I Ran Away for a Mamma Mia Summer - Then Started Again From Scratch

might be quite naive but I've always kind of imagined that I would be okay and I would land on my feet and this isn't a dress rehearsal this is it this is one life one shot so I've always thought I'll just go for it but there has been an element of me that has always attached myself worth my career. My whole life changed in the space of 10 weeks like I was moving to a new place new friends my crib was and my environment changed that just kind of showed me that your career isn't to find yourself worth and you can go and do something different. There's not just one option in life there's always a chance to pivot and there's always a chance to go down a new option and even as you get older don't ever feel like it's too late to change something. There are so many women who are just scared but feel so stuck and just think is this is this it is this what my life is about and I really really hope when they listen to this episode that they hear your words and they remember themselves when they were in their 20s. I ended up in this English drama degree, it went to graduate in March of 2020 and we all know what happened so especially as a drama art student everything got pulled from under after being on graduate showcases everyone that was doing a full drama degree really got impacted as well and I'd been marketing myself as an actor doing extra work, doing modelling and I was like why don't I do a master's in marketing so I had the most chaotic 2020 where I was moving between houses, thoughting at my masters, getting my drama teacher to write my master's reference and then I went and did a year of my master's degree in marketing which is when I started freelancing in social media for the first time and again that wasn't the plan that just started out as a quotes page on Instagram and then it grew people started asking me how am I growing my page can I help them with theirs and by the time I graduated I had a full client roster so I was doing that all the way until 2022 again March everything seems to happen in March for me and my four year relationship ended overnight completely unexpected and I did what any normal I think was 22 23 I went on a solo cruise for seven days just to get away and I loved it came home close to the business and applied to work on cruise ships and flew out six weeks later to call food had this mummer me a summer in Greece selling excursions going on excursions so when the guests weren't assured that's what I did and then there was this other department on the ship which was future cruise but it wasn't its own department and I loved it but I was struggling with the short excursions part of it because it's a lot of organization a lot of moving parts and 18 months passed I'm still at sea so it was turning into a career and I moved companies and became one of the youngest highest ranking women on board if not the youngest on certain contracts definitely one of the highest females on board and still a very male dominated environment on cruise ships and we are in charge of loyalty revenue on certain launches we took I remember emailing someone in head office and I was like how much have we taken on our ship in comparison for the total sales and it was something like we took an eighth of that company's total revenue from that 48 hour period was me and my colleague was eight percent of how much they made to the company which was crazy and so I did that and I was really enjoying it really enjoying this life at sea but still something was ticking on my head like you kind of ran away from your business because A) you didn't want to fail publicly and B) your relationship ended and you fell into ships you fell into ships and everything survived so why can't you fall out of ships and everything will still survive so I did like the reverse 180 and I was on the world cruise which I really wanted to do it's something you want to do as a cruise ship crew member the world cruise is like the final boss of cruising and I was in Madera we just finished the world cruise and I was like I kind of want to go home now I'm kind of done with ships I've seen everywhere I've wanted to do normally around three to four years is when you either decide to do it long term or you get into management or you leave and that same day I remember having a conversation with my friend she said they were renting out their place and a month later I'd sign the contract for 12 months lease to rent his house with no clients and no business to come home to so in June last year so June 2025 came home and it wasn't until September that I landed my first client so I had three months of this first month being fine August was what have I done am I going to have to go back to ships am I going to have to move home what's going to happen and I've basically built the same freelancing business that I had before I went to ships but in a much more intentional way and from where we scaled first on round freelancing in 18 months I'd reach that informance so I'm currently at this point and it's very recent the last two months and this is where everything's really intentionalized with the company that I'm building now is this idea of okay you scaled so much quicker this time now everything's so clean and slate what do I do and it's this complete unknown and I think that's made me intentionalize everything so that is my journey in a nutshell people call it eye catching people call it unique people call it interesting it's opened a lot of doors for me it's quite interesting because I'm using my drama degree at the moment doing extra work and then I'm using my marketing degree running the writer's harbour which is my marketing agency so I'm using both my degrees but throughout everything and this is something I'll go into a bit more detail about writing as always being at the centre of everything I've done I just haven't realised it well that is huge thank you yeah thank you for sharing all of that and you know I always say to people when I'm when I'm telling my story like listen to my voice but hear things for you and there's so much in there that and I remember the first time you spoke it was like I feel like I'm looking in the mirror here at my myself when I was in my 20s and as a mid-life woman and a mid-life woman anyone listening to this we forget who we are in our 20s we forget that journey we forget that strength and you've articulated it so beautifully first of all we both aquariums yes that kind of got me so happy birthday happy birthday yes and we were like and I said to you you sure right doing the podcast around this time because yeah we were we were kind of thinking you know was was it the right time to do it and I felt that it was and it is the right time because first of all you just talked about your thread and a lot of a lot of the work that I do is about looking back and finding our threads of gold so going through COVID I experienced a real kind of reflective time of you know looking at my life and evaluating what I was really going to do was that the time that you kind of pivoted and you had those moments so I was really ill when I was 13 I had a birth dependence that almost turned septic I'll be very lucky to be able to survive that but it gave me a sense of mortality awareness which I don't think you have a less you've come close to kind of losing either your health or it was very serious and since then and it might be quite naive but I've always kind of imagined that I would be okay and I would land on my feet and this isn't a dress rehearsal this is it this is one life one shot so I've always thought I should go for it but there has been an element of me that has always attached myself worth to my career and I think when I was freelancing and I was doing my masters I was doing this marketing a lot of other people were doing it at the time as well it was 2020 2021 everyone was jumping on Instagram and setting up a marketing page and I just didn't feel that individual which as an Aquarius is really hard yeah individual people and it wasn't until I went to cruise ships that I kind of rounded and I was like this is for me this is a completely bizarre career move to make but I've literally lost my relationship we were looking for apartments and my whole life changed in the space of 10 weeks like I was moving to a new place new friends new social scene obviously when you live on a ship everything isn't wind my career paused and my environment changed and that just kind of showed me that your career isn't to find yourself worth and you can go and do something different so I think I'm quite lucky in that way that I've always had that like mortality awareness of this is one life I'm going to go for it issue 20s you can mess them up like 16 times over and normally you'll be okay I'm not someone that grew up with a lot of privilege I'm also not someone who didn't grow up with like nothing I have support of parents I have a home to go home to if I need to I have had access to a good education but I still worked really hard for where I've got to and what I've done but it's that balance of having that ability to try different things and fall back on your feet mixed with that self trust of knowing you're going to be okay but also the fact that sometimes I took really big risks like leaving ships and having no clients and a 12 month lease to pay for I live by myself so I don't have any flatmates or housemates or anything I was fixing like learning how to rinse say to dishwasher sounds so bizarre but you don't have dishwasher on cruise ships like in your cabin and putting up a Christmas decorations I was doing everything and I think throughout life I've always just been like you've done this before you can do it again or you can land on your feet or I've looked for examples where I've done things before and it's worked out to validate that that thing that I'm trying next will work out. Wow I honestly everything that you have said is everything that I talked to my clients when I'm coaching them because we forget who we are and you know obviously you're not where I'm sitting now you're in that place where all last midlife women were in our 20s time to mess up time to take take on challenges remembering that strength and that zest for life that we all some people don't have that anymore and they're kind of searching for it in my age group and I think that what you said that things don't define you nothing should define you it's taking a step forward and trying something new and knowing that whatever the outcome is if it doesn't feel right you'll change your pivot your move and you'll try something else yeah and yeah I just I'm trying to absorb everything that you said because it honestly is it's so valuable for somebody who is in my stage of life for a woman who's going to be listening to this podcast to try and reflect on her life in her 20s what she might have been thinking what she was like and I'm sure that so many women are going to be listening to your pieces of gold that you've just given us so thank you I think it's like an older as well like I know I'm only 27 but it's the oldest I've ever been so for me it does feel quite old but when I'm going through life it's never written in pen you can always erase bits and you can always like rub his the bow and go on a different direction it's not written in permanent marker and I do feel like as I've got older I've got more of a collection of experiences and with that it's like a tree like when you're like my sister's 18 next month her tree is just starting and she's always kind of been school college and it's been a very solid trunk and then when you get to like your mid 20s I thought friends that are in corporate friends that are on ships friends at freelance friends that are traveling the world and it's all the different branches going out and I think you I've got to 27 and I think oh hang on I've come home from traveling in the world for three years which has been incredible but my friends just bought a house or my friends got married or my friends just had a baby and it's like should I be on that path and I feel like that is only going to get more varied and there's only going to be more branches as I go on you taking me back to my 20s feels me with sort of like ignite that spark again it's like yeah I was that I was that person back then but what happens in between 27 and 52 could you imagine yourself in my shoes? I think something that ships have told me is that it's never too late and the way that I came into ships was so unexpected that it's kind of instilled that idea that it's never too late to start something or it's okay to completely pivot and I think if I was in your shoes something that that's why I was that's what I was trying to guess ships it's difficult to articulate but when I was growing up and when I joined ships and when I was thinking of leaving ships certain people around me were saying oh well be careful when you leave ships because then you'll never go back to ships because you'll have a mortgage and you'll find a partner and then you'll have kids and that life won't be available to you anymore and it's almost like as we get older our choices limit because we get more responsibility we have partners we have mortgages we have kids dogs the lot I'm quite independent still I'm single I have my own place by rent I don't have a dog don't have kids so maybe it's a bit kind of Rose tinted for me to say but I very much grown up with the fact that I never want to be kind of shackled into a life path and one of my old managers and I won't say too much because it's not my story to tell but she has two kids at my age and when they hit the early 20s that's when she started on ships so she was similar to your age and that's when she started on ships and it's this idea of I've never wanted to feel like I'm constrained or restricted in a certain life path and I do feel like society has a massive pressure on us to get a mortgage get husband get kids have like all of these things and it's really difficult going against that grain especially when a lot of my friends are having weddings and kids and dogs and all of this stuff that's going on and I'm not but I know that it's down the line been it might not be right now and also there's not just one option in life and I feel like obviously I'm in U27 but a philosophy that I want to carry through my life until I'm your age and beyond is that there's always a chance to pivot and there's always a chance to go down a new option and even as you get older don't ever feel like it's too late to change something don't ever feel like it's too late to start like for me like my manager did she was in her 50s I know other people like all of these celebrities like her written books at 40 or who've started fashion brands that like feel like it's very one who started her fashion label like really late on and actors who got their roles and their thirdies or their 50s and that's kind of where their life pivoted I want to always carry that through my life that I can always pivot if I need to. I hear a lot of what you're saying when I was younger I would always say that I never wanted to look back on my life with what if and that I never wanted to move or change direction as in I guess have a family with a thought in my head that I wish I would have done something and I think very much like you I do feel that anything is possible and you know I've been through divorce I've been through career changes I've been through remarriages I've been through blending a family so all of those have happened and I think it was probably very much the same thought process as you that just because I'm married now I have to stay married even though I might be miserable or even might though there might be a situation there was always an opportunity to get out of that situation and pivot and change and when I was a single mum what did I really want to spend the rest of my life on my own I didn't really think about that but I then chose to go into a marriage and have a relationship with someone so I think it's so important with what you're saying is then actually it's interesting how you can take the opportunities there is another direction that you can go in. I think this is a very key part to say that it takes a lot of courage I don't want people listening to this to think that this is an easy option if you're sat there and you're thinking Laura it's so nerve-racking to pivot it a hundred percent is and I think that's why a lot of people just stick with their life paths and that's completely okay because it is such a courageous nerve-racking thing to do to pivot and I don't expect everyone to be able to or want to do that but if you are sat there listening to their thinking I'm like 27 or 37 or 47 or 57 or however old and you're thinking oh I regretted not doing this or I regretted not doing that is there a possibility that you can still accomplish that is there still a possibility that that is still on the trajectory for you just not in the area that you thought it would be. I was 16 when I went on my first cruise I think we had a bereavement and came and do a little bit of money and we went on the cruise and that's kind of where my cruise love started and it was on a ship that was like a little tiny ship it was super cute and I remember that they had this show team and they were amazing and I was looking at them being like I'd love to do that but I cannot sing and I can barely keep my own room tidy so I can't do housekeeping I can't cook under pressure so K-Rins out the question and I'm not going to spend 20 years learning to drive the ship so I was like I went home and I went back to 6 when I was like kept thinking about these people on ships and I was like that's never going to happen for me but I'm imagine standing on that stage and I used to see the cruise director and she was so charismatic and she would host everything I was like imagine hosting on a cruise ship 10 years later that was the 27th of August no 27th of July to the 2nd of August 2015 on the 7th of August 2025 I was stood on that exact same ship on that stage as a senior officer introducing myself and it's when I was 16 I was like that's never going to happen for me but then when I was 26 it had happened for me so if you're sat there listening to this thinking it's too late to do something maybe it's just not hit your trajectory yet maybe it's possible in five years 10 years maybe it's going to come full circle in some way so don't think it's too late it might just be on your journey that you haven't hit yet I love that I want to join it honestly your energy is just amazing and what you're saying is incredible and and again I look back and think you know you trained you wanted to be an actress part of that was writing and you said that your thread was always writing and then I look at myself and I think I always wanted to be in front of camera that was where I wanted to be radio TV it was one of those forms of medium but I left that behind at 21 years old and I have gone full circle and now I'm running a podcast I'm coaching people I think the coaching came for me from my lived experience from having all those lived experiences that I have from being able to pivot from being able to change which is why this conversation is so important which is why it's so valuable to have my younger self-sign in front of me talking because it is it you know I want to encourage women as you're saying it's never too late it's never too late if you've got that thing inside of it you that says you know I was once fulfilled but I'm not fulfilled anymore look back and look back and find that thing that maybe that is now missing from your life that you wanted it when you were younger and I'm interested to know what you're doing now because you said you know as a as a person who has entered into this new world of social media and having to put myself out there life was very different for me when I was in my 20s I didn't have people watching me I didn't have people analyzing me the judgment and I'm I think being the age I'm now I actually find it probably a little bit easier because I'm in that give a shit excuse my language mentality I've got to a point in my life where it's like well you know what if you don't like me then whatever it's taking me courage to get to that point and I think a lot of people are scared of it but how has that been for you navigating your life with like all eyes around you that how I found you yeah and then I noticed and I said to you you were a bit quiet on LinkedIn so people watch people right and I was I didn't want to reach out so I thought you know maybe something wrong it's not my business but actually you've been busy working in the background yeah something came about from that so firstly I think with social media it's it's a blessing in a curse a lot of people watch you but a lot of people watch you so I've had so many instances in my life and it's one of the biggest things I've struggled with is the perception of others and how they perceive me and because I go so against the grain and I've traveled the world and I've not done the corporate life it's this idea of like what are people thinking about me but then I've also had it on the flip side when you change your perspective and I've had girls say to me oh you inspired me to start my business or I took this girl round I used to do like student tours for like perspective students you need and then I think they were like we need people to pick up the international students from Heathrow Airport because it was like five minute journey from my uni so as I okay I'll go do that I picked up a girl and I was like how are you feeling she was like you gave me my tour around the university and that's what made me decide to come here and I was like oh my gosh I just changed this girls to jewellery so when you change your perspective and you think actually you're able to impact other people but you don't see it your name is being mentioned in rooms that you're not in soon as you realise that yes you'll put yourself out there but people might actually have like a really positive experience from it does make it a lot easier when I came home and started what is now called the writer's harbour I've labeled it as a flow marketing agency and that came to me in around November of December I've always found my strength to be writing and email marketing has always performed so strongly for me every single client I've worked with and email marketing has had program sell out 40 to 50% open rates really good results then LinkedIn for me excuse me on LinkedIn personal branding that long term game has been amazing and then Pinterest Pinterest has stuck with me since 2020 I had a lifestyle blog and when COVID hit and everything changed I kind of just stopped posting on it nine months later I had a pin then another pin then another pin all pop off and I got a million monthly consecutive views so a million people were looking at my pins every month and people will be like yeah but is that like 200,000 people looking at your pins five times if you wanted to go into the details it was 8,000, 866,000 individual people monthly were looking at my Pinterest account and I was getting leads I was getting people still going to that blog that I hadn't posted for in nine months and it's this long term longevity marketing strategy that was linking to my writing so in November I complete the scale down my agency I do occasionally do Instagram and TikTok but in a world that is so fast-paced we are flooded with information I saw a statistic that said that a cover to cover newspapers how much someone would consume in their entire lifetime 400 years ago that's how much information they would consume yeah we probably consume that in like a week and so I've actually removed Instagram and TikTok from any future services I do and I predominantly work on LinkedIn for personal branding and long term longevity in my marketing for the conversion it's got one of the highest conversion rates and building a list that you own that isn't hinched on an algorithm you don't understand all changes every week and then Pinterest is that long term if you think of a TikTok at last 24 hours you think of a Pinterest pin it's three months to three years it can be a lot of a pin wow it's crazy it would take three months to get kind of ranked in the search engine because Pinterest is more of a search engine than a social media but then as soon as it starts ticking over that's just compound interest if you think of it as like a stock market compound interest it gets quicker over time so I focus on those three like core fundamental belief with the rights harbors at slow marketing agency is you really got to get down the reliable sustainable trustworthy marketing avenues and then when you go to post on Instagram and TikTok because I'm not saying don't ever post on Instagram on TikTok again I'm not saying don't try to go viral or don't play around with marketing strategies that could get you massive visibility that's still got its place what I am saying is make sure that you put the fundamental foundations of long term marketing in place that are going to pay you dividends over time so when you go to Instagram and TikTok hey it's more fun because you're not putting everything in that basket and hoping your revenue is going to come from that and praying the algorithm is going to actually put your video on someone's feed it so it becomes more fun and it's not the be-all end or off your revenue visibility and leads you already know your visibility is coming from Pinterest leading thousands of people to your website every month you already know your emails getting your conversions for you you already know LinkedIn is building your personal brand Instagram and TikTok are just great for extra visibility or a couple new more leaves that's my philosophy building a foundation of marketing leads visibility that you can rely on and you can trust over-viality and hoping that a TikTok grows viral so that you might be able to get a couple more sales it's not sustainable and it's not going to serve you well as a long-term company and I know that this podcast is listened to by people that might be a little bit older but if there's anyone younger listening or similar to my age a lot of us are creating companies that purely just exist on Instagram think about if you want to exit your company in 10 years how are you going to do that if you are constantly hoping that an algorithm is going to give you a sale you need that long-term foundation that's exactly what we do at the writers harbor I literally had this sort of that three days ago sat in my house and I was like your purpose is writing but it's taken me until 27 to realize that not in GCSEs not in A levels not when I was writing and marketing myself as an actor not when I was writing on cruise ships not when I was writing travel blogs and lifestyle blogs not when I was doing my marketing agency only now a couple of days ago have I had that realization that writing is my purpose now I was thinking about it and I was like sometimes we don't even understand what our purpose is until like quite late into life not like I mean I'm 27 so it's not really late into my life but it's late in terms of like you're supposed to have your purpose sorted in your GCSEs or your A levels you're supposed to have your life plan sorted by 18 ready to go to uni that is so young and I've said to my sister's turning 18 next month do not worry about if you haven't found your purpose because again there's so many different routes you can go down in life and I wouldn't almost say like don't try and like drag it out of the ground just I sound so cliche but do what you love and I've taken a few income hits by changing to slow marketing there's a lot of money in Instagram there's a lot of money in variety it's not what I love and I love writing and I feel like especially in a day where we spend so much time on our phones it's a very dark place right now in the world in many areas and yet we've taken all this time on our screens and the fact I've been like now I'm going to step away from that I have taken an income dip it's something I love and the writing and the purpose has eventually come to light but I haven't like grabbed it out I've just always kind of felt like oh I'll find what I want to do eventually and there's a quote by Oscar Wilde if you know it you might be able to help me out and if you're listening you'll probably know what I mean but I don't know it in its entire kind of correct terminology but he says if you want to be a doctor or an astronaut and a probably massively powerful is in this sorry Oscar but if you want to be an astronaut or a doctor or a baker or whatever you've got your life sorted and that's great very nice to be happy but if you don't know what you want to do it's like you get to live so many different lives and you'll never be bored and you'll never be like stagnant and there's so much power in being able to kind of even if you're in one career that you love is there a different promotion that you'd like would you like to go down to different path is there something you can train in in that sector having that variation in your life because you're not going to do it again it's so important so valuable it's an I didn't find my purpose until I was in my 50s this is this is you know it's I always knew something was there I always knew what my dream was but I kind of left that behind because life got in the way and because my world got drawn into I got drawn into actually I got drawn into different situations because I allowed myself to go down that road but then I realized in the back of my mind there's a reason why I'm walking into all these challenges there's a and I kept saying I had there's there's a reason why I've been put on this earth I don't know what it is but it's going to it will happen and that's where my epiphany moment happened the coaching was was my purpose because of my lived experience I could mention before and then having this podcast to give other women a space to talk about their stories because I had so many friggin stories and I was keeping them to myself and I thought why am I keeping them to myself when actually we should be sharing our stories and we should be you know sharing our experiences because they're inspiring to other people but we keep us all small I think the one thing that I probably struggled with as as you mentioned the word courage having having the courage to actually pivot and change and move direction and there are so many women who are just scared but feel so stuck and just think is this is this it is this what my life is about and I really really hope when they listen to this episode that they hear your words and they remember themselves when they were in their 20s and to try and draw on that strength and draw on that passion somehow and maybe it wasn't in their 20s maybe it was when they were even younger but knowing that something is out there that life is not linear the world doesn't the world doesn't just stay flat the world is moving so fast we can let it because it's sometimes I feel so overwhelmed with the speed that things go at and it's like I'm sitting on this train and everything's wishing past me and how am I going to just find my way and I think it's just about slowing yourself down and going it's okay the world can keep moving but if I just have something that I want to try and just take small steps and speak to women like yourselves to give means variation do you know what I mean it's like why shouldn't we and that's why I wanted to bring you in like I talk to my children my children are in their 20s and I get inspired by them I look at them and they look at me we should be taking inspiration from each other I don't know if I can inspire you in any way should be and I think your purpose can change because your purpose might not have been possible 20 years ago because your storytelling haven't evolved at that point I can't sit here and I mean I'm literally writing a story but I can't sit here and be like oh I've got all of the storytelling experience that's not my current purpose my current purpose is writing and building solid foundations for marketing in a world that is so fast so fast paced also not to get like horrendously morbid or anything but in like 150 years time and let's like do something massive or supernova or like whatever now I was going to really remember me now I was going to remember that LinkedIn post that got three likes now I was going to remember that real where like the light and the slight the dodgy like now I was going to really remember any of that and also in the nicest possible way no one really cares that deeply what you're posting and what you're doing people support you and people like you and people will get inspiration from your post but unless they literally have so much time on their hands that they're going to go out their way to I don't say something not many people are like that not many people do that not many people really care because you're focused obviously on your I'm focused on my business my mission my purpose I'm not sitting here thinking oh guys I was a bit dodgy yeah gosh I'm going to remember that for 30 years that was absolutely abysmal no one no one really cares that deeply so try things I think this um embarrassment is the fate is the entry fee or success you have to start small and building is the hardest part I think with my LinkedIn I grew my LinkedIn over about 18 to 24 months before I went to see got it to around 2,300 we've now just hit around 4,100 in seven months I'm expecting the 4,800 potentially be even quicker than the 8 to 16,000 there's going to be because it's again compound yeah the hardest part is starting was someone's really going to care if you mess up like if you look at anyone's like there's a video of like edger and I think and he was like saying I didn't start off as a great singer he had to learn people have like singing lessons dancing lessons normal starts off perfectly and if you're worried about trying something and thinking it's not going to do well no one really cares that deeply I was I was at silent disco last night in the national history museum which I told you about I was belting out wicked high school musical directly dancing all of that silent disco if you take your headphones off people can hear you people really hear you think and I'm not a singer that's why I didn't go to drama school I did it as a degree did I care no and I know that again is a courage thing but I'm not going to bump into those people again if I bump into someone next week and they're like I saw you at the silent disco at the national history museum I thought it was really bad and I'm going to be like you need to be focusing on way more important things and also what's the likelihood that that's going to happen yeah try things mess up fail learn quickly from your failures and just keep going that's and I know it's so simple but no one really cares that deeply I just want to say from one fellow aquarium to another and you've taken me back to young Galisa and spurred me on even more and I really hope that this podcast will spur other women on to go and take some leafs out of your book and probably their own when they were younger look back and find your golden thread look back and think about really what is your purpose because it's there yeah you just got dig deep and find it