Transitioning from self-employed to working a 9-5 job: What I learnt and gained

This is an article I’ve wanted to write for a little while. It goes against the grain of probably 1000’s of articles where people have left a job to go self-employed of some form, so I felt it was important to highlight that valuable lessons can come from both ways.

And that any type of big life or career transition are highly personal to one’s own circumstances at the time. 

To give a little bit of context – in the late summer of 2016, I decided to wind down my health coaching business for a number of reasons (full story here). I was at the time living with family outside of London, and I wanted to move back to where my friends were, regain some sense of stability in both my finances and my mental health.

I had started my website and business – Happy Sugar Habits back in 2012 and had spent the best part of four years working on it, eighteen months in 2015/16 working remotely from Bali where I was able to coach via Skype and develop online courses.

So in starting to look for a paid job and making what felt at times like a ‘backwards’ transition, I had to come to terms with lots of different feelings and address various mindset issues. It was a funky time!

My hope is that sharing this article lifts any shame of anyone making transitions that go against what other people may think is best or where you fear being branded a ‘failure’. I hope it offers up some tips to make the most of the experience.

So what did I gain and learn through the process?

Humility

The greatest lesson that this transition taught me was to be humble.

Our ego can easily get the better of us and sometimes you just don’t realise how much it might be driving your behaviour or actions.

I had lived in Bali for eighteen months, where the word ‘corporate’ was the devil. The ‘9-5’ was the enemy at all costs and if you escaped, why would you ever go back. I was embedded in a groupthink that was clouding my judgement away from what was best for me at this stage in my life and career journey.

I will admit I was somewhat attached to being ‘an entrepreneur’ and having my own business. I had helped many people with my work I know but I wasn’t feeling as aligned with it and was struggling to work out how to evolve my brand. At the same time, whilst it was moving in the right direction, it wasn’t financially at a place where it could support me moving to London and help me support my Mum (I potentially needed to take out a second mortgage).

Also, my self-worth by this point was tied up so heavily in the identity of me being the founder of Happy Sugar Habits that I felt if it didn’t succeed, it was a personal issue with me. And of course that’s where shame comes into the picture.

“The problem is that when we get our identity tied up in our work, we worry that any kind of failure will then say something bad about us as a person.” Ryan Holiday, Ego is The Enemy.

After four years of this work, many of my friends and acquaintances saw me as ‘Sugar Laura’ or ‘Shugs’. If I stopped being this business, surely I would have to explain over and over that it just didn’t work out and others would judge me as ‘giving up’ or ‘failing’.

If there’s one thing I want to write this blog post for, it’s to anyone that makes a bold decision for them and faces some of that shameful feeling. It’s ok and I think you grow enormously resilient from it.

I had this self-worth lesson to learn, and I still need pulling back from tying up too much of my identity in my work even today.

A partner

This is possibly a controversial one, but I think it’s worth sharing, even if there isn’t any real correlation and it was just luck.

For the five years I had been running my business Happy Sugar Habits, I had been largely single. I had of course dated and I had made an effort, realising that this was an important component of life for me, but nothing had worked out.

I remember feeling frustration with dating as it it could be exasperating and sometimes I felt the time could have been more efficiently spent doing all the fun business things I wanted to be doing. When I had started to see someone, I found it tricky to work out how to balance ‘seeing’ them with the goals I was setting myself and my work ambitious. I possibly was always going to put my business first leaving little mental capacity for much else.

When I went back to working I went dating pretty much the same as I did before, but I did start investing a lot more time into hobbies, for example I started Ballroom dancing a few times a week and attending a cycling club.

Low and behold after four months of dancing, a charming chap joins my class and shows some interest. This time I had the clear boundaries of a job which enabled me to enjoy all that a new relationship brought to me at this point without feeling any ‘I’m not working’ anxiety and it was wonderful. 

And now, if I am looking to venture into a more entrepreneurial or creative project again, I have his support. I feel very lucky, and without this decision, I may not have met him so I’ll take it as a plus!

Routine gave me some much needed freedom

When you’re self-employed you are bombarded with choice – what do you work on when, what strategy to adopt, when to go to the gym etc. etc.

In many respects I love this freedom as I hate being stuck in inefficient meetings or without my own autonomy – something that can come with working in an organisation or bigger team.

Routines and rituals are the key to success here – and something I mastered a lot better when I was recently freelancing for a short while.   

However, where I was in the summer of 2016 I was struggling enormously with a lack of structure and thus I had little mental capacity for much else. Work thinking (even if not actually working) was consuming me at all hours.

When I started my 9-5, I had some constraints.

Oh my how I loved constraints all of a sudden.

I had to go to my gym classes at 7am, so I did. I had to prep all of my food and salads on a Sunday ready for the week, so I did. I had to communicate to others who had got used to calling me during the day and expecting responses, that I now couldn’t speak.

It was freedom.

And it allowed me to plan more effectively, thus I became more efficient with my time. I started dance classes and used the hour between finishing work and dancing for reading. I could budget my time better and my habits really started serving me.

As a result, I read more, I toned up and spent better quality time with people where I was truly present. Of course you can do all of these things whilst self-employed or running a business, but at the this point in my life the harder boundaries really helped me and I see them as a great plus of having a job. I’ve heard stories that those working have actually found it easier to set up businesses because of these constraints and boundaries, even though they theoretically have less time.

Work is not just your job or business, it’s your wider contribution

The word ‘work’ in my eyes has changed over the past few years. It isn’t just what you’re doing as a business or as a job in exchange for money, it’s your wider contribution.

“Don’t reduce ‘work’ to that which you get paid for – treat work as your participation in the great ongoing human adventure on the planet.” Bill Burnet and Dave Evans, Designing Your Life.

I’m sure that most parents will agree, one of the hardest forms of work is being a parent – so demanding on so many levels, yet hugely impactful.

Volunteering, supporting family, setting up a meet-up in local community. It can all be a form of ‘work’.

For me at this time, he start of this new chapter was a conscious decision to transfer some of my ‘work’ capacity to helping my Mum move house so to improve her quality of life and mental health. This was a large commitment because at this time in September 2016, she was living in a four-bedroom house that was FULL of stuff. Mum was, and to an extent still is, a hoarder, so this commitment was not a small undertaking.

I was recently asked what my biggest life achievement is and without hesitation I answered that it was clearing that house and moving my Mum. It still brings tears to my eyes that we did it. If I start to feel any doubt at decisions I made, I constantly remind myself that I was in a period of my life where my ‘work’ was defined elsewhere outside of the traditional notions of success, and I’m accepting of that.

I expanded my network and learnt new things from smart people

The 9-5 job I started at this point was working for a “future of work” consultancy and it was fascinating.

I was lucky enough to find myself around some very intelligent people, one of which read an enormous amount and who deeply inspired me. She shared links that I wouldn’t have found in my usual sphere of friends or those that I already followed, and my eyes opened to lots of new concepts and new ways of thinking.

However, at times I felt like I was grappling with two different worlds.

I had my experience of Bali and an entrepreneurial world with various worldviews (feel your energy my friend!), and now I was in this other more academic and scientific work environment. I enjoyed and valued both but I almost at times felt like an outsider to this new group and an outsider now to my old group.

This left me feeling a bit lost I have to say. Where do I fit in?

Recently I came across the work of Michael Simmons who promoted the concept of ‘open networks’ and suddenly I understood the potential power of this uncomfortable misfit feeling.

As a result of switching my working environment, I was building a very open network (a wide range of people) and I now attribute this to having more empathy, more understanding and more creativity in everything that I do. I got myself out of any echo chambers. Something I feel is especially valuable in today’s political and divided society where social media displays a disturbing amount of judgement.  

I wouldn’t be writing this new blog with such a richness of combined ideas and without this experience. So I would say to anyone, to trust that a lateral career move in any direction can bring about huge benefit to how you think down the line.

Improved mental health through a team

The euphoric feeling that I got on a Friday afternoon having beers again with a team, was something I wrote in my gratitude journal each week for about three months. I was truly happy in that moment and the world was put to right.

It really re-focussed me to the fact that I do love being part of a dynamic team and that this has an immense benefit on my mental health.

As an extrovert, I’ve always been aware that I draw a lot of my energy from people and situations. Working at home for a few days, let alone a whole week is hard going for me. So going back into a team and feeling those feelings, just confirmed what was somewhat obvious to me.

Even if my future is to bounce around between more independent jobs, entrepreneurial projects or being back in a company, now I know how critical this is for me, I can actively manage it with the priority it needs. One thing I did differently for a stint when freelancing is set up a local meet-up group and find a like-minded friend to check in regularly with like a teammate.

Yet nothing beats that buzz for me of being in a team that’s a great fit for you. And when you’re working for a great team, who you like and the day-to-day is fun, work really doesn’t feel like work, it’s play.  

A mortgage

Finally, a bit of a boring one, but something to highlight. After one year of working 9-5, I was able to support buying my Mum a two-bedroom sea view flat in Weston-Super-Mare.

Firstly I got the mortgage because the steady pay cheque enabled me to leverage my financial capital and buy a second property via a chunky loan.

Note: This second house was for my Mum and part of the strategy to move her. We couldn’t sell the other house until we moved the stuff somewhere, so we needed to buy another house to ship the stuff over to and then we could put it on the market and sell it!

Secondly, I was able to save up quickly for a good chunk of the deposit because I was well trained after five years of small and frugal spending.

It wasn’t easy having a previous five years with a low unsteady income, but it did teach me to budget like a ninja - a skill that has set me up for life.

So with a steady income, instead of up stepping my lifestyle to match straight away which is always easy to do, I set up two regular savings accounts and got focussed on saving rapidly for a deposit to invest. 

Learning from our transitions

I hope that if you’ve read this far, you’ve enjoyed an alternative perspective that shows benefit can come from both ways - that returning to a 9-5 after an entrepreneurial adventure for some people, isn’t the end of the world and can bring benefit.

This is by no means to ward anyone off or to stop them following their dream and setting something up or leaving a job which can be a hugely valuable and enriching endeavour.

It’s merely to show that it’s not a complete backwards turn if things don’t work exactly out as you had hoped and you decide at some point take an alternative direction.

Trust yourself and trust the process of what you need to learn at the appropriate time.

Laura xx