Balancing is tough. It’s tough to find a balance between work and life. It’s tough to find a balance between time you spend with friends versus family versus your significant other. It’s tough to find a balance between downtime and time spent being social. I haven’t spent a lot of time by myself since I moved out of my parents place last summer1. And in fact, I’m pretty sure I had not spent a lot of time by myself since I came back from living in Dublin.
I haven’t had much time to sit down and figure out why that is2, which means I haven’t really had time to figure out exactly how I feel about it. I finally went camping this year and the photo above was taken on our last morning at Silent Lake; I was disappointed with camping for so many reasons3, but the most important was that I did not get to spend time with nature4 as I so long to do right now.
I write. I like to write anyway, but a lot of my writing requires the quiet of birds chirping or only the wind whisper-howling through the rustle of leaves. But it’s difficult to get in that mindset when I barely have time to put away laundry. But I have no plans on stopping the way life has been pushing me to live; no, I’m determined to live life this way and still find my writing mind with less down time.
After all, what good would I be if I needed to hole myself out in the woods every time I wanted to write something heartfelt? I haven’t shared my poetry on the blog since I removed it from my portfolio5 but I’m thinking maybe enough time has passed that I can do that again6. I shall keep trying to find a way to have balance in my life, and if I should discover some secret to it – I promise to tell you.
With my current, ever-growing involvement in the Twitterverse, I’ve been finding it difficult to finish a blog post. Part of this is due to the fact that I’m still observing things and getting a feel for it before I form my opinions. First impressions are that this is a great addition to my life but I do see some hurdles. Another reason is because some of the stuff I want to talk about are things that I am not sure I really want out there.
Part of it has to do with sex; people get the wrong impression when a girl starts talking about sex, especially when it involves revealing how much said person enjoys said act. But that’s only part of the story, and only part of the reason why I am reluctant to write about it. Another part of the reason involves a person who is still a puzzle to me. Albeit, a puzzle that I am more than happy to leave alone without having ever figuring him out. But talking about him on this blog and in detail could do one or both of the following: It could1 give his already enormous ego a boost and/or it could make him upset that I’m writing about his personal life2 on such a public medium.
I know the3 rules, especially when it comes to personal blogging – I shouldn’t care about all this but the fact is that I do and it is a deterrent, and at the very least it’s going to take a while to be able to write about it. At least the want is there. In the mean time, I’m trying to think of something else to talk about but apart from this heart’s4 adventures there really isn’t much else I’d be passionate about writing about.
So I’m going to open it up and let you ask me anything – you don’t have to do it in the comments, you can ask me on twitter but I will answer in a blog post.
I got this from Lara, who got this from Leah (but she called hers 25 before 25 hehe). It was hard to come up with 30 things that I wanted to accomplish before I turn 30 because I was stuck on this notion that they had to be big accomplishments. So I went smaller (in terms of “life-importance”), and it became an easier task. I also learnt a while ago that when setting goals for yourself, it’s important to be realistic, and to quantify (that is, to be more specific with the goal and not vague). Here goes nothing (in no particular order):
Get some decent momentum going in my career (event planner extraordinaire).
Start put money away for emergencies – even when I don”t think I can afford it (the plan is to stick to a minimum of $10 per paycheque).
Continue to put money away in my RRSP (the plan here? the same as above; $10 per paycheque).
Consult someone (anyone) on how to budget, and actually stick to it (Yes, it is that difficult for me that I feel I need someone to hold my hand the first little while).
Decide on an actual focus for this personal blog of mine. This is going to involve looking back on old posts and doing a bit of reorganising.
Find a professional mentor (thanks for this idea Leah).
Visit Greece.
Take a road trip, or two on my own (or with ONE close friend).
Visit a friend in Chicago (at least once).
Visit a friend in New York (at laest once).
Visit my best friend in Victoria, BC.
Organize a cottage weekend for New Year”s with a group of my closest friends (even if we have to rent a cottage). And spend it single.
Visit a friend up North a few more times (assuming I get invited back).
Visit a friend (hehe or a few friends) in London, Ontario.
Join a choir, and perform with them.
Reach an intermediate level of Jazz/Broadway dance.
Learn at least 2 songs on my guitar (one song a year might seem small, but I think it’s more realistic).
Perform in an amateur musical production (complete with dancing yo).
Volunteer and ride for the Terry Fox Wilket Creek Park site two more times.
Become a regular volunteer for Big Brothers, Big Sisters Toronto.
Go rock climbing at least 5 more times. Maybe even climb a wall rated at 5.11. Maybe, just maybe even try climbing an outdoor wall.
Start and continue to play badminton and/or tennis and/or racquet ball at least once a month.
Get my own place (not necessarily to purchase but that would be nice).
Build on my existing female friendships; to a point where I can call certain ones my closest friends (and yes, I do have specific people in mind already).
Perfect at least 5 recipes (two mains, two appetizers and a dessert).
Figure out what kind of photos I need to enhance my portfolio (for modeling) and get them done.
Figure out why I get so insecure when I like someone when I have all the confidence in the world in every other part of my life (except of course when it comes to friendships – which are just another type of relationship right?). And most importantly, figure out how in the heck to accept and then deal with this limitation.
Learn to accept that it’s ok to feel a certain way; that it’s about what you *do* with those feelings that matter more.
Learn to always be honest about how I’m feeling.
The harder part to the above is this: Learn how to step away so that I can identify exactly how I’m feeling before I do anything that’ll result in something undesirable.
(Bonus) Finish a certain list that contains 180 bullets.
Do you have a milestone birthday coming up? What do you want to accomplish by then?
p.s. my footnotes plug-in isn”t working right now. Also, wordpress keeps adding apostrophe”s to where I”ve used them. So if you see any extras, I”m not an idiot.
I could have gotten upset. I could have gotten really depressed because I can’t really afford to decorate my apartment for Christmas. Instead, I’m excited. I’m excited because I’m going to take on yet another craft project and decorate my home with my own creations. I have a TON of left over gift bags, wrapping paper, Bristol board, ribbon and even some fabric from my Halloween costume project to make pretty much everything.
I will still have to buy lights but I actually think that my Dad has a spare pair at home. I’m not even really planning on buying a tree. I’m planning on putting up some sort of tree mural where I can also display my Christmas cards so that I don’t need to make TOO many ornaments. The ideas were coming to me so quickly that I honestly didn’t even have a second to be sad about not being able to buy my decorations1.
I’ve already downloaded some templates, and I’m planning on picking up everything from my parents’ place tonight when I go over to pick up the car. I’ll try and update soon on my plans once I get some drawings done… but I have a feeling this is going to be just awesome.
What are your plans this recessionary Christmas?
Footnotes:
which is really strange, because we all know how much I love shopping!![↩]
Since I have promised to stop browsing my usual social media haunts while at work in an attempt to deliver more accurate results I’ve taken to reading the news; mostly the Toronto Star and it has certainly served as a good way to keep me entertained while not distracting me from my work. Today I came across an article about VW’s initiative called The Fun Theory and I am in love.
In my last post, I talked about what your thoughts were on making the world a better place… and this idea that we can make the world a better place by simply making things better/easier/more fun for people to do has made me feel so good that I just had to share it. There have been three experiments conducted so far, and this one is my favourite:
The Fun Theory is actually a contest running from Oct 1st till November 15th where first prize is €1,500. That’s like a gazillion Canadian dollars and like a fazillion1 US dollars. So if you have a great idea, enter! You have absolutely nothing to lose and everything to gain: fame, fortune2, and a better world! Do it. Do it now.
What do you think about The Fun Theory?
Footnotes:
because of the current almost par dollar exchange rates *at the moment*; also faziiion is obviously not real word… I went one back in the alpahbet. You know, in case you didn’t get my bad attempt at humour there.[↩]
ok maybe just a few extra pennies in your pocket[↩]
