COVID- Yet another turning point of my life!

So in continuation with my previous article, I want to share why I started my own company. Being an entrepreneur is not easy- absolutely not! I had zeal to explore my field more. I wanted to do things without any boundation and complete authority. I was experimental in nature that a job did not allow me at that time. So I founded Petite Pebbles- Great Brands, Great Stories, Great Results in January 2018.

I obviously did not start thinking it will fail one day.

but there is this thing- I enjoyed my struggles and hardships of discovering and learning more about PR and Marketing. I made clients in diverse industries, locations and services.

Moreover, it was a proprietorship firm and non-funded. Every penny that went into the company was hard earned by me. Company was solely running on the cash inflows it generated. I take a lot of pride in saying that I started a firm with zero capital as a one man army.

My first milestone was Karims and it will always be special for me. For me, it was big thing to get them featured in a Netflix documentary. Honestly, I can't even put my feeling into words when it happened. I got a lot of work after that. My plates were full. I started outsourcing some verticals and expanded my team simultaneously. In June 2019, I was very happy with my business. I could see the results of constantly working hard day and night. It had been years altogether since I had given myself a break. So I decided to travel and reap the benefits of all diligence. I kept on travelling from September 2019 to January 2020 and Boom- COVID made its entry. I would like to admit that I wasn't paying much attention while I was away from Delhi.

By the time I came back and thought of pulling my socks, COVID's impact started to show. My clients got cold with the payments and some paused the work as they could not take the burden of marketing expense. My business was badly hurt. Eventually I had to dilute the team and do all the work myself for handful of clients. They also terminated the contract as they too were badly affected by the pandemic.

For the first time in many years, I was sitting with zero income and failure. I was still trying to make a comeback somehow but failed again. It almost felt like I lost my self confidence and myself along with my business.

I decided to find my happiness before getting into anything. I started exploring my hobbies and realised there were a lot of sides of me that I never touched. I started painting, meditating, baking and gardening. I even took a certification in Tarot Reading. I started healing- with this I learnt acceptance.

For me, year 2020 was the year of acceptance.

I realised maybe right now is not the time for me to start my business all over again. I enrolled myself into Digital Marketing Course at MICA university. I started working aggressively on upskilling myself. My needs in life has changed. Now I look for more stability. I am now in a position to have a job in leadership role. I started working full-time since September 2020. I worked on my LinkedIn profile and now stand with 13,000 followers.

Lot of people must have gone through what I went through. I just want to say that failure is a terrible thing to experience but it also teaches you a lot of things. There had been days when I used to find it hard to gather courage to get out of my bed but I made it. I am happy now. I see myself growing into a person that I dreamt of. Destiny is still the same, only the journey has changed. For me, I discovered a part of me.