12 Months To 30

As we near the end of June and July is just round the corner, so is my 29th Birthday and the countdown to 30 begins.

So I thought this was the perfect opportunity to set myself 12 goals, one a month, to get me to 30.

1. Get better at taking criticism – I am notoriously bad at being criticised and immediately assume I am being told off . Time to deal with that.

2. Learn to drive – I think by 30 I probably should have learned how to drive a car.

3. Maintain a weight below 60kg – that is within the healthy range for my height and age and will ensure I probably stop consuming quite so much sugar.

4. Get a promotion at work – I need to start advocating more for myself and making sure I am not overlooked for opportunities.

5. Learn all A1 vocabulary in Russian – I have been learning for almost 3 years and still I struggle to find the words I need because I haven’t made the effort to commit them to memory.

6. Grow a usable ingredient – I have recently become interested in plants and growing something. I want to grow one usable ingredient for a meal.

7. Make a new friend – I have struggled this last year with friendships and I want to put myself out there.

8. Sell something online – I want to explore e-commerce as a means of expanding my finances.

9. Visit 30 countries before I am 30 – I am already close to achieving this goal of experiencing new cultures.

10. Run 10km – I have done one 5km race in my life and I want to try and push that.

11. Journal once a week – It has never been in my routine to journal and I want to have some time to reflect each week, be grateful and strive for my goals the next.

12. Have a digital detox once a month – I want to be more present, I want to be more productive, scrolling on social media inhibits this.

Half Year Reset

Inspired by the video by struthless here is my half year reset.

Mind Dump

I’ll save you the pain of reading the nonsense that happens in my head

January Goals and What Happened To Them

1. read 24 books (have read 18 so am ahead of schedule)

2. daily 5 minute Russian (did this for January and then stopped)

3. academic money goal (am £700 below target)

4. weight loss goal (hit it, put back on 2kg, but it fluctuates)

5. daily affirmations (they are on my mirror)

6. limit social media to 1 hour a day (most days I do this)

7. keep a diary (I have done a photo a day instead)

Why I Missed The Goals and Why I Succeeded

1. I made targets for how much I needed to read per day in order to finish the book within 2 weeks to keep on schedule. I prioritised reading. I read on my commute. I fell in love with books again.

2. I was lazy, I find it hard and need accountability in order to do it.

3. I went on holiday and enjoyed my friends. I do not feel bad about this.

4. I went on holiday, I stopped exercising, I started eating all hours again.

5. I may not say them to myself everyday but I do look at them and I have been nicer to myself.

6. I put on a limit on my phone that shuts my social media down after an hour of use and I usually don’t test the limit of it.

7. I kept forgetting to write my journal and needed to catch up days and I felt guilty so I stopped altogether but have replaced it with something I am enjoying more.

Second Half Of The Year Goals In Order

1. Read the other 6 books I need to complete my yearly target.

2. Save my monthly target.

3. Exercise at home once a week, restrict eating hours a minimum of 4 days a week.

4. Learn some Russian daily.

5. Say something nice to yourself for every not nice thing you say.

6. Let yourself be vulnerable and brave.

Who Am I Going To Be

A dedicated, passionate reader who is positive and self accepting, considerate with her spending, compassionate to her body by building it’s strength and nourishing it, who is becoming proficient in a second language and is open and fearless.

The System

An accountability partner – need to invest in pressure and accountability in order to reach my goals.

Wake up 10 minutes earlier, fit as much in that time as possible.

Sticking To The Plan

Make Russian cards to have under pillow so that it’s easy to do or read a little bit of Russian without a time limit on the amount.

Be compassionate to myself, if I miss a day, just start again the next.

Why I Am Worth It

I am a kind, caring and generally positive person who deserve to continue to grow, develop and achieve. I deserve treats and success because I share those with the people I love.

Make change your passion

Make change your passion

Update

I haven’t written in a while, I haven’t had much to say. But here is a dump of the things that I guess have accumulated:

1) Will I or when will I be ready to reach out? Should I have let go? He probably has.

2) When did my friends become boring? Are they boring, are we just growing up? What I am trying to compete with? I enjoy cards and house drinks as much as I enjoy a club and yet I feel embarrassed? Sad? Disappointed? That I haven’t been to a club?

3) My optimism and positivity have been tested and I struggle with that.

4) I have never personally seen a slid into a DM. Don’t know what to make of the two scenarios happening right now, feel ill-equipped to advise.

5) Progress with zapping has been made.

A Document

I want to document a feeling I have today.

A feeling of uncertainty and panic.

A feeling of being lost and scared.

A feeling of being worried and nervous.

The future is coming and it’s not panning out how I thought.

The plans are changing and may evaporate all together.

And then what?

And then who will I be?

I am terrified I will fall back into a person who doesn’t serve me.

I am not her anymore and yet she is rearing her head and in times of precariousness she is appealing and safe.

I want to document what happens when a dream is being taken from you.

Because it changes who you are.

And worse yet, soon it will change how people view you as well.

Adulthood and dreams

“The adult world isn’t made for us to dream”

Suli Breaks – Adulthood

What a realisation.

What a world we have created, forged, cultivated

Look at the wonder in the eyes of children, in the world where dreams still exist and innocence isn’t a word, it’s a disposition

How have we got so far lost from ourselves that we gave up dreaming?

We tell ourselves we can change, improve and develop. But is that dreaming?

Or are we talking in adult language that has meant we have lost all the words for dreams?

Does becoming an adult mean that we can no longer hope for an unrealistic, great, loving, beautiful, perfect life?

Are we so destroyed by our world, our reality that we can no longer create even the idea of a new one?

3 questions

I was lucky enough today to watch a ted talk by Stacy Abrams entitled “three questions you should ask yourself about everything you do”. She was inspiring, she was charismatic, she was human. And yet this reflection is not going to be about her, or her story or even her speech, it’s going to be about the questions.

1. What do I want?

2. Why do I want it?

3. How am I going to get it?

The problem is this, the idea of this is simple and effective and probably the most useful questions to ask yourself about any major change in your life. Except, that it isn’t. What do I want? Now there my friend is a question! Personally I have absolutely no idea and thus fail at the first hurdle, I can’t make it to question 2 and 3 because I don’t have an answer to 1. I have a million answers for 2 depending on what I decide the 1 is, but that doesn’t work does it… because that just means that I am following my emotions and not my desires, dreams or ambitions because I haven’t taken the time to work out what those are yet.

So I live in a perpetual state of 2, 1, 3. And I guess this year I hope that for at least one area of my life I can pick a 1 and then address it’s 2 and 3.

True Love Waits Forever: Care Home Hooligan -Part 7

Sometimes I am reminded that my job is one of the best jobs in the world. That I am privileged enough to have a part of someone’s life, their most intimate moments and thoughts. This week I had one of those moments.

I was speaking with a gentlemen about his life and specifically his wife and he shared with me the story of when he first realised he was in love with her. It brought me also to tears. So here is his story:

She had been away in Doncaster visiting her sister-in-law’s family and I was going to meet her at the station. So as I am waiting on platform one at kings cross station, her train pulls in. She steps out and she walks towards me smiling and radiant. And, in that moment, I realised I was madly in love with her and couldn’t bear to be apart from her ever again.

That. That is the kind of love I want. That is the kind of love that happens once in a lifetime, that makes you believe in soulmates, that restores your faith in humanity. That is the kind of love that makes movies, that makes hearts melt, that gives life meaning and purpose. That is the kind of love you only get to witness in my kind of job.

New Years Resolutions 2017

So it’s been a whole year since I first made my New Years resolutions blog post. Last year I set myself 3 resolutions, and like the vast majority of us I carry them over to this year as I failed to achieve them last year.

1. Learn Spanish – the forever dream, that forever dies because I don’t have the faith in myself to maintain the motivation to spend real money on lessons.

2. Lose one stone – should have been relatively simple, I had a whole year. And yet, the pull of those cakes and biscuits are unwavering!

3. Stay motivated – this I would argue hasn’t failed me as much, I still feel pretty motivated, just tarnished my time pressures. So this year I am going to remove this off the list.. yay, somewhat of a success!

4. So to have 3 healthy goals I am going to set this years new resolution to read 10 books. I managed 8 last year I believe, so I think 10 is a good target. I spend so much time starting at screens I am surprised I don’t have glasses by this point! So to postpone the inevitable I want to go back to reading, as it really is one of my favourite pastimes.

So here is to 2018, may you be better than 2017, and trust me you have a hell of a lot of work to do to top that corker of a year!

So I Put My Tree Up In November

So this may be controversial, but hey, Christmas is a season not a day….

I am a big believer that everyday you should try and find the good and try and find the happiness. For me the Christmas season is nothing but joy and happiness! Primary example being, endless chocolate and sweets and minimal guilt about eating them all because it’s Christmas.

So much to my boyfriend and parents dismay I put up my tree on the 20th of November and have been enjoying its glistening lights ever since! This post is a month overdue but I have been a little busy preparing a whole care home for Christmas.

This is the artificial tree I bought as I didn’t own one, and I’ll be honest it’s quite beautiful and a bargain! It cost me £20 from B&Q

As you can tell standard artificial tree design to put it up, two big poles to slot together and a tree topper, followed by individual metal tree branches to slot in and puff up.

This is my beautiful tree up and then with my lights that I bought last year in New Zealand. I had to get an adapter for them and I’ll be honest they are being a bit of a nightmare because they keep popping out the socket adapter! However, they are magical and long and will probably last me a lifetime.

Then it was time to start decorating! Everyone knows a tree needs a bit of red! I bought pretty much all my decorations from wilkos because I needed a starter kit. So these berries were £1 and have brought the tree to life.

The Santa and J and K on the tree are obviously not from the set. The Santa was £3 from sainsburys and the J and K were gifts from my aunty while we were in New Zealand.

So there you go, there is my November through to January Christmas tree! ❤️