What do YOU want to be known for?

So it's been a little while since I blogged here.. Part of the reason for that is that I really miss the wordpress interface and blogging here doesn't feel as intuitive. But the other much bigger reason is that I have had no clue what to say. Which is weird, because I talk a LOT. 

I do a chatty Instagram story at least once a week, and waffle on ceaselessly, but as soon as I think about getting some of these thoughts down on paper (or..screen..?) I sort of freeze up. I think it's a bit of a hangover from when I announced I was going all whale, all the time, and then had to overcome my embarrassment and feelings of shame when I realised that by boxing myself in like that I'd made myself super miserable.

This public mea culpa has been a massive step in the journey I'm on at the moment, one in which I am trying to work out what it is I want to do, and what I want to be recognised for. I always thought this recognition would come from external sources; oh Victoria, she loves shrimp, that's what she does. And I'd sort of go; cool, I'm the shrimp girl, that's what I do. And as I type this that was TOTALLY what happened with the whole whale thing. 

This year I've been a member of Indie Roller's Make it Happen group with Leona Thrift-Ola (an absolute queen, who is HERE for the indie biz owner, go and check out her site and Kickstarter if you want to know more

https://indieroller.com/) and I've suddenly had this online gang of people who are all on a creative business journey together, just at different points in the journey. I keep getting tripped up by my own ambition and impatience, and it is through this group that I remember to slow down, breathe, and really thing; what do I want to be known for? What do I want to do?

One of the problems I've had with this is that (like with the whale thing) I've wanted to niche down, to make my purpose, my why, super clear, but in trying to do so I completely lost it. It's like I don't think the things that are important to me are important enough for everyone, or that people will just think it's fluffy nonsense and won't get it. 

So, what am I doing about this? How am I working it out? Well, for starters, and thanks to my whale fail, I'm letting myself be 100% myself, and completely honest on social media. I've totally fallen in love with Insta stories, and now by blogging again I am trying to find my voice in the written sense, so I can be honest here too, rather than just writing crap about new products or whatever.

I wrote a thing to put on my market stall right in the middle of whale fail realisation, when I let myself create whatever the hell I wanted, whatever brought me joy. I scribbled it on a bit of paper, on a total whim, and it is still one of the most honest things I have ever written about myself. So let me reintroduce myself to you all, and I hope you'll enjoy reading along on my journey of self discovery as an artist and small biz owner.