Could you tell me a time you needed someone else?

It was a day I nearly lost. Waking up early in my, suddenly, messy room, again. I'm locked into bed demanding why things persistently tumble from order to chaos. It's too late, before I realise I'm wasting my time. A day off is a day off, the only one I got. I'm finally feeling lazy enough to get out of my bed, and it becomes clear this is how every day off goes. So to motivate myself I make coffee, cigarettes and food. Essential things to do before leaving the house, but perhaps a little distraction before too. Watch some videos and read some news, make attempts to reach out of this loneliness. If no one close is free, I'll happily go further and further until I'm talking to robots. Before long I realise I'm wasting my time again.

Frustration pushes me to get out and leave for a walk. I suit up, grab the lead and get in the car, I'm going north. Perhaps this beautiful part of the country is bad for my soul, at the drop of a hat I can disappear up a hill, through the woods, along the coast. Perhaps this is why I give myself so much time in the morning. I still hadn't decided where i was going, I had a memory in my head, of a place I wanted to reclaim, but without a clue where it was. This is sometimes why the voice in my head tells me I'm crazy, busy looking for something to reclaim, stumbling around like a fool without that clue.

After over an hour of driving, the pin I dropped in the map was wrong, the road is leading me through a pretty flooded Ford, so I stopped. For all this stressing about relaxing, I achieved little more than wasting petrol. Brilliant, a nice accompaniment of guilt to join the laziness and foolishness this morning has already brought. This is when it hit me the clearest, I'm only here wasting my time again. More time spent in my head justifying, apologising and arguing myself to myself all the while wasting my time from things more productive. I'm impossible, there's a hole in my bucket and I'm annoying myself, out for a walk but not finding one, out for myself and all I do is argue.

Resigned I was about to go home. I put the car in gear and notice someone is walking towards the car from theirs. Suddenly, this woman had arrived at the window of the car and knocked. I had a moment, while I fumbled to open the window, to notice this women must have been in her 50s, with a well worn jacket and that this is the first person I'm going to actually speak to today. As the window opens the lady leans down and arrives at my level. Well this is it, I'm going to have to talk and connect with a stranger.

She asks me straight "do you want to move my car forward so you can park behind mine?"

I'm hesitating, trying to quickly arrive back to the present to reach out and give my response.

"Oh, you know, it's ok, I havent decided where I'm going just yet, dont let me put you out" I finally replied, quietly hoping she didnt notice the vulnerability I'd woven through the words. I'm caught in her friendly face with a feeling that shes looking right through whatever mask I've put on to hide my internal voices. I'm left asking myself, just who is this woman?

Her face breaks into a smile, causing my defences to begin to dissolve, and she tells me I should park and leave for a walk from here.

"There's an old woodland that goes up the valley, it's perfectly quiet and has indications that people from a time long ago lived and worked within this woodland. If you are looking for a walk this is the one to do" she finally said through her smile.

This strange woman, who appeared from nowhere and has an apparent ability to talk straight through the feeble defences I normally put up between strangers, was using all the words that would persuade the child alive within me to get out and really explore. I dont need to hesitate anymore, the idea has been firmly sold, or maybe I'm just happy someone has come and told me what to do.

I move my car and fill the space this woman has created for me, I take a moment to roll a cigarette and process all these unusual feelings meeting this woman has stirred. I've already imagined her as a magical gatekeeper, loitering around the entrance to these woods to encourage, or discourage, individuals on whichever path they need to take that day. I know I'm back wasting time, but I'm inspired into a world that I love wasting time in. This has been what I've been waiting for all day and I feel it.

I'm ready to set off and make sure I thank this woman once again because my gratitude has grown considerably since parking the car and catching up with my thoughts. I confidently stride towards the gate and it barely slows me down as I open it to let me and the dog through. Already, after the first few steps I feel like I've moved far away from the world I woke up in. I find a rocky outcrop, that worked as a quarry at one point in history, and I'm straight up climbing to the top. Ok, it's raining, and my shoes are not appropriate, but it doesnt matter. I've long left the self loathing that would have seen these as hindrance, completely removed from the hindrance the ford presented to me. Completely removed from the guilt, laziness and foolishness that was accumulating within.

With this new spirit and perseverance I was able to take the good with the bad. One became the other and this motivation encouraged me to ditch my unsuitable shoes and to trust that wet and muddy feet are more practical to me than wet and muddy shoes. This symbolic act of removing my shoes and walking muddy trails and through muddy puddles rescued my fragile mind in a significant way. It represented to me that being ill-prepared is solvable.

My mind is a labyrinth of endless corridors to get lost down, this is something I cannot change. However, it's a dynamic place which can transform in a moment and learning to trust the corridors I find myself roaming through is difficult. Knowing how I see these corridors is never permanent and that fills me with reassurance. I'm learning that the lonely corridors are sometimes the most difficult places to roam, without physical company it can feel impossible to experience the perception change that can inspire or debilitate. So loneliness is not a choice, it's a situation many people find themselves, and if you are open to connection, and willing to let your path cross, even the slightest moment of company can be enough to transform your perception.

So thank you again, wonderful strange lady. I might never get the chance to tell you to what extent you changed my day, or my life, but I'll pass on your intuition to people over again. If it can happen once, it can happen again. You're likely to never know how much you mean to other people, whether close friends or complete strangers, but every day a stranger makes someones world less lonely. Here's to hoping that this wonderful strange lady knows this, I find her worth talking about again and again.

Could you tell me a time you hit a wall?

In the year of 2016, I entered what would ultimately be an unsuccessful year of education but from which I learned some valuable lessons about myself and my approach towards other people. It was to be a victory lap on what had been a vastly enjoyable experience at university where I studied the field of Physics. I had glided through my penultimate year with relative ease and I was comfortably swimming in safe familiar waters with a final year ahead that was a stage set up for its final act, a predictable but happy conclusion. I entered my Honors year brimming with confidence and a keen interest to explore new territory. All through life I’ve maintained an awareness of the issues that our planet's environment is facing and like many others I’ve experienced frustration for my incapability as an individual to influence change on a large scale. In the brainstorming for my thesis proposal, I was presented with a rare opportunity to do just that and it was an easy choice. I was offered the opportunity to study the intake of microplastics in marine life; an issue that was rapidly becoming more prevalent and headline-worthy as people become aware of the damage that their favourite facial scrub was doing (another topic for writing in itself, but in short… the oceans are a mess). I recklessly bowled into it like an electrician attempting heart surgery, so eager to help without fully assessing my suitability. As you may have realised (unlike me) there is little overlap between a physics degree and the study of plastics in fish and it was already a stretch but my mind had been lit up with possibility at the prospect and after meetings where the possibility of having results published there was no question of me not choosing it.

Ironically with the field of marine biology, I found my self stranded in deep water. I was placed in a new building away from all the students and colleagues I’d been working with from the beginning with a laboratory I had no familiarity with.The apparatus was all new and I would have to repeatedly ask strangers for the simplest of advice. I’m sure in retrospect they were all welcoming of a newcomer in their departmentbut from my perspective I could feel eyes rolling back behind closed eyelids and imaginary disdain in their every tone. I hit my first stride a week or so in, finally being able to produce some results I could show to my supervisor. When presented, however, I was told of the irrelevancy of the results and lambasted for wasting valuable time with inconsequential research. I felt a significant knock to my confidence that day, but I still felt driven to correct my mistake. I would wake up with determination, pack my bag for the day, lunches prepped and all, and walk to university with the intent of spending the whole day making drastic breakthroughs and uncovering newground-breaking results. But I’d reach the front door and I’d pause, hesitant to step in from the cold. I’d do a small lap of the block maybe picking up a coffee as if that was the answer to everything and head back only to slow down again outside and be hit with a sudden overwhelming urge to just go home. Try again tomorrow! Something’s just not right today. I conceded and fell into this awful pattern, only rarely making it across threshold only to be met with further frustration and perplexity and every day I’d return to bed another rung down the ladder. Numerous times this frustration reduced me to the verge of tears and I’d make a hushed exit stage left so I could be alone before I had a breakdown in public. After a while, this solidified connection was formed between the work I was expected to complete and being unhappy. I knew every morning looking up at the modern architecture of the department building that if I was to put myself in that small dark optics room on the third floor I’d just feel like a failure. I’d have more ease scaling the side of the building than overcoming this unsurmountable wall I’d constructed in my mind.

Eventually, after weeks of repeating this awful pattern and dodging emails, I met with my head of year (after the previous experience of meeting my supervisor I’d rather avoid a repeat of that). I explained my situation and was greeted with welcome sympathy but rather than accepting the unfeasibility I was told to endure it and keep going. I am very fortunate in life to of had my mental wellbeing in good health for most of my life, never having to experience to horrible realities of clinical depression or anxiety but I feel like I understand a little more the extent of this inability from this experience. Stories of people who suffer depression and struggle to get out of bed in the morning are not to be dismissed. Whenever somewhere, someone is suffering from a resistance that their own brain can pose when faced with the simplest of tasks you should treat it like you would a physical illness. I’d like to emphasise that my experience doesn’t fall in this category but to the senior staff in my department, it was probably like asking a primary kid to learn his times tables. They may have understood the difficulties but its far from an insurmountable problem, just a learning curve to be overcome. What’s far harder to fathom is the pure impossibility of a task. For me this was impossible. Nothing was going to change that. I didn’t care about trying again. I didn’t care about graduating. I just didn’t want to step in that laboratory every again and I feared that forcing it would only jeopardize my wellbeing. Forcing out of idle is almost never the answer. It only exacerbates the feeling of failure.

I firmly believe that a far more consoling and productive reaction is to try a new avenue. One from which you can gain just the same sense of achievement. Criticising a person’sinabilities can often feel for them like they’re just digging a bigger hole for themselves. For me, I took the following summer for myself and returned with a project that played to my strengths. I don’t mean to dissuade from exploring outside your comfort zone but going in with the understanding that sometimes it just might not work out and that’s okay is very important. Realise that you can still learn and grow from such experiences. I returned to blue shores where I completed my degree with a superb final result that I will always be extremely proud of and attended my graduation ceremony that had felt light-years away only a year prior.

Could you tell me a time you felt insecure?

Insecurity is something that is always there, small and almost inconsequential in the back of my mind. I think that must be the case for almost everyone, you have to be a certain kind of confident to never compare yourself to anyone else and get that feeling you’re not-quite-as-good. I find social media can be a world that exacerbates this problem, there is always going to be someone more attractive/sportier/confident on your timeline that makes you feel lacking. For me I particularly struggle with feelings of insecurity in social situations or stressful times, it takes one lack of an invitation to feel like you’re nowhere near as popular as everyone else going, but that’s where perspective and rationalisation come into play. Yes it is a difficult and frustrating situation but if you take time to think about all the good things that are going on (which are always there, if not always big things or particularly obvious), then the feelings of self-doubt slowly ebb away.

One of the hardest things to do, but something that I’m slowly learning makes an enormous difference in everyday life, is to try and not be envious or compare yourself to other people who appear to have everything easy. I am one of the biggest over-thinkers I know, less than I used to be, but still constantly unsure of myself, and yet I think many people who meet me would be totally unable to see this aspect of my personality. I like to think that is the case for most other people too, so if you are ever feeling insecure for not being quite as good as someone in one aspect, never forget they are probably comparing themselves back against you and thinking they aren’t as good for another reason.

A time recently that I have felt insecure was just a few weeks ago when things got on top of me at university. It got to that point at the start of winter that you’re feeling run down and ill, and deadlines stack up. When I’m tired I find it so much harder to think rationally, and for one particularly challenging piece of coursework I just couldn’t work out what I was supposed to do. I felt like every single other person in my module could understand so much easier and I was in the wrong place, insecure in my intelligence. I felt like if I reached out to my friends and said I was really struggling they would judge me and dismiss me for not understanding it like they did. Reaching a point of overwhelming panic, I had to sit down with one of my friends and just admit I just couldn’t wrap my head around it. She was EXACTLY the same. We sat for about an hour just non-stop complaining about how difficult the module was and how we felt everyone else understood while we didn’t. Next we started actually tackling the questions and while it was still difficult, we made a lot more progress than I had been able to before, and had the confidence to text more friends to help us, some of them who are super bright who got it straight way, but many more others in similar situations.

When it comes to insecurity about things like this, or about your looks, or popularity etc., it is so important to bear in mind that there are so many others who feel the same, and if you reach out to a close friend a problem shared can often be a problem halved. You could spend your whole life comparing yourself to others that appear to be better-off in a whole load of different ways, and it’s so difficult not to, but the more you put yourself out there and stay active – keeping your mind off things that make you feel less-than – the more I find you can start to be grateful and positive about other unique aspects of yourself.

Could you tell me a time you took a step back?

Around 2 years ago, at the age of 27, on a holiday with some friends in Sète my mental health reached a melting point. Looking back, I realise now that it was mostly likely years of escaping my negative self-beliefs through various avoidance strategies that led to this event where my complications with mental health became self evident. At that moment in time, and for the weeks that followed, I experienced a complete loss of self esteem and confidence. I felt embarrassed, confused, stupid, useless and ashamed of myself. I found it impossible to concentrate from having severe brain fog and had a deep rooted un- comfort and stress around my friends. As a result, I chose to isolate myself which led to me then slipping in to a dark depression.

I remember the exact moment when I reached breaking point. I was assisting my friend making breakfast one morning. Usually what would be a simple task became an overwhelming experience. Finding it difficult to concentrate, I needed him to guide me through the process as I feared making a mistake and embarrassing myself over the most basic task. Once we had finished preparing food, I felt severely stressed from how difficult I found this everyday routine. My friend, unaware of my negative thoughts at the time, made a passing joke about me only having half a brain that morning. Unfortunately this solidified the negative thoughts I was having about myself and my worries that my insecurities would become noticed by friends was confirmed. I felt completely embarrassed and useless. As a result, I couldn’t even stay to eat the breakfast we had prepared - I sat down and started to profusely sweat in the sun. My friends conversed and I focused on trying not to embarrass myself further so I sat there in silence trying to persevere over the negative thoughts I was ruminating over. My situation did not improve and I eventually started to feel like I was going to have a panic attack so I said I needed to go for a walk. I rushed out of the house and sat by the canal worrying about what was happening to me and fearful of returning to the house. All I could do was ruminate over what had happened and catastrophize what was going to happen in the future. At this moment in time, I thought that I would never be the same again. I began to identify with these new feelings and believed that the happier less anxious me of the past was actually an imposter that had had his day and that circumstances had finally exposed the real me that would remain for the rest of my years.

At this time, I was very unfamiliar with the complexities of Anxiety and Depression. Even though I had probably been experiencing such symptoms for years I never felt like they were severe enough to warrant much attention. I was told by one friend that I could be suffering from Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) as result from traumatic life experiences. At the time, I couldn’t believe that my symptoms were solely caused from this and convinced myself that it must have stemmed from a biological failure in my body or a physical accident. Despite experiencing these symptoms in the past they had never been so crippling so I thought that they must have been worsened by some recent development. I then started my own research and became obsessed with getting to the route cause of my psychological complications. My first diagnoses was that I had an Over-Active Thyroid and I was experiencing Hyperthyroidism.

Once I returned to the UK from Sète, I became obsessed with trying to discover what was causing my condition. As a result of ruminating over my negative thoughts, my symptoms remained and I began avoiding social situations and not answering phone calls from friends. I continued to diagnose myself with all sorts of illnesses online that continued to make me feel even more hopeless about the future. I began to believe that there was no chance of improvement. My condition got so severe that I even contemplated suicide. After visiting the doctor and having various blood checks, it was clear that it wasn’t a overactive thyroid that was causing my symptoms. Through diagnosing myself online (the worst thing a hypochondriac can do in this situation), I then developed a new theory that I had experienced Brain Damage caused by a Traumatic Brain Injury (TBI) which had triggered my anxiety and depression. Besides various minor knocks to the head, something which is probably common for skateboarders, I’ve only ever had one major knock that resulted in a concussion. Despite having scans at the time of the accident and being given the all clear from doctors without much sign of concern, I continued to worry about this long after the injury. My worries were not necessarily unjustified as I have seen the affects of Major Brain Damage in my father who had accident when I was in University and now requires 24/7 continuous care. After revisiting the doctor with this proposal, I was told that it was unlikely that my psychological state was the result of a previous bang on the head. This scepticism from the doctor was due to the nature of my symptoms, as they quite often come and go. I was then given a prescription of Selective Serotonin Reuptake Inhibitors (SSRI’s) called Citalopram to see if this would improve my condition. I started the course of SSRI’s and simultaneously began Cognitive Behavioural Therapy (CBT) to satisfy the notion that my condition could be improved and was not irreversible.

Once I started CBT I learnt a lot more about my mental health. I was told that to improve my mental hygiene I would have to retrain my brain through various mental exercises to transform my negative thoughts cycles about myself in to more positive ones. After a few sessions with my therapist I stopped taking antidepressants and began to believe that my symptoms were not the result of Brain Damage, but were the result of a form of mild Social Anxiety Disorder (SAD) and could be resolved through therapy. My therapist reaffirmed that my hypochondria had got the better of me and through self diagnoses I had found something to explain my condition that would only allow my negative thought cycles to continue. I began to understand I was suffering from very low-self esteem that most likely resulted from negative core beliefs about myself that I had developed throughout my entire life. I began to understand that some of the traumatic events surrounding my upbringing were most likely the cause of my negative thought patterns. I could see the patterns of my thoughts that had been developing for years and the ways I would ruminate over negative thoughts and begin to identify with them. I began setting my self challenges to break my negative thought cycles. Most of the exercises I worked on came from a book by Dr Melanie Fennell called ‘Overcoming Low Self-Esteem and Overcoming Low Self-Esteem Self-Help Course’ and the website www.getselfhelp.co.uk. After about a month of starting CBT I slowly started to feel a return of my old self. My symptoms began to dissipate and I was able to carry on with things with a new sense of empowerment over my thoughts. Although there are times when my symptoms have returned, I have stopped obsessing about what is causing them and instead focus on things I can do that can make me better in those moments. Overtime I have noticed many other triggers that have an impact on my mental hygiene. I’ve seen that my symptoms sometimes worsened during;

- Periods when I am idle and don’t have much to concentrate on.

- Times when I have been travelling a lot and not sleeping properly.

- Mornings after drinking alcohol.

- Weeks when I have been eating a lot of sugar and drinking a lot of coffee.

This has led to me avoiding these triggers at times when I can feel my anxieties returning which definitely benefits my mental hygiene. I have began to accept that there is not necessarily a singular reason to explain my condition and understand the fact that I can only hypothesize what brought on my break down in Sète and that obsessing about previous injuries only allows my symptoms to persist. There are most likely various environmental and biological causes for my symptoms. Fortunately, I now have the tools to help prevent me from ruminating over them so they persist and instead I can carry on with life as normal.

Could you tell me a time you felt optimistic?

Optimism is a hard emotion, in my opinion. Its not just like feeling happy or sad, its deeper than that. It’s telling yourself that you believe you can achieve something. In a lot of situations, I let other emotions push that feeling out of my mind. I’ve recently realised that tapping into that optimism can make me feel better about something that’s happening in a completely different part of my life. It gives me focus and excitement.

Optimism for me, at the moment, is directed towards my future and career. It feels great knowing that I’m doing everything possible to set myself up for success in the future. I’m not focussing on only one thing; I’m trying to set myself up with options through my studies and work experience. It may be hard work, but it gives me that belief for the things to come and distracts me from other things that may not be going so well right now.

There is always something that can get in the way of feeling optimistic, but there is always room in life to do something that can give you that feeling and its worth every minute. Giving myself time to think about what I am doing well so I can focus on feeling optimistic isn’t something that comes naturally to me, but I hope I can keep doing it in more parts of my life.

Could you tell me a time you felt connected?

I recently moved The Hague in the Netherlands from my home in London to study for a year. An experience that has turned out to be far more challenging and lonely than I ever pictured it to be.

When I’m waiting at Centraal Station for a train one of my favourite things to do is to sit on the steps next to the piano where commuters sit and play. I love watching people sitting down playing, so absorbed in what they are doing and so connected to everyone that is listening to them. I like observing the smiles it puts on people’s faces and the people just jumping up when they have finished playing and continuing on their way!

Doing this reminds me that everyone is kind of alone, but connected at the same time. I gain a lot from taking time out of my often hectic day to sit down and watch people walk to where they have to be, whilst listening to someone play the piano. I think it’s little things like this that you need to appreciate when you’re feeling lonely or anxious and this really lifts my mood on a blue day. It would be easy to sit on my phone or have both headphones in, but I feel so much more connected to people when I’m looking up and not plugged into a device. This is so important with regards to my generation. I was born in 1998 so have been exposed to technology and social media since the beginning of my teenage years. Social media can make it really difficult to get a realistic picture of life, when all you see is the idyllic visions and social personas that people present on Instagram. Something I really struggle with and that gets me down is constantly comparing my reality abroad (which can be pretty miserable at times) with the life my friends at home are having.

But, right now I feel present and content, which is something I’m really trying to feel more often; through doing yoga, running, reading more and spending time outdoors disconnected from technology. Growing up is hard and I’m still trying to figure out how to live well and be happy, but baby steps! Memo - written sitting on the steps of Den Haag Central station next to the piano!

Could you tell me a time you needed time?

When you’re loud, it’s hard to be quiet. I have a big personality. Always cheery, always smiley and cracking jokes. I’m a people person. A massive extrovert. I definitely love nothing more than spending time with others.

But recently I got rejected from a job that I had worked hard to have enough experience for, and one that I had wanted for a while. I’m lucky. I have a job that I love, friends around me and supportive family. But still, it has really hit me. My confidence has been knocked, I’m disappointed, embarrassed and more than ever I’m doubting myself, rethinking my abilities and what I want to do next. I currently live in a fantastic place, where there are always things going on. I live with other people, people come over, and people invite you round to spend time with other people. Usually, I love it, but recently it has meant that it has been hard to take time for myself. If you’re an introvert people expect you spend time on your own. You can take an hour, an afternoon, a day out, to spend doing whatever you need to. But if you’re not, any time that you try to take is interrupted by a barrage of texts and phone calls, knocks on the door to check that you’re ok. People think you are being rude if you don’t fancy going along to an event, for the first time since they’ve known you, if you want to go for a walk by yourself or just fancy a day watching Netflix (other streaming platforms are available) in bed. They worry, constantly ask if you’re alright and you say yes, because, despite acting out of the ordinary, you are. But when you’re loud people don’t expect you to want time to be quiet. They expect you to bounce back. To constantly remain the life and soul, to crack jokes. If you say no it sounds too dramatic for the way that you’re feeling. They try to help, to fix it, to get you out, give advice, to hang out with you, when all you really need, is a little bit of time. 

I won’t be sad forever, or probably even for very long, but I do need to be allowed to be sad and disappointed and sometimes, that’s ok. I need time to figure out what I can do differently, where I might want to go next, what steps I need to take.  

When you’re loud, being quiet can be a battle. But I think that we all need to be afforded some time to think every now and again. 

Luckily, today, I’ve been able to take a minute for myself for the first time in a long time. And it’s given me time to write this blog, which I’ve been meaning to do for a while. 

If you ask me again next week, I’ll write a post about feeling happy - about how funny I am (or think I am) and how much I love a good boogie at a party, because that is me, most of the time.

Could you tell me a time you felt freedom?

I oftentimes find myself wandering alone, finding strength in my autonomy and independence. Whether this is a good or bad thing, well that’s your opinion. I find myself alone despite friends and family by my side, pushing those closest to me away for fear of hurt down the line. For me, solitude comes not from the silence that my being alone brings, but rather the safety of knowing that no-one can hurt me later on should I let them in too close. 

In the summer of 2018, I lost a very close family member to suicide and it hurt far more than I’d have ever anticipated. Within 10 days of her death, I sat university exams and flew out to Singapore alone to pursue an internship at an economic think-tank. I hurt more than I could ever say but numbness was to be my only resolve.

This hurt came not necessarily from her death, nor my living alone on a different continent. I’d been pushing people away for years due to childhood trauma in days long passed. For me, moving away and making a new life is far easier than staying in one place, risking letting people in, ever bringing down my wall that has been so carefully built. I’ve seen time and time over that it’s those closest to you that you must never trust, it’s those that you give the chance that hurt you. 

When in Singapore, I travelled alone around much of South-East Asia on my weekends, and one weekend wound up in Krabi in southern Thailand. I found myself making friends with two other solo travellers, and for a day we feigned friendship and an intimacy unparalleled in so many of my real friendships. For a day, I found two other women as scared as I to let people in. I found two other women like me, that didn’t push me on questions I had little will to answer, but with them took a little piece of my heart that I sleep peacefully knowing will never be shared or hurt. We drove through the rugged streets to unknown beaches and I told them things that I’d never tell my closest of friends back home. 

Whether I will ever let people in, let my life be ruled by trust and compassion and empathy, well I doubt that immensely. But that day in rural Thailand, in the company of women whom I shall never meet again, with the promise of feigned friendship that had only pure intention and good will, I found myself feeling free. Finally, I was free.

Could you tell me about a time you felt anxious?

Ah man, all the time. 

There’s a familiar expression of mine that my friends and family recognise almost instantly – a furrowed brow and eyes growing wide in concern as my hands starts to softly poke at my face while I’m thinking. A sudden silence and drop of energy after a lot of conversation and animation, as it becomes apparent that I am clearly musing over something. It can be triggered by almost anything – I can be my happiest and relaxed self without a care in the world, and the smallest and most insignificant inconvenience can send me into a downwards spiral of anxiety. 

‘Don’t worry’ is what people say to me the most in life. But as I’ve grown older I’ve come to realise that being worried is a part of my permanent state of being.

As a child I would frequently lie awake at night worried out of mind, my heart racing and a million thoughts circling around my head. Back then it was things I’d only long to worry about now – having said something embarrassing in class, getting in trouble when I had forgotten to do my homework, going into school after an argument with a friend, and wondering where I would sit at lunch. Acne, boys, fashion, exam results. How I looked, how I acted, who I was friends with. Every time I would start at a new school, I would cry to my mum the night before as I didn’t know where I would be able to hang my coat.

As I grew older, the things I would worry about as a child seemed almost insignificant compared to the things you have to worry about as an adult. Suddenly there’s bills to be paid and monthly budgets to be planned, job interviews to attend, bosses to please and life decisions to be made. And amongst all the normal adult worries - like money, health and relationships - comes another string of worries that are specific to you and your life. 

I bit the bullet and went to the doctor about my racing heartbeat and tight chest that I would get when someone at work asked to talk to me, or the dizzying thoughts of having done something wrong if a friend replied to my text in a slightly different tone than usual. The diagnosis of anxiety was a relief, but it manifested itself into something far more dangerous as I tried to take control of it, to find a distraction. During the deepest darkest clutches of my eating disorder last year, my worried thoughts at night would not be on whether my health would deteriorate further or the people in my life I was hurting, but on whether or not the 600 calories that I had consumed that day were ‘too much.’ The irony was that when my body and mind was consumed with anorexia, the things I would have usually worried about once upon a time were the last things on my mind. So, in a sense, I had achieved what I wanted. 

But I made the decision to remove myself from the place I became sick when I realised I couldn’t heal there, and now, six months later, my mind is occupied differently. For the first time in a long time, there’s relative peace in my head. I now spend most of my time thinking about the French language, dog walking, Zumba and the absolute joy of hot Belgian fries on a Sunday evening. I find myself in a loving relationship with a wonderful guy, and there’s now another person floating about in my thoughts, and not just me. My spare time is now filled with exhibitions and cinemas to go to, parks to visit and cobbled streets to cycle over. I have the mental, and physical, capacity to travel to new countries and dance at concerts again. I’m working somewhere where all the responsibility doesn’t fall on just me, and when I go home at 5 o’clock, I truly do go home. I’m able to sit down and read a book without my thoughts rushing off somewhere, finishing it from cover to cover and giving it my full, undistracted attention. I can watch new TV shows and films with my boyfriend without thinking about what I had for dinner. When I make a mistake or something goes wrong, I’m able to view it rationally and know that these things happen, and it won’t always be bad. 

The worry is still there, of course. The familiar drop in my stomach when presented with something foreign and unusual. And it will always be there – I am an anxious person. I care too much about what people think, how my actions directly impact those around me and the decisions I make in life. But I have come to realise now that life doesn’t have to be perfect and free of anxiety for it to be a happy life. And that’s what it is – a happy life, with bits of anxiety in it, and not the other way around.

Could you tell me a time you felt lost?

It’s incredibly easy to look at yourself and never be satisfied. It’s incredibly easy to reflect on what you haven’t achieved. It’s incredibly easy to become comfortable. It’s incredibly easy to suffer in silence.

It’s not easy to change who you want to be. It’s not easy to push yourself. It’s not easy to move your comfort zone. It’s not easy to admit your suffering.

Why should you settle for easy? – I asked myself this question on Boxing Day 2017, the day I admitted to myself that I wasn’t okay.

Since that day I started creating change, making more mistakes, trying to learn from them and ultimately trying to make myself feel better, make myself feel happy. I tried to tackle everything head on, I tried to tackle a few big factors in my life that didn’t make me feel happy, I struggled, eventually I broke the biggest factor down and tried to fix it one day at a time – making positive choices consistently. I had bad days, I had good days, I had great days and I had days that I don’t want to remember – but ultimately they were the days that shaped me.

I put one foot in front of the other and repeated, repeated and repeated. 

Set myself progressive goals that I never thought would be possible and then… I put one foot in front of the other and repeated, repeated and repeated.

I’m over 18 months on from when I first started and I find it hard to reflect on what I have achieved but so far: I’ve lost over 8 stone; I’ve ran a marathon; ran 4 half marathons; ran over 500 miles in 2019 (so far..); I’m due to run, run cycle and kayak the width of Scotland in a couple of months and ultimately I have begun to like the person I am becoming. I have ups and downs and no two days are the same but I am positive that my best is yet to come.

Do something today that will make you smile tomorrow.

Could you tell me a time you felt alive?

When you think about it, like really think about it, our bodies are pretty incredible. Home to everything that we need to survive; full of lots intricate workings ticking along, that we are usually blissfully unaware of (you can tell I didn’t study biology). It’s amazing and I definitely don’t appreciate it enough. To say that everyday I recognise that my body is “alive” would be a lie. Yet each and every time I step and submerge myself in the sea, I become acutely aware of all of those intricate workings; my heart beating (sometimes racing), my breath sharp and icy; my legs and muscles and every joint and connection within them awaken and I definitely feel alive. 

 Over the last few years I have really come to appreciate the incredible effects of sea swimming on both my body and head. There really is no feeling quite like it. You could have had the worst day in the world and a splash in the sea will clear everything away, even if only for a short while. Swimming in the sea doesn’t allow for me to focus on anything that has been all consuming in myhead. As the cold water moves up my body with every step, or sometimes leap that I take, I become focused only on the shock of the cold water on my skin (and sometimes the screeches of pals also taking a dip). There is no space to think about anything else and it is great. Once my head is under (which can sometimes be a challenge), my hair wet, my eyes softly stinging from the salty water and I come back up for air, I absolutely feel alive.

 Whatever day I’ve had, if a swim in the sea can be fitted in, it’s always going to be a better day.  It doesn’t need to be a long dip, sometimes it’s only three minutes before my body says, “okay I feel alive but I’d like to get out now” or on other days it could be over twenty, swirling and swimming away. Whatever the length of time the effects are just the same, you feel invigorated, refreshed, awake, alert and bloody brilliant.

 Living where I currently live has made the sea unavoidable, with beaches and swim spots in abundance and for that I am very fortunate. Wherever I head next, I will need to make sure that there is some form of open water not too far away as I know my body and head will need regular check-ins. It’s addictive and in my eyes one of the best ways to feel alive. 

 Next time you’re near the sea, just jump in. 

Could you tell me a time you took a risk?

I’ve found that living with a big vision of the future you wish to create brings some doubt and anxiety about the details of the how, when and where of it all — And the way we’re brought up in society hasn’t allowed us to live with these creative tensions — suggesting that we always need to have control over these things — so when we don’t, we stress!

It’s nice to have things under control... it’s nice to see the full view... and I think that’s why most people stay at their ‘control towers‘ in life. Unless you sense or know there is a much deeper river of life out there waiting for you to experience, I’ll be the first to admit that it’s pretty hard to let go of the control!

But learning to live with the mystery, the unknown, the doubt — is one of the most rich and purposeful experiences Elise and I have had. 
I remember this time last year just before Elise left her job to pursue our dreams, I asked her if she was sure she wanted to leave the comfort of the job (that she loved!). She just simply looked at me and said, “we weren’t created to be comfy.” Probably the sexiest thing I’ve ever heard someone say ha! But I think that’s so real — because we don’t ever arrive at a place where this all comes easy — it’s a real journey — but I believe if you listen to the voice of encouragement deep within, and simply trust and believe that this inner voice is not your own but the voice of your designer/creator/divine encourager/God — you’ll find overwhelming peace amongst the unknowns of life — and you’ll be able to step into the fullness of the journey you were born to explore and enjoy.

You’ll be able to let go of the exhausting fight for control and find rest and joy in not knowing the full picture. 

So, if you’ve read this far, know that it’s okay to figure things out step by step. It’s a journey — and there’s no beauty without mystery.

Could you tell me a time you felt fear?

The word fear is often associated and thought of with negative connotations. I guess in the last year the feeling of fear has hit me in many ways, admittedly negative, but also in a more positive way, a way that has made me feel scared, but determined at the same time. 

Throughout my life I have been faced with fear: fear of losing, fear of trying too hard and failing, fear of my own thoughts and ambitions and even a fear of something that may not ever happen to me. But the fear of the unknown in your own life has to be one of the most significant and for me the largest and newest emotion I have felt in the last year. Whilst entering the last year of my university experience at this stage of my life, I came across large challenges, some that I knew eventually I would get through, but many I had no idea what the impact or the outcome of such actions would be. I was aware that I had so many decisions to make in the near future, the fear of the unknown and not knowing what will happen if I choose a certain pathway of life hits you hard, not only is it constantly on your mind: as you are weighing up such choices and consequences of choosing a certain route to take, but also you know that ultimately the ownership is on you and only you for making such decisions. Throughout the year I have tried to weigh up and think and really try and engage with how and what I want my life to be like, and as a 22-year-old female that is hard. Once you reach adulthood the expectation of you being brave and fearless really is a myth, if anything, when you become an adult that is when you really start to experience consequential fear. When making the decisions I have made (and I am still yet to make more) I have decided that going with the moment and what you feel at that precise moment deters the fear that you may be feeling and simply makes you feel like it is a small decision you are making that day. The fear of the unknown will never leave, it will also never get easier as I get older and ultimately have to make even more decisions and regulate consequences. At the beginning I stated that not all moments where I have felt fear this year have been negative, in fact many things I have feared have turned out to be some of the most amazing things I have experienced this year. Fear is not to be feared; fear is to be negotiated with: for example, whatever you are scared of now, will you still be scared of that in a month, year or even two years’ time? The fear of the unknown has definitely developed me into a stronger minded individual, not only that but I have learnt that the fear of the unknown is normal, positive, natural and healthy.

Could you tell me a time you felt self love?

Self Love is a journey.

It’s impossible to talk about that journey without facing up to what came before. Self loathing.

I’m sure it’s a familiar tale to plenty of people. Tearing myself to shreds, overly critical about my abilities, about my body, about myself as a person. Imagining the worst things people could think about me and taking those to be truth. I’d try to take control of how I was feeling. To manage it in all the wrong ways. I was punishing my body by withholding things I like and need, like food and space to heal, and overindulgence in the household numbing agent of choice, alcohol. Strictly controlling my diet wasn’t making me any happier. My body got smaller but it wasn’t good enough. The workouts got tougher and became daily and were not to clear my head but to punish myself, to push my body to the brink. They didn’t help either. The booze helped. When I was drunk I didn’t give a damn about what anyone thought about me. I could stop the nonstop criticism in my head and just relax. It was wonderful. And then the morning would come and I’d be a wreck. But not from the hangover. It wasn’t the physical effects of the booze that left me crippled. It was the psychological effects. I was far more anxious than I previously had been pre-drinking. What had I said? What had I done? I’d probably made a tit of myself. People probably thought I was a terrible person because I’d have revealed that I actually am a terrible person. I’d want to hide and outwardly pretend it never happened whilst inwardly destroying myself. So I’d restrict my food, or kick my ass in a workout and punish myself to balance it all out. And it all worked out and I lived happily ever after in this healthy cycle of self loathing, numbing and more self loathing.

The one thing I was fairly sure I was good at was my job. When I was at work I was fine. The worry and bullying would mute and I’d spend my days helping other people solve their problems and helping them overcome their anxieties. Before I knew what had happened I had thrown far too much of myself into my work and I had a serious burn out. My mental health hit rock bottom and I couldn’t work. I couldn’t do much at all. I felt like a shadow of a person, vaguely human shaped but completely unable to function. The self loathing took on a whole new level and all hope escaped me. I would look at old photos of myself laughing and smiling and think ‘Why can’t I be THAT woman? She was actually pretty fun. She laughed. She has friends. She knew what she wanted in life. She was pretty cool. Why didn’t I appreciate her when now I am THIS wreck?!’ This was retrospective self love accompanied by the greatest self loathing I’d ever felt. Self loathing which convinced me that the world would be better if I wasn’t in it. It was dark. And hard. And I wanted to be the woman I used to be. I wanted to have a second chance and to appreciate her and tell her I loved her, show her the affection that she needed and deserved so that she’d never leave me again. No wonder she’d left when all she’d had from me was shit.

I made some drastic life changes, quit my job, took a considerable amount of time off and worked only on projects I was passionate about but that I could manage, promising myself I’d duck out if I started noticing those patterns of downward spiral again. Steps towards self love can be big or small. Talking to people about my breakdown and what had happened reduced my anxiety. I realised I wasn’t alone. Then things like curating my Instagram feed and removing anyone who made me feel bad or critically compare myself to.

I stopped drinking alcohol. That alone has been the single biggest act of self love, the biggest step, and one of the toughest parts of this journey. When I have a bad day all I want is a large glass of wine (or five!), evidence that to me it is a numbing agent, a way to avoid facing up to my issues and communicating how I feel. Instead I’ll have a lemonade and open up about how I’m feeling. Shock horror, it’s far more effective than deadening my emotions! Sobriety has shown me that I’m good at conversation, can make people laugh, can still tell a good story, can dance and sing and be in the moment completely stone cold sober. This woman can still be life and soul and be sober. It’s a great feeling. So is the sweet joy of waking up hangover free! I’ve been embracing my body. It’s changed since I started to allow myself to eat what I wanted. I look in the mirror and see how far I’ve come. I see the curves and wobbles and feel proud that they’re there because they show me how far I’ve come. A year ago I’d have bullied this body away.

I’m still growing, getting to a stage where I’m ready to work out again but my fear of obsessive exercise in the name of faux self love is still there. My body needs me to move but it doesn’t deserve to be punished. I’m not confident I can get back into a regular workout routine without slipping back into old habits. I know i’ll write this and send it over and then worry that it’s not good enough. I’m still learning and that’s ok. Baby steps. Self Love is a journey.