This is from a post I did at my style blog, Jewel Divas Style, at the beginning of 2020 about the decade I’d spent online, writing and making jewellery. It was not only a new year, but a new decade. And yes, I know that’s years ago now, but it shows the mindset of one living this kind of life. One with a life unfulfilled who strives to do something for themselves, while not actually getting anywhere.

I also put this in my memoir, as it’s still so relevant.

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“I started the decade one year into my author blog with two novels already written, and a jewellery business at the beginning of its life. I had no idea what the hell I was doing, or where I wanted to go, but I knew I wanted to do something.

As the years progressed, I wrote more novels under my author name, which I matured and adultified, blogged weekly, set up a website for my jewellery business, bought multiple domains, trade marks and copyrights, and had legal issues. I then started writing under my own name and progressed to a third author name. Not only did my own health suffer greatly during this decade, but my mother became so sick and crippled that I had to put my jewellery business on permanent holiday just so I could focus on my writing. And then I lost my writing inspiration, Jackie Collins.

I continued writing so much that I not only set up multiple websites to cover all of my names, but decided to set up a publishing house to publish all of my books. I bought my own ISBNs, bought everything that I would need, such as pictures, and gave my cover designer mock-ups of what I wanted for my books.

I’ve dealt with shit, literally, that no one should have to deal with. I resent myself, the Universe, and my enemy, for what has happened in my life and have no real idea how to get out of it. My life is not where I thought it would be, nor where I want it to be. And how that will evolve over the next ten years I don’t know. I cringe at the thought that I’ll still be here, in this exact place, in ten years; living the same life, dealing with the same shit. Because sometimes, it just ain’t that easy to pack up and leave. But that’s for another time.

And yes, all of this is a weight I’ve borne by my own hand.

As I ended the year, and decade, I looked back at all the crushes I’d had, the love I didn’t experience, the children I didn’t have, the things I did, and saw nothing but insignificant achievements that meant, quite frankly, not a fucking lot. Although, setting up a publishing house and releasing a whole bunch of books IS a lot, it just didn’t feel like it.

I ended the decade with two rooms full of clothing and accessories, books, collections, and knick-knacks that I loved and wanted, but which I had no place to properly display or store. I also ended the decade with seven more novels, four novellas, eleven non-fiction, and forty-two short stories under my name and two others, all published under my own publishing house, plus a thousand more pieces of jewellery than what I started it with and more kaftans and kimonos than I ever dreamed of having. I have multiple websites, domains and businesses, more business debt than I’ve ever had in my life (but can fortunately pay off each month), yet I own nothing except what I have in these two rooms.

While I ended the year, and the decade, with a whole lot more than what I went into it with, regardless of what I had actually done and achieved, it seemed like I’d done nothing at all.”

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Continued excerpt from Unfulfilled…

Looking back at my life, I know full well I’ve done more than others. It’s that weird balance of life. You know you’ve done a lot, but it feels as if you haven’t. Maybe that’s because I haven’t achieved what I actually want to, so nothing else feels like an achievement of any kind. It takes a lot to write a book, but it came easily thanks to still being creative coming out of school. It also takes a lot to get your work out there, to get yourself out there, and to try and make something of yourself, and that’s damn hard. And some days, you feel as if you’ve achieved nothing because the hard work isn’t paying off.

I also know I haven’t done as much as many others. I didn’t get to travel broadly, or overseas, have a career, or move interstate on my own, or have kids or marriages, and at this point of my life I’d get married and divorced just to say I had.

In the general sense of the “average” life most have, with relationships, kids, careers, and travel, I didn’t get to have it, and there will always be that part of me that regrets that. I hated kids when I was a kid. I couldn’t stand my screaming nephews, but once I turned eighteen, all I wanted was a baby. A girl to be exact. I wanted the mini version of me, which so many girls seem to want. And every time I saw a baby girl, or toddler, out in public my heart panged for what I wanted desperately. And that desperation never left. It may have mellowed, but the pain is still there and sometimes I cry at night in the darkness of my bedroom about how fucking lonely I am and how I’ve missed out on the two things I wanted most. And still do.

And because of these emotional holes that are in my heart and soul, I developed a lower scale shopping addiction. Buying pretty things that I can sometimes barely afford, but want, fills that hole left in my life. I own pretty things; I have nothing else. It fills the hole, but not for long as the cycle starts again. I buy things to fill the holes. I buy things to fill my life.

It pisses me off that I didn’t get to have a life, or haven’t got to have one, regardless of how much I try and change things. I also don’t expect anything to change, even though I try and will it to, so in another fifty years I’ll be talking about the same things.

Like being envious of others. I have no problem saying that. I’m not jealous, I’m envious. I envy what they have, and what they have is what I covet. The freedom to do what they want, go where they want, and have what they want when they want it.

That’s what I want most. The freedom to do what I want, when I want, with whom I want, how and where I want. But that’s not going to happen now, is it? And that’s a really damn fucking hard lesson to learn because all of it, my whole life, and all of the lessons, have led me to here. A place I don’t want to be. Here. Stuck in this hole of an existence not knowing what the hell to do to change it. I soldier on, suck up my lot in life, and get on with it. Because what else is one supposed to do? What am I supposed to do but suck it up and get on with it and keep on soldiering on through this shithole of an existence?

So as I rolled into the fifty-first year of my life, I decided to throw together this memoir, because, hey, why not. It’s one more book I’ve written, using stories from my life, and may or may not have any relevance to you, the reader. But then again, it might. I didn’t set forth to teach any lessons. That wasn’t the point of this book. I just wanted to tell some stories about the things that have happened in my life that may be of interest to others. I hope you enjoyed it, and will pass it on to someone else for whatever reason.

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Back to 2025…

Since I wrote that blog post in 2020, I have written more novels and stories, released more books, put together a memoir, guides, and updated books as you can see from the running tally I now keep on my About page.

I’ve closed down my jewellery business, two author websites, and multiple sets of social media. I’ve bought more clothes and jewellery, more knick-knacks, more books, more stuff, while also donating stuff. It’s a never-ending rotation of bring in, throw out.

I keep re-organising, re-scheduling, re-arranging my personal life, my emotional life, my home life, my business life in the hope it will somehow change. That the Universe will come along and bestow its riches upon me and tell me my life will now be different moving forward. I keep doing it because I have to. Because I need to. Because without it, I would cease to exist.

Because that’s life.