change

life is a rollercoaster, and I want to get off

2021, mental health

Hello,

I’m sure I’m not alone in feeling like time is moving far too fast at the moment – a lot of us are still stuck in March 2020 when the most unusual event of (probably) our whole lives kicked off, but I swear it was June yesterday and now it’s nearly October?

I like being in control (read: control freak) and to feel like I’m losing time doing who knows what makes me feel quite on edge – I keep trying to think of ways to feel more present, but I just can’t make time for journalling or meditating in my routine right now. I feel like I’m tripping through life and while I’m just settling into the fact it’s September, next week is October and I constantly feel like I’m playing catch up.

I started to type ‘there’s a lot going on in my life right now’, but before I’d finished typing it I realised it wasn’t true. I have one big thing going on, but it’s a significant change and I’m finding all aspects of it difficult. I received some good news yesterday, after a relatively rubbish week (including a very kindly delivered job rejection phone call and my HelloFresh box just not arriving), and my partner congratulated me and asked me why I looked like I was about to cry.

It was because it meant the change was real. And I have a big decision to make as to whether I want to accept it.

But I can’t even cry – I’ve been struggling for a few weeks now and I really feel like there’s a big emotion I need to get out, but for whatever reason (maybe my meds or some other mental block), I just can’t get it out.

The rollercoaster of my analogy is going way too fast – the wind is whipping through my hair and I’m desperately trying to process it all but I just can’t keep up.

By 25 I thought I’d be more settled than this. Three years out from finishing my first degree (which makes me sound way more intelligent than I am), I thought I’d be more comfortable in my job and my income, I thought everything would feel more stable but I feel like there’s lots of spinning plates and I’ve already got shards of broken crockery at my feet. Everything feels broken, but even I can see objectively enough to know that it’s not.

I’m tired. I feel like I’m fighting to get through each day and then when I get to bed I can’t even get to sleep despite being exhausted all the time.

The one positive I can find, is that although I know I’m in a subconscious depressive low right now, I know it won’t last forever. I can’t force it – I can’t pretend a bath and a face mask is the ‘self care’ I need, because I don’t even know what I need right now, but I know that it will end – my sleep will get better, getting out of bed won’t feel so tough and good news won’t make me nearly-cry (at least, not in a bad way).

I keep trying to figure out what my blog is right now – I think it’s just me in each moment. It’s the happy lists, it’s the emotional rambles, it’s the favourites posts and the goals. I’ve been writing this blog since I turned 18 in 2014 – I just turned 25. Although at my core I like to think I’m much of the same socially inept, closet nerds with ginormous dreams, so much has changed and I’ve grown in the best way. I don’t think I’m someone my 18 year old self would be proud of yet, but one day.

Thank you for reading,

Sophie xx

my favourite parts of Autumn

2021

Hello!

Autumn is my favourite time of year, second only to Christmas – there’s lots of lovely things about summer; the warmth on my skin, the light evenings, barbecues with friends! But then the burning heat, being sweaty all the time and working inside while I can hear kids screaming in paddling pools in the garden down the road. Pros and cons!

I wasn’t sure what I wanted to write about, but I’ve been enjoying writing little positivity lists so I thought I’d pick the 10 things I’m most excited about for the change in season!

  1. Sweaters. Long sleeves, knitwear, feeling cosy and warm. It’s my true form.
  2. Blankets! I have one in basically every room but my favourite one is the one with sleeves that I sometimes wear as a cape because I can.
  3. Dark evenings with the fairy lights on. They always make me feel magical ✨
  4. Rewatching Harry Potter. It just comes with the time of year.
  5. Warm winter foods – is there anything better than getting the slow cooker out and making something hearty and filling the whole house with the smell?
  6. The leaves changing colour – we don’t always get those beautiful orange shots you see in American hallmark movies, but when the does come out and the leaves crunch beneath my feet on the ground, that never gets less exciting.
  7. Wearing my Dr Martens – I’m not very good at sticking to one ‘look’ or style but putting my Docs on with anything makes me feel a bit more badass than I really am.
  8. Cadbury Snow Bites – I’m not one for celebrating Christmas too early (because otherwise I’ll run out of momentum) but I won’t complain about the Christmas chocolates. Snow Bites are my favourite and they are my weakness.
  9. Hot chocolate – Costa hot chocolate is my favourite but I got pretty good at making my own at home last winter (though I’ve deliberately never calorie counted them).
  10. Snuggles with my boy – yes, I had to get soppy at some point. Whether it’s on the sofa watching TV, under the blanket as we fall asleep watching George Clark’s Amazing Spaces or standing in the kitchen making dinner, the worst bit about summer is feeling too warm for hugs and cuddles.

There are good and bad parts to every season and after such an unconventional winter last year, I know many people are concerned about seasonal affective disorder and I don’t to belittle that by pretending everything is pretty leaves and cosy drinks. Some fairy lights aren’t going to make up for how much darker it is, however magical they feel.

However cheesy it sounds, it’s remembering that the sun will always rise again – there’s always another tomorrow, summer will always come back, take Vitamin D supplements if you need them and see your doctor if things feel too hard.

Change is hard and weird, but although the seasons change and the weather’s unpredictable, like most thing’s in life – they won’t stay the same forever.

Thank you for reading,

Sophie xx

adjusting to being alone

2021, lifestyle

Hello!

My fiancé works in Outside Broadcast, which means he sets up all the camera equipment for live sports matches; football, rugby, he’s done boxing, his colleagues have done golf and tennis – it’s a huge thing and it’s a very exciting industry, even for someone who has zero interest in sport.

He’s currently working out in Rome, Italy on the Euros – he just worked on the Opening Ceremony and the first game and he’s out there living the Italian life for nearly 5 weeks.

Several people – both his colleagues and mine – have question why we as a couple are okay with this, but we always said career comes first. It’s an amazing opportunity to work on such a huge event and in the scale of it all, five weeks is nothing. With video calls and WhatsApps and silly voice notes there’s plenty of ways for us to keep in touch and alongside being an amazing experience, it’s a good financial opportunity for us and we have a wedding to save for!

But whilst he has an amazing opportunity and extra money, I have an empty house and a lot of alone time for five weeks. It’s definitely a tough trade off but I never want to be the one holding him back from amazing opportunities. He’s been flown to Rome to work on one of the first major sporting events since the pandemic cancelled everything and whilst we’re relatively unattached (no pets or children or anyone under our care), now’s the perfect time to go. If I worked in an industry that had similar opportunities, I would have done the same.

Being home alone has been a big adjustment – many of my friends and family live alone and I’ve had a few comments from one family member saying ‘now you understand’ but, whilst it may be easy for me to say; I don’t think it’s the simple. It’s all about what is considered our ‘normal’ – my normal is living with someone else, so suddenly being on my own isn’t really equivalent to living alone because it’s not my normal. Sure, it’s an insight into what your life is like but it’s not my normal.

However, today I wanted to talk about all the nice things I’m experiencing in being on my own for a little bit – it’s not all highs and it’s not all lows but there’s a place for talking about the tough times and a place to concentrate on the best bits – today is a best bits day.

Firstly, the weather has massively picked up in the UK and it’s been lovely to have the back door open and feel a warm breeze, the sun on my skin and the smell of barbecues at the weekend (despite how hungry it makes me!). I’m normally very much an inside person and last year our garden was essentially shared so I didn’t love spending time outside, but now I have my own private garden, I’ve picked up some garishly yellow sun loungers and I have a plan to douse myself in SPF and spend the afternoon making a good dent in my book!

Which leads me on to my current greatest passion – reading. I really got back into reading in 2020 and although it’s ebbed and flowed and a bad book can put me off for a few weeks, as the weather’s got better the only thing I want to do is sit outside with my prescription sunglasses and a book. Maybe a snack but I’m working on not snacking.

At the moment, most of my evenings are finishing work, having half an hour to mentally check out of ‘work mode’, making dinner then sitting on the sofa watching YouTube until 10pm when I go up to bed and read until I fall asleep and although it sounds a bit boring, I’m enjoying giving myself a little bit of structure. I’m still figuring out what the best routine is to get the best nights sleep but just blitzing through my watch later playlist and catching up on all my YouTube videos is really satisfying to me.

This might be the silliest thing that brings me joy… but I bought a bubble machine.

Let me explain!

Last year when we had an essentially-shared-garden, our neighbours kid had a bubble machine and the joy I felt watching all the bubbles float passed our window was so pure and wholesome. I realised a few weeks ago that I am a whole grown ass adult and if I want a bubble machine I can buy myself a bubble machine.

So I did.

I am posed with my tongue out and bubbles floating all around me.

And I was 100% correct about the level of joy it brings me – £6 well spent.

Life’s too short to deny ourselves simple pleasures.

A project I’m doing which perfectly coincides with my fiancé being away is Hannah Witton‘s #DearJune Instagram challenge – I’ve totally re-evaluated my relationship with posting on Instagram and for the last six or seven months or so I’ve only posted the photos I really like and want to share, rather than posting every single day because I felt obligated as a ‘blogger’, ‘wannabe influencer’ person and I was a little worried with Dear June interfering with that, but it’s pushed me creatively to take more interesting photos and write more meaningful captions and I’m really proud of what I’ve shared so far! It’s been a fantastic creative exercise so far and it’s been surprisingly self-reflective too, making me look me deeply within myself and giving me lots more to discuss with my therapist (which is a good thing).

Changing living situation is always hard, whether it’s moving house, being in a long distance relationship for a little bit or simple trying a new routine. But I suppose it’s mentally reframing change as an opportunity to be a good thing and not immediately react negatively (but this is hard and takes practice!).

Thank you for reading,

Sophie xx

adapting you goals (and why it’s okay)

2020, goals, organisation

Hello!

I write a lot about my monthly and yearly goals, I try to share tips on what’s worked for me and I’ve had a fair few messages from people saying they’ve starting using advice I’ve given, which is a lovely feeling. But I’ve never written about adapting goals and embracing change.

For me, the thought of adapting or getting rid of a goal feels like cheating, like I’ve done something wrong or failed. What I need to learn is that recognising when a goal doesn’t serve me or my long term goals or aspirations, there’s no point wasting time and energy to achieve it for the sake of not adapting it.

Maybe I’m making this sound more melodramatic than it is, especially considering the context that made me consider this at all. One of my monthly goals was to hit certain milestones in my crafting – I wanted to make four more face masks (which I’ve done!), plan my new cross stitch design and finish learning how to knit a soft toy that I intended to stuff with all my old holey socks (clean, of course).

I sat down to work on this duck and I realised I was getting stressed about all the different types of knitting stitches I needed to figure out and it all felt too complicated and big, when my crafts were meant to be my outlet to relax – to just sit, shove some YouTube on in the background and make something with my hands without thinking too hard.

But when I realised I didn’t want to make the toy, the thought of not achieving my goal bothered me.

So I changed it.

All I want from my knitting is to sit and do the same stitch mindlessly over and over again, so I’m just doing that and maybe one day it’ll be a scarf but it’s therapeutic and it felt so much better than forcing myself to do something that meant I had to concentrate when I wanted to do the opposite and unwind. So I changed my goal to just ‘work on knitting a scarf’ and in the evening if I’ve done everything else I just sit and watch videos or watch my boyfriend play video games and knit without really thinking.

I feel way less stressed and intimidated by the goal and I’m enjoying the process of knitting again because of it.

In the scheme of things, a craft goal is not that important and I definitely placed too much weight on it. But it made me think of my 2019 goals – at the beginning of the year I set a goal about building a freelance career because I had some work lined up, but that fell through before the end of January and I just ignored it for the rest of the year. I missed an opportunity to adapt the goal into something more suitable and perhaps have achieved something else in the span of that year.

Of course there’s going too far with adapting goals – changing them as soon as they get hard is missing the entire point of growing and learning from your goals. But if your goals as they currently stand don’t aid your growth in the direction you want it to – whether you realise it’s not a path for you, you want to try an alternative method or it is negatively impacting you – then continuing putting time into it isn’t worth it.

I don’t know if this was useful in any way, shape or form – there’s every chance I was just making a revelation about knitting into something way bigger than it deserved to be – but it’s helped my mindset on goals not being as rigid as I’d thought and allowing them the flexibility to serve your greater ambitions.

Thank you for reading – I hope you and your loved ones are happy, healthy and staying safe!

Sophie xx

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an accidental week off, but that’s okay

2018, lifestyle, mental health

Hello!

This week has been my biggest week since I finished uni – I’ve barely been at home and I’ve definitely not had the time or energy for creative projects as usual.

So days went on and the weekly vlog hasn’t been uploaded, I didn’t post a blog post on Wednesday, I couldn’t film, edit or upload a second YouTube video and my usual Saturday blog post was a mere dream.

I wanted to post something just to acknowledge it – I don’t think anyone’s on tender hooks waiting to see why I haven’t uploaded but on two sides I wanted to say something and I needed to write about it for my sake and for anyone reading.

I’ve felt a bit flat this week, but I always do when I don’t feel productive and I don’t get everything on my list done, but I need to train myself out of it because at the end of the day? Not forcing myself to write, film and edit late into the night was better for me in the long run and practising the self care to not be bothered is more important than beating myself up about missing deadlines I set for myself.

Obviously if you’re at uni or work this isn’t as flexible because deadlines are important, but similarly if something goes wrong and things have to change, deadlines need to get shifted then letting yourself be emotionally invested and be negatively effected by those things isn’t worth the heartache.

I’m still astounded by the positive impact the mentality of ‘everything is hard, make it worth it’ and the coil have done for my mental health and positive outlook – months, even years ago, I wouldn’t have been able to decide not to let anything effect me like this but with positive mental practice, I’ll be able to take changes like this in my stride and won’t beat myself up for it.

Especially over a hobby like blogging and my YouTube channel – this super busy week has shown me what a working week might look like and has shown me that maybe I won’t be able to sustain this creative outlet when I do get into working full time but being aware of that and allowing myself flexibility is a good step for preparing for that. But that’s more of a 2019 problem!

I’m excited for the new year and applying my new mindset to what I do – 2019 is going to be the year that everything changes and I’m not going to sit around and wait for it to happen.

And I’m not going to waste my time getting hung up on missed blog posts and dwindling subscriber counts! (Still working and not caring about that one, but it doesn’t matter and that’s what I need to remember)

Give yourself a break, you’ve achieved a lot.

Thank you so much for reading,

Sophie xx

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