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There is a very deep sense of loneliness that settles in when you’re someone who works on their own. As someone who has been freelancing of her own volition, I knows the high-highs and low-lows of being alone with your work, a little too well. While there is a lack of distractions and a sense of freedom in being your own boss most of the time, there are also times when it can be extremely isolating. There are days when you finally crack a difficult conundrum that you’ve been agonizing over, and you look around…and there is no one to celebrate with, but yourself. Don’t get me wrong, there is a lot of joy in forging our own path, but there is also the need for a community for support and encouragement.
As usual, the land of the startups is also the land of innovations and the answer to the agony of having no one to share your work joys with as a solopreneur or freelancer, was also made here. BLR Besties is an organization founded by friends Bisma Kazi and Sahiti Gavarikar, as a much-needed answer to the isolation of freelance work.
Bisma is a solo entrepreneur and content freelancer. She founded Blep Studios, a consultancy that develops content strategies for early-stage startups. Sahiti is the co-founder of The Restory Project - an initiative that provides queer-affirmative, trauma-informed, feminist therapy and related services. As two female solopreneurs who know and understand the value of supportive community spaces, they came together to start BLR Besties.
After having worked for over a year on her own, Bisma was staggering under the burn-out of working by herself, when she discovered an instagram reel about a community of freelancers, founders and solopreneurs in San Francisco, where they meet regularly to share in their learnings and wins. What started as Bisma’s tweet about potentially organising something similar in Bangalore, reached Sahiti, who in turn reached out to Bisma to create this community. And thus, BLR Besties was born. Limiting their offline meetings to 15 slots each, they try to ensure the intimate nature of the gathering is maintained and that every single person in attendance gets the space they need for themselves.
Today, the organisation’s Whatsapp community has more than 60 people from across Bangalore who are all their own bosses, and they are steadily growing through their offline events. They have a small but extremely connected, and constantly growing community filled with driven individuals. What started simply as an offline accountability meet-up has slowly started growing into mixers and founder exchange events, where original thought is nurtured and new ideas take shape through conversation and collaboration.
But ultimately, when asked about how they envision the BLR-Besties community growing, Bisma summed it up poignantly. She said, "We want this community to grow slowly and steadily and provide support to each other, learn from each other and more." and added on:
“The idea is to build a deeper, supportive ecosystem that sets people up for success.”
Bisma Kazi, Co-founder, BLR Besties
Follow BLR Besties here.
