Do The Hustle
Photo by Simon Wiseby
Jay-Z said it best when he said ‘I’m a Hustler Baby, I just want you to know, it ain’t where I been, it’s where I’m ’bout to go.’ Preach on Hova, preach on. I’m a big believer in learning from your past, moving on and doing your best to make things happen for yourself. Through my various mistakes, I’ve learned that sitting around waiting for things to happen or for people to give you a break is generally not the best approach to life. The only thing for it is to hustle. Go after what you want and be proactive.
It’s just the way it goes that things won’t always run smoothly on your journey to hit your goal. It’s a lesson I learned, initially brought on, as so many lessons are, by a mistake. That lesson came in New York. I had moved there after uni to do an internship. Three weeks after I got there, I walked out of said internship because I thought I should be doing more than running around a snowy Manhattan returning clothes from photo shoots back to PR showrooms. Let me be all the way honest – I thought I was too good for it. I hadn’t traveled 3000 miles for that. After all, at the grand old age of 23, I had a world of work experience under my belt, this was supposed to be my big break.
I jumped ship to an internship at a different magazine and had to deal with an emotionally unstable and borderline psychotic manager. Those who’d interned for her before me often only lasted a few days. As my dad says, ‘sometimes you just have to shovel shit,’ so I figured this was my shit to shovel. I worked my ass off at the internship and did odd jobs and wrote for a UK magazine to pay the bills.
It was a hand-to-mouth existence.
There are a lot of people in New York – a hell of a lot who also consider the city their big shot. Everyone is firing on all cylinders, fighting for their shot, their chance to be heard. Be it the guy selling his mixtape in Times Square or the chick waiting tables between auditions, everyone is hustling to get their break. And that is the difference – they’re not waiting, they’re actively pursuing their goals, doing what they can to make it happen.
When I moved to Canada and couldn’t get an interview for a magazine job for love nor money, I thought ‘screw it, I’ll start my own thing.’ Then BOOM! Bangs and a Bun was born. I hustled crappy jobs in the background to build this dream up (because hey, sometimes you have to shovel some shit). I realised in order to get it where I want it to be, I’d have to shout about it. I channeled the inner hustler in me from New York and became a one woman PR machine, telling any and everyone who would listen about my new project. And I haven’t stopped since. Some people find my style of fairly constant self promotion to be aggressive and irritating but marketing myself is part of what I do – no one else is gonna do it for me. There are days even I don’t want to do it, but no one else wants my dream to happen as much as me, so I don’t have time to skip a beat.
Aggressive or not, excuse me while I go make my dreams happen. And they will, ’cause I learned from the best. Thank you New York.
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Tags: Ambition, career advice, Drive, Hustle, new york, work experience
