Gratitude

I've been thinking a lot about gratitude over the last few days. Initially this was because the actor Tyler Hoechlin tweeted a link to this TED talk by David Steindl-Rast, the topic of which is "If you want to be happy, be grateful".

This resonated with me, particularly the parts about taking a moment to stop and observe the world around you so that you don't take everything for granted. It's not something I do very often, if at all.

Boy, did that change today!

I got home last night after a lovely meal with my guests from Minnesota to discover that my laundry, which was half dry when I left, was soaking wet and trapped in the washing machine. After trying many things, I finally thought that I'd got the washing machine fixed (I spent some time poring over the manual last night), but I wanted to stay awake until the cycle was finished (1am) to make sure. Alas, it was not fixed, and my clothes sat in a pool of very soapy water all night.

Having a fresh pair of eyes this morning did not shed any light on the problem, other than to firmly acknowledge that for some reason the washing machine is broke. That's fine, we can deal with that, but first I need to rinse my laundry and hang it up to dry.

My hands must have been in slightly-soapy water for about an hour and a quarter. They are now so very, very sore. The amount of soap that was in the clothes was phenomenal, the washing machine clearly hadn't rinsed it at all, so it took filling the sink with water at least six times per load of rinsing (there were two loads - one of my towels was too big to fit in with the rest). I have never been so glad that I was born in this day and age in my life!

I am so, so grateful that I was not born one hundred years or more ago, because there's no way I would have been high-born so I would likely have ended up a maid. I'm so grateful we have washing machines. I'm so grateful I don't have to hand-wash on a regular basis. I'm so grateful for dryers. I'm so grateful for repair people, and the fact that I have no doubt we'll get it fixed soon. I'm so grateful for hand-cream. I'm also really grateful that my mother taught me how to hand wash, because despite hating this morning at least I knew what to do with my soapy clothes!

And because I'm so grateful about all of these things, I'm not particularly unhappy or annoyed about the washing machine. Sure, it's a pain, but I got the things I wanted washing washed anyway, and besides, my gratitude for not normally having this problem far outweighs the annoyance of actually having the problem.

Gala Darling, in this article here, discusses the idea of starting a gratitude jar for the year. The idea is that you write down anything you're grateful for when it happens, put it in the jar, then on the 31st December you take them all out and read them. Alternatively you can read them whenever you're feeling unhappy or annoyed, since as in the talk above, it'll probably make you happy.

I think it's a wonderful idea. I'm not sure that I'll be doing it, but I definitely want to start being more grateful for things. So I thought I'd share two little things here that I've been grateful for recently.

This is part of my birthday present that my ex-flatmate and platonic life partner Harriet made for me. It's so pretty! No one has ever made me something like this before, and I'm aware of the time and effort that she put into it because I was half-talking to her on Facebook at the time. There's a bird cage for him as well, and I named him Dionysus. I love it, and I'm so grateful for the fact she decided to make it. [Harriet's blog, if you're interested, can be found here.]

The next thing I'm grateful for is my mum. What does that have to do with the photo above? On Monday evening I vacuum cleaned the house from top to bottom, and I spent a lot of time in the kitchen getting the floor spotless (well, bit-less). The above is the pile of crumbs and dirt that I brushed up at 9.30 on Tuesday morning once everyone had finished breakfast. It was annoying, because the floor had been so clean! It really made me think about my mum, and everyone else who keeps their house clean. You don't really pay attention to the efforts that they put in, but it's really hard work keeping everything spotless! I'm so grateful that she did it (and still does, in her house), and I'm so grateful that up until now I didn't have to do it. I never realised how much work it was, and I really appreciate everyone who is the primary house-keeper of their family.

You're all amazing people!

Weights on my shoulders [Part 2]

Song of the day: Icarus - Bastille

So where were we?

Consequences. Things have consequences. And we have to face them.

Yes, we do.

On the outside, my past actions of not working very hard at university and managing to get out of any prior consequences seem to have not impacted on my life in any way. After all, I didn't get into any trouble, I got good grades, went to a good university, and today I'm none the worse for wear.

I didn't take responsibility for my past actions. I blamed other circumstances. I wasn't feeling well. I just couldn't do it. Something came up. I never faced the truth. I was lazy. I didn't want to do it. I couldn't be bothered. I didn't work as hard as I could have. But now I have, I'm faced with thoughts of me not being or doing good enough. It doesn't matter if everyone else is proud of what I achieved, I know I could have done better. And that applies to most things in the last decade. For some reason, around the age of eleven I stopped caring. And now I've started again, I deeply regret large parts of the last ten years.

The other downside to never having to worry about consequences before is that now I do, and that terrifies me. I don't know how to deal with confrontation and being in the wrong, and having to own up to that. As stated in the last post, my response in the past has been to ignore it. To give up or to run away. I've become known as a quitter, and I hate that. But I've only got myself to blame.

So how does this get back to dealing with anxiety and depression? Simple.

By taking responsibility of my own actions and accepting consequences for what they are, I can help to break the cycles and just make life a lot easier for myself.

For example, a few weeks ago I let anxiety get the better of me, and I switched my phone to silent for two or three days and ignored every phone call I received.

Yup, it was not a good idea. Ignoring problems/people does not make them go away. It only makes it harder to deal with afterwards. After all, not only are you then worrying about the initial problem, you're also worrying about the fact that you're ignoring them. It all adds up, it's not mature, professional or healthy. It's just stupid.

So I'm trying to change my actions. This morning I received an email that made me anxious (because so many things do, I can't really help it). In the past I would have left it for a few hours, until the stress built up so much that I had to reply or have a nervous breakdown. Today I replied straight away. I'm still a little anxious about it, but I know that there are no actions I can take regarding it now. It's out of my hands. I have done all the actions I can do, so the ball is in their court. [I realise I'm making this email seem like a big deal. It really wasn't, I'm just trying to explain my thinking.] I did all I could, and as redundant as it seems to say it, that's all I can do. For once, I did my best.

So I decided that I'm going to try making a list of all the things that are weights on my shoulders, either due to things I did in the past (or didn't do, as the case may be) which have consequences currently arising, or things which aren't of my making, but if I do not take action and responsibility, the consequences most certainly will be.

And whilst the idea of listing my weights so I can learn how to lighten my load is primarily to help myself deal with stress and anxiety, the fact that I suffer from anxiety is going to be one of the items on the list. It's nothing that's going to go away by itself. Now that I'm aware of it, I have to remain aware of it, and do what I can to reduce it's grip on me. It may not be my fault that it affects me, but it will be my fault if I don't deal with it.

This post became a lot more ramble-y and different than I originally intended. I was going to just list the weights and talk about the best way to ease them, but I think that might have to be a private endeavour before I make it public. I'll be delving into the depths of my mind that normally remain untouched. Who knows what will surface?

Weights on my shoulders [Part 1]

It's very hard, on days like today, to talk myself into doing something. There's no particular 'something' that I should be doing, it's just a generic idea of productivity. I feel bad, so I don't want to do anything, so I don't do anything, so I feel worse. It's a horrible cycle that occurs often when one is suffering from depression [mild], and there's a similar cycle that crops up with anxiety [more severe]. Only in that case, you put off doing a task that is making you anxious, which therefore makes you even more anxious about it.

You said it, Stiles.

The most important thing is to be aware of the cycle. I'd been vaguely aware of it for some time, but it was really drilled home for me during my sessions of CBT [cognitive behavioural therapy]. It became clear that the best way to feel a bit better is to get something done. That way you can't sit around berating yourself for being lazy and unproductive, because look, you're not! Which is why I finally sat down today to write this blog post. I got up at half eight this morning, earlier than I have done in a while, and proceeded to do absolutely nothing for several hours. That's not going to make anyone feel good, let alone someone who started the day feeling down for no reason anyway.

So is there a point to this post, besides forcing myself to do something other than sit around with a weight in my chest?

Why yes, yes there is.

I've been thinking a lot recently about taking responsibility for myself. [Side note, awesome music just appeared: Sky Battle from Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows. I was not expecting such dramatic music to occur at this moment.] It's partly due to having this break before I start the next big chapter of my life (i.e. starting work), but it's been building for some time.

In the past, my approach to bad things in life was a little like this:

It didn't matter what it was. Didn't do some homework? I could do it during the break it was due after, it was easy enough. If that didn't work, well, the teachers liked me, they'd accept whatever excuse I would come up with. Innocent-eyed and a good student, if I ever did do anything wrong I got away with it easily enough. Didn't revise for GCSEs? No problem, I got mostly A*s anyway. Don't revise enough for A-levels and actually get worse results? Drink too much, then blame your being sick on the chocolate you ate beforehand (which I'm still convinced played a part), and get out of trouble due to this being not-normal behaviour and you're so sorry and you'll never do it again. I never had to face consequences, so I could ignore the problems.

Then we get to university, when I'm more independent. Again, consequences don't seem to happen for when I don't do the right thing. I'm good at cramming and writing last-minute essays, which get me good grades even if they're not as good as I could do. So I ignored the fact that I wasn't working hard enough. I ignored the fact that I was having mental health issues until my flatmate coerced me into addressing them with a professional rather than just saying "oh I should probably speak to someone, this can't be completely normal, but ignore me, I'm fine". Once I stopped getting therapy, I just ignored the problem again instead of setting up a new support system. I've still not told my family the full extent (so if they happen across this, surprise! I'm fine, do we really have to have a conversation about this? I mean, we probably do, I just don't want to), and look, I'm trying to ignore a problem again! Then once university is over and I have problems with money and rent and finding a place to live and everything else that comes with being 85% independent, well... ooh look, a squirrel!

But you know what? These things did have consequences. They were just internal, and I ignored them until now.

Because now, I'm trying to pass as a 98%-independent adult, and I can't use my situation or personality or luck or anything to smooth over anything that goes wrong due to me messing up.

Accurate pictorial representation of the world.

The world doesn't work like that. It doesn't care about us as individuals. We have to care about us as individuals. So that's what I'm trying to do.

This post is getting too long. I'm going to split it. Part two can be found here.

The World (Is Going Up In Flames) [Part 3]

Song of the day: How Long - Charles Bradley 
"How long must I keep going on?"

There's something to be said about being ruthless when sorting. It's something I used to be terrible at, but the many occasions over the last year or two that my mother has asked me to clear some space in my bedroom in my parents' house so they can use it has taught me a thing or two. For example, over Christmas I decided (mum decided I was) to sort out my chest of drawers. Four large drawers, four small. Last time I sorted through it I got rid of a fair few items, so that instead of all the drawers being ready to burst, they were only semi-filled.

This time however, I was taking no prisoners. Whereas last time a few things got though the decision making process by the age old 'I might wear it one day', I was having none of that this time. After an hour or two, we were down to the following:

One drawer containing memory clothing, e.g. primary school dresses with everyone's signatures on, orchestra tour t-shirts for China and Prague.
Three boxes of jewellery, health+beauty products and other memorabilia (e.g. dance and gymnastic medals) that I just couldn't get rid of. These boxes fit into the same drawer as the above.

And I think that was it! Eight drawers down to one.

Something that helps you to be ruthless is moving the items you don't want to keep out of your room/ house as soon as possible. Last time I sorted through my clothes here in London was several months ago, but I put the clothes to-go in a pile that stayed here until this weekend. Clearing up on Saturday, however, involved me very quickly saying "yes" or "no" to items (think twice about your decision on the former, but only once about the latter), and then immediately going out to Oxfam with my bag of donations. The only textile items I have left that need to go are a bag of holey old socks, because I wasn't sure how best to get rid of them.

Day 3: 5pm, still sorting.

Being ruthless can be hard though. As you can see in the above photo, today I was sorting out my shoe collection. I owned about sixteen pairs, which I culled down to eleven today. Out of those eleven, I wear two, perhaps three on a regular occasion. Most of the eleven are heels that go with specific outfits that I wear only occasionally but don't want to get rid of yet. I don't mind about keeping them. What was hard was throwing away some of the shoes that have served me faithfully over the years but are far past it now. A pair of brown high-heeled boots that I wore almost every day last year, a pair of walking boots that I've owned for about five years and got me through the worst of work when I started but have just become too un-waterproof for me to continue using them, and a pair of black court shoes that I've had since I was in my last years in secondary school. I really like them, but I've worn them so much the heel has worn down to the point where it's dangerous to use them. They had to go. It's always hard to get rid of things that have seen you through a lot. You often don't realise you have an emotional attachment to something (why would you? It's a pair of shoes!) until you have to let it go. But it's necessary.

We've made good progress though. The room is looking much, much better than it did a few days ago, and it's making me feel better. It looks more home-y, I'm more able to find things, and it's generally just a nice room to be in! Actually getting the TV to work rather than using it as a noticeboard was a benefit I had no idea would be so great. I get to watch Harvey Specter on a screen easily three times bigger than my laptop screen. It's becoming more of a thing with every passing episode. If only I could get White Collar and Teen Wolf on there as well, I'd be a puddle of goo on the floor, and mess up all my efforts this weekend. Maybe it's a good thing we're limited to just this one show for the moment.

So what have we actually done? May I present...

Formerly-problem-area #1. It's not perfect as the dryer was commandeered before I could finish drying my duvet cover, but we're down to just reading material! And to prove that it's not all just been moved to the couch,

Ta-daa! Nothing there except for reading material either. And finally,

Formerly-problem-area #4. All nice and neat, and providing room for me to type this up in comfort, rather than hunched over a laptop sitting on a not-so-comfortable couch.

So there we have it. The room is almost complete. All that is left is the ever-looming problem area #3, which may have actually ever so slightly increased in size. But whilst I've not yet completed all that I set out to do, I have learnt something about deadlines and projects. I need to make sure my goals are realistic for the time that I have, and I probably need to procrastinate less. I have no doubt that I would have got everything finished today had I a) done something yesterday and b) not spent most all of this morning reading fanfiction and playing on empire building browser games. These projects take time, but they are doable. And they're really not as daunting as they first seem.

And tomorrow I'm going to kick problem area #3's behind.

The World (Is Going Up In Flames) [Part 2]

A good part of today was spent not tidying, but discovering that there are pelicans in St James' Park and trying to take photos of them. This was the best I could do:

What's that? You can't actually see any pelicans there? Well, yes. That's because by this point they'd swam behind that grassy bit, and were also too far away and so really tiny. The latter was the same problem for this heron:

I think it's a fairly nice picture anyway. Nothing like a good long walk in the park in the cold to start the day off right, hey?

Except that I originally planned to give myself until the end of today to get everything in my room finished, but a week of not sleeping very well has taken it's toll (a topic we will return to at a later date), and this afternoon was been mostly spent laying on my bed watching Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D and Diners, Drive-Ins and Dives. Very classy.

So we've not managed to get everything organised, but progress has certainly been made. May I present:

Area formerly known as Problem Area #2:

All the clothes were sorted in a keep pile or a donate pile. The donate pile went straight to Oxfam (up a much-steeper-than-planned hill), and the keep pile went straight in the wash basket. New home for my shoes as well.

This next area wasn't even a problem area.... it just didn't exist at all!

The television is the one that was on my desk yesterday, the first shelf of books are the cookbooks I mentioned, which had been living in a box underneath the desk for the last six months, and the books beneath that are various academic texts that have really been living on the floor for god knows how long. And the electronics (wireless router etc) are all nice and neat too. The table itself was 'borrowed' from the living room.

Also, yes, I did only just get instagram recently and am overusing the filters a bit. I'm late to the party. But you know what?

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Things still left to do:

* Move desk to the left, swap boxes around different sides.
* Put the printer on the smaller box.
* Problem area #3
* Clothes recycling bag 2
* Actually clean (vacuum, dust etc)
* Change bedding. Do additional load of laundry to get to-wash pile down.

Smaller things (to buy):

40W 240V screw-in bulb
Over-door hooks

The World (Is Going Up In Flames) [Part 1]

Today is Saturday, and we're going to hit the ground running. A few days ago I signed up for Apartment Therapy's January Cure, and whilst we're not going to be doing the task they suggest for today (it's one of my flatmate's months to clean the kitchen), we are going to take a leaf out of their book and tackle my living space.

So what do we have to work with?

Problem area #1: All the stuff that gets moved from the bed to the couch and back again every single day.

Problem area #2: All the clothes that were in my suitcase from when I moved in 6 months ago but I have yet to do anything with, except dump on the floor when I needed to use said suitcase two weeks ago.

Problem area #3: I like to pretend this bit doesn't exist. It's all just a giant, horrible hallucination.

And finally, problem area #4. The box underneath the desk is full of cookbooks that I have no bookshelf space for. I'm not really sure what to do with them right now. I also want a bigger desk at some point, and to put the television (which doesn't work at the moment) on a coffee table. But all these things cost money, which, alas, I have none of right now.

It's a huge task, so I'm giving myself the whole weekend to do it. Or, I'm giving myself all of today and then a few hours tomorrow, since I'm museum/art gallery/walk-in-the-park -ing tomorrow. Whilst this isn't going to be a post-everyday blog, check in tomorrow to see how I did. I'll give you a hint... it's not looking too shabby!

You have caught a wild 20-something!

Song of the day:  Love Like A Sunset Part 1 - Phoenix

So, the first post. That which I spent quite a while mentally composing in the shower earlier, only to be suddenly drawing a blank now that I'm actually trying to write it. It's always the way, isn't it? Blogs would be a lot easier if the first post didn't exist and we just got straight into it.

The basic premise is this:

Who are you? 

I'm a twenty-something trying to navigate the perils of becoming an adult.

Becoming an adult?

Yes. I graduated university about six months ago - it was some time summer 2013 but I'm not sure what month to call it. I had my last class in March, last exam in May (or was it April?), found out that I'd passed in June, got module results in July, and had my graduation ceremony at the end of August. So about six months ago.

What did you study? 

BSc Anthropology! Followed by a brief attempt at MA Film & Philosophy, before quitting due to lack of finances and it just not being the right course for me.

You didn't answer the question, becoming an adult? 

So six months ago I graduated, and since then I've been working not very many hours at two zero-hour contract jobs, getting to grips with a minor mental health problem, and living on my own in a house with two guys I'd never met before I moved in, brief look around the place aside (where I met one, not the other). I don't know many people who live in the city, despite this being my fourth year here, I still have things left to unpack from moving in on August 1st, and I generally don't do very much with my days. But...

There is a but!

Not that kind.

But I'm now making a conscious effort to stop living like a student in the middle of their summer holidays, and start doing more with my life. Evolving into a (still young) grown-up. Or at least someone who can pass for one when necessary. This is mainly due to me having a proper full-time job offer which starts mid-February.

So what does this entail?

I'm going to start improving all aspects of my life, and through this blog you will accompany me on the journey. These facets of my life include how I spend my time, how I dress (because most of my clothes are about 5 years old - I have no sense of personal style other than 'this is clean'), how I eat, my living space, my mental space (I will learn what's going on in the world!), and anything else I can think of!

This is not going to be a fashion blog, or a food blog, or an 'insert x' blog. This is going to be a combination of all the things required to make it in the "adult" world, that place where I can't spend all day talking about the latest Suits fanfiction that I read (not that I can anyway to be honest - the person I usually fan-talk with hasn't seen the show) and lounging around in jeans that have a massive hole in the thigh and slipper-boots. We're going to have anything and everything here, and more besides!

Awesome! Where are you from, by the way?

At the moment I live in London, UK.

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All good? Alright then... let's get started!

Go team!