Love and inspiration

From the land of the blogs I've discovered a few fabulous reads for you this week...

I recently read #Girlboss and absolutely LOVED it, it is one of the few non-fiction books I have read cover to cover in (almost) one sitting! Sophia shows you the journey Nasty Gal has taken to reach it's magnitude proportions. All the hard work that she put into her business and the pay off that it has had as a result. As a small business owner watching the growth and development of Hazed, it has provided some much needed enthusiasm to just put in the work to 'make it happen'. 

I really enjoyed A Beautiful Mess's discussion on the topic, it is encouraging to know that the book had the same impact on other readers too! 

Likewise this post from Creative Women's Circle 'When is it giving up? And when is it finding your true north?' has had an impact on Hazel Loves Design, last year I put too many fingers into too many pies and as a result found that a couple of those fingers got burnt, and I got burnt too, as in burnt out. It meant I needed to walk away from some of those projects, and even some projects I really, truly enjoyed participating in. It was disappointing, it was hard, but guess what... I now have even MORE focus to pull off the things that I am really good at! So it was worth the sadness that let that happen. 

Vanessa from The Bubbalino Kitchen brings forth an interesting argument about the world of social media and the glorification that instagram brings to the seemingly perfect, it has been left in my thoughts for the balance of the week after reading them. BONUS of this post is the Ginger Roulade recipe she shares with us at the same time... YUMMO guys, YUMMO!!

Likewise Gala Darling shares an interesting thought on her post 'I woke up like this: On flawlessness and admitting the effort required', another interesting piece on the world we project. As gala says:  

"Blake Lively and Kim Kardashian spend the same amount of time in the make-up artist's chair, but only Black Lively acts as if she doesn't. The natural look is fine, but no one wakes up like that. It seems to me that women spend an inordinate amount of time trying to look "effortless": effortless appearance, effortless career, effortless relationship. 

Let's be straight-up: "effortless" is bullshit. Every woman I know is working herself to the bone..." 

I find Gala's posts the best to read for those 'self check' moments, those moments you need to have a look within yourself to comprehend the world outside yourself with fresh eyes.

And last but not least 'Weigh in: Are personal blogs and business blogs really that different?' by Problogger. For me, my blog attempts to follow a niche, that of 'Kiwi indie design', but it is also about the people who write the blog, our fabulous contributors and myself, so of course it tends to have an edge of fabulousness personal elements built into it as well. I hope that we at Hazel Loves Design are carving out a space where you all enjoy coming to visit from time time. 

So my lovelies, those were some of my favourites this week, obviously a whole lot of reading and not nearly enough visual inspiration, but that is the point, sometimes we need the fabulousness to be in our minds and not in our eyes for the growth and development of our worlds!