Wednesday 10 September 2014

22 things I've learned by 22

1. If you love someone, tell them. Even if you think it's the scariest thing in the world, tell them. Tell your mum you love her, tell your grandma, tell your best friend. Because we all think we have forever, but the reality is that we never know what's around the corner. And what's the harm in putting a little more love in the world?

2. What's done is done. There is no do-over, there is no going back. There is no point in looking back and no point in regrets, they will swallow you up and have you forever living in the past.

3. Worrying is pointless, literally and absolutely pointless. It does no good, there is nothing positive that comes from it.

4. Wine and vodka do not go well together. They are great on their own, but together they'll make you fall asleep in the most public and embarrassing of places. Don't do it.

5. Do what you can to make work fun. If you have to pay your dues before you get your dream job, make the most of it. Theres something great about having no responsibility at a crappy job. I've had the best shifts working behind a bar getting drunk on champagne and gin with my friends, or just laughing at how stupid I look in a hair net in a fast food place. Everyone has been there, embrace it!

6. If you want a friendship to last, you need to work at it. It's really easy to drift apart and lose touch with someone you once talked to every day. If you want that person to stay in your life for the long-haul, let them know.

7. School days are the best of your life, as are uni days, graduate days, sitting-on-the-sofa-with-your-friends-doing-nothing days, family days, holidays. Every day has the potential to be a great day. You might think the good old days are something in the past, but a couple of months from now you'll probably look back and think that these days were the good ones. Every day is a good one if you look hard enough.

8. There is a reason for everything. Even if you can't see what it is yet. If you can find even a tiny positive thing in a horrible thing, focus on it.

9. Be friends with your family, they'll always have your back.

10. If you're sad, tell someone. Never be sad on your own, text your friend or ring your mum, there is always someone who wants to make you smile again.

11. Don't let anyone tell you what you can or can't do. Go after your dreams, prove the doubters wrong.

12. Show up early to the airport. Chances are, the place you're going is somewhere you really want to be and your flight has cost you a fair bit of money. Sacrifice the extra hour in bed for the sake of your blood pressure and tears. I once missed two flights in one day, I was not a pretty sight when I finally made it onto a plane.

13. Don't waste years of your life pretending to be something you're not. Be who you want to be, not what other people expect you to be.

14. Don't wear suncream that cost £1. You will burn, badly.

15. Stop every now and again to take in the view. Watch the sunset, look at your family around the dinner table, watch your friends laugh until they cry. It's the little things.

16. Sing loudly and badly. Sing in the car, sing duets with your siblings, sing while you clean, go to concerts and sing until your throat hurts, sing in the shower. Sing the power ballads and the cheesy 90's pop songs.

17. Be spontaneous. If you're sitting at home bored, call a friend - go on a bike ride, go for lunch, go drink wine in the park. Usually the things you don't plan are the things you'll remember. A random, spontaneous trip to a pet shop with my bestie turned into one of the funniest days I've had in forever and one that I'll remember for a long time.

18. Laugh. Spend time with people who make you laugh. Watch Miranda. Make fun of yourself. Send funny dog pictures to your friends. Laughing decreases stress, makes you look younger, improves sleep, improves your relationships and is a natural pain killer. LOL everyday.

19. Dance like no one's watching. Dance in the kitchen with your flatmates, dance when you hear gangsta rap blasting from people's cars in the street, dance in the club with your friends like an idiot. Don't care what people might think, if it makes you laugh then why not?! Once me and my flatmate spontaneously did the parent trap handshake/dance in the middle of a club in Piccadilly Circus and I still smile (and cringe) when I think about it.

20. Take photos. Lots of photos. Document your life, have stuff to put on your walls when you get your dream house. Download snapchat and start screenshotting. There's no better way to cheer yourself up when you're sad than looking at pictures of your best mates trying to look ugly. (Emphasis on "trying", my friends are beyond beautiful!)

21. Don't buy shoes from Primark. They will turn to mush at the first sight of rain. Once I wore a pair to work at Royal Ascot. The shoe got stuck to the floor, the sole stayed stuck and the rest of the shoe went with me. I spent the rest of the day walking around with a bobble holding my shoe together.

22. People come into our lives for a reason. If you're lucky enough to find friends who become family, hold onto them and don't let them go. Best friends are like soul mates, they don't come along very often and if they do, realise how lucky you are and keep them close.

Tuesday 9 September 2014

We are all responsible for our own happiness

Someone once said "I wish we could know we're in the good old days before we've actually left them." Some people look back on days in the past with nostalgia and think they were the happiest days of their lives, or gaze into the future and think that they'll have this perfect, happy life twenty years from now. Like happiness is something to be gained after graduating, travelling the world, getting that dream job, getting married, like when we've finally ticked everything off the list a wave of euphoria will wash over us and we'll finally be happy..right? Not really.

I think happiness is something we all have the potential to be. Our happiness can't depend on someone else. A best friend can't make us happy, or a boyfriend or a girlfriend. There's a sparkle inside everyone that draws people in to loving you in the first place, and if for some reason that sparkle goes out we can't depend on other people to get it back for us. We are responsible for our own happiness. Instead of aspiring to be happy when you reach your goals, make the goal to be happy right now. Life is basically a massive pursuit of happiness. But really we all have the potential to be happy right now.

The odds of each of us being born are 1 in 6000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000. That wasn't a typo. It is pretty much a miracle that every one of us is here. Sometimes we just need to take a minute and think about the fact that we're all miracles. We all need to stop fretting over the past or worrying about the future. We need to stop worrying what people think about us and stop regretting the things we can't change. An asteroid could hit tomorrow, we could get hit by a bus, but if we worried about those things we'd never leave the house. Forget worry and be happy. Be grateful for the people you have. Be grateful for the life you have.

Find your sparkle and be the happiest you can be right now.