Let me start this by saying: this blog isn’t going anywhere. I may be sharing my reflections on 2022, but I also recognize that it’s been a loooong time since I’ve posted to my Oops & Daisies blog.
A whole lot has changed since I last wrote and shared a post on here, nearly a year and a half ago. But I think just about everyone can agree that, over the last few years, little has gone as planned.
When I first started this blog in 2015, I had a lot of different plans for it as well as my writing in general. At the time, I was freelancing for a wide variety of websites and publications, selling beauty products, and working for a cooking vacation company, all while juggling taking care of my first-born child.
In the intervening seven years…
I trimmed my freelance writing client list.
Picked up fiction writing again.
Had a second child, my sweet baby boy.
Moved to the suburbs and renovated a house.
Dusted an old draft of a young adult novel I wrote as a grad student. (I’m still plodding along on this).
Dropped my beauty consultant business… and
Reconsidered my work-from-home career path and reinvigorated my freelance/content development consultant business.
And that’s just my short version of events.
I’ll never forget the turning point that I didn’t realize was a turning point until years later. In a 2018 journal, I wrote “I want to help people tell their stories.” I had no idea what that might look like, but I wrote it down anyway.
All I knew was that, time and time again – especially in a fiction critique group that I was a part of and in my work with freelance clients – people struggled to understand the power of their own personal stories, not only for themselves but for others.
(If you’re waiting for the point of this post, and how it has anything to do with reflections on 2022, I’m getting there, I promise).
In 2019, I pivoted from pitching freelance articles to finding long-term and steady freelance clients. I approached a friend, asking if she needed help developing content for her new immigration law firm website. She didn’t, but she had an idea of how I could help her with content. While the work I do for her (and most of my clients) is confidential, I can say this: I’m helping people share and tell their stories.
It was never ever what I expected. To be honest, I didn’t know a content writing job like it existed! But when I looked back at that old 2018 journal, and read about how I wanted to help people tell their stories, it gave me goosebumps. I had a goal, a dream, a wish – but I could never have predicted how it would have panned out until it did.
My path continues to surprise me. Just this past year, in 2022, I developed a communications policy and strategy for another client. Part of the work involved delving into the world of ethical storytelling and answering the question, how do we tell someone else’s story in an ethical way? By making sure they are the ones with the power, that they are the hero of their own story, and never sharing their story without their deep, informed consent.
I’m not much of a resolution person anymore, but I will always be goal-oriented — even when I’m not sure how that goal will pan out.
In regard to my work, 2022 was a super busy year, but it was also incredibly fulfilling — and that’s how I know I’m on the right path for my career. I’m still finding new ways of helping people tell their stories.
As for this blog? Again, its not going anywhere. I hope to be more active on it in 2023, telling my stories as well as those of others, but my clients, and their stories, are my priority moving forward right now.
So those are my work reflections on 2022. I’d love to hear more about your own career path too. Feel free to comment below!
**
Don’t miss a blog post! Subscribe to Oops & Daisies here.
