036: Adventures In: Meditating

I would like to say that I am a relativity calm person (when I'm not driving that is) but I never really got into the habit of meditating. I used to do it at school - when our teachers decided that instead of PE we could lay on the gym floor and try to focus on every part of our bodies.

However, since finishing school I have never really had the time to stop and on how my third toe was feeling. Which is quite a shame because that was when I needed it the most (not only my third toe, but the rest of my body as well.) Today however, I decided that it might be the time when I stop and refocus on myself for a while.

To help me with my reconnection I downloaded the Smiling Mind Ap. I always found it difficult to focus on my own, so I liked the idea of having a voice to guide me through the meditating.

Aimed at children, teenagers and young adults, Smiling Mind a tool for the modern age, aiding people in finding a sense of calm, clarity and contentment. I think the program I started in was for beginners, as I quickly fell into the deep stupor of peace and calm, while the program was telling me to focus on my breathing.

I love having something progress my development, telling you exactly how long you have meditated for and what 'level' you are at, but that is merely a bonus to how I was feeling when I returned to the 'real' world once I had completed my daily session plus a little extra, just because I was feeling good.

Next time I will opt out for the music playing in the background and go for a longer session, and although I didn't expect to see a grand difference straight away, I hope to build it into my daily habits and start to feel the difference.

What about you? Do you meditate? Do you have something that helps you get into the zone? I'd love to know

  Kathleen x

031: So, something I don't like thinking about.

It really awful (depending on your answer) but... remember what you were doing this time last year?

I do. I was getting off a plane into the blizzardy London streets, with my recently broken suitcase in hand and had never been more excited in my life.

Its strange to think that so little time has passed, and yet so much has happened and so much has changed. Those six short months changed almost every aspect of my person, my attitude and my perception of the world. I was able to cram so much experience and life into my time over seas that I can't imagine doing half as much in this year. And yet, I know it is possible, because I have done it.

Some days, just going back over the memories can be painful, sometimes I laugh until I cry and then laugh again. Sometimes doing a simple day to day activity - like tipping a waiter will make me remember the time my house mates filled out a paper pick up for me to give to the waiter in London. Or when I went down the wrong corridor and tried to get into someone elses room. Little things that remind me that my time in England was the best in my life. And I would do it all again in a heartbeat.

  Kathleen x

028: 14 Things to Change in 2014

I can't believe that 2014 is upon us already. I am never ready for the new year to roll in - it takes me eight months or so to get used to any new year, and then it just swaps, just like that.

This year in particular, the change from December to January has been hard because although I plan for the coming year to be better than the last, I know that it is going to be difficult. 2013 was easily the best year I ever had. 2013 was the year of travel, the year of exploration and growth. To think that this time last year, Katie was a timid little Aussie girl who could barely hold a conversation with a stranger let alone live with a bunch of them on the other side of the world. I love that I have changed, but I know that there is always room for something else to change.

Rather than creating a whole new list of thing I want to do, I though I might just take the opportunity to my list of things to do from last year.

Now added the list of things Katie must do when she gets a free moment include

      92. Buy Organic - feel the difference
      93. Create the perfect Study
      94. New House, New Adventure
      95. The Perfect pair of shorts
      96. Plan (and go on if possible) exchange meet up
      97. Complete 50/50 challenge
      98. Buy a New Laptop
      99. Make a Difference
     100. Look after me
     101. Weekly visit to Grandparents
     102. Keep on top of uni work
     103. Renew Passport (with good reason)
     104. Start reviewing books
     105. Wash car
     106. Accept that I will only get 10% of this list finished

There, more goals, lets see what 2014 has in store for me this year.

  Kathleen x

022: Apparently I would be dead in a zombie apocalypses

Spring has crept up on me so suddenly that I had almost forgotten my mid year resolution (much the same as New Year Resolutions, but without the hype and expectations) to be fit for summer. So I dusted off my runners and legging - the only time its acceptable to wear leggings in public - and decided to go for a run.

During my last feeble attempt at getting fit, I downloaded a 'Couch to Marathon 5K Running" Ap in the hopes that a little motivaion would help me get there (last time I hadn't even opened it) and decided that this sunny Spring morning would be a good time to try it out.

As it turns out, I'm not even fit enough for the beginners level. I jogged through my warm up, feeling the energy pulse through me - and then he (the little overly American trainer that I had selected) told me to run.

It might have been only for a minute, but I could feel myself dying as I ran. The warm breeze brushing through my hair, the flies hitching a ride on my sweaty back, uncoordinated feet hitting the pavement in some attempt at rhythm. It was the hardest minute of my life.

Clearly its going to take a while before I get to those 5km, but I'm (hopefully) not going to give up yet.

  Kathleen x

010: Reason to Shave My Legs

It is the middle of winter here and I am quite single at the moment. With that perfect combination, it is a rare occasion when I actually shave my legs. It is not the season to be showing skin, so most of the time everything is covered by with jeans or stockings or my favourite striped pyjamas and sadly when out of sight, things are too often out of mind. If I know I’m going out, I’ll give the pins a once over with a disposable in the shower, but it’s never a particularly good job and has to last until the next night out is planned. I am quite a lazy being, and will endure all the prickly shins and unsightliness that cause many to turn to drink, but I am rarely phased. And if I am willing to put up with it, it can’t be that bad.

This afternoon, when I had nothing more than season one of GIRLS to consume, I whipped out my trusty epilator (a device so obviously designed by a man and tested by compliant women) and gave it a go. Like every other time I have left it too long, I was thankful for the atrocious amount of n

oise the small thing can make  as it masked almost all of my swearing, but it also gets me thinking.

Too often in the past I associated smooth hair free legs with boys. I remember a conversation I had with a girlfriend where we noticed that too familiar collation with the nights we epilated and the nights we pulled. She having a fun adventure one night, and I the next because we had been sharing a bathroom and couldn’t both have been silky smooth at the same time. We worked out (as many women before us have) that by not shaving our legs we gave ourselves a strange but legitimate reason not to go home with a fella – the embarrassment for one is a  certain way that can get me running for the razor ( I have had a charming man announce loudly for those around him to “beware the cactus” that is still leaving scars) But also, in a backwards kind of way, having a little touch of sexy beauty can give you that added need of confidence that can really change how one handles a situation.

This also got me thinking, and my chaotic stream of consciousness followed thus: Why should I let a boy be the reason that I want to shave or epilate my legs? Who cares if no one else is going to come near enough to feel just how silky smooth my legs are now? Why should it be strange that I want to feel comfortable in my own body and go through self-inflicted pain to get there? Why does the effort I put into the way I look have to be solely for the benefit of the people around me? Why can’t I try to look pretty purely for the sake of not wanting to look ugly? Why feel like I need a reason to do this?

I could very easily wait around for someone to be my reason to shave my legs – be it a night out with my girls or an unusually strong desire to find a tall dark handsome stranger but I might accumulate a pair of legs similar to my father. Why can’t I be my own reason? Why am I not allowed to be my own motivation for getting out of the house and embracing the influence that I have on my own life? Am I not reason enough?

Embracing ones appearance is an important part of growing up. So much time and energy is put into the way other people see us but I think it is invested for the wrong reason. The days that I curl my hair or a splash of my favourite lipstick or have endured all the pain with an epilation session, I feel like a can conquer anything. So watch out world, this week Katie comes at you with socially acceptable legs - I might accidently change everything. 

006: Fear of the Idle

I have been home now for just over two weeks and the one constant thing about the past sixteen days has been a strange fear of being idle.

Before I went travelling, I led a very simple life. Although I had a full load at university, for a time worked two jobs and had regular weekend tips down to see family and friends, I longed for my afternoons of doing nothing. When I could curl up, in some disgusting assortment of dirty clothes, tucked up in bed, lap top resting on pillows beside half a dozen mugs and bowls, smeared with the remains of meals or lingering dregs of tea. I would browse through the Internet and watch reruns of old TV shows. Although it included living in my own squalor I was content with the idle life I led.  

But since my return, I can't seem to enjoy sitting around doing nothing. I can barely stand sitting still. This might have something to do with my lap top still being shipped from the UK and my bed still in storage, but I am still incapable of having a full hour of nothing, let alone a whole day. The truth is I seem to have a whole lot of things to do. Finding work, unpacking my boxes, teaching myself how to cook again, reconnecting with people I haven't seen in years with the excuse of "oh but I've been in England" because I know, as almost everything that does, that the subconscious Katie has something else in mind.

I can't bare the thought of returning to that lifestyle. Not doing anything. No having a reason to get dressed in the morning, or to check the mail box. Because I had deluded myself into thinking that it didn't matter. That it was only going I effect me. That one one else was cared. And I didn't care. 

I am so scared of going back, that I am filling my days so I don't even have to time to be idle. If I get into different routine then there is one less thing I will have to worry about. However, I am nervous that once I resettle back into my unit - unpack all the boxes and put everything thing into place - I will run out of things to do. 

Guess I'll need something more to fill in my days. Any suggestions?

004: Walls With Secrets

Things are beginning to fall into place. I took the leap yesterday to drive from the comfort (and well stocked pantry) which is my parents’ house my little unit beside my university. It was the first long drive I’ve done since returning – that was nerve racking to say the least, had to keep reminding myself that I wasn’t in Europe any more, and that roundabouts go the other way.

Just driving back, making the physical move was enough to re-trigger all my life changing goals that I have culminated over the last couple of months – all those plans to make the house pretty, to get fit and to keep a schedule. Such a thrill to know that something is actually going to change now.

However this thrill didn’t last long. While I was gone, as punishment for extending my trip, my housemate (love her to bits) took over the larger bedroom. I have no issue with this, as before we lived together, I was in the second room, but returning to that room was a strange occurrence.

That room was the room I had battled depression in, and although the cream coloured walls hide it well, I still see the shadows cast and the memories hidden there. It took me a moment to recognise that this is my home, and although the room is the same, I am not.

Currently it is a mess of coat hangers and boxes, but it will be mine. And not the hermitage that I hide away in, but a sanctuary, a beautiful place just for me. So I guess that is now up there on y ever growing list of things to do. Might as well get started, rather than wasting my time on here.

Kathleen x