actually are!!) there are those who don't love their jobs but can't leave it because of several reasons (okay, now you can roll your eyes! ) - it looks so pleasant, getting money at the end of the month, isn't it? Getting a paycheck and then being able to buy whatever you want with the money every damn month. Wow! So cool man. 

But hey, there's another category of people - those who don't know where and how the next paycheck will come from! 

Does it sound exciting or scary? If exciting, welcome to the league. If scary, well yeah it is scary but the thrill of living on the edge is seriously inexplicable. 

So, let's talk about the people who get a fat paycheck every month. 

The best thing is they have a stipulated amount of money that they know they WILL get each month. They can then plan ahead what they can buy. 

But, they also know what they CANNOT BUY. 

They know how much they earn today, how much they might earn five years later and how much ten years later. 

But they don't know how much THEY ARE CAPABLE of earning. 

That was about money. Let's talk about the better things in life.

The good thing about working in a good company is : you know where you have to go daily, that you will get a pretty desk, a nice office space, bunch of friends and a lot of fun! 

But if you are self-employed, there's no plush office, there might not be an office space at all. There are no office timings, no work culture, no desk and above all - no bunch of people! Self - employed people are often lonely creatures. They don't understand what their friends do and their friends don't understand what they do.
As Paulo Coehlo (on of my favorite authors) says: "The winner stands alone!" :)

Let's come to the most talked - about part about being self-employed. It is a good thing and a bad thing both , that you have no boss! The good thing is that there's nobody to nag you, rule over you and the bad thing is that you have have to be self disciplined and self motivated!!

If you are not self motivated and self disciplined, there's no self-employment.

As I sit at at my friend's office writing this article and sipping a coffe, Mr. Ingvar Kamprad, the founder of Ikea looks at me from a blue poster and says:

How I fired a client and you should do it too!

I recently said "Sorry, we won't be able to continue providing services to your company" to a client. However rude or arrogant that may sound, but I did that to save the very purpose of starting up my own digital marketing venture instead of working in the corporate rat-race.

In our agency, we hire only self motivated people, there's nobody who you have to shout at to get work done. It is a very friendly environment where we are happy, and clients are always happier.

We started working with this client couple of months ago, who would NEVER appreciate when something good was done and was always keen on ONLY finding mistakes that don't even matter, using very very bad language, shouting and abusing everyone in the team, including me and our managers.

Everytime any one of us talked to him, it would become a reason of fight among our own team. His negativity and arrogance was seeping into our culture.

The worst part was, whenever we asked for payment, he would start abusing and throwing personal assaults on who ever asked him to pay. Days would pass by after the due date of payment and he still wouldn't pay and if I asked , he would go to the extent of throwing bad personal remarks.

And thus, we finally terminated the agreement to save the culture and happiness of our company! Happiness and satisfaction at work is much much more important than money. That's the reason I started up and have been facing all those hardships, cash crunches and family problems, only for happiness!

P.S : Payments are still pending with that guy. We are still trying to get the pending amount . 

Don't get worries out of your brain, get your brain out of worries!!

Till last week, I was dreading sunday, simply because it is a no-work day! I couldn't get my brain out of my work, and kept on fretting on sundays because I don't have a team to work with, neither do I have a client to discuss or talk to!

I used to keep fretting and never really enjoyed any Sunday because of that. With numerous lectures from Gaurav and everyone else around me, I started trying to get my brain out of my work.

While last week we went out roaming around Delhi, this week as Saturday was ending, I was again on a fretting spree when I picked up a book. Not a book on SEO, social media, branding, entrepreneurship, but a chick - lit (a slang for girly, romantic books). I had picked up this book last week from the book fair. It's called "Shopaholic ties the knot". It's not a bestseller, the author's name is Sophie Kinsella. The book is a story of an over-spending frenzied confused girl who is about to get married and how she thought it would mean only shopping, shopping shopping but some other serious issues crop up and she's stuck!

I read into the night on Saturday. Slept at 4. Almost completed the book. I was reminded of my school and college days when we used to pick up books for a week's time, completed them in 2 days and pleaded to the librarian to issue another one!

I woke up with a good and cheerful mood. I was about to switch on my laptop when I was reminded of "not worrying about work" on Sunday.

I decided to live the "Sunday" (after so many years). I actually forgot all worries and indulged in activities that I hadn't in years.

The first one was search for nail art tutorials and learn how to paint my nails creatively! I crashed into some videos, I realized I don't even know what are those weird nail art tools like. Picked up a few old nail paints, a plastic sticker stripped off a plastic bag (to make the design neat) and did this:

I know there must be beauty teachers/experts here who would say "Hah! A 10 year old can do better than that", but this is what I am proud of. I did something girly and well, most importantly spent 1.5 hours on it!!

After being done with this, I picked up the next task - cooking! Asked around a few recipes from people in social media groups (Chef at Large) and friends, googled some stuff but didn't find anything that I could do.

I knew 2 recipes - of a red sauce pasta and of a white sauce pasta! I decided to do yet another experiment, implement the two together!

I made a red + white sauce pasta!

I know I am bad at photography. I actually suck at it!

I tried to make a cake as well, in which I put salt, thinking it was powdered sugar! That's what human nature is like, isn't it? Sometimes we act to make a good impact but end up making it bitter. There's no point regretting it, be contented that you atleast tried!

Well, it was a day well spent. And I realized that it is important to take your brain off the worries of your business. Too much of something might hurt, and it had started hurting me with severe headaches. I feel better and fresher today!

Stay calm, stay happy!

Cheers :) 

Life is a string of memories - both good and bad!

Life - as we perceive it is a complicated thing.

In actuality, it is very simple! Everything is just a state of mind - be it happiness or sorrow. Just when I start counting what is bad in my life, I start feeling sad; as soon as I sit and count the good things - I become happy.

What I have learnt is that happiness shouldn't really have an external source. It MUST come from within. Still, I and everyone else around me is human, and we become sad due to things that someone said, unsuccessful pitches, resource crunches, fights with people and so on.

But the good thing is, what makes me happy is a good moment. It is not really a dinner at a 5-star or an Aldo dress, it is eating at the roadside stall and laughing my heart out with people who matter.

And thus I can say, life is nothing but a string of memories - both good and bad. There are places which you must have visited when you were tensed, there must be places which you must have visited when you were really happy - and when you visit those places again, you can feel the bygone moments at your side. You feel the laughter or the silent sobs which are associated with the place. Same goes with songs, food items, people and what not.

For me, life is not about the clothes that I wear today and throw away tomorrow, or about the diamonds/gold (which they say last forever) or the car I possess; it is about the moments I have spent at different places, with different people, different situations, different emotions and different food ;)

Let's go on creating memories - good and bad because we need both of them later. Good ones to remind us of happiness in sad times and bad ones so that we value good things in life! :)

Cheers

Re-activating the forgotten blog! :)

Hello world!

I wanted to write, have a blog since a long time! I started blogging on quora for a few days but that's not exactly like a blog. Feel nahin aayi! :)

I would be posting after 3 years on this blog! Phew, long time! Life has taken a 360 degree since then. College days, and now! The previous posts might look childish (they actually are!), but life has changed so much, I can't really help.

When we used to be in college, friends, relationships, ladaai, jhagde, fests, birthdays meant everything to us. Now, all that has taken a back seat.

I am glad that I have chosen my career as entrepreneurship because now I love life more! I have bigger goals, better perspectives, better goals and a clear thinking! That was actually what I wanted in college. Atleast, I ain't as confused as I was when in college.

The 19 year old Garima would have never ever imagined that life would be like this at 22! Within three years, I have lived and learnt more than what any average girl would learn. That's something for which I am proud of!

Anyway, this is my blog address from now on! Cheers! :)