Officially entering a new era
It’s been about 2 months since I’ve started giving facials again and let me tell you - I am ALIVE. I honestly wasn’t expecting to feel so invigorated by it. But here I am, elated and also glad that I was so wrong about any apprehension I had coming back to the treatment room.
During the last two years, everything became a red flag to me about my industry. I needed to completely deconstruct my view point and dig deeper about WHY I actually still give facials after 16 years. My soul was no longer in it and I didn’t think anyone deserved that. I lost my identity a little bit over the last few years, just like a lot of people have. I got a hefty amount of world experience and got to learn and unlearn things.
This past weekend, it dawned on me that I’ve entered a new era of my esthetician career. It feels like I’m finally in the space where I have a balance and ease to my offerings. I’m happy to be doing it but I don’t feel pressured to overwork or perform. It feels cheesy to say but I feel like I’m in the right space at the right time in my life, which is not what my past self would have ever believed about Dallas.
Coming back to doing facials also has helped me gain perspective on my losses. I met my acupuncturist Emily of Acupuncture Juncture during my miscarriages - the worst I’ve ever felt and most vulnerable I’ve been in front of a stranger. Even just a few weeks after my second miscarriage, Emily asked if I would consider potentially renting a space at East Dallas Collaborative and connected me with Bree, the amazing chiropractor who owes the building. To have someone see the potential that you have while you’re going through an emotionally vulnerable and devastating time is what inspired me to step into the treatment room again.
Losing my LA practice was so much more difficult that I expected and my experience in Oregon was really difficult on my physical body. I was so discouraged but the space I took away allowed me time to grief and grow. I felt like I no longer belonged and that possibly I have outgrown an industry that I’ve given myself completely to for almost 2 decades. Turns out, I just needed time to reset and space to figure out what I wanted out of this career to begin with. Despite initial hesitations, it really just came down to this; giving facials is the space that makes me feel the most like myself. And I wanted to feel like me again.
Which leads me to my greatest lesson in all of this which is how much I require certain boundaries in order to avoid burnout. I had recently discovered through a series of tests with my naturopath that I have a genetic marker that essentially means that I don’t have the same signaling for stress as most other people do. This put into perspective that my work/life balance may just have to look a little different from now on. For the first time in a long time, I fully believe and know I can still be happy and healthy now that I have some guidance on how to help my body function better. One of the main reasons why I feel I am enjoying my facial practice again is that I’m only working 2 days a week. I’ve finally come to accept that my body functions in certain ways that doesn’t let me give 5 days worth of facials anymore.
During my break I also developed a consistent routine with movement in my life where I have a greater sense of functional body mechanics. For example, I used to not be able to move very well and doing an exercise like a squat or a lung would put me in a full body flare. It was due to my undiagnosed endometriosis and me not knowing how to recover from long days of work. I move better now than I did when I was 18 so I finally feel equipped to work without the side effect of pain. Something I am extremely grateful for because I want each facial to feel like an experience which means I’m not running out of gas by the halfway point of my day anymore. This is why I feel ALIVE - I can finally offer the facials I’ve been holding myself back from offering. I finally can physically do it.
There’s also the healing that has taken place where I can finally hold space for someone else. There was a time when the thought of caring for someone else felt impossible. So instead, I took care of me. And it took for that attention to be redirected towards me to really listen to that voice that has helped so many others for so many years. I basically Therapeutic Skin Coach’ed myself and built a community of healers to help me rebuild my health from the ground up. I’m no longer cloudy, no longer easily fatigued, aching all over, or needing to cancel due to a full body flare. It’s actually exhausting to think that I ever let myself work under such poor health conditions. But hey, I forgive that version of me who was just trying to make everything work.
Like many of you in your own careers, I’ve had many eras as an esthetician. The hustle era, the try everything era, the holier than thou era, the imposter syndrome era, and the completely burnt out era. Now I’ve finally found a sense of Yin that I was searching for all those years.
I’m sharing this with all of you because many of you have followed along during the peaks and valleys of my 16 year career. Some of you are just discovering me and some can maybe relate to my story. Either way, I’m glad you’re here and reading this. My hope is that you are reminded that you are important enough to get the care you need. However it may look, even if it is difficult at times. I’m just so grateful to be where I am now and feeling so inspired to nurture people in my beautiful little space here in Dallas.
Sending love and thanks for reading! xo - Hayley
p.s. Thank you to everyone who has been booking in! I’m so honored to work with you and look forward to meeting many of you soon as well.
