Don’t let fear stand in the way!

Hi to all my bumblebees, I’m Bridget and welcome to my first ever post, and as I’m a person that believes - as stated on my site info - ‘you must bring your whole self to the table if you want to thrive in today’s crazy world’, and that’s what I’m about to do now, so here goes…

#LIFESADVENTURES #HOWEXCITING #BLOGGINGWITHBEE

I’ve dreamt about starting a blog for the longest while now, but somehow I always seem to put it off by making excuses such as, I don’t know what to blog about, I don’t think I’ll have the time, or I don’t know how to build a website let alone blog... Although, in all honesty, I feel my biggest roadblock that stopped me from starting a blog was out of fear.

Not the fear of hard work, but the anxiety you get when negative thoughts pop into your mind making you feel that you’ve failed before you’ve even begun. Then self-sabotage kicks in, and you start worrying 'if I start this will anyone read it; if they do what will they say about it, and hold up I forgot about social trolls!!!, will I be able to handle that'. So, you talk yourself out of it, and just like that, you have avoided the situation and let fear stand in the way of chasing your dreams.

Sound familiar? “I’m sure we’ve all felt like this at some point in our life”.

This was me on the 10th January 2020, I was sitting in my kitchen sipping on my coffee and scrolling through my social media – as you do – when I noticed the same ad kept popping up across all my socials. The content read: 'create your own website’ @wix.com. Obviously, I knew it was target advertising based on my interest and most times, I scroll past them.

However, on this particular day, my finger kept on hovering over the ad, debating with myself on whether I should click on the link. The same anxious feelings starting to creep in taking control of my thoughts, then something snapped, and I was like NO Bridget; "this is a new year, stop doubting yourself. You are the one in charge, stop letting fear of the unknown stand in your way". So I clicked on the link, and here I am today.

READ ON to find out more about me and what you can expect on blogging with Bee.

#Enjoy

Introduction to me

I live in the UK. I am a daughter, sister, auntie, and would like to think, a friend to many. I would say that I'm a homebody, down to earth, loyal and kind, that loves to work hard, but also, play tough. I cherish socialising with family, friends, and going on date nights with my boyfriend. Also, in my spear time, I enjoy unique team-building experiences and adventurous activities, the scarier, the better; although, I must say my face suggests different in the photo, which was taken at 'Go Ape' in Alexandra Palace. I'll let you in on a little secret; I ended up doing the splits on this part of the course. It was so funny at the time but so scary, and all I remember saying to myself was "I don't like this, but I've got this"! LOL.

In my professional career so far, I have gained 17 years of retail experience in women's fashion and gambling industries. I have recently obtained a bachelor’s degree in Business and management. My areas of expertise include knowledge on the Principles of Marketing and the Fundamentals of Digital Marketing along with a project-based comprehension of a marketing plan (seems like a CV summary, sorry folks).

At the moment I'm in the process of a career change from retail customer service into marketing, and I am currently in the stage of job hunting. Which I can genuinely say is hard when you have knowledge in a specific field, however, are lacking experience, or you're overqualified for one job position and under-qualified for the next. The job-searching process can get exceptionally frustrating at times, but to stay motivated, I always remind myself, although I might get 1000 NOs, there will be that one YES that will help jump-start my career.

A quick question, "Has any other person encountered this or encountering it right now?" If so, please don't hesitate to get in touch with any tips that you feel helped you and might help me on my career path.

As a blogger, I would state that I am indeed a novice (henceforth the first post) and I'm learning as I go - which is alarming yet also just as exciting. I'm sure there will be mistakes made, but that's ok because it's the whole process of learning and growing from your errors (I'll keep you posted on how I'm getting on). However, over time with practice, I would like to see it as a profession, alongside marketing which is one of my passions.

Naturally, I love reading about the latest trends or processes in marketing. I would state I'm a confident and innovative individual, with a substantial interest regarding technology innovation in the realm of augmented reality marketing, and how it's seeping into retail changing the way we shop or could shop in the future.

Moreover, having this interest inspired me to design and conduct a usability test project for my thesis last year on 'the factors affecting UK customers' use of virtual reality in retail', and I couldn't imagine anything better than to blog about this topic over time. #boastingmoment

In case you don't know at this point YES, I love marketing and VR, yet, I additionally have many different interests and passions that I'm confident you'll discover about them in the coming months.

The reason behind starting this blog.

Blogging with Bee is my personal blog, and the purpose of starting it is to showcase my self-awareness in my profession and individual life. Someplace for me to learn and develop while expanding my content creating and marketing aptitudes. So, that in years to come I can look back at my accomplishments, the high points and low points of my adventure, a reflecting spot to show myself how far I've come. It's likewise, an inspirational platform for myself that hopefully may inspire others along the way.

So, if you are still puzzled or questioned why I referred to bumblebee at the begging of this blog, then the explanation for this is that one of my loyal besties gave me the name. Which was originated from when my niece was little, about ten years ago, she couldn't say my name correctly, so she called me Aunite Bee, and it's stuck ever since.

Therefore, because the name is personal to me, and it's my own blog, I would adore creating a network of faithful bumblebee followers. Where my blogs feel personal to you, and somewhere we can share our career journeys, beneficial encounters, experiences, or guidance that encourages us to grow as a community.

The content you can expect to see on blogging with Bee.

Within the coming months, the content you can expect to see on my blog will definitely be about my marketing career. So you can look forward to seeing blogs on my journey so far and then at each stage of my career path, and who knows once I've gained enough experience I may create advice blogs if that's something you would be interested in.

Further blog posts you can hope to see will be surrounding my social hobbies, for example, travel and activity blogs on places I've been or want to go, and activities I've done or want to do. As well as, food blogs - not cooking it, but definitely eating it - for instance, restaurants I've eaten at and enjoyed or ones I'm still yet to visit.

Having said that, if there is a specific topic you would like me to blog about, then please get in touch. Whether its business management or customer service related, just a general matter, or even feedback, let me know by either leaving a comment attached to this post or through email and/or sign up to my mailing list which can be located on my site.

Finally, I want to thank you for choosing the time out of your busy schedule to read my blog, and at this exciting time in my life, I hope you'll follow me on my new adventure @blogging-with-Bee.