An Open Letter to My New Upstairs Neighbour

Dear Neighbour

Hi! Welcome to the neighbourhood. I hope you are so far enjoying your new surroundings and that everyone is being friendly and welcoming.

When you moved in, my housemate and I surmised that you must work long hours during the day, otherwise why would you consider it acceptable to drill and bang into the late hours of the night putting your Ikea Aspelund bed together. We gave you the benefit of the doubt and didn't complain, we know how hard it is to work and try to run a household, especially set up a new one. 

You seem to have finished the necessary building works but now I have discovered you feel that it is also acceptable to let your children run around on what is obviously wooden flooring late into the night when I am trying to get a peaceful night's sleep. Maybe you are vampires? Not having children of my own, I can only empathise and say that from the experience of friend's children, when they are young and wilful, it must be somewhat hard to get them into bed and stay there. However, I'm not sure Super Nanny would agree - after all YOU are the parent and THEY are the children. You can probably guess where I'm going with this.

PLEASE! Make your children stay in bed. Or at least wear industrial thickness socks so that I can't hear them banging around when I am trying to get my recommended 8 hours of slumber. Yes, this is London and we live on Albion Road, maybe peaceful is too much to ask, but I would like to go into work not looking like a shattered, bedraggled mess every day. I do not work in the fashion industry so I can't pull this off as the 'next big thing'. If you need recommendations for thick socks, I know Primark do some for about £1. I will GIVE you the £1 if it means I can get some sleep.

From your tired and irritable downstairs neighbour.

Huh...

I just typed BBC2 into Google and it came up with "Flight Status for Biman Bangladesh Airlines 2"...

Huh.

So Excited I Can't Think of a Title!!

Hello again peoples!!

Hope you're having a glorious day. It may only be 9am here in London but things can still be glorious!!

I have excitement coming out of my FINGERS at the moment hence the second post in two days. I did something yesterday that I have been meaning to do for 3 whole years. I signed up to yoga teacher training in 2012!! I can't even explain how happy I am at finally finding a teacher who is on the same level as me, who seems trustworthy and who seems to truly understand the meaning of yoga. 

I have previously called several TT's who are unwilling to discuss payment plans and charge the earth for the courses - personally I don't have £2.5k at my disposal thus making the idea of training appear unreachable. The teacher I called yesterday was lovely, chatty, approachable and more than that, he was quite willing to discuss payment options to make doing the TT viable. In the course of our discussion, he said he would prefer that someone is able to come to class or even teacher training regardless of their financial situation - he doesn't shut people out if they don't have money. What a relief!! And what a breath of fresh air to meet someone who is not "in it for the money".

Following on from that, I appear to have had a boost in energy and motivation so I've updated my status on Facebook asking for friends, bendy and non-bendy, to volunteer themselves to help me practice on them. Facebook may be many things, but in this case, it's a very useful tool for communicating quickly and getting a message out there. So far I've had a few responses which is very encouraging :) 

So peeps, that's what I wanted to share with you today!! A ray of sunshine to come out of some stressful days :) 

If you're ever in London and want to practice some yoga then ping me a message and we can get bendy!! 

Bye for now.

Much love xxx

I Should Write a Manual on How NOT to Handle Stress

Hi everyone (all both of you)

You can probably tell from the blog title that I am currently going through some minor stresses and I feel as though I should impart some words of wisdom on how NOT to handle stress (as I have learnt the hard way). However, just to confuse you I am in fact going to write a few pointers on how you SHOULD handle stress. Because being positive is much more effective than not. So here goes...

1. Stay calm! Getting stressed in an already stressful situation will only make matters feel worse. Try to stay as calm as possible and if you feel upset, do something that will take your mind off things - something that has meaning. Meditate, practice yoga, read a book, call your best friend, go to the movies. Anything that will help lighten your heart.
2. A great phrase that I have heard a few times is "mind the gap". No, I'm not talking about the announcement on London Underground, but mind the gap in your thoughts. Are your thoughts connected to anything real or are they simply there to make you feel worse? This was a big one for me when overcoming depression (more on that later); it was the moment when I realised I could look at depression objectively rather than as an all encompassing parasite.
3. Stay positive! This is an obvious one but it is SO important in any situation. Stay positive and things won't seem as bad as you thought. Stay positive and it will reflect in your demeanour and you are more likely to attain the outcome you require.
4. Call your best friend and get his/her advice, love and support. There's nothing more lightening than sharing something with someone who knows you best and who knows what to say to make you feel better. And don't feel guilty for offloading either - you would do the same for them.
5. Be determined. Determination is key to any situation. Imagine the outcome you wish for you be determined that it will happen for you. It will. The universe is great like that :)
6. Believe in yourself! Having self belief is probably the most important thing to bear in mind when you feel down, stressed, low. Whatever you're going through, stay true to your inner self and believe in your thoughts and feelings. Your gut is always going to tell you what is right FOR YOU so do not falter and believe!

I have decided to stop at point six because it seems like a nice number and I could probably go on for another 648 points but that would make for a really long post and you will probably fall asleep by the 211th one.

Hope you are all doing well peoples, today in London it's looking pretty grim, despite being August, it feels like November.

Before I go, I want to direct you to this link:

http://consciouslivingblog.com

This blog is written by my meditation teacher, Jillian Lavender (what a fantastic name! :)) I find it incredibly inspiring and it reminds me to think more about what I think, what I say and how I behave. Hopefully you will enjoy reading it as I do :)

Well, until my next post in approximately 7 months!!

xxx

Friends and Ting

 Me and Spud

 Amy and James

 Em, Kirsty, Helen and Me

 Amy, Kirsty, Em and Me - the Original Gang! :)

 Me and Leanna

 Leanna's Baby Boy Harrison

 Me and Amy

 Kirsty's Little Girl Megan

Me and Robbie

The Ten Pros and the Ten Cons of Cycling to Work

Pros

1. I do one hour of aerobic exercise A DAY :)

    - Keep me fit

    - Keeps me healthy

    - It's good for my mind, body and spirit

2. I get to see sights I would miss on the bus or the underground.

3. It's free!

4. It wakes me up in the morning (however, refer to Con No. 2)

5. It makes you appreciate the elements - good and bad

6. I don't have to wait for and rely on public transport to go anywhere - I can get on my bike and go anytime I like!

7. I get to meet fellow cyclists

8. I get to wear leggings - my favourite type of trouser

9. I can sort through my thoughts as I cycle

10. It's a good way to learn patience and tolerance (towards other road users)

Cons

1. When it rains, you get wet right through to your knickers

2. I'm tired again when I get to work (but is a physical not mental tiredness!)

3. In no particular order, pedestrians, taxi drivers and bus drivers are STOOPID and sometimes aggressive... Need to work on that patience a bit more :D

4.  Some people see fit to steal your bike

5. Bike gadgets cost a lot

6. I'm actually struggling to find more cons...

7. I have to take two showers a day - not good for the environment but it would be worse for the world if I walked around stinking of sweat!!

8. Struggling for another point...

9. I go through more clothing per week as I have to continually wash my cycle gear

10. Oil is really hard to wash out of your clothes!

Lessons Learned

Hi

This is going to be quite a self-reflective post today but I think it's important to reflect on our lives and wellbeing and mental health from time to time, especially when major life events take place.

Robbie and I split up fairly recently - I'd say about 6 weeks or so ago. Of course when these things happen,  you go through different emotions and look back on the relationship, on your part in it and consider whether things could have been different. It's a well known fact that women are particularly prone to this in comparison to men. I have had the odd reflective period where I consider who Robbie and I were as a couple and who I was in the relationship and I have come to the conclusion that when I'm with someone, I forget who I am, I forget the things that I like and don't like and I don't always stand up for myself -- I don't mean that to sound as if Robbie was bullying me, he would never do that, I mean in the silly moments like when you want to go to the cinema and he doesn't, or when you don't want to buy orange juice from concentrate (because let's face it, it tastes awful!) but he does. I give my all to the other person, I'm incredibly loyal and I would do anything for them. 

It's like that line in Eat Pray Love, and I'm paraphrasing here because I can't find it in the book to quote it fully but "if I'm with you, you can have all of me". Am I allowed to quote or paraphrase in my blog? I'm not quite sure on the laws of these things. Oh hang on!! I found it!!

"If I love you, I will carry for you all your pain, I will assume for you all your debts (in every definition of the word), I will protect you from your own insecurity, I will protect upon you all sorts of good qualities that you have never actually cultivated in yourself and I will buy Christmas presents for your entire family. I will give you the sun and the rain, and if they are not available, I will give you a sun check and a rain check. I will give you all this and more, until I get so exhausted and depleted that the only way I can recover my energy is by becoming infatuated with someone else." 

That is me. Apart from the becoming infatuated with someone else because I've never been one for moving straight from one man to another.  Anyhow, a thought occurred to me earlier: to stop forgetting who you are in a relationship, should you be in one to learn that lesson or should you discover your strength first before you let someone in? I think the latter but it would be interesting to be with someone and grow like that, to learn to remember yourself.   

I consider myself to be a work in progress, I know I have a lot of work to do when it comes to self esteem and other things but I think I need to learn to love myself before I love someone else. I may well be single for a loooong time but I'm prepared to wait!! In the meantime, I'm a lucky girl; I have great friends, I meditate, I practice yoga and I live in a great part of London. Always count your blessings :)

Well, that's my 10 cents for the day. I'm off to visit Vicky in Ipswich tomorrow for the long weekend so no doubt we'll be watching to Royal Wedding tomorrow and then we'll have some other stories to report back with. Hope you have a great weekend!!

xx

p.s. I've been listening to Don McLean a lot lately -- Vincent is one of my favourite songs of all time. I suggest you get onto youtube instantly and look for the live recording!!