Appreciating others.

Yesterday, like every Sunday, my parents and I talked on Skype. And lately I’ve been feeling a little bit more homesick than normal, probably because there’s no-one else in the house so I’ve either been at work or by myself. So when I was talking to them yesterday, I asked if they would be able to visit in the next few weeks. For someone with social anxiety, even asking my parents for anything is difficult, and I didn’t want to force them to drive the 3 hours or so to where I live just because I’m a bit hormonal and homesick. But they came to visit me today. Granted, it’s a bank holiday in the UK and they didn’t have anything planned, but they came when I needed them. My dad got back from a work trip to Singapore the other day, and is completely jetlagged and exhausted but he still drove here and back to visit me. They dropped a day of relaxing and doing nothing to traipse around the town centre in the pouring rain because I needed company. I hate needing people, and I pride myself on being independent, but they’re always okay with it. And I absolutely love them for it.

This post is only a short one, a little reminder to look at the people in your life and appreciate them for their place in it. Take a little moment and thank them for whatever they’ve done for you lately. Tell them you love them, that you’re glad they’re in your life. It’s easy to assume that they already know it, but tell them anyway.

5 things this week.

After yesterday’s bad day, I wanted to lighten the mood a little. My 5 things this week are the things that I turn to to cheer myself up, or keep up the momentum of a good feeling.

1. Fruit. It’s a simple one, but my favourite breakfast is a bowl of fresh berries, maybe half a banana if I fancy it, topped with a bit of greek yoghurt and cinnamon. A slice of peanut butter or jam on toast is a good addition as well. Fruit doesn’t just cheer me up at breakfast though; every now and again I’ll buy a pack of prepared fruit, normally mango or melon, as a little treat. Is it sad that Ican get so excited over a little pot of tropical fruit? It might be, but I don’t care.
2. A new magazine. When I was a kid, I would value reading a new book more than a magazine, and nowadays, I enjoy both. But there are some days when I prefer a magazine. For one, there’s no commitment or pressure. You aren’t required to pore over every word on each page, in order. To be perfectly honest, I mostly just like flicking through and looking at the nice pictures. I like the freedom of picking which articles to read first, or read at all. This time I picked up the new issue of Mollie Makes, which I thoroughly recommend if you’re into any kind of crafty hobby (or like wasting a fair amount of time on Pinterest like I do.)
3. A good cup of tea. Maybe this is my Britishness shining through, but there’s nothing like a nice cuppa to make your day. It doesn’t matter what kind. Just to give you an idea of how much tea means to me, I think I’ve had about 4 varieties today. Savouring your favourite type in your favourite mug has the effect of slowing down time, and making your problems seem a little less urgent. It’s lovely. If I really fancy a treat, I might go out for a cup of tea in town. It might seem silly, that I drank the same thing at home for free a couple of hours before and now I’m paying for it. To me, it’s similar to going out for dinner, on a smaller scale. So why not?
4. Getting chores done early. Now, if you didn’t think that getting that excited about tea and fruit is a bit weird, this is the one where I might lose you. But let me explain. If the first thing that you do in the day is to get your chores done, or you had the foresight to get them done the day before, then it means you haven’t got anything to do for the rest of the day. It means that you can totally justify a netflix binge, or sitting with a magazine or a book and not doing a single thing else. It means that you don’t have to stop, just when you’re really enjoying yourself, to do the washing up. And that’s worth it’s weight in gold.
5. New socks. It’s a bit early in the year for this, but once it starts to cool down and I’m dusting off my boots, then I’m all about socks. The novelty ones, especially. It makes sitting at work, or being in a long class much more bearable, when you know that underneath the serious work uniform, your socks have cartoon characters on. Or breakfast food. Or garden gnomes. You get the gist. Plus, there’s that special new sock feel; they’re just never as nice after they go through the wash.

Over the years, I’ve spent a lot of time working out the best ways to get through a bad day, some mental, and as you’ve seen in this post, some physical. So, reader, what things do you reach for when you need a pick-me-up?

Letting yourself off the hook.

There are some days when you feel terrible. For me, today is one of them. I’m tired, hormonal, and anxious, and it’s take far more effort than normal to get myself to write this. To be perfectly honest, I considered skipping it altogether.

And that’s okay.

Sometimes we forget that it’s absolutely fine to have bad days. It’s completely normal, and we all have them. This post is a quick reminder to let yourself off the hook on these days. It’s perfectly fine to skip a run if you need to, or have an early night, or cancel a social engagement. Do whatever you need to do to care for yourself. Self care is the most important thing that we can do for ourselves.

At the same time, the best thing for me now is to find a balance between the guilt-inducing complete indulgence of this negativity, and the exhaustion that comes with finding the energy to ignore it altogether. I know that neither is healthy. In the past, I’ve indulged the feelings that I have on my bad days, and then spent the next day making myself feel guilty for doing so. All that leads to is a downward spiral, and a string of more bad days. On the days when I’ve tried to ignore it, the exhaustion leads to an even worse bad day, so that clearly isn’t the better option.

As far as I can see, my personal balance is linked to my obligations. I had an obligation to my job to turn up to work this morning. I have an obligation to myself and my health. And I have an obligation to you. I made a promise that I would write and publish something everyday, and not fulfilling it is one of those indulges that would lead to one of those guilt spirals I mentioned earlier. This probably counts as another unexpected side effect of writing everyday; it’s step that feels small and manageable. Like I might be able to regain control over my emotions. To claw my way out of this hole that my anxiety put me in. That’s my message to you. Take little steps towards regaining control, but don’t expect yourself to conquer it completely.

Happy places.

Everyone has a happy place, somewhere we go to physically or emotionally when we need a moment for ourselves. There’s just something about the place that brings us to a different state. Flashbacks to a happier time, or the potential that lies within it. Mine are bookshops. No one shop in particular, but all of them.

This is fairly true to the stereotype of a literature student. For me now, it’s that there are so many new things to discover in a bookshop. New favourite authors, or books, or genres. Each one that I pick up could be the one that changes my life. The thing that I love most about literature is the idea that we all have a novel in us. Every book is a different way of viewing the world, as experienced by the author. Under the roof of a bookshop are thousands of these viewfinders into another world, another version of our world, another life that we can live. There’s a quote from Roald Dahl’s Matilda, one of my absolute favourite books; “All the reading she had done had given her a view of life they had never seen.” In a few words, this is exactly how I feel about reading, and how strong my belief is that everyone reads. That’s what a bookshop represents to me.

They became my happy place when I was much younger though. When I was a kid, whenever we would go on holiday, my parents would take me to our local bookshop and let me pick out a few to take away with me. There was nothing happier to me than those times. Carefully running my fingers over the spines of each book, reading over the blurbs. It felt like hours. By the end of it, I’d always have an armful of books, and I’d inevitably be made to put a few of them back. But they were always there for me to come back to.

Whenever I need a moment for myself now, I head to a bookshop. The paper-and-glue smell that everyone who still reads books on paper makes me feel like a child again. Even if I don’t intend to buy anything, there’s something about the process of looking around a bookshop that is inherently calming.

I’ve shown you mine, now tell me yours. Where’s your happy place? And what makes it’s so special to you? Please, share yours in the comments, I’d really love to hear from you.