My Toxic Rain Pathfinder is squishy, how can I improve defense?

Please take a look at my build and skill tree and advise what I can do to improve my defenses without sacrificing too much on dps. I was running t8 maps and I get one-shot by some trash mobs. Thanks in advance!!

https://www.pathofexile.com/fullscreen-passive-skill-tree/AAAABAIDAABeAO4GoQguCIkNjQ5ID6sRLxNtFAkVIBa_GYoZjiLiI_YkiyU_JogmlSpNKwos6TBxMHwyCTWSN9Q6QjrhPyc_bEfiSRNKfUrIS3hNkk3jUABRR1VLW69daF3yX5hh4mxGbqpxoXJsdoJ7w311f4B_loAihrOHdongiq-MNo19jb-PT5AKkBGTH5UFlwaa8ZuNn22jiqQ5p9SxMLTRtQi1SLXytzC748M6xKLIDMqp037UI9i92cbdqOZY62PtP-2D7g7vevJF9qP8xf4K_o_-uv7I_xA=?accountName=PrometheusNL&characterName=Lorena_The_Poise

Thank you. I unhide my character. Please take a look at my pathfinder when you get a chance.

For jewels, what jewels should I use for defense?

You have way too little life on your gear. All your % increased life doesn't do much if there isn't much +life to scale it with. Look for boots and a belt with more life. For jewels you should be going for abyss jewels with +life, after that look for stats you need.

Overall I'm a little confused by your build, are you following a guide? It feels like you're trying to do everything at once and that results in you doing nothing well. You're trying to scale toxic rains hit and the chaos aoe and have a good herald of agony. You should just be focusing on 1 of those which would let you focus more on defense. Without knowing what you really want to do it's hard to make overall gear and talent suggestions besides get a lot more life.

Also, some of it may be playstyle. You're a bow character so you should ideally be killing at range and trying to avoid getting into melee.

Thank you for the reply.

I'll definitely pay more attention to +life per your suggestion.

In terms of focus, I would like to focus on Toxic Rain rather than HoA, assuming that is end game viable (Shaper, Elder, T16 maps, etc.). What should I do to optimize that? I was following some build guide that is a hybrid of TR and HoA but looks like that is not a good idea.

In terms of staying in distance, perhaps my movement speed is not good enough but mobs seem to get in my point blank distance as soon as they show up on screen (and they typically die shortly afterwards). Should I start shooting into blank space randomly to avoid this before mobs show up? What about opening up a strongbox? I died a few times from doing that.

Thanks again!

Having both Toxic rain and Herald of agony crawler is fine (if you have free sockets).
Toxic Rain slows movement speed of enemies.

About strongbox - identify it and/or put totem and activate flasks - anti freeze and get out (use movement skill); Quartz flask is also pretty good (and also in delve) to pass through enemies.

Taking Abyss jewels with 40+ life or jewels with max life should help with survivability.
Your boots and belt should also have better life roll.
Thief ring is nice but limiting in endgame (you´re loosing 300-400 life from rings). You can consider replacing him too unless you plan different bow for endgame.

I would also replace Witchfire flask for basalt flask to mitigate physical damage and your life and QS flask should have 20% quality and some useful mods.

Have anti bleed and antifreeze flask is a must (or get freeze immunity from Boots).