I have many failed businesses on my entrepreneurial resume.

I have a defunct website design business. I have an Etsy store earning pittances despite five years of painful development. I have a defunct online directory, with an evaporated friendship and any hope of recouping the start-up costs. I have more business failure than I care to admit.

I can’t blame everything on the pandemic. Most of my businesses suffered financial fatality long before the world suffered together. Sometimes I invent a scenario when I could blame all my failures on the global crisis. …

I’ve been thinking a lot about Carrie Bradshaw’s life.

Less thinking, more analysing.

The television show, more so than the book, depicts the unattached writer as a free-spirited goddess. A writer who works from home, who possesses the finances and time capacity for a luxurious lifestyle. All without arduous hours over the keyboard.

Carrie’s represents the writer fallacy. An ability to enjoy extended lunches no matter the day. The flexibility for all hours affairs followed by nightly cocktails. But her unrealistic workload, of producing one article per week, is the clincher.

Characters like Carrie Bradshaw has generations envious of the…

Are we destined to find Prince Charming? Or will our princess be waiting at the top of the tower, waiting for us to rescue them?

The short answer is no.

We’re wise enough to know that the love fairy tale doesn’t exist. We know these are stories set in a land where people don’t age, evil people suffer in misery, and the heroes find happiness.

With our wisdom and dating maturity, we know the fairy tale doesn’t exist. So with this tiny part of cynicism instilled into us, we give up on the idea of finding “Mr/Miss Right”. And settle for “Mr/Miss Right Now”.

Too often we compromise more than we should. We give up on being with someone we’re attracted to, that makes us…

I have worked for some terrible businesses.

Let me qualify the level of terrible. Three businesses closed a year after I quit, and two others stripped their workforce of all my colleagues.

I had worked for so many dismal businesses that I didn’t know what a good one was for most of my employment years.

What I’ve always found interesting the continuity between these so-called professionals. All were very different business offering varied products and services. Yet they were all identical repeat offenders of identical business crimes.

If it was possible to attend school for bad business practices, all would…

When beginning your writing career, everyone will tell you that rejection is normal.

When starting any business, mentors and leaders will prepare you for inevitable failure. Like death and taxes, your failure is written in the stars.

When I submitted my first novel for publication, I expected rejection. And, little surprise, that’s what happened. Sometimes I speculate why I bothered to submit it in the first place.

I persisted with the novel. I didn’t receive any feedback from the editor. So I blindly edited, cut out characters, and completely overhauled the storyline. …

I don’t envy those going through a de facto divorce. In some ways, it seems harder than a ‘normal’ divorce.

As I approach my mid-thirties, I know more people than ever going through the de facto divorce. That’s what we call it in Australia. Yet, around the world, most call it a ‘common-law marriage’.

No matter what we want to label it, it’s the divorce that isn’t a divorce. But it feels as painful, all the same.

Most people don’t realise they’re in a de facto relationship. They’re unaware of the legal bond to their partner, despite the lack of…

I have a unique relationship with the most essential yet inanimate object in my life. It has sustained me through thick and thin. To date, it has never deceived me.

I can depend on this object in times of stress, discomfort and complete joy.

It’s my toilet.

To me, it isn’t just ceramic, plastic, buttons and plumbing. It’s significantly more than mechanics glued together. It’s a friend. It’s a tropical escape. It’s the safety of a warm embrace. It’s the place where I can be me without judgment or ridicule.

My familiar toilet is my saviour for every souring moment…

How many of you have broken up with a friend?

This style of break-up is, in many ways, worse than a romantic one. I didn’t think breaking up with my best friend could be any worse than it was. That was I until I realised I was splitting with our seven mutual friends at the same time.

By the time all the hurt and anger had passed through my body, it wasn’t our separation I found myself reflecting upon. It was the way it happened.

My best friend spoke for everyone when she said we couldn’t be friends anymore. …