Back on the treadmill.

Yesterday, I finally forced myself to go back to the gym, after what must've been a few months off, while I was stressing over the end of uni, deadlines and wandering into the real world. 

Nobody told me thag I would be at a disadvantage if I had a degree. Not one person. Admittedly the job hunt wasn't as pro-active as it should've been to begin with, but now it's in full swing. At the age of almost 22, I am unemployed with a degree in English Literature and Creative Writing. I want to break into that discipline, but living in the north east of England, it seems relatively impossible. I can see people trying to conceal their eyes rolling into the back of their heads as I announce 'I want to write.' Frankly, if I had a £1 for every time someone had said to me, 'so are you just going to teach?' I wouldn't even need a job. Credit goes out to those who see that as a life they want, but I'm not one of those people. I lack the patience, the desire or the determination to teach. My passion lies with writing. Picking up a pen, or in this case, my iPhone, to blog. It's soothing writing down my thoughts, even if I'm editing them all as I do so. 

I've been pretty down about the job hunt, as well as some other things lately, but yesterday I powered through. I set my alarm, got up, had breakfast, put my gym attire on, grabbed my keys, a water bottle and some headphones, and I was off. Although I struggled through the hour I was there, I felt better for forcing myself to get out of bed and exercise. It was a step forward. It was something pro-active, and until then, I don't think I'd considered it so. Whether I used to like to hear it or not, my P.E. teacher used to tell me that, 'exercise relieves all your stress, Eleanor' and yet, despite her prevailing, I hated it. I walked into my physical education lessons, entering via the changing room back doors, and while all the other girls were chatting away, I didn't say much. 

I passionately hated PE. 'I can't do it,' was my favourite excuse. In case you hadn't noticed, I have a strong, stubborn negativity about me at times. Even at the height, I was a 16 year old who was very self conscious, and didn't believe she was sporty whatsoever. I'm still not. I still have that attitude. I will probably never run a marathon. I will never be on a sports team. But I figured out early on, that was because I didn't want to be, rather than any capabilities I did or didn't lack.

My point being, the exercise that once scared me half to death, actually does make me feel better. It's a stress reliever definitely, for me anyway. When discussing this with my boyfriend via text the other day, I just happened to drop in a relevant Legally Blonde quote, and he had no idea what I was saying, having never seen such a brilliant film. I'll leave you with the quote, that is seriously relevant, very daft and almost always puts a smile on people's faces. Even after what can be described as a really shit few weeks, or even months, I know that getting back on the treadmill makes things fade away for a bit. 

'Exercise gives you endorphins, endorphins make you happy, and happy people just don't shoot their husbands, they just DON'T.'

-Elle Woods, Legally Blonde.

Happy days: #1

Okay so I've well and truly jumped on the #hashtagging happy days bandwagon and for that, I'm smiley yet also partly sorry for giving into it. It's kind of just too irresistible. I'm going to write happy posts every so often, in a list-like form, of things that make/ are making me, happy. Plus, as people know, I have a tendency to be cynical, negative and terribly pessimistic. Indeed. So, maybe, I think, this may help lift my mood, and focus on positives rather than negatives. Always a good idea, right? So here goes nothing. 

A kind of given, but Alex Turner's voice is just the soundtrack to my life at the minute. I'm unhealthily obsessed with Arctic Monkeys, and AM is, in my view, the best album yet. My favourite song, well, I have too many. I'm too indecisive for that. 

My "reading week" at uni: yes! It's finally here, shh, we're taking advantage of any time off possie. As of Monday coming, I'm off for the week (according to my own schedule anyway) so that means no uni, no stressy mornings and no boring as hell lectures at 9am. Happy days, I've needed time off for ages. Sleep time yes.

My latest read: as some of you may or may not know, Nathan Filer's debut novel The Shock of the Fall won Costa's book prize this year. Immediately, I almost sprinted to Waterstones to get my hands on a copy. As soon as my eyes feasted on the first few pass of this brand spanking new novel, I just knew I was going to love it. I'm about a third of the way through at the moment, and it's really addictive. The crisp pages are just engorged between my fingertips. It's one of the best pieces of writing I've read in ages. Read it. It's making me happy.

My old new-found obsession with My Family. We bought the boxset around Christmas time. If you haven't seen it already, I urge you to google it, or find one of the many sky channels that count on repeats to fund their viewings, because this programme will be lurking around I promise you. Originally a BBC sitcom, My Family follows the lives of the Harper family, their ups and downs, loves and losses, through chaos and celebration, turmoil and despair. I have seen every single episode multiple times, and now we've invested in the boxset (yes..boxsets are the way forward for a quick fix) I just need to watch them over and over again. Also, Miranda, yes, she's wonderful, and the sitcom is just painfully hilarious. Get watching.

Oh, and I can't forget this one. A spin off from the very well known Grey's Anatomy, Private Practise was discovered by me about a year ago, maybe less. I started watching just one or two episodes a week, and now it's five and a half seasons later and things are unwinding like never before. It's already finished, I might add. This programme doesn't run any more. It ended 13 episodes into six seasons, over nearly as many years. I have around 15 hours of it left to watch, ever, and I'm torn between savouring it and completely devouring it in one intense, bizarre, emotional sitting. The latter will probably occur very shortly. 

So, yes. Happy moments. Also, a tiny little shout out to Lukas. I'm not one for soppy exchanges and waaaaay OTT PDA's, but I don't care, this suffices, because, he makes me happy. So there you go. That's really all there is to it. 

I'd probably still adore you with your hands around my neck.

Little miss negative has just plummeted to the depths of despair and thank god there's surely no further to fall. I'm overly pessimistic, I keep picking faults with everything I do, I'm lazy and I put everything off, and I'm pretty hopeless at times. I bite my nails and stress a lot, I let stupid things get to me, I'm clumsy and dull and I have days I don't even want to get out of bed or see anyone. I push away the people who care about me, and pull the ones who end up hurting me even closer. I'm naive and gullible and people take advantage of that. I'm quiet beneath a shouty exterior. I'm uncomfortable around people I don't know, so if you know the silly things about me, I must really trust you, so don't make me regret that. I take things too literally, I have the worst laugh in the world, and I don't look in the mirror and like what I see. I have a bit of an addictive personality. I can't function without coffee and enough sleep. I'm thoughtless at times, I can be selfish and self-motivated. I don't think before I speak or act and then have to deal with the unexpected consequences. I don't think full-stop sometimes. I'm ditsy and clumsy and a little bit stubborn. I'm shy and cagey at times. I don't confide in many people these days. I spend too much money and I'm constantly living outside my means. I have about six people outside of my family I'd trust with my life. I'm horrifically insecure sometimes. I wake up with no confidence some days, and other days, it's there in abundance. I don't ever like to share my personal writing. I'm shit scared of taking important risks. I have a couple of irrational fears. There aren't that many people who have my back. I shout when I need to whisper and then can't find my voice when I really need to speak up. This might seem like a list of negativity, pessimism, faults. In one respect it is, in another, it's my venting process for today. All of this is true. Very true. There's things I don't write and never will probably, because there are certain things I don't want anyone to read, even if they are very close to me, or, differently, total strangers. This is my risk. My outward splurge of who i see myself as, who I am, and the things I shrug off every single day. I suppose what I'm saying is, everyone has their demons, and here are some of mine. Enjoy, hate or revel in them, I frankly couldn't give a damn. 

x

Indescribable.

Half nine on a Friday night in December and I'm in bed, tipsy and teary eyed. Yes, there's something wrong with this image. I never really blog properly after a drink, but tonight it seems necessary. I'm in a bad mood, because of countless things. Oh, and by the looks of things, wine makes me depressed. Which, obviously, isn't great. 

Suddenly everything seems to have caused my shoulders to collapse. The pressure seems too much to take right now. With I'm a celebrity blurring in the background, I'm all too aware how alone I'm feeling. I can count on one hand how many people have attempted to contact me today, or even the rest of this week, and it's making me miserable. As someone who is very centred around friends and social goings on, when my social life shatters around my ankles, I feel very glum indeed. No texts, phonecalls, tweets, Facebook messages, snapchats or physical interactions. Seems like the people I'm not even closest to are the ones ready to cheer me up, while the people who are physically (and chronologically) closer to me are AWOL. it's making me unnecessarily sad. Disagreements and arguments I just don't want to get involved in. Stress I just don't need right now, with my first real second year exam looming in just a week's time. I feel like there are certain people I need and want in my life and they are nowhere to be seen. There's someone I really need right now, and you just don't even seem to acknowledge this. I'm sick of negativity, and misery and stressful situations. 

I'm too young to feel so upset. Fast forward to Friday 13th at 11.30 and that's when my cares go completely out of the window. Happy times will be welcomed and the festive season will be truly out in full force. Yes. That's what I need. 

Rain on my parade.

I'm smiling. Genuinely. One of those ear-to-ear, painful, grinning kinda smiles. One you can't suppress, no matter how hard you try. One that makes your eyes all squinty and your cheekbones ache. I feel like there's been a massive weight lifted off my shoulders recently. A certain someone is responsible for this. And I can say, proudly, and slightly smugly, that despite what everyone says, I'm a pretty good judge of character. Maybe I should be giving some of those critics two fingers but I wouldn't. They're like that for a reason, which I appreciate to a point. So, certain things do pay off. Don't let anyone tell you otherwise. If you want something enough, go and get it. It works. Oh, did I mention I'm happy? Nobody can rain on my parade right now.

Would you like a gag with that compliment?

Receiving a compliment is weird. It's kind of positive, but it's also kind of negative in one sense. While I like to think I'm quite good at accepting compliments, (not because I'm vain, or think the person is right in what they say) but purely because I think sometimes, it's better to accept a compliment, than deny it and somewhat publicly humiliate the complimenter by throwing it back in their face. Its like, that just isn't very polite. I also feel that if I deny a compliment, someone might actually take offense and feel that I'm being weird and stand-offish, when that wouldn't actually be the case.

Meanwhile, refusal to accept a nice remark or comment made by someone, whether it be a friend, relative or stranger, can actually make you question yourself further. Someone recently told me they thought I was pretty, and I immediately jumped up, defensively, and shrugged off their compliment, when deep down I could have (and should have) just smiled and realised that actually it was a nice comment coming from a nice place. While this person was complimenting me, I was going over and over in my head listing the things that were, in my opinion, wrong with myself, both internally and externally, and why, in my opinion, this comment was not fitting for little old me. Compliments are sometimes back-handed, yet this is unintentional. Cue a Mean Girls quote: "Oh my god, I love your bracelet, where did you get it?" and shrink back with disdain and hatred we collectively share for arch-nemesis and ultimate bitch, Regina George. What about these: "Is your hair different, it looks nice" makes you think "does it look a mess usually?" "Have you lost weight?" Is that a hint that you probably need to shed a few pounds? A comment on your physical appearance makes you feel analysed and subjected, and yet happy/sad/worried at the same time. I don't ever think I've had bundled of self-confidence, but every so often, there will be peaks and troughs, just a everyone has.

When someone comments positively about me, maybe I don't believe them because previously, someone who has said the same or a similar thing, turned out to be lying/not really bothered/not who I thought they were, so maybe their judgement isn't to be trusted. Am I afraid of what the compliment means, in both surface meaning and deeper meaning? Yes. What if someone I like tries to flatter me and I turn all gullible and believe every word they breathe in my presence, then later turn out to have been taken for a ride, and end up looking stupid and foolish. Yet another reason to avoid accepting and believing compliments. An outfit praise, a "thin" comment or a realisation that my hair is different to what it was yesterday can all spark the same gut-wrenching reaction. We jerk backwards. We recoil. We hide away from the positives and seemingly attract the negatives like magnets. It is, of course, proven that while you can receive a hundred compliments and doubt every single one, yet one insult or negative comment, and it will dwell and stay with you for years.

Ross: Rach, come on, look, I know how you must feel.

Rachel: No, you don't, Ross. Imagine the worst things you think about yourself. Now, how would you    feel if the one person you trusted most in the world not only thinks them too, but actually uses them as reasons not to be with you.

Ross: No, but, but I wanna be with you in spite of all those things.

Rachel: Oh, well, that's, that's mighty big of you.

Ross: You know what? You know what? If things were the other way around, there's nothing you could put on a list that would ever make me not want to be with you.

Rachel: Well I guess that's the difference between us. See, I'd never make a list.