All the way from sunny Manchester, UK

I’m sat on my sofa with a cushion on my lap, with my MacBook on top

I just finished a cottage cheese (fat-free, of course) with salt and honey on toast — don’t knock it until you’ve tried it

Anyway

Hi friend,

I don’t know how you found this page, but you’re my friend now

It’s 2012. My mum just kicked me out and moved to another town. I’m not close to any of my family, so I’m now homeless.

I managed to get myself into a homeless shelter but quickly fell into the wrong crowd, getting up to no good to make money

Every time I got back to the shelter, the guys I went out with would rap about what we just did and go out again tomorrow

I knew that wasn't the life that I wanted to lead, I wanted to travel — so I needed to make money

I tried a bunch of ways to make a legitimate income, customising trainers, buying and reselling clothing, then starting a clothign brand, f course, none of them worked out, i didn’t know shit about shit

So i coninued to quest of finding the thing that would allow me to travel.

I hated working for other people, I couldn;t hold down a job beyond the probation and I knew I had to work for myself

None of the creative persuits brought in enough money for me to live off — so I turned to selling drugs

It was easy, fast, and regular

But again, I knew this “Career” wasn’t for me — It was pure survival

Early 2016 I saw a YouTube video of a guy explaining his “barber life”

How he works for himself, never asks for time off, answeres to nobody, and makes good money

It looked cool, but i didn’t think much of it

until a week later, I’m walking past a hair suppplies shop, the ones that sell wigs and products, and there is something staring at me square in the face…

A set of bright yellow whal pro clip clippers for £25 — IYKYK

This reminded me of the barber life video i watched last week and decided fate was trying to tell me something

So I bought the clippers and decided I was going to be a barber

I’m 24 at this point, the last thing i want to do is go to college, i need to make chedda — yesterday!

So, I start walking into barbershops asking for jobs

I told them I had been “cutting hair cir 6 months” — I’d had the clippers about 6 days, and done zero haircuts (but I did watcha. lot of youtube though)

I fancied my chnaces

About the 8th shop I walked in, the owner told me to bring a friend to show him my skills

I brought Wayne, my trust friend with afro hair, but I watched enough fade tutorials I was pretty sure I had it in the bag

I did a number 2 on top down to a zero — I just went down in guards thinking that if I work down from the longest, i can’t take it too high and fuck it up

Here’s the result — my first ever haircut. Number 2 down to a zero

This got me the job

then I quit 4 weeks later to start working at another shop which promised a lot more potential

I started in the salon upstairs, washing womens hair, assisting (holding brushes and making brews) the hairdressers

Until two months in I realised they wern’t going to teach me any barbering

I sat the manager down and said

“I’m going to bring my own cleints in to cut in the barbershop downstairs”

She gave me the nod

I taught myself how to cut hair on paying clients by doing the consulation

going in to the staff room to “make a brew for the lady upstairs”

Watching what the client just asked for on youtube on x2

Then going out to repeat everything I just watched

I got 27.5% of all haircuts (but 27.5% of fuck all is fuck all)

I was going to get confident enough to go traveling and bounce, until a new barber started working with us and we had a similar work rate

He asked if i wanted to open a shop

We did, in 2017 then we opened an academy

we built it for 8 years, then i left in 2025

to teach full-time