But I don't think I want to be in the beauty industry anymore.
I love the thought of doing things but when it comes down to it, I dread carrying out the treatment. I've been out of beauty for about a year and a half and I don't know if I've just lost my mojo, but there aren't any beauty jobs about. I wouldn't have a clue what to do if I didn't do beauty though :s it's all a little confusing
anyone in a similar situation?
I am at a similar stage right now but perhaps for different reasons.
In the last few months I have done a lot of soul searching in the sense that after two unpleasant employed roles in the beauty industry I went for self employment which I went into as a bit of a stop gap. As I say, after a lot of soul searching I have been able to distinguish between what I do and don't like about the industry and I would consider this to be the way forward in making an effective decision. That is to say that I have a genuine interest in the treatments and learning more and I love giving a client an experience that can range from anything to pleasant, mind boosting and even confidence boosting. So I do have a passion for the industry in a sense.
However on the other hand I have a lot of frustrations regarding employment because so far I have found management to be at best immature and at worst just downright bitchy and intimidating and even if I had the personality type to be able to deal with this better, I am finding it hard to supress how insulted I feel that companies expect you to be happy to work every single weekend for minimum wage because there are so many people in so many other professions who wouldn't dream of putting up with that and fairly enough me thinks. In relation to these frustrations, a lot of people say that self employed is the way to go but again, I really don't believe that effort required is proportionate to pay received and consequently my heart just isn't in it.
Based on the above, unless I can secure employment where I am treated well enough to compensate for the rubbish hours and rubbish pay (which to be fair I did have time and patience for before I realised how toxic a working environment can be in this industry), I would be surprised if I was in this industry by my 30s to be honest because I just feel that I want more in return for my efforts.
I love beauty and nails and holistics and coming onto salongeek to talk about it and I love getting my hands on a textbook or a scratch magazine and I love doing treatments for family and friends and I would like to keep all of that up because I don't think it would be fair to myself to reject my interest in beauty entirely but I do think in terms of earning an income, I need that bit more incentive to maintain my loyalty in all honesty.
Luckily, I have always known that I want to teach and I have a range of subjects (beauty or otherwise) that I could pursue so I'm currently remaining in beauty for now with the view to moving onto further study when time/money/course entry requirements allow.
I was going to write all of this as a blog to be fair but seeing as someone else is going through something similar I thought I'd share it here.
Going forward, I would urge anyone in this same boat to think about what they do and don't like about the industry and from there, have a think about the ways in which the perks can be pursued and the bad stuff avoided. It's easier said than done and it can be very stressful, headache inducing and disillusioning but that's what I would advise based on my very situation at the moment.
If it's any consolation I don't think that this is unusual. There are lots of therapists with up to five years experience (give or take) but it's very rare to meet people who have been doing this for longer than a decade and with respect to the industry and the advantages of it, I do think that there is fair enough reason for that.
When you're loving it this can be an awesome and rewarding opportunity of an industry to be in at the best of times and places but I do think such opportunities are few and far between and compared to the hours and pay in this industry, there *is* a lot of tosh out there. I say this based on experience; the number of places that don't follow employment law, min wage, bad hours which change at short notice, having to phone acas, stressing family and friends out and choosing to phone the nice lady on th phone at the Samaritans when at my wits end! (might be a me thing but there you go lol!)
Seriously, when it's good it's really good but when it's bad it's horrid and whatever you do, proper respect. Hope I've not rambled too much!!
