Why should you support creatives and small businesses this Christmas, every Christmas and all year round? I’d like to share my thoughts on this. Excuse me while I get a little vulnerable.

Being creative can be a curse. You live for your art and anything else is soul-destroying. But for many of us, it’s anxiety-inducing to put yourself out there.

Case in point, the ‘minute’ I launched an Insight Timer meditation I got a 1-star review. You have to listen to the whole thing to rate it, so that’s ironic. What kind of sociopath listens to an entire meditation that they absolutely despise?! Was it perfect, probably not given I recorded it in my bedroom, in a lockdown with kids interrupting and it was my first time editing audio off YouTube tutorials. (Don’t worry, I rerecorded bits so there is no ‘Mummy, what are you doing?’ in the meditation. 🤣 But I actually had great feedback on it from others, so this rating felt malicious. I can’t imagine who dislikes me so much that they jump at the chance to slam something I produce to help a child’s well-being in the midst of an anxiety epidemic. But that’s the risk you take when you put yourself out there. Sometimes it hurts. And the problem is, other people don’t think ‘Oh, that was likely someone being nasty’, they just see The.Worst.Possible rating and assume it’s crap. But, the very next day I recorded another one, (creatives can’t stop creating!).

It’s hard to put into words the overwhelm and at times debilitating paralysis that comes with a creative trying to start a business on their own on a shoestring budget. In my case, all the technical stuff required, like accounting, website building, SEO, online sales management, shipping logistics never get easier. As someone who suffers from dyscalculia, I can barely dial a phone number correctly let alone cope with an Excel spreadsheet. I cried several times and lost four days of my life trying to sort local shipping labels because my brain simply doesn’t work that way.

When you baulk at the shipping cost from a small business, please remember, we aren’t ripping you off. We might not even be making a living yet! We are not a company whose multi-million dollar profits allow us the luxury of free shipping. We’d love to offer you that. We can’t. In fact, we only charge you for the packaging and the courier charges, not our time… even though we believe everyone should be paid for their time. What ‘shipping’ often looks like for a small business owner is someone sitting at their kitchen table, faffing with spreadsheets, tripping over boxes of packaging in the hallway or garage, packing boxes on the floor with an aching back and trying to figure out how to ‘be there for the courier pick up’ when they also have to drop kids at school and go to the supermarket.

But here’s what I want you to know.

We creatives and small business owners clap our hands in joy when you give us a positive review. That two minutes you took to write a review is a balm to someone who has spent years of their life creating something we think you might like.

We creatives absolutely do a happy dance when you buy something because that little bit of support makes it all worth it. You make our dream a reality.

So, I’d love for you to promote some of your talented creative friends and small business owners – feel free to do it in the comments below, or take some time to do it on your own social media page. Think consciously about what you buy and who you buy from this Christmas and all year round.

In doing so, you help to spread happy dances up and down the country. After the challenges of this pandemic, this Christmas is a good opportunity for us to support small, local businesses and individuals that work all hours of the day and night to bring something unique to life. Honestly, I speak for all small business owners and creatives when I say it takes serious courage to keep rising to these challenges day after day. And I think that is worth celebrating.