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Set up on my own two years ago after 24 years at it - WildWood Legal. A shameless plug and a big clue as to my Weller adulation.
Brilliant working for myself but tough at times. I have a few links with the scooter-riding community as I've ridden them for years and set up and ran a helmet company for a few years. Plus I do the legal Q & A for Scootering magazine.
Couldn't go back to being an employee in a million years...
My advice is to choose something that you find satisfying and work out how you can make an income from it. Not necessarily a living, but an income. Make sure there is a market for what you choose to make or do, even it is a small niche. Then set up a website and/or social media to promote it. That suggests self-employment, which I would recommend from the independence point of view, but you could also look for an employed position.
Convince yourself that you are good at it before trying to sell to others - if you can’t persuade yourself then you might be in the wrong place.
Good luck, and keep us posted. Don’t be afraid to ask for help!
Apart from some pocket money jobs, I've been self employed pretty much since leaving university in 2002. I played in a signed band for ten years and then worked as a flight instructor for two. Last year I started my current job and enjoyed all of the benefits of being employed until moving base and being made a contractor in January.
Went to uni to Study Architecture. Got my degree, work for a year in practice, loved it, went back to do post-grad and RIBA Part 2. Hated it. Quit and went and did a Law Conversion, also known as the Common Professional Exam.
Done the CPE, then did the LPC after that. I think altogether I spent about 6 years across 3 different universities.
After the LPC I went to work for a small high street firm and then the department I was in, who had a contract with Norwich Union (now Aviva) who handled defendant road traffic accidents. 2 years passed, that department got TUPE into a much much larger international law firm. But my commute went from 45mins on the train to 90mins on the train. It was in the middle of this I started my own Wedding Photography business on the side in my own time. Taking annual leave and using them to shoot weddings. On the weekend, if I am not doing that, i am helping my parents out in their Take Away. So basically I work 7 days a week either in the office doing law, shooting weddings or serving takeaway orders.
When I moved to the larger firm, I stayed for 5 1/2 years, got sick of all of it towards the end. Around the same time my mum had a cancer scare so I want to work closer to home so took any job, found a credit control job 5mins from home. Applied and got it. Did that for 2 years until one day the director of the UK division asked if i want to do the graphic design/photography for the UK division as he heard about my photography stuff. I said Okay.
That was 3 years ago. I still shooting weddings throughout it all, and help my parents on the weekend.
I am a piano player who messes with guitar rather than the other way around but gigging on keys is beyond me really I think, obviously with covid but in general also due to the commitment a band requires. I don't think I'd have the support of my other half for this, as she's not really someone who will go and watch live music so whenever I'm doing that she'd be stuck in by herself I guess. Who knows
soundcloud.com/thecolourbox-1
youtube.com/@TheColourboxMusic
My business has grown and now employs my younger son full-time and my elder son part time. I'm trying to retire but failing, we have never had so much work on the books.
It involves a lot of spreadsheets, compiling shitty reports, arguing with people who are wrong, and a bit of web stuff, photography and graphic design.
Point is if you reword your skills and with a bit of creativity you could fit my job description.
Like me, you clearly don't know what you want to do, so maybe just find something else that you can do. Look on the job pages and read the spec, not the titles.
soundcloud.com/thecolourbox-1
youtube.com/@TheColourboxMusic
@thecolourbox with experience like that, sounds to me like you already have the foundations of getting out of bed and having a list of things to do. Very important for anyone self employed or self-guided, to have a process to follow. I'm a fan of lists. We use JIRA to organise our workloads. It used to be Trello and Mantis. Same sort of thing though - spend a chunk of each morning just organising work.
That way you know what you're avoiding when you're posting on here!
Sometimes I even sport a really rather far out white hat to do it