I am more interested in your fruit than I am your theology. If your knowledge doesn’t better equip you to love, it’s worthless.- Mattie Montgomery (via missericaleigh) (courtesy of awelltraveledwoman.tumblr.com)
1.15.2013
Do.
Learn.
Learn to like what doesn’t cost much.Learn to like reading, conversation, music.Learn to like plain food, plain service, plain cooking.Learn to like fields, trees, brooks, hiking, rowing, climbing hills.Learn to like people, even though some of them may be different…different from you.Learn to like to work and enjoy the satisfaction doing your job as well as it can be done.Learn to like the song of birds, the companionship of dogs.Learn to like gardening, puttering around the house, and fixing things.Learn to like the sunrise and sunset, the beating of rain on the roof and windows, and the gentle fall of snow on a winter day.Learn to keep your wants simple and refuse to be controlled by the likes and dislikes of others.
- Lowell C. Bennion (via larmoyante)(Courtesy of awelltraveledwoman.tumblr.com)
1.02.2013
2013
Wow, I think December was the first time I went an entire month without blogging! I know I discussed it before, but I feel like motivating myself to blog when I am busy/happy/having writer's block is a lot more difficult than I realized. I have a few ideas to get that Blogger Funk to head out, which is a part of what I am talking about today.
Obviously it's a new year. And people make resolutions on New Years Day to make serious changes. However, I haven't had a history of being one of those people. I guess I just cop out to that old "I never keep them anyways" thought process. But just because there is a chance you might fail at something- doesn't mean you should just not even try. So I've been thinking about what resolutions I would go for this year... I wanted to aim for something different, but realistic and attainable. I've also missed making goals and seeing them come to fruition. I did that a lot at the end of 2011 and into 2012, and I think it was a really great way to make small monthly changes that I could complete and see in a matter of a few weeks. I am also a big advocate of self-reflection, and I think that looking back on lessons and changes from 2012 is a healthy way to move forward from the good, the bad, and the ugly from the past year. So today, there is a lot to talk about.
As far as the past year, it's been a wild ride. I don't know how much I've necessarily changed in the past 12 months because I think it takes a little more time to really get to a place where I could reflect on something like that. I will say that the first half of my year and the second half were drastically different. I was still in that weird funk for the first part of the year. I didn't take my annual vacation until pretty late (July), as opposed to going in the spring like I had done the year before. I was still putting up with a lot of negative people and just trying to "power through it" rather than do something about it. Which I know now was a huge mistake. I had a quote that I used to keep on my bedroom door for years and years which read: I knew if I wasn't happy with my life, it was up to ME to do something about it. For the record: if you're unhappy, don't wait to power through it. DO something about it. I should have done a number of things a lot sooner than I did in 2012. Maybe out of laziness, maybe I was scared of change. I honestly can't pin down exactly what it was. But I guess that could have been one of my biggest lessons of the year. After my birthday and Costa Rica trip in July, I felt like my life made a complete 180-degree turn. And it wasn't just one thing. It was meeting my boyfriend, moving back to Huntington Beach, cutting out a lot of the negativity and poor friendships in my life, and really just a culmination of events that stemmed from those three things. Because I was planning to travel more, I invested in a good camera. Because I got the camera (and had the good fortune to talk to my friend Drew about his writing gig), I got hired on as a writer and photographer for NiteGuide Magazine. Because I got that side-job, I was given opportunities to cover a ton of concerts and festivals across California. About that same time, I met my boyfriend and he (in his unyielding search for spontaneous adventure) jumped in a car with me on our second date and drove to San Francisco to cover my first big concert. We started dating after that and ended up where we are now, which is a pretty great place. I think that me wanting to have a place "more my own," to have friends and my boyfriend come over to led me to seek out my current roommates, who have made my life feel so crazy-blessed and peaceful and happy that it blows my mind on a daily basis. These girls are seriously some of the most amazing people that I get to share a house with and I love them both more than anything. Incorporating the two of them in addition to my boyfriend has changed a lot of things about my life. They've taught me that spontaneity and simply allowing myself to be fun-loving again can make all the difference in the world. For the first time in years, I feel like I am okay being 100% myself. I don't feel like I'm constantly needing to be on the defense for being quirky or making the occasional mistake. Life is a lot less serious these days and it seems so much easier when handled in that light. I'm learning more about myself as a friend, a person, and a girlfriend than I've ever learned before. And it's been a pretty great few months for those reasons.
For 2013, I'm hoping to continue that search for knowledge and adventure. I'm turning 30 this year, which is really wild to think about. There's my big trip coming up, hopefully in April. I wont talk about that until I actually buy my ticket because I don't want to jinx it. I also have a few other plans in the works that I will wait until I have concrete material to talk about them, but suffice to say that this year is going to have a lot of newness for me, and I'm really excited about it all. To make more concrete goals, however, I want to list them here.
1. Advance in my photography skills. I initially took most of my photos on an Auto Mode, which is sort of cheating. It took me a loooong while to even attempt to use manual settings, but I finally got into it over the Christmas holiday, enough to at least feel comfortable using my camera on manual. My pictures are a lot better, and I have to admit: it's a lot more fun! I was insanely spoiled over Christmas and received a new zoom lens that I'm also obsessed with- so this is the year of the photograph for me.
2. Start a new blog. I have some really great ideas for a new blog, which I will work on for a few weeks before sharing in order to make sure it's not just going to be a start-up-and-dump-it idea. If all goes according to plan (and what I'm hoping) this could end up turning into something I may even transition over to a book. It would be a good step toward pursuing my dream of writing for a living; something I'm realizing more and more is something I'd like to do as my career.
3. Change jobs. I'll have been working at my current job for 7 years this spring, and there really isn't much more I can do to advance here. Every year, I say I'm going to look for a new work adventure and every year I procrastinate. Certain aspects of my life are aligned that would allow me to kind of "start fresh," and I think that with me turning 30 this year it's a good time to get serious about what I do for work every day. This is my year.
4. Buy a computer. Because no writer uses an iPad to do their work. Plus I would ultimately like to have more flexibility with my career and be able to work from home if I wanted to. It's 2013- people just don't need to drive into work every single day.
5. Find a fitness routine that works for me and get serious about it. I change it up a lot, usually because of the seasons. I think that what this goal ultimately means is that I need to start going to bed earlier so that I can get up early and work out. It really is the only solution that I think would really work with my schedule and needs. This is also a great goal that can be gradually achieved starting today.
What are your reflections/New Years goals?
Obviously it's a new year. And people make resolutions on New Years Day to make serious changes. However, I haven't had a history of being one of those people. I guess I just cop out to that old "I never keep them anyways" thought process. But just because there is a chance you might fail at something- doesn't mean you should just not even try. So I've been thinking about what resolutions I would go for this year... I wanted to aim for something different, but realistic and attainable. I've also missed making goals and seeing them come to fruition. I did that a lot at the end of 2011 and into 2012, and I think it was a really great way to make small monthly changes that I could complete and see in a matter of a few weeks. I am also a big advocate of self-reflection, and I think that looking back on lessons and changes from 2012 is a healthy way to move forward from the good, the bad, and the ugly from the past year. So today, there is a lot to talk about.
As far as the past year, it's been a wild ride. I don't know how much I've necessarily changed in the past 12 months because I think it takes a little more time to really get to a place where I could reflect on something like that. I will say that the first half of my year and the second half were drastically different. I was still in that weird funk for the first part of the year. I didn't take my annual vacation until pretty late (July), as opposed to going in the spring like I had done the year before. I was still putting up with a lot of negative people and just trying to "power through it" rather than do something about it. Which I know now was a huge mistake. I had a quote that I used to keep on my bedroom door for years and years which read: I knew if I wasn't happy with my life, it was up to ME to do something about it. For the record: if you're unhappy, don't wait to power through it. DO something about it. I should have done a number of things a lot sooner than I did in 2012. Maybe out of laziness, maybe I was scared of change. I honestly can't pin down exactly what it was. But I guess that could have been one of my biggest lessons of the year. After my birthday and Costa Rica trip in July, I felt like my life made a complete 180-degree turn. And it wasn't just one thing. It was meeting my boyfriend, moving back to Huntington Beach, cutting out a lot of the negativity and poor friendships in my life, and really just a culmination of events that stemmed from those three things. Because I was planning to travel more, I invested in a good camera. Because I got the camera (and had the good fortune to talk to my friend Drew about his writing gig), I got hired on as a writer and photographer for NiteGuide Magazine. Because I got that side-job, I was given opportunities to cover a ton of concerts and festivals across California. About that same time, I met my boyfriend and he (in his unyielding search for spontaneous adventure) jumped in a car with me on our second date and drove to San Francisco to cover my first big concert. We started dating after that and ended up where we are now, which is a pretty great place. I think that me wanting to have a place "more my own," to have friends and my boyfriend come over to led me to seek out my current roommates, who have made my life feel so crazy-blessed and peaceful and happy that it blows my mind on a daily basis. These girls are seriously some of the most amazing people that I get to share a house with and I love them both more than anything. Incorporating the two of them in addition to my boyfriend has changed a lot of things about my life. They've taught me that spontaneity and simply allowing myself to be fun-loving again can make all the difference in the world. For the first time in years, I feel like I am okay being 100% myself. I don't feel like I'm constantly needing to be on the defense for being quirky or making the occasional mistake. Life is a lot less serious these days and it seems so much easier when handled in that light. I'm learning more about myself as a friend, a person, and a girlfriend than I've ever learned before. And it's been a pretty great few months for those reasons.
For 2013, I'm hoping to continue that search for knowledge and adventure. I'm turning 30 this year, which is really wild to think about. There's my big trip coming up, hopefully in April. I wont talk about that until I actually buy my ticket because I don't want to jinx it. I also have a few other plans in the works that I will wait until I have concrete material to talk about them, but suffice to say that this year is going to have a lot of newness for me, and I'm really excited about it all. To make more concrete goals, however, I want to list them here.
1. Advance in my photography skills. I initially took most of my photos on an Auto Mode, which is sort of cheating. It took me a loooong while to even attempt to use manual settings, but I finally got into it over the Christmas holiday, enough to at least feel comfortable using my camera on manual. My pictures are a lot better, and I have to admit: it's a lot more fun! I was insanely spoiled over Christmas and received a new zoom lens that I'm also obsessed with- so this is the year of the photograph for me.
2. Start a new blog. I have some really great ideas for a new blog, which I will work on for a few weeks before sharing in order to make sure it's not just going to be a start-up-and-dump-it idea. If all goes according to plan (and what I'm hoping) this could end up turning into something I may even transition over to a book. It would be a good step toward pursuing my dream of writing for a living; something I'm realizing more and more is something I'd like to do as my career.
3. Change jobs. I'll have been working at my current job for 7 years this spring, and there really isn't much more I can do to advance here. Every year, I say I'm going to look for a new work adventure and every year I procrastinate. Certain aspects of my life are aligned that would allow me to kind of "start fresh," and I think that with me turning 30 this year it's a good time to get serious about what I do for work every day. This is my year.
4. Buy a computer. Because no writer uses an iPad to do their work. Plus I would ultimately like to have more flexibility with my career and be able to work from home if I wanted to. It's 2013- people just don't need to drive into work every single day.
5. Find a fitness routine that works for me and get serious about it. I change it up a lot, usually because of the seasons. I think that what this goal ultimately means is that I need to start going to bed earlier so that I can get up early and work out. It really is the only solution that I think would really work with my schedule and needs. This is also a great goal that can be gradually achieved starting today.
What are your reflections/New Years goals?
11.28.2012
Flow with it.
There are times in our lives... wait, scratch that. I hate entries that start out with that sentence. So I guess I will just start out by talking about my own personal experience and go from there...
Last year, as I'm sure I have discussed in great depth, was rough for me. But I needed it to be rough for me. I needed a push, or perhaps just a reminder, of what the other side of the fence looks like. I needed to learn lessons of patience, and lessons of humility, and more than anything I needed to learn to stop and look at what was really going on in and around me. Experiences like those are almost like a map. Or I guess a journal. We go through these trying situations and we remember (hopefully) what we did to jump the hurdles where we faltered.
I read an article today about going with the flow, and really paying attention to what has and has not worked for us. Isn't life so often just a matter of really listening to ourselves? I mean REALLY listening- to our past, to our bodies, to our deep-rooted feelings... to turn down the congested noise around us and really pay attention to what we already know. You think of birds, for a strange example. Birds don't have GoogleMaps to tell them where or when to migrate. They just know. they were born with an intuitive knowledge of how to do exactly what they are supposed to do in order to survive. Humans are, at our core, the same way. I think that, more often that not, when we are looking for direction- we already have it. But in order to hone in the ability to listen to ourselves, we need to practice by overcoming obstacles. See: we need practice quieting our minds to hear that inner voice.
That's what a lot of what I write about... stuff people already know. A lot of self-help is that way: it's: one person pointing out what you already know. That's why it's so identifiable and relate-able. That's why it's an "AHA!" Moment. If we can learn to listen to ourselves, and what we already know, then outside self-help would become obsolete and unnecessary.
Back to the article I was reading, I really enjoyed the concept of "going with the flow," because I felt like that has a history of being the time when I've always done my best. When I allow my life to be what it is, rather than trying to control everything around me, I am happier and more fulfilled. It's almost as if life waits for me to stop asking and searching in order to deliver me where I am supposed to be. It's sort of a spiritual thing, in a lot of ways. Almost like "stop telling me what you want and I'll give you what you need." It was when I stopped trying to be in charge of things that my life took charge (and got better), which was also sort of funny because I felt so much more peace being able to relax and take my hands off of everything.
There are a lot of components to what I believe makes a good approach to life. And I guess what I'm getting at is that I think a good portion of that is to just be who you are. You know who to be, and you know what to do. Shut up, once in a while. Lock yourself away from the chatter outside and take the time to listen to what your inner persona tells you to do. Your life is going to hand you a series of gifts, choices, whether you hunt them down or not. Relax and allow that to happen, and as comically "zen" as it sounds: everything will play out as it was always meant to.
Last year, as I'm sure I have discussed in great depth, was rough for me. But I needed it to be rough for me. I needed a push, or perhaps just a reminder, of what the other side of the fence looks like. I needed to learn lessons of patience, and lessons of humility, and more than anything I needed to learn to stop and look at what was really going on in and around me. Experiences like those are almost like a map. Or I guess a journal. We go through these trying situations and we remember (hopefully) what we did to jump the hurdles where we faltered.
I read an article today about going with the flow, and really paying attention to what has and has not worked for us. Isn't life so often just a matter of really listening to ourselves? I mean REALLY listening- to our past, to our bodies, to our deep-rooted feelings... to turn down the congested noise around us and really pay attention to what we already know. You think of birds, for a strange example. Birds don't have GoogleMaps to tell them where or when to migrate. They just know. they were born with an intuitive knowledge of how to do exactly what they are supposed to do in order to survive. Humans are, at our core, the same way. I think that, more often that not, when we are looking for direction- we already have it. But in order to hone in the ability to listen to ourselves, we need to practice by overcoming obstacles. See: we need practice quieting our minds to hear that inner voice.
photo credit: unknown
Back to the article I was reading, I really enjoyed the concept of "going with the flow," because I felt like that has a history of being the time when I've always done my best. When I allow my life to be what it is, rather than trying to control everything around me, I am happier and more fulfilled. It's almost as if life waits for me to stop asking and searching in order to deliver me where I am supposed to be. It's sort of a spiritual thing, in a lot of ways. Almost like "stop telling me what you want and I'll give you what you need." It was when I stopped trying to be in charge of things that my life took charge (and got better), which was also sort of funny because I felt so much more peace being able to relax and take my hands off of everything.
There are a lot of components to what I believe makes a good approach to life. And I guess what I'm getting at is that I think a good portion of that is to just be who you are. You know who to be, and you know what to do. Shut up, once in a while. Lock yourself away from the chatter outside and take the time to listen to what your inner persona tells you to do. Your life is going to hand you a series of gifts, choices, whether you hunt them down or not. Relax and allow that to happen, and as comically "zen" as it sounds: everything will play out as it was always meant to.
11.27.2012
Absentee
My apologies for being absent as of late. There are a few good reasons, I'll have you know! For one, I have been poking around in my blog history and more or less sniping away at entries that are boring or overly personal in hopes that I will be able to use my blog for more professional reasons. The writing bug has been biting pretty hard now that I'm doing some work for NiteGuide and I'm hoping to cater my blog to more resume-type exposure. We'll see how it goes! I'm also crazy busy, as most people are during the holidays. Last week was Thanksgiving and a huge group of us went to Big Bear to rent a cabin and gorge ourselves on some of the best eats I've had, ever ever ever. Now it's time to gear up for Christmas with not only my personal cards, gifts, etc.- but also work mailings to be sent out as well as MORE cards and a party to plan. On top of that I'm planning a trip to Ohio for Christmas.
Lots and lots to do, but hopefully I get a breather in there to update more about my goings-on and make some fun plans for 2013! I miss your guts, and will write again soon!
In the mean time, check this out (I can hardly wait, this looks amazing):
Lots and lots to do, but hopefully I get a breather in there to update more about my goings-on and make some fun plans for 2013! I miss your guts, and will write again soon!
In the mean time, check this out (I can hardly wait, this looks amazing):
11.21.2012
Growing Day By Day
Loving this post from Daily Om:
We understand that we want to be better but have no clear definition of what better means and that is part of the process.
At some point in our lives, many of us find ourselves overcome with the desire to become better people. While we are all uniquely capable of navigating this world, we may nonetheless feel driven to grow, expand, and change. This innate need for personal expansion can lead us down many paths as we develop within the context of our individual lives. Yet the initial steps that can put us on the road to evolution are not always clear. We understand that we want to be better but have no clear definition of “better.” To ease this often frustrating uncertainty, we can take small steps, keeping our own concept of growth in mind rather than allowing others to direct the course of our journey. And we should accept that change won’t happen overnight—we may not recognize the transformations taking place within us at first.
Becoming a better person in your own eyes is a whole-life project, and thus you should focus your step-by-step efforts on multiple areas of your existence. Since you likely know innately which qualities you consider good, growing as an individual is simply a matter of making an effort to do good whenever possible. Respect should be a key element of your efforts. When you acknowledge that all people are deserving of compassion, consideration, and dignity, you are naturally more apt to treat them in the manner you yourself wish to be treated. You will intuitively become a more active listener, universally helpful, and truthful. Going the extra mile in all you do can also facilitate evolution. Approaching your everyday duties with an upbeat attitude and positive expectations can help you make the world a brighter, more cheerful place. Finally, coming to terms with your values and then abiding by them will enable you to introduce a new degree of integrity and dignity into your life.
As you endeavor to develop yourself further, you can take pride not only in your successes, but also in the fact that you are cultivating consciousness within yourself through your choices, actions, and behaviors. While you may never feel you have reached the pinnacles of awareness you hope to achieve, you can make the most of this creative process of transformation. Becoming a better person is your choice and is a natural progression in your journey of self-awareness.
We understand that we want to be better but have no clear definition of what better means and that is part of the process.
At some point in our lives, many of us find ourselves overcome with the desire to become better people. While we are all uniquely capable of navigating this world, we may nonetheless feel driven to grow, expand, and change. This innate need for personal expansion can lead us down many paths as we develop within the context of our individual lives. Yet the initial steps that can put us on the road to evolution are not always clear. We understand that we want to be better but have no clear definition of “better.” To ease this often frustrating uncertainty, we can take small steps, keeping our own concept of growth in mind rather than allowing others to direct the course of our journey. And we should accept that change won’t happen overnight—we may not recognize the transformations taking place within us at first.
Becoming a better person in your own eyes is a whole-life project, and thus you should focus your step-by-step efforts on multiple areas of your existence. Since you likely know innately which qualities you consider good, growing as an individual is simply a matter of making an effort to do good whenever possible. Respect should be a key element of your efforts. When you acknowledge that all people are deserving of compassion, consideration, and dignity, you are naturally more apt to treat them in the manner you yourself wish to be treated. You will intuitively become a more active listener, universally helpful, and truthful. Going the extra mile in all you do can also facilitate evolution. Approaching your everyday duties with an upbeat attitude and positive expectations can help you make the world a brighter, more cheerful place. Finally, coming to terms with your values and then abiding by them will enable you to introduce a new degree of integrity and dignity into your life.
As you endeavor to develop yourself further, you can take pride not only in your successes, but also in the fact that you are cultivating consciousness within yourself through your choices, actions, and behaviors. While you may never feel you have reached the pinnacles of awareness you hope to achieve, you can make the most of this creative process of transformation. Becoming a better person is your choice and is a natural progression in your journey of self-awareness.
(Image Courtesy of Pinterest via Awelltraveledwoman)
11.05.2012
You & I.
"I do my thing and you do yours. I am not in this world to live up to your expectations, and you are not in this world to live up to mine. You are you and I am I, and if by chance we happen to find each other, then it is beautiful. If not, it can't be helped."
Fritz Perls, Gestalt Prayer (via http://awelltraveledwoman.tumblr.com/)
This is one of the most beautiful things I've ever read.
Fritz Perls, Gestalt Prayer (via http://awelltraveledwoman.tumblr.com/)
This is one of the most beautiful things I've ever read.
10.25.2012
New Style.
I am borderline obsessed with this website called Thought Catalog. I'm sure I've mentioned it before. Today I read a post that I felt compelled to put on here, mainly because it explains a lot of my absence from writing lately.
http://thoughtcatalog.com/2011/why-its-harder-to-write-when-youre-happy/
It couldn't be more on the money. But it also got me thinking, along with a few other things going on, about being happy and sharing that happiness. I think that people find it easy to bond over the sad things in life. Even the comical things in life are, generally speaking, sad things that we make light of. Look at any stand-up comedian and examine their material: it's usually poking fun at some odd and embarrassing parent, string of bad dates, or complaints about their spouse or boss. Why is it easier for us to talk about our negative life experiences than our positive ones?
I read a lot of blogs every day, and I'm finding- in retrospect- that most of the ones I seek out are inspiring to me on some level. One has pointers on how to navigate through tough times, one girl has my dream closet, another "Tumbls" about outdoorsy adventures that she goes on. I guess it would make sense to say that most of what I seek out is something legitimately uplifting. I'm not sure, then, why I feel so uninspired to write when my life is going well. Shouldn't I have so many positive things to discuss? I feel like all of my posts when I've felt somewhat inspiring have come out of pains that I was working through at the time, so I guess when those pains are passed over I feel like I land in new territory as far as inspirational material. Perhaps this can be a new starting point for my blog... not only finding inspiration from positivism but transcribing that inspiration into words that people want to read. Lets face it- no one wants to read about how much I adore my boyfriend or friends. There's a fine line between sharing and bragging, and I don't want to cross it.
It says in the Thought Catalog entry that people who are happy are more inspired to "do," rather than "react." I totally agree. This is why people become suspicious of the validity of a person's happiness when they over share information to assure people just how "well things are going." There should be a lot of "do" entries in my blog if things are going well. There's a lot of fun things that I have been lucky enough to get to be involved in as of late, and it may be fun to share them as well as give recommendation on how other people can check them out. I guess I should just stop being vague and start writing, no?
It's almost the end of October, which is CRAZY to me. I mean, legitimately crazy. Summer went way too far into the Fall (as expected thanks to living in Southern California), and I'm really excited for it to finally start to cool down. I wrote an article for NiteGuide with a laundry list of activities for Halloween. The best of which, in my opinion, was to hit up Universal Studios Halloween Haunt. If you live in SoCal, this is what you need to do for Halloween. I've gone every year for the past 5 or so years and it is absolutely the most fun thing you can do in the area. Universal Studios is an actual movie studio lot, which means that their make up artists are the ones creating these monsters for the big screen. Needless to say, their costumes are the gnarliest ones out there. They pull out all the stops with their haunt and their mazes and I'd be lying if I said I haven't hidden behind groups of sketched-out tourists in hopes that they would get chased instead of me! The way to do it is to get a VIP Pass, which is about $30 more per ticket but totally worth it. You don't wait in any lines for more than 15 minutes and every year that I've done it I have gotten to go through every maze/on every ride instead of only having time for like 5 things since I'm in each line for 2 hours (please don't check my math on that... I am not there for 10 hour spans of time). Costumes are not allowed, so don't worry about that. And if you need to liquid courage yourself up before the night starts, there's a restaurant in front of the entrance with some awesome drinks (and food, if you're into that sort of thing). Don't miss the Bill and Ted Adventure show because it's hilarious and totally rips on every pop culture thing from the past year... and as positive as I'm trying to be- few things are better than seeing a woman dressed as Britney Spears with a shaved head and carrying her baby by one foot while dancing. I'm just sayin'.
Hopefully you can check this out and if you do, let me know what you thought of it here in a comment! More fun posts to follow. And be patient with me, writing about stuff other than "feelings" is a newbie for me and I'm trying to make it fun without sounding like they're all sponsored posts. In the mean time, check out this video I've had on repeat for like two weeks:
http://thoughtcatalog.com/2011/why-its-harder-to-write-when-youre-happy/
It couldn't be more on the money. But it also got me thinking, along with a few other things going on, about being happy and sharing that happiness. I think that people find it easy to bond over the sad things in life. Even the comical things in life are, generally speaking, sad things that we make light of. Look at any stand-up comedian and examine their material: it's usually poking fun at some odd and embarrassing parent, string of bad dates, or complaints about their spouse or boss. Why is it easier for us to talk about our negative life experiences than our positive ones?
I read a lot of blogs every day, and I'm finding- in retrospect- that most of the ones I seek out are inspiring to me on some level. One has pointers on how to navigate through tough times, one girl has my dream closet, another "Tumbls" about outdoorsy adventures that she goes on. I guess it would make sense to say that most of what I seek out is something legitimately uplifting. I'm not sure, then, why I feel so uninspired to write when my life is going well. Shouldn't I have so many positive things to discuss? I feel like all of my posts when I've felt somewhat inspiring have come out of pains that I was working through at the time, so I guess when those pains are passed over I feel like I land in new territory as far as inspirational material. Perhaps this can be a new starting point for my blog... not only finding inspiration from positivism but transcribing that inspiration into words that people want to read. Lets face it- no one wants to read about how much I adore my boyfriend or friends. There's a fine line between sharing and bragging, and I don't want to cross it.
It says in the Thought Catalog entry that people who are happy are more inspired to "do," rather than "react." I totally agree. This is why people become suspicious of the validity of a person's happiness when they over share information to assure people just how "well things are going." There should be a lot of "do" entries in my blog if things are going well. There's a lot of fun things that I have been lucky enough to get to be involved in as of late, and it may be fun to share them as well as give recommendation on how other people can check them out. I guess I should just stop being vague and start writing, no?
It's almost the end of October, which is CRAZY to me. I mean, legitimately crazy. Summer went way too far into the Fall (as expected thanks to living in Southern California), and I'm really excited for it to finally start to cool down. I wrote an article for NiteGuide with a laundry list of activities for Halloween. The best of which, in my opinion, was to hit up Universal Studios Halloween Haunt. If you live in SoCal, this is what you need to do for Halloween. I've gone every year for the past 5 or so years and it is absolutely the most fun thing you can do in the area. Universal Studios is an actual movie studio lot, which means that their make up artists are the ones creating these monsters for the big screen. Needless to say, their costumes are the gnarliest ones out there. They pull out all the stops with their haunt and their mazes and I'd be lying if I said I haven't hidden behind groups of sketched-out tourists in hopes that they would get chased instead of me! The way to do it is to get a VIP Pass, which is about $30 more per ticket but totally worth it. You don't wait in any lines for more than 15 minutes and every year that I've done it I have gotten to go through every maze/on every ride instead of only having time for like 5 things since I'm in each line for 2 hours (please don't check my math on that... I am not there for 10 hour spans of time). Costumes are not allowed, so don't worry about that. And if you need to liquid courage yourself up before the night starts, there's a restaurant in front of the entrance with some awesome drinks (and food, if you're into that sort of thing). Don't miss the Bill and Ted Adventure show because it's hilarious and totally rips on every pop culture thing from the past year... and as positive as I'm trying to be- few things are better than seeing a woman dressed as Britney Spears with a shaved head and carrying her baby by one foot while dancing. I'm just sayin'.
Hopefully you can check this out and if you do, let me know what you thought of it here in a comment! More fun posts to follow. And be patient with me, writing about stuff other than "feelings" is a newbie for me and I'm trying to make it fun without sounding like they're all sponsored posts. In the mean time, check out this video I've had on repeat for like two weeks:
10.09.2012
Wandering.
photo credit: unknown
The past year of my life has been deeply personal for me, as is the matter of what I am choosing to write about today. But I guess that if you consider yourself a writer, it's that deeply personal stuff that really exposes you and therefore becomes the epitome of "raw" material, right?
A little over a year ago, I made some pretty big changes. Changes that I didn't expect to be as huge or to last as long as they did- but that also contributed to making them so impactful in the grand scheme of things. I had been dating someone with whom things, I thought, were headed down a good path. We had talked a lot about "the future" of our relationship, and so I felt comfortable that things would progress in that direction. I was living in the same apartment that I'd lived in for nearly half a decade where I had become the most permanent fixture in a revolving door of roommates. I don't know how to explain that without making it sound like I considered myself some kind of "Queen Bee," but I will just say that when you know you're a permanent fixture in a house where people seem to pass through, you put a great amount of effort into maintaining a consistency in the type of environment that has become a Home to you.
Within a matter of one month, however, both of the things that I had found a lot of my stability in were quickly dismissed. I guess they were both things that I should have seen coming... but I hate change and have a tendency to avoid seeing it's inevitability sometimes. I had been having some issues with the people I lived with, as well as issues in my relationship, that nearly simultaneously came to a head. I wont go into detail because it's not good to dwell on the past, but in both scenarios I had decided that it was time to make my exit. So I packed up and moved to a new house, and I went forward into what would be the longest time I had been single in almost a decade.
As for the living situation, I moved in with a friend and her 4 year-old daughter. The things that had been issues for me in my previous house were no longer problems, and I was sublimely happy for that. Everything about living with them was great, but there is something to be said about living in someone else's home. Going from a place that felt like mine into somewhere that I felt I was more of a renter was surprisingly tough on me. I think it also had a lot to do with the fact that I was nearing 30 and yet living in a room for rent, much like a college kid trying to get by. It's nothing against my friend or her daughter, but it began to make me feel kind of depressed to be as old as I was and not having a space that was at least equally mine the way I had before. The only room that I felt I had really made my own was my bedroom, and that was really hard for me to feel like an adult while living in a space that was someone else's. If that makes any kind of sense. But as with everything else that seems "hard" in life, it became a really good thing for me. I had to learn to let go of some personality traits that I had acquired from living in a house with new people passing through all of the time. Things were no longer on my watch, not that they ever SHOULD have been in a house with other people, and I had to let go of a lot of the control issues that I think I acquired from my previous living situation. You try telling a 4 year-old that she should be cleaning up after herself better! She's a kid, and with that comes the reality that sometimes, you just have to let it go. And so one of the hard parts of the past year of my life became a huge blessing in disguise for me. Now facing my last week in that house, I can't help but feel the pangs of sadness when I think about not being able to see my friend and her daughter whenever I come home. It honestly breaks my heart, looking toward how much I am going to miss that kid, in particular.
A year ago, I went through one of the more dramatic break-ups of my life. As much time as I've spent trying to figure out why it was so tough on me, I honestly can't. It's nothing against the person, it's just that we weren't together for a long enough time to where I should have felt the upset that I did. I also think that as time went on, it became harder because it was a long time before I subconsciously allowed myself to meet someone new. For one thing (the most important thing), I wanted to make sure I was ready to date again. I hadn't had a good solid "single streak" since I was 20, and being alone had become something foreign to me. That wasn't intentional, sometimes that's just what happens. But as time went on, I realized that I'd never allowed myself to fully heal from any of the relationships I'd had. No matter who breaks up with who- it's important to sit with that and absorb it in order to learn from what went wrong. I'd never taken the time to learn who I'd become as my own person and not a part of a relationship. In a lot of ways, it was a revelation. In a lot more ways- it was incredibly lonely. And hard. And confusing. But I learned to try things on my own; going to movies and concerts alone. Going to museums alone. Learning new crafts and skills. I learned to take the time to decide my opinion on things from the latest action movie to spirituality. I learned to trust my gut and to have a firm stand on the things that are important to ME, and not to someone else.
Spending that time alone was- especially in addition to my different living arrangements- really hard for me. I spent a lot of time feeling really sad and feeling pretty lost. I watched Eat, Pray, Love a LOT. I knew that I was trying to become something better than I was, but a lot of that time felt like I was walking through a dark tunnel and only knew the way I had come- and it often crossed my mind to head back that way because I was certain that I had made a wrong turn somewhere. Shouldn't trying to be better... FEEL better? The thing that kept me from turning back was that knowledge that before all great change comes great adversity. I had faith that if I just stuck with it, things would eventually be alright.
9.17.2012
Missing.
I miss you, blog. I know I'm trying to make a conscious effort to stop thinking in terms of "what to blog about" and to be out there living my life... but I miss you just the same. I miss unloading my thoughts in this space and jotting down some goals in a manner that pushes me to pursue them. It's tough to weasel out of self-commitments when they're in writing.
I think that I've spent a good portion of my life playing the victim to my own emotions. I'm a very emotion-driven person (with hints of logic peppered in), and those emotions have a tendency to run my life for me from time to time. That's not the issue, however, so much as the fact that I will play the emotion card to legitimize a bevy of behaviors and attitudes. "But I don't FEEL right about it," or "I can't help the way I feel!!" True, to be sure, but also complete copouts. If a certain emotion hasn't been serving you, at some point you need to have the self control to tuck it away. Don't use it as an excuse, because some emotions and attitudes really are completely pointless. "I'm just a jealous person, I can't help it!" or "I have a short temper" really ARE just excuses to avoid facing the fact that you have little to no self-control. "This is just the way I am..." is like the Lazy Ass' Battle Cry.
At the end of the day, you are the only one who is the boss of you. And if you can't take negative and non-self-serving behaviors and attitudes and wrangle them into submission- you're never going to improve on yourself as a person. There's a big difference between being true to yourself and being lazy. Don't be lazy. Be evolutionary.
Summer is officially over (although someone should really tell that to the heat) and life is finally starting to slow down. After months of rushing from one thing to another, it's finally Fall. I always loved the in-between seasons because they're a break from the extremes. I know, I know, I should shut up about extreme weather seeing as how I live in a pretty tropical location... but we have semi-seasons here too! Or perhaps not, but I'm a big wimp. And yes, here I am talking about the weather. How completely boring of me.
I'm excited to have some breathing space. I'm excited to not be running from event to event the way I feel like the past month or two has been. I think that it's an easy steam engine to jump on where you can over schedule yourself and then become so frazzled that you are either goinggoinggoing or at a dead stop trying to catch your breath. I can't help but feel like my seams have started to show the past few weeks after not giving myself enough "me" time, and it's time to reclaim that part of my life. Me time is important, and so often overlooked. And maybe that's what this blog has morphed into for me, at least right now. This is my "Me Time/Space." A place to collect my sanity and gather my wits about me in order to present something more of a calm and collected person. If you've seen me in the past two or three months (aside from in Costa Rica), I apologize for whoever that was you must have met. She seemed stressed.
And without further adieu- here is an actual topic of conversation so that you don't have to read my random ramblings about nothing:
I was talking to a good friend of mine and expressing some emotions I had regarding things going on in my life. I wont get specific, because it's irrelevant. But I have had a particular problem for as long as I can remember and it seemed to me that my emotions were unable to compromise with certain attitudes I had held onto for years and years. I called my friend and asked her opinion on it, and she dropped a truth bomb on me that (as they often are) was so simple that it was borderline absurd. She told me that what I had been doing wasn't working (duh) and so I should try doing something different (double duh). I told her that I wasn't sure if I could deal with the feelings that I was having about it and she finally just said, "Megan... why don't you just control those feelings? Have a little self-control because otherwise... what's the point?" Wow. Truth bomb, officially dropped.
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