Most Mondays I post some bit of advice or motivation, but it can get quite preachy, and I’m not feeling particularly preachy today. There’s only so many things I can give advice about while I’m still working hard on my own goals. So let’s have a chat.
I feel good. I struggled a bit last week but for the most part I’ve been really motivated lately. I often wonder where my time is going, but when I look at my to-do lists I can see that I’m getting things done. I’ve been eating better, working out and walking a lot more, I’ve been getting documents gathered for applications, and I’ve been more inspired. The only catch is that I haven’t been as productive with school as I really do need to be, nor have I been active with my blog or my youtube channel.
2016 is this big year of change for me, so I’m trying to document it in vlog form, only I keep forgetting to vlog and we’re at the end of March and I’ve yet to finish editing the January video. I’d like to say it’s because I’m being productive with all of those other things, but I still spend hours in bed not writing, not editing, just scrolling through tumblr. I know I should allow myself things that make me happy, but I can’t help but think about all of the things I could be getting done instead of obsessing over pretty clothes and kpop.
Starting today I’m going to try to limit my use of social media: no more than 1 hour of social media and 40 minutes of netflix per day. I shouldn’t have a problem with the netflix bit, I usually only watch an episode or two of an anime a day, but the social media part will be a struggle. At best, I should get a lot more done this week. If I’m not more productive, I should at least sleep more, which in itself is a bit of a feat. I have a bad habit for planning for 8 hours of sleep but scrolling on tumblr until it’s more like 6.5 hours.
I started 2016 terrified of what would happen, and now I’m excited. My last day of classes of my entire undergraduate degree is in less than 3 weeks, and then I’ll have finals for a couple of weeks after that. And then I’ll be done, and move on to the next big thing, and that’s insane but also very exciting.
My anxiety has been almost non-existent this year. Last semester I struggled with it quite a bit, but this semester I’ve only felt it begin once or twice. I think I told myself that I was going to kick 2016’s ass, and somehow that helped me be more confident in everything I do. Sometimes I’ve wanted to stay home rather than go out with friends at night, for fear of getting anxious, but then I just remind myself that I’m going to move to another country this summer and I’m going to be in a lot of less-than-ideal situations, and that I just need to be able to deal with them. Anxiety attacks for me are more triggered by my own anxiety of getting anxious than by anything seriously wrong with me. I’m lucky that way.
As I mentioned earlier, I struggled a bit last week. I have two weeks off of work, so I’m supposed to be spending them writing research papers, but I didn’t get any of my school work done last week. I also didn’t eat as well, and I only worked out once. I did smile a lot though, so I think that’s something.
On Thursday I went to my first university sporting event, where UBC’s men’s varsity basketball team started with a huge lead but ultimately lost in overtime to a much worse team. Whoops. Then on Saturday morning I took a shuttle bus to Seattle, where I spent the weekend with one of the few good friends I’ve kept from high school. We saw the downtown parts of the city and I met her family, and it was all-in-all quite lovely. On the bus ride back last night I couldn’t help but feel like it was the little break I needed from life to get back to being productive.
So here I am, on Monday afternoon, having gone for a run, done some strength training, cleaned my room a bit, eaten a healthy breakfast, done my duolingo. I need to wake up earlier to get more done in the morning, but I feel good about it. I have some errands to run, and then I really have to buckle down on those papers for school. This last semester has been my best yet, and I’m going to make sure it ends that way.
Life is exciting. I hope you feel that way, too. I hope you feel determined. It’s all up to you. x.
dream.think.work. 