Serving You: from I had to have coffee at 5pm today Closing Time Ya know the song bartenders play when it’s 2 am and there is still the one couple that are yapping away and have already been sitting at that high top table for far too many hours. As I wrap up my college career a lot of different emotions hit you all at once. You feel relieved, excited, and curious but also reminiscing on all of the good times makes you sad a chapter has to close so soon. I found myself in January not being able to wait until May and now I could use time to slow down just a little bit! While I am the Wunder Woman I still can’t control the speed of life (I know crazy news) but I can control knowing that I don’t get to pick when we speed up and slow down time. My boyfriend told me several years ago to NEVER WISH AWAY TIME, and while all of you are thinking ummm duh, I didn’t really apply that concept to my life. I was always so excited for what was next that I was virtually wishing away the in between by not enjoying it. Even when you’re in one of those “average” phases, it doesn’t hurt to find what you like about that time and really enjoy it. While it seems average now, those things will become something unique to that stage of your life. Now wishing time would slow down… cue John Mayer’s “Stop This Train”… where we all learn that there is no stopping the train. I admit, I listened to this song after high school graduation and sobbed in my car all of the way home. But really that sobbing comes from a place of being so grateful of what an amazing chapter that was, all good things come to an end (another song hah) but that is only to allow new good things to surface. It’s especially tricky to live in the present when there are so many thoughts and emotions circling around your head but all you can do is put blinders on to what’s after graduation and enjoy every moment of your “lasts”. CHEERS!Serving You: wrapping up my day with caramel bedtime tea the importance of recoverySo the Wunder Woman can only be so super for so long! It is very important to take the time for recovery and mental + physical relaxation. Ideally it is the best to incorporate this into your every day routine and like all habits all it takes is some practice and consistency to incorporate this kind of work into your daily routine. First, the problem with putting off recovery…. I recently had a very large deadline coming up and spent all of my waking hours in my dingy on-campus computer lab, the only location that had access to the software I needed to use. While I was successful in completing the project and being very happy with my final product, after turning in the project, all of the energy in my body whooshed out in one swipe. After all of the adrenaline and focus my body was hit with a brick wall in need of recovery. I’ve made up for my lack of small portions of recovery with a couple of very lengthy afternoon naps. While this does work if your schedule allows, it would have served me to give myself little portions of recovery spread out versus a major catch up period needed to feel like a functioning human again. here are some things that you can try...1. meditationThis is really just breathing! It is taking a moment to sit still, sit in silence, and think about nothing other than your breath going in and out. 5 minutes is all that you need! 2. YogaNot necessarily signing up for a yoga class but rather allowing yourself a 5-10 minute stretch session at your lunch break to refresh and reset after sitting at your desk all morning. 3. No technologyChoose post work activities that do not involve a screen, after all we stare at the computer all day! 4. casual socialNot to reference closing down the bars in downtown with your best friend (although that is always an unforgettable experience) but instead inviting a friend over for a casual dinner and a glass of wine. Talking, laughing and enjoying good food will give you a nice break from alone time.
Serving You: from a really late lunch and a begging dog. I’ve had several mom figures throughout my life, which has been SUCH A BLESSING!! Uniquely all three of them start with J’s so I like to think I’m starting a trend here! I go to each one any time a big decision is happening and I trust their advice like no one else’s. While they are there to help with the big stuff, some of the most influential lessons I learned from them were just in day to day life. One specifically has recently been on my mind given that my life is in a place where a LOT of big changes are about to happen I wanted to share this concept because it can be applied throughout your life!
The idea is pretty simple. I keep this idea in my mind ever since that casual dinner at my second Mom's house where the concept first came to my attention. She said... “Ya know, you’ll learn that most of your life is pretty average. You go to work, you have a routine and that’s that. So because most of your life goes this way you HAVE to get really excited about all of the good stuff and take the time to really feel your way out of the not so good stuff.” Celebrate the highs, learn from the downs and really be present in those moments! Until I heard these words spoken I didn’t really take the appropriate time needed in either the highs or the lows. Now I bring all of my energy to the surface when something goes good in my life or in a family or friends’ life. I make a point to take the time to get my closest friends together and CELEBRATE! Life passes too quickly and we have to take time to recognize these landmarks and I hope you take time to recognize too! Serving You: from sloppy joes and tv cuddles Even the Wunder Woman gets busy sometimes! So here is a short, sweet little post for this week. I saw a challenge on Facebook yesterday and loved the concept! Generally when something bad happens in our day we reflect on how unfortunate that situation was and how it negatively effected our day. However, we don’t do this for the reverse and note all of the great things that happened in our day. I think we often categorize these good moments in our day as “normal” and so only the bad stands out to us. It is important to remember the good things that we are taking for granted and maybe we can remember how much the good outweighs the bad. The challenge? Write 7 things that you enjoyed about your day. GO! What's good with the Wunder Woman... 3/29
Now it's your turn! look at only the good for one day and comment your top 7 below!Serving You: from a late night bowl of cereal and netflix Okay so we will start this blog off with a true story, something that happened to the Wunder Woman just yesterday!
offers a building that doesn’t look like it used to be an insane asylum but also offers a large parking lot for people with appointments! Crazy concept, I know, but the previous center in the MIDDLE of campus offered around five parking spots for the hundreds of people to be seen in the facility of which were taken by students late to class anyway and not actual appointment goers. But let’s get back to the story! Again, two destinations, both on campus, it’s a matter of stop signs before I get from Point A to Point B. I’m making my way and after the first few stop signs there is a car RIGHT behind me, I mean RIGHT behind me. Sort of annoying, just like hello what are you doing? So this car is literraly f o l l o w i n g me down the main drag and also happens to turn into the health center parking lot. Me: “I guess this guy is late for his super important appointment! Jeezo, back off buddy!”. So I park in the furthest row from the entrance of the building (because I’m not in such a hurry!). I go through the usual checklist in my mind: phone, wallet, water bottle, grab keys…. I look in my side mirror to see the same tailgating car stopped right behind me. Well that’s interesting…. It was obvious this person had something to say to me but at this point I have NO CLUE what about! Did I drop something back in the lab and he was being a good citizen? Did something fall off of my car? So I get out. And immediately get yelled at like I’m a six year old by a 30 something man with an obvious east coast accent driving a gray hybrid car (like he’s a super nice dude that cares about people and the environment). So he spews his initial line “you almost caused five accidents back there!!!!!!!!!!”. 1) Interesting that in my 3 stop signs I almost caused 5 accidents 2) there was zero honking? 3) To think I almost caused ALL of this chaos and I didn’t notice for one mili second? So the guy rants for his solid 30 seconds, something about left turns, and right-aways, and I don’t know, I tune out. Then he pauses, I come back to consciousness. Me: Okay he must be done with his spiel. I let out a “mmmkay” and he huffs and puffs and speeds away (like the role model, excellent driver he is). After the guy drives away I begin to assess what has just happened and wish I could ask this road rage guy a series of follow-up questions. Was that what you needed, do you feel better now that you got to yell at someone? Would your life just not have gone on if you didn’t get the chance to tell everyone when they do something “wrong”? I mean hopefully the dude feels better about himself, however I can’t imagine handling every small situation I run into in that way, that takes a LOT of effort! Okay Katie so you were a dummie and may not have been paying the best attention and some dude having a bad day yelled at you, boo hoo. Well, I’m not really focused on me in this scenario but I honestly begin to feel bad for the road rage guy… how can his life be so miserable that he feels the need to take down other people on his way? And where I think road rage guy starts getting into trouble is when we analyze where he is allocating his energy to. We all get frustrated, we all get mad, we all get annoyed and if we allow ourselves to spend all of our energy on these negatives moments, the negatives become our lives. We get to choose what aspects of our day we would like to focus on and what pieces of our life we would like to spend energy on because trust me, we only have a limited amount! Your life follows your attention. Wherever you look, you end up going. — Martha Beck So road rage guy finds pleasure in spending his energy shaming others and making sure everyone knows when he is frustrated. But sadly this becomes his life, a life full of amplifying, magnetizing and highlighting all of the shitty things that have gone on in his day! Knowing that the not so awesome stuff is going to happen no matter what may help us be less “surprised” when something is frustrating and doesn’t go our way. It’s a fact of life that we can NOT control. What we can control is what moments we allow to take our energy, what moments we allow to define our character and what moments we allow ourselves to highlight as a reflection of our lives and our inner self. What are you spending your energy on?
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“Real love moves freely in both directions. Don’t waste your time on anything else.”
“Love is a game that two can play and both win.” —Eva Gabor in Reader’s Digest Equality but not necessarily fairness. Both feeling equally appreciated but in different ways, at different times, with different sacrifices, different ups and different downs. |
“Love cannot survive if you just give it scraps of yourself, scraps of your time, scraps of your thoughts.”
—Mary O’Hara in Something More Understanding that fake love lacks this power that Sandra mentions in the quote above. It’s not all rainbows and butterflies but it is an experience like no other where people are exposing all that is them and in turn that receiving person accepting what they see fully (the great and the not so great). |
2. Who's who.
We often like to base our feelings on someone by what they could be. This is the classic "bad boy" example and why, often times, women get caught up in wanting to fix someone and become fascinated on this idea of what they could be rather than assessing the situation by what is right in front of them.
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3. Food.
While this doesn't have anything to do with what the mind has made up, this is a topic I’ve very passionate about but have not yet been able to incorporate into a post! There are so many people driving different health fads and advice into our brains, how do we know what’s really good for us!? I used to sort of fall for these claims but now have come up with my own formula that works for me. My formula is based on exactly what today’s post discusses and my idea of being a healthy consumer of food is to eat real food. The best way to do this? Cooking at home!! Know what goes into your meals and keep ingrediants limited – meat (if that’s your style), lots of veggies, and your spices!
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4. Worry.
Worry is this made up concept in your mind, its an idea you’ve created and have allowed to blossom.
“What we focus on, we empower and enlarge. Good multiplies when focused upon. Negativity multiplies when focused upon. The choice is ours. Which do we want more of?” —Julia Cameron from Blessings Often times these worries are NOT formed from an actual problem (similar to what we’ve discussed in #2) but are based on an idea of what could be or what could happen. A line from a John Mayer song that has resonated in my head for years goes, “I will worry about it when I find out what it is I’m worried about…”. This very simply explains the notion that we are worrying about an unknown not something that has actually occurred in our lives. |
5. EXPECTATIONS
This is a VERY tricky one for me, the presence of my own expectations that I have created in my mind causes a lot of self destruction for me in form of some sort of dissapointment. Similar to worry, expectations are an idea we have created based on what could be, not on anything real!!
“Flexibility is one of the key ingredients to being successful. If you feel like it’s difficult to change you will probably have a hard time succeeding.” —Andrea Jung in You Can Do It! Being flexible has become my answer to this problem of setting expectations. I’ve found I can’t really totally avoid setting them or ideating on how a situation may go (though I can be more realistic sometimes) however I can change my reaction to when those expectations aren’t exactly how I had envisioned (which happens more often than not). “The real winners in life are the people who look at every situation with an expectation that they can make it work or make it better.” —Barbara Pletcher in The Walk Out Woman |
6. Y-O-U.
You are real, obviously! But you also create these false expectations, ideas, personas, etc. and apply them to yourself in the same way we apply these ideas to others.
“You get your confidence and intuition back by trusting yourself, by being militantly on your own side.” —Ann Lamott in Bird by Bird “Thoughts are energy, and you can make your world or break your world by your thinking.” —Susan L. Taylor in Essence Magazine You have to be your own biggest fan and accept your true self, otherwise who else will! “There’s a point where you go with what you’ve got. Or you don’t go.” —Joan Didion Essays and Conversations Coming full circle from our first discussion point, YOU HAVE TO LOVE YOURSELF. Practice all of these points applied on your own self with expectations, visions, thoughts versus reality, etc. |
p.s. Wunder women! :
After writing this post I stumbled upon a video shared by a family member on Facebook that I thought was very applicable to today's topic and all that we have been talking about over the past few weeks! Check out what Will Smith's thoughts on "Be Someone Who Makes You Happy" below.
Now I'm sure you're thinking, wow must have taken some time to gather all of those quotes together for today's post! I would like to take credit for this conglomeration of great quotes however someone already did the hard work for me! Check out Women's Quotations for Successful Living, available on Amazon. I received this book as a gift a few years ago and while I've read through all of the pages, every time I open the book a new quote that has become more relatable than before.
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UNDERSTANDING real things to focus your energy on...
Serving You: with an episode of GLOW playing in the background (check it out on Netflix if you are in need of a good a laugh)
Where is the happy middle where we don’t feel exhausted, we feel productive, but we are enjoying what’s going on around us? It’s not always an easy place to find!
Where is the happy middle where we don’t feel exhausted, we feel productive, but we are enjoying what’s going on around us? It’s not always an easy place to find!
Staying above water: when to speed up.It seems like once we get behind, w e g e t b e h i n d . . . and then it takes more effort to catch back up, and then we are even more unmotivated to get back on track, and then we fall even more behind, see where I’m going here? It’s a vicious circle to get into, and even more vicious to get out of. So, even if we are struggling, we’ve got to make sure we are just barely staying above water. Even if it’s been a long day I feel less tired knowing I’ve gotten what I needed to get done, done and I’ll sleep better too! |
Being okay with doing “nothing”: when to slow down.Monday through Friday can bring a lot of mindless movement. You have a routine and you have a schedule that generally brings thoughtless motions of going to the gym, driving to work, getting ready for the day, packing lunch, etc. After doing what we “have to do”, we want our evenings and weekends to be jam packed with social events and fun activities. While sometimes this may make your life feel full (after all, we all need to occasionally attend some happy hours with the girls to keep our sanity) after weeks and weeks of a busy schedule you might want to be okay with doing “nothing”. Take a moment to enjoy making breakfast, read some of your book, do some yoga, watch your favorite movie, order take out. You don’t have to stop and smell the roses while doing your dishes (Yes, I’ve heard a yogi talk about forcing yourself to enjoy washing dishes, c’mon nobody likes that) but do stop and smell the roses with things that focus on you, your wellbeing, and quality time with loved ones. |
The reset button: when to press pause.Unfortunately, time moves too quickly to totally slam on the brakes, however it is occasionally necessary to take time to reset. Whether you are an astrological guru and do this on every new moon, if you do this every time you feel off, or if you take the time to stop and think every time a big event in your life happens, trust your gut! If you listen to your feelings and that voice in your head, you will know when its time to reevaluate your schedule, your priorities, time allocations, and the people in your life! Knowing when you should press the reset button is sometimes obvious but it is not as easy to make the time to understand your feelings or to further understand what needs to be improved/modified/changed at all. This understanding of your own self takes time and takes practice! To get started, understand that you don’t have to be “happy” and “all good” all of the time, get comfortable with your emotions, they aren’t so scary! |
5 lifestyle tips from the wunder woman:
1. the reward system
I realize this is so elementary but it totally works for me! I love basing my schedule around the reward system where I reward productivity with something I really enjoy. It gives me incentive and something to look forward to after.
2. Its not about WHAT you're doing, it’s about WHO you're doing it with
This may be important when you need to slow down a little... Know what is most important and know when you might need to say no. Quality over quantity.
3. you need to be well to help others be well
Physically and mentally you need to be healthy before you can take on other’s needs, otherwise you will consciously or subconsciously deteriorate. Hopefully knowing when you need to slow down, speed up, or reset will allow you to better maintain your personal wellbeing.
4. Nothing worth doing is easy
When I say you should be enjoying what you’re doing, we go back to Manson’s “struggle” reference from the first blog post. Manson notes that everything comes with a struggle, we just choose what struggle we don’t mind as much as others. So, not everything is happy go lucky, and yes we still have to work, but knowing that our struggles are the correct set of struggles for ourselves, personally, then we will still feel that our lives are full.
5. As a general rule, don't over-analyze
Okay Katie you write a novel about knowing yourself but now you’re telling me to not over analyze?! Okay I see what you’re saying there… but hear me out! I want understanding these three lifestyle modifications to be a mindful reflection – I had a good day, why did I have a good day? I am feeling tired, why am I feeling tired? This should not be a stressful event where you are trying to dig too deep. As put in Manson’s book emotions are just signs of whether we are doing what we should be doing or not – they are not something to be so scared of! Know about yourself, but don’t try to control things that you can’t (and yes a lot of things are going to be out of your control!)
If you’re in your twenty somethings like me, this might be the first time you’ve really delved into self-awareness like this. It might seem intimidating at first but its actually really exciting to begin mapping out what makes your lifestyle structure original! If you've already endured your twenty somethings you probably have a better understanding of this kind of self-awareness but because our lives are always changing, remembering to mindfully use these tips and evaluations is always helpful during the ebbs and flows.
take a moment to map out your life!
fill out today's journal below.
Let’s talk about sex baby! No, not really however let’s do talk about how everyone else talking about it. Did that make sense? I recently watched the Netflix documentary Liberated and the role the word now plays in today’s society where being liberated has transformed into the idea of feeling “free” from one’s emotions by not having them at all. The documentary focuses on changes specific to today’s younger generation and the culture they are (intentionally or not) creating spotlighting the perceived roles of men and women to better understand why the two interact the way that they do. M E D I A . End of blog post? I mean everyone reads that one word and gets a bad taste in their mouth or hears that phrase they hear EVERY time they turn on the television, “FAKE NEWS!”… Right? So, end of post, you get it, deceiving messages in the media. But do you really get it? You know that you know but do you subconsciously act? The answer is yeah you probably do. Why don’t you notice? I don’t always either because, cultural norms. When one, same idea gets isolated together… wait why am I trying to explain this? Watch the clip from the documentary on our Facebook page, click the link below!
When something becomes normalized in a culture we become subconsciously numb to the concept – it just is how it is. When we see the same sets of images over and over and over, without differing context, then we come to the consensus that those are the only images that is the only way to be a woman.
I’m sensing a misunderstanding of what it mean to be empowered…
“the process of becoming stronger and more confident, especially in controlling one's life and claiming one's rights.” (Thanks Google!) So the question becomes if we are doing what the media tells us to do, wearing what they say we should wear, and acting the way the other women, that have been selected to be shown act, is that control? Or is that maybe acceptance due to lack of control? Okay, Katie you lost me. (or maybe you just need another cup of coffee...)
We will rewind...
“…where being liberated has transformed into the idea of feeling 'free' from one’s emotions by not having them at all”. If we turn off, we cannot feel, and therefore we will be in control because nothing and no one can hurt us.
“the process of becoming stronger and more confident, especially in controlling one's life and claiming one's rights.” (Thanks Google!) So the question becomes if we are doing what the media tells us to do, wearing what they say we should wear, and acting the way the other women, that have been selected to be shown act, is that control? Or is that maybe acceptance due to lack of control? Okay, Katie you lost me. (or maybe you just need another cup of coffee...)
We will rewind...
“…where being liberated has transformed into the idea of feeling 'free' from one’s emotions by not having them at all”. If we turn off, we cannot feel, and therefore we will be in control because nothing and no one can hurt us.
I want all of us to turn back ON! Being on is the real sexy, the real empowerment, and the real definition of being a woman. Making choices, understanding the context and finding uniqueness.
turn me onnn!
No prob, download today’s journal below.
Serving You From: A Glass of Wine by the Fireplace (& yes it’s snowing).
So I’ve been reading this book… and I’ve been debating for a week whether this book is acceptable to be reading as I’m in the doctor’s office waiting room passing the 30 minutes of time needed for “check-in” for my 5 minute appointment. I hold the book as flat as possible so the elder lady across from me doesn’t think “huh, books young kids are reading these day” shaking her head no in her mind. Or that the receptionist whom already knows probably too much about me doesn’t find a way to turn my book reading into my today’s lunch hour hot topic. Okay, so there is a “bad word” in the title… But it doesn’t stop there… the publishers decided that the word choice + a vivid, hunter orange background would make the perfect combo for LOOK AT WHAT I AM READING. Well, to be fair, I’m sure the tactic was perfect for the bookshelves at Barnes and Noble, but its post-shelf life is causing me some turmoil! Similar to the feeling that one may be a little hesitant to show off their "guilty pleasure" in reading 50 Shades of Grey, I wonder what someone may assume my book's message is by simply judging the book by its cover (hah, get it?). However, this book I've been holding onto is a little less fantasy than Mr. Grey’s seductive red room, and actually is more like a lifestyle guide so c’mon I’ve got to be accepted for studying such intellectual literature in public! Mark Manson’s The Subtle Art of Not Giving a F**k offers a “Counterintuitive Approach to Living a Good Life”. Manson, a blogger, shares life lessons through humor, personal experiences and well, a lot of references to F**ks. Without the profanity, which ladies let’s admit is necessary to the success of the book, he is saying we have only so many “cares” to give, we can’t care about everything and similarly we cannot care about nothing at all. So how do we determine if this is something we should care about? The short answer is all of those things you think you need to care about, you don’t. Now for the long answer….
Manson first establishes the normality of “always wanting more”, in that humans, as a species, have natural instincts to continually strive to be better and to live better (after all that is how our world has evolved into such developed societies). So, it’s okay to want more. You want the cheese from the good section, go get it girl! Work the couple of overtime hours at the job, maybe don’t get those pair of Steve Maddens you’ve been wanting… and go get that $15 block of cheese! Well, maybe this takes us to our next section in Manson’s book. Everything, whether it is an “upgrade” or not, takes a struggle. So I get the good cheese but now I have to work an extra couple of hours at work this week. But maybe I like work! So the “struggle” of working a couple of hours extra is nothing to me. However, maybe if the couple of extra hours meant I had to miss my daughter’s first soccer game then maybe I decide I can actually settle for the cheese that sits next to the hot dogs. Manson is proving to his readers that more or less what you want and what you do is really compromised by what are you willing to struggle for. We all want to have an Olympic Gold Medal but its apparent, by the amount of us that actually do, most of us aren’t interested in the struggle it takes to get one.
So I’ve been reading this book… and I’ve been debating for a week whether this book is acceptable to be reading as I’m in the doctor’s office waiting room passing the 30 minutes of time needed for “check-in” for my 5 minute appointment. I hold the book as flat as possible so the elder lady across from me doesn’t think “huh, books young kids are reading these day” shaking her head no in her mind. Or that the receptionist whom already knows probably too much about me doesn’t find a way to turn my book reading into my today’s lunch hour hot topic. Okay, so there is a “bad word” in the title… But it doesn’t stop there… the publishers decided that the word choice + a vivid, hunter orange background would make the perfect combo for LOOK AT WHAT I AM READING. Well, to be fair, I’m sure the tactic was perfect for the bookshelves at Barnes and Noble, but its post-shelf life is causing me some turmoil! Similar to the feeling that one may be a little hesitant to show off their "guilty pleasure" in reading 50 Shades of Grey, I wonder what someone may assume my book's message is by simply judging the book by its cover (hah, get it?). However, this book I've been holding onto is a little less fantasy than Mr. Grey’s seductive red room, and actually is more like a lifestyle guide so c’mon I’ve got to be accepted for studying such intellectual literature in public! Mark Manson’s The Subtle Art of Not Giving a F**k offers a “Counterintuitive Approach to Living a Good Life”. Manson, a blogger, shares life lessons through humor, personal experiences and well, a lot of references to F**ks. Without the profanity, which ladies let’s admit is necessary to the success of the book, he is saying we have only so many “cares” to give, we can’t care about everything and similarly we cannot care about nothing at all. So how do we determine if this is something we should care about? The short answer is all of those things you think you need to care about, you don’t. Now for the long answer….
Manson first establishes the normality of “always wanting more”, in that humans, as a species, have natural instincts to continually strive to be better and to live better (after all that is how our world has evolved into such developed societies). So, it’s okay to want more. You want the cheese from the good section, go get it girl! Work the couple of overtime hours at the job, maybe don’t get those pair of Steve Maddens you’ve been wanting… and go get that $15 block of cheese! Well, maybe this takes us to our next section in Manson’s book. Everything, whether it is an “upgrade” or not, takes a struggle. So I get the good cheese but now I have to work an extra couple of hours at work this week. But maybe I like work! So the “struggle” of working a couple of hours extra is nothing to me. However, maybe if the couple of extra hours meant I had to miss my daughter’s first soccer game then maybe I decide I can actually settle for the cheese that sits next to the hot dogs. Manson is proving to his readers that more or less what you want and what you do is really compromised by what are you willing to struggle for. We all want to have an Olympic Gold Medal but its apparent, by the amount of us that actually do, most of us aren’t interested in the struggle it takes to get one.
I’m willing to live in my tiny little apartment in a mountain town so I am able to have access to the immediate hikes, skiing, biking, etc. Struggling to make rent for my less than average place is worth it to me. I know I could get a really nice place for the same amount of money in Kansas but that is not a place that I care about. |
So, further, why does the world tell us what to care about if we all have very personalized opinions? You should support African orphanages, snow leopards, a veterans center in Texas. Okay so I do care about children without parents, I do care about animals that are struggling to thrive, I do care about vets and their physical and mental health, but if I don’t care enough to do something why care? I only have so many cares to give so maybe I should use my select cares on things that I will actually involve myself in, a doing something not just a thinking something.
The downsides to social media are probably already apparent to you and you have an idea of the negative impacts it has on its users. However, Manson is able to actually define these negative impacts noting that social media is a showcase for the bests of the bests. Those that are "Instagram famous" are the ones chosen to be showcased because they are the top of their category. So, our exposure to who we think are normal people are really the cream of the crop and if we do not understand this then we may be deceived into thinking that we can be what all of these people are. We can be really fit, eat really healthy, do our makeup like a professional, write a popular blog, and quit our boring office jobs to travel the world. We think we can do all of these things – why couldn’t we? I see everyone else doing them! But the reality is that for the fitness mogul, that is what they are really good at, that’s what they’ve dedicated their life to and the sacrifice to be that fit includes portioning meals, counting calories, no happy hours, scheduling their life around hours spent at the gym, suffering through physical pain induced by progress at the gym. But what happens is that the fitness mogul actually enjoys and prefers these struggles over other struggles they’ve encountered in their life. The couple that quit their job and are traveling the world actually prefer the struggle of having little money, not seeing their families, not investing in a career, home, etc., over the struggle of acting like they enjoy an office job, living in suburbia and pressures to have a family or to be domesticated. You’ve probably heard that anything in life that is worth it is not easy, and refraining from being this cheesy, that is actually what Manson is trying to get at. Everything we do is a struggle, we have to choose which set of struggles we want to endure.
That is a wrap for today! Stay tuned for another post following up on what the rest of the book has to offer (yes, those were take-aways from just the first few chapters!) or you can even follow along with me! Get your copy on Amazon.
The downsides to social media are probably already apparent to you and you have an idea of the negative impacts it has on its users. However, Manson is able to actually define these negative impacts noting that social media is a showcase for the bests of the bests. Those that are "Instagram famous" are the ones chosen to be showcased because they are the top of their category. So, our exposure to who we think are normal people are really the cream of the crop and if we do not understand this then we may be deceived into thinking that we can be what all of these people are. We can be really fit, eat really healthy, do our makeup like a professional, write a popular blog, and quit our boring office jobs to travel the world. We think we can do all of these things – why couldn’t we? I see everyone else doing them! But the reality is that for the fitness mogul, that is what they are really good at, that’s what they’ve dedicated their life to and the sacrifice to be that fit includes portioning meals, counting calories, no happy hours, scheduling their life around hours spent at the gym, suffering through physical pain induced by progress at the gym. But what happens is that the fitness mogul actually enjoys and prefers these struggles over other struggles they’ve encountered in their life. The couple that quit their job and are traveling the world actually prefer the struggle of having little money, not seeing their families, not investing in a career, home, etc., over the struggle of acting like they enjoy an office job, living in suburbia and pressures to have a family or to be domesticated. You’ve probably heard that anything in life that is worth it is not easy, and refraining from being this cheesy, that is actually what Manson is trying to get at. Everything we do is a struggle, we have to choose which set of struggles we want to endure.
That is a wrap for today! Stay tuned for another post following up on what the rest of the book has to offer (yes, those were take-aways from just the first few chapters!) or you can even follow along with me! Get your copy on Amazon.
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Author
Meet Katie!
Age l 23
Traits l Red Hair
Superpower l Speaking without using words
Girl Crush l Miranda Lambert
Fav Food l Avocado Toast