Knilly Frickers

It’s seven days til Christmas! I’m not sure where this year has gone! Well, I grasp the passage of time but I do feel like it’s zoomed past!  There are also two weeks left of this year, I’m not really into this new year new me nonsense, but it is my opportunity to think about how I want the year ahead to take shape. Normally at this time of year I make a list of all the things I dislike about myself and try to channel them into ways I’m going to change.  I’m not really into that anymore.  I’ll always want to be the best version of myself but that doesn’t mean I have to change everything about who I am. That’s not me saying I’m awesome, flawless and require no self improvement, but I don’t need to become someone else to achieve it. Right, that’s my mind cleansed of thoughts for Monday lunch time, I’m going to try and get back in the habit of getting my musings out of my head and onto paper more often. 

It’s officially the first of December, at time of writing in Scotland anyway. It’s already the second in some parts of the world and by the time you read this December could have been and gone.  I’m side tracking, December is here. I’m turning into one of those people who comments on how quickly the year has gone in - like elderly ladies at bus stops, I’m not sure if that’s a universal thing or a Scottish thing where we pass the time of day with fellow soon to be bus passengers by commenting on the speed at which time accelerate and how the weather of this particular season is vastly inferior to the years prior - back to my point, this year really has gone quickly. I really do feel like not that long ago 2017 was a fresh new year and I was ready to tackle it with gusto and determination. There is now a matter of days left of the year before the next begins and I’m wondering where it has gone.   Usually around this time of year I start to panic when people talk about being orga...

I've shared some of my happy lists on my blog before. Sometimes I write them when I'm feeling a little down and it reminds me of all thing things I have to be happy about, sometimes I write them when I'm feeling quite good.  Today I've had a fairly quiet and reflective day, I have quite a few weekends like that a month where I shut down for a little while and take stock of where I am, what I'm doing - in life and in that moment and think about where I want to get to or things I'd like to do. My friend was speaking to me about how she's drafting up a list of things she'd like to do/achieve in 2018 and I thought that sounded like a great idea, I've loads of things I'd like to try, experience or achieve and over the next few weeks I'll put some thought in to that.  For today though, I thought I'd make a list of some things that make me smile in the here and now.  I'm used to keeping myself busy and I can get into a habit of thinking so m...

My head hasn’t really been in the game for the last month, it’s become a bit foggy, I’ve been extra tired and lacking in energy. I started comparing myself to my phone this week, which sounds daft..but stick with me. My phone is by my side all day, I check and use it a lot, I go home and use it there while simultaneously using other devices and then I leave it sitting on all night while I sleep, not using it, just sitting idle by my bedside.  In a way I kind of treat myself like that too.  I get up, sometimes I forget to have breakfast, go to work, run on empty until lunch, feel sluggish afterwards because I’ve eaten something unhealthy and then meander my way through the rest of the day.   I’ll go to my other weekly activities after work, then I’ll come home, snack on rubbish and over stimulate my brain with devices galore and go to bed late because I’ve binged watched my way through some box sets on Netflix or watched about 4 soaps one after the other and then I’ll go t...

About two and a half years years ago I wrote a blog post about doing one thing every day that scares me.  I've done this in fits and starts since then with varying results. At the time of writing the original post, I'd just decided to resume driving lessons, the outcome being that I've now been driving for a year and that's a direct result of doing something that scared me. I haven't stuck to that commitment of doing something scary every day, I've been less terrified to fry an egg (heck I poach them now) or get stuck at traffic lights on a steep hill but I haven't set out to purposefully remove myself from the comfort and security of my own bubble.  I thought I'd  done the occasionally daring thing, my hair was post box red when I started my blog, it's now black and blue but looking back that wasn't really a daring choice.  That was done in an effort to put myself back in my box a little bit.  I've kinda been putting myself in a box for the...

I’m on annual leave today, I’m not actually away on holiday anywhere, just taking a few days to chill and relax.  My original plan was to make use of Netflix, binge watch something, do some online shopping seeing as it’s pay day………today had other plans for me.   The internet was down, the television was down and my xbox game collection consists of games that are far more appealing to my 12-year-old nephew than myself – so I decided to read one of the mountain of books lying on my bedroom floor. In a moment of amusement given my lack of technological stimulation, I picked up Essentialism: The Disciplined Pursuit of Less by Greg McKeown. This book was recommended to me by my colleague Chelsea, she had read one of my blogs last year about my inability to say no to things I don’t want to do (you can read that here if you wish) and recommended to me that I read this book. I’d be lying if I said that I’ll go through the rest of my life suddenly starting to throw out no’s all ...

I’m far from being the perfect human being, I’m deeply flawed, make silly choices sometimes and I’m often annoying but I like to think that for the most part I’m an okay person.    I have some traits that I like and hate about myself in equal measure. One is my ability to let things go and another is my reluctance to make a fuss. I like that I can let very little bother me but it also means that I let others away with things that I shouldn’t. My reluctance to make a fuss kind of goes hand in hand with this.  This week I let both of those take over. I visited a restaurant - I won’t mention which one - where the person serving me clearly found something amusing about my appearance. I am all kinds of quirky but for me I was dressed very tame, this wasn’t a 'what is she wearing’ or ‘she looks odd’, this was just straight up finding  amusement  at the way I look.  I felt very uncomfortable as whilst I couldn’t hear what was being said it was blatantly obvious I ...