july favourites.

I haven't uploaded one of these for a good few months, however, I've just had my birthday and felt there were actually a couple of things I wanted to share the love for with you (plus the post I was going to upload wasn't coming together and I wasn't enjoying how deep it was going... so here's a light read for you!) Here are five of my favourite things from this month, in no particular order!

1. Billy Elliot: The Musical

I went to see this as my birthday present from my Dad, and boy was it good! I love the film and have been pretty set on seeing the theatre production, as it's one on my 'theatre bucket list'. Yes, I have a theatre bucket list... 

Anyway, it was really brought to life on stage and there was a good mix of everything, funny bits, sad bits, singing, dancing, and acting. I also enjoyed the technical side, from the staging to the set, to puppetry to prop use. Can you tell I did GCSE Drama? Pfft. But still, it was a really good show and one I'd love to see again, and I will be getting the soundtrack on CD, to go alongside Joseph and Wicked, yes, it was that good! 

2. Posters

This may seem like an odd one and thinking about it, it probably is! However, for a fair amount of time I'd left my bedroom walls to become bare, posters, art and photos had slowly fallen and I hadn't put them back up, just left them in a heap on the top of my bookshelf. I've FINALLY sorted out all my posters and everything back onto my walls and it's feeling like 'my bedroom' again, with my maps, doctor who quotes, band and artists dotted around, I have plastered 'me' all over my white walls again. 

3. Inside Out

As part of my birthday each year, it's become tradition to go and see a film, and in more recent years, that has included Toy Story 3 and Monsters University... So keeping with tradition and that, this year I headed to see Inside Out. My inner Disney Pixar nerd was feeling all the feels (excuse the on-topic pun...) It's a great film and again, it's got something for everyone, which is one thing I will always love Disney Pixar for... their ability to target all ages. There's a few scenes, which I feel could have been done better, but then again, isn't there always? Definitely would recommend anyone going to see it, makes everyone understand their brain a little better I think :) 

4. Vinyls

I've done it. I've gone and fallen for vinyls. I loved them anyway, nothing beats the raw and old school sound of a vinyl. But I now own a record player and two vinyls... 'Bon Iver' by Bon Iver and 'Back To Black' by Amy Winehouse, attempting to grow that collection slowly but surely, as I only want certain albums on record etc. but it'll get there :) 

5. Amy Winehouse

From the days of 'Frank' to the days that will never be. Amy Winehouse will always be at the top of my favourite artists and favourite people lists. I recently went and saw 'Amy', the film/documentary all about her and unfortunately all the speculation following her addictions and death. It was a hard watch, and I left feeling even more frustrated and angry at the media and her Dad, which I didn't think was possible, but apparently it is! Another brilliant watch and as I mentioned previously I've now got her second album on vinyl, which has been getting many spins recently, as well as quotes of hers being taped onto my desk as inspiration for projects. *sighs* yet another talent and wonderful person gone way too soon. 

Our Day Will Come - Amy Winehouse (link)

What have you been loving recently? 

anxiety.

.noun. 1. a feeling of worry, nervousness, or unease about something with an uncertain outcome.
            2. strong desire or concern to do something or for something to happen.

Those two definitions suggest that anxiety can be a positive and negative thing. Even though now I can appreciate the positive side of anxiety (that excitement or push to do something to the best you can) before doing something; for the past few years I hadn't been able to see past the negative.
It definitely got worse over my 'exam years' but when I went to the doctors and they said 'it's normal to get worried before an exam'; I got angry because they clearly hadn't listened to the bit about not being able to get out of my bed or house somedays, stopping myself from playing cricket, sleepless nights or the several panic attacks I had over the space of four or five years. But then I gave up on myself and told myself I was being stupid and that they were right, that must be normal. When your own brain starts stopping you from doing things you enjoy, that's probably when you should do something about it, but me being me, I kept going and instead ended up in a bit of a state.

A year ago, I wouldn't have been able to write this blog and even now, I don't feel 'qualified' enough, but I think it's more of a self-realisation that I was in a really bad place. I'm by no means 'better' and my brain likes to trip me up in more ways than 'just' anxiety, but I'm not going into that, so here is a conversation with myself about anxiety, feel free to peer over my shoulder!

I saw a post somewhere a while back (and wrote it down):

"If you are ever with a person who has anxiety and they ask you to order their food for them, stand next to them when they buy something, or reassure them countless times exactly the time and place where you will be meeting them at, DO NOT ROLL YOUR EYES, DO NOT SIGH IN EXASPERATION, AND DO NOT TELL THEM TO STOP BEING SO SILLY. Sometimes, it's hard to do simple things like that, and when people help us out, it means the world to us,' 

I hadn't really thought about this much before but I guess subconsciously I stopped seeing 'friends' that would say/do some of the things mentioned above in response to me asking for a bit of help when I was in an environment that would make me anxious. It became a joke that I wouldn't go to parties or go out into town when I turned 18. It also became a joke that I'd be late to my lessons in sixth form, that's if I turned up at all. My half-dazed state from only three hours sleep would become a joke that received sarky comments from teachers, amongst comments of 'cheer up' or 'you alright grumpy' from people in my classes. Everything became a joke, because it was easier to shrug it off that way.
I stopped playing cricket - the sport I'd been playing since I don't even know when - because I physically couldn't put myself through it. When I was batting, my hands would shake, my legs would become heavy, I'd become breathless and hot, my vision would become starry and then tunnelled and I'd lose focus, I'd get out without scoring any runs and that was that. I couldn't take it any more, but again it was easier to blame my dodgy joints and injury to my knee, than say my brain's the problem. I couldn't (and still can't) stay round someone's house or somewhere that isn't Mum's, Dad's or Selsey, without ticking: a lack of sleep, panic attack, having a splitting headache and being sick off my checklist of to-dos that my friend anxiety had planned out for me.

I remember a Saturday morning in November last year, I'd forced myself out of bed forty minutes before I was meant to start my shift at work and everything seemed like hard work. I loved working where I did. But that morning nothing seemed to be going right; I'd spent the majority of the morning crying or lying on my bed staring at my ceiling. I didn't eat anything because I wasn't hungry and I couldn't stomach the thought of food. Then I went into full blown meltdown mode.
That was the final straw for me, even though so much was going ok/right I'd ended up in this mess and had exhausted myself, physically, mentally and emotionally.
I quit my part time job, decided I was going to finish Media A Level (even if I didn't pass, I wanted to complete a subject that I'd started and enjoyed, because I hadn't managed that since GCSE) and look after myself a little more.

I've made it to the end of sixth form; I finished nearly two months ago and honestly, I'm in a better place now. Even though I still have really bad days, and life still throws curveballs at me, I haven't had a panic attack in a while, only days where anxiety is at a niggling 71% at most; those bad days are a little easier to cope with. I'm taking this summer to learn to breathe again and feel okay. I aim to have a few adventures and make some memories. I'm not going to let anxiety get in the way, I'll work alongside it and as for the other little friends that like to poke at my brain and make days difficult, well, it's time to make them those friends that you'll stop talking to slowly and nod to in the high street a few years later.

(and because I like linking everything to music, two songs that have helped me on bad days).

Up Again (Closer EP version) - Rae Morris (link)

Keep - The White Raven (link)

inspiration.

.noun. the process of being mentally stimulated to do or feel something, especially to do something creative. 

Inspiration is a funny thing. It comes in waves, all at once or not at all and it can be found in the smallest and weirdest of places. Recently, creativity has been lacking, I feel that is partly down to the majority of ideas I put into my creative writing coursework, but I think I’d be lying to myself if I said it wasn’t to do with a lack of motivation in general too.

My other blog is now getting a little bigger, content is being shared more often and maybe I got a little sucked into that repetitive structured way of those music blogs I write, as I was lacking structure in my everyday life after finishing sixth form. 

Inspiration hasn’t exactly dried up completely and the amount of random words and sentences I’ve strung together and written down in random notebooks and on scraps of paper are actually a bit ridiculous. However, I haven’t had the motivation to actually type them up and share them with anyone. I’m slowly getting there with things in general (that’s coming in a future blog…) and I feel a ‘proper’ regular return to this blog is actually on its way. I don’t want to make any promises and at the same time I don’t want to apologise for not posting, because I’d rather share something I’m proud of and okay with sharing rather than some half-arsed crap attempt at writing something that’s come from my brain and doesn’t make any sense at all and isn’t really worthwhile sharing with anyone.

The first step of that has been making sure my brain is in the right place again; second has been working my brain a little, reading more often and watching things that get me inspired creatively, (Bertie Gilbert shorts, ThisBeDottie's YouTube videos, Submarine and Where The Wild Things Are) and writing everyday. Third was drafting those poems, thoughts and random ramblings into something that actually makes sense and finally having the confidence in my own writing and believing that it was good enough to upload and share then that post.

This is the first of those and hopefully more will follow, there may be a surge of posts from me, and then they will more than likely slow to once or twice a week; and the content will be honest and hopefully have a little more substance to them than those previously. I want to use my A Levels to get somewhere, but I don’t want to go the usual way about that. Uni isn’t for me, definitely not at the minute anyway, and if I change my mind that option will –hopefully – still be there a few years down the line; but for now I’m focusing on stepping out of my comfort zone and finding a new one.  

(I’m not sure if that last point made any sense and I probably jumped back and forth from point to point in this blog, but this is me saying I’m back and I’m going to be taking one day at a time.)