Tag: self improvement

Off to a good start

~ Sue ~ 1 Comment

I last posted on New Year’s Day, which was almost 2 weeks ago. Not exactly the great start I was hoping to have in 2025, but it happens. I have been working extra shifts at work, because it is the busy period, and I have had the lurgy for the last week or so. Which has left me being able to function, but with little energy to do anything else. So, I have updated hardly anything online.

I spent time reading which is good. I normally find that doom scrolling on social media, distracts me from doing what I actually enjoy. But because I didn’t want to deal with people, I did some reading instead. Maybe that is something that I need to do more, schedule in social media time, so that I don’t simply waste hours of my life on it. Because when scrolling through TikTok, I find that I blink and 3 hours have gone by. The problem is, that I blame myself for being so stupid, but is it really different from anything else? People come home from work and put on the TV and watch 3-4 hours of stuff, and that’s okay. Is it only a problem when TikTok is being watched rather than BBC 1?

Honestly, I don’t know. I get bored watching a lot of TV these days, the things that are on, don’t often catch my attention. Like, I don’t really want to watch most soaps, reality TV, or yet another drama about murder. I don’t know if it is because, unless the program is really good, my brain just isn’t engaged enough, and I end up bored. So I turn to my phone, to scroll through stuff, I usually have no interest in. When in reality, I should really go and do something that I am interested in. I can’t complain that my time has been wasted, when I am not doing anything about it.

So, tonight, we are going to do a little studying, read a little, and make a start on my new journal, instead of watching TV shows, I am not interested in. And, when I am done, I’ll have a nice early night for work tomorrow. Things can only get better if baby steps are made, day-by-day.

Never Giving Up

~ Sue ~ 1 Comment

Education is something that I have struggled with. As a teenager, and as a working adult, you are encouraged to seek out a further education, as being educated is the only way for you to have any shape of career. My issue is with education, is that what I think I can deal with, and what I can actually deal with are two completely different things. I can easily become overwhelmed and have a habit of burying my head in the proverbial sand. Which then leaves me too far behind in whatever plans, to actually be able to do anything to fix it.

I have attempted further education multiple times, and each time I have found myself bowing out in utter failure. I used to do so well in education, especially when I was younger, and in the early years of high school. It would then get to. the point where I couldn’t prioritise what I needed to do first, so things become overwhelming. I remember being told to leave the Higher English class because my prelim exams and coursework, where not meeting the minimum grade. This is how a lot of Schools manage their exam results in league tables, give up on folk who are struggling. I am a constant writer, a bookworm since I could read, I was completely flummoxed by the fact that I couldn’t ‘do’ English. As the remarkable Ralph Wiggum says ‘Me fail English, that’s unpossible’. Because I had always felt that reading and writing was my strong point, I lost a lot of confidence. And, I think that helped make my confidence in myself fail, because if I couldn’t do something that I actually thought I was good at, what chances did I have of doing anything else?

I tried Veterinary Nursing, which I loved, but believed I was useless at it, so failed the course. It then became too expensive to continue re-submitting coursework, and then re-sitting exams, I ended up working in Greggs instead. That job frustrated me to no end, so I thought about what I could do next. Well, I loved art. So, I went to do that. Did the first year okay, but completely messed up the HNC twice. Just became so overwhelmed between doing all the coursework and then working at a call centre every evening. There was no time for everything, and I just struggled. I then started at my current job which is warehouse work. I started studying IT through the Open University. And it has been a rough ride, if I were to be honest. Again I misjudged the time I needed to do the work and have had to take a couple of gaps.

Well… it’s not over. Not yet anyway. I have applied to start another unit, slowly continuing my work towards my degree. The good thing about a place like the Open University is that they try to promote the idea of life-long learning, and that if people need to take breaks it’s okay. They have been super supportive when I said I wanted to go back, and there was no judgement, no negativity, just lots of sources for if I do run into bother again. Which, is great. I also had advice when selecting what course I wanted to pick. Normally, part-time learning at the Open University is taking 2 30 credit units per year, where each 30 credit unit is an estimated 10-15 hours a week of study. This is where I had an issue, as I work full time, more if I do overtime, and the time to study 20-30 hours a week was impossible. Hence, my previous failure. One of the advisory team at the OU stated that maybe I can try one unit this year, and see if that goes better.

So, that is where I find myself. I am still working away full time, and tomorrow, the website of my new course opens. I am studying is Communication and Information Technologies. I received the books on Saturday, and I am pretty excited to learn something new. The difference is, that I have already opened up dialogue with the support team, in the hope that no barriers crop up this year. So, that is already an improvement from the last time I studied. Onwards and upwards, as they say.

A Little Push Every Day.

~ Sue ~ 1 Comment

During my last post, I talked about trying to get my life in some kind of order. After some further thought, I decided to give myself till Christmas, as a place to assess how well things have gotten. So I have decided to focus on different things every day, do things in small bits. Because, when you simply look at the ‘bigger picture’ it can easily become overwhelming. Or, it does when I do.

Yesterday was a struggle, where I was really sore. I find it really hard to start moving, when I have no solid plans. So I lay on my bed, and felt sorry for myself. I was awake early, but I had no motivation. And that is the issue, the longer I lie, the more everything hurts. Around midday, I got a text from my friend about going to get some coffee after her work, and that appeared to be all the plan I needed. It was frustrating because I couldn’t even do the dishes because I had zero grip, which made me feel useless and I had a little cry. I then went for the bus and bought a sandwich to finally have some painkillers. Progress.

As I already knew, once I had my pain relief and had started walking around, things started to feel a lot better. I had coffee with my friend, and then I went and bought stuff for dinner. I ended up feeling so good I made my dinner, which is a rarity when I have a bad pain day. And then I finally did dishes, so despite starting off bad, I felt rather accomplished.

So, I decided that as I watched the TV during the evening, I was going to do some drawing. One of those hobbies that I have been struggling with. So I charged up my Apple Pencil, and spent around an hour doing a doodle. It wasn’t a piece of fantastic art, but it was a bit of creativity. I am fully aware it looks like a piece of crap.

Today has been a lot better. I got up and moving at a decent time. Had breakfast and pain relief at a decent hour. I then did the dishes, and decided I needed to do some laundry. 5 loads of laundry to be exact. And I organised some things in my room, which made the mess a little bit less messy. I did it whilst listening to some vinyl, namely Descendents’ Everything Sux, and NWA’s Straight Outta Compton. By focusing on what I was doing for short burst, I was quite productive. I’ve now had my dinner, half my laundry is drying on the line outside, and I am planning on having a wee read tonight, after I finish writing.

I feel like a person who can actually function today, which is rare. This is the feeling that I wanted, and one I hope to continue. I’m very good at recognising the bad days, but I need to recognise the good days more.