5 things I’ve learned since closing my shop 1. I didn’t realise how much fear I was carrying. Owning a business meant waking up every day wondering what was about to go wrong. It sat in my chest, constant. Looking back, I wasn’t present, I was surviving. Now? I can breathe again. And that’s not a small thing. 2. When the business struggles, you think you’re the one failing. It gets under your skin. Becomes your identity. But the truth is… they’re not the same thing. A business can fail. That doesn’t mean you do. 3. The shop was never the business. It was just four walls. I’m the business. Always was. 4. The high street isn’t the gatekeeper anymore. Your phone is. Your name is. Your digital footprint is. Customers don’t belong to shops now, they follow people. The tide’s already come in… most just haven’t noticed yet. 5. Sometimes everything has to fall away for you to actually see where you are. Space is uncomfortable at first… then it becomes clarity. And in that clarity, new doo...