Go date yourself

So I have recently, and by recently I mean for at least the last year or maybe more? Have been taking myself out and about.

Why is this worth posting about? Because I bloody want to. SO… For a long time I found myself doing things with other people. Long walks, going to shops and generally always having company. Have I confused you? Good.

There is nothing wrong with spending time with your friends, far from it I do actually love being in the company in my friends and doing these things with them. However I realised one day that it felt like I couldn’t do these things UNLESS I had someone with me. It was like I forgot I could do these things without someone chaperoning me (a high number of people disagree with this statement)

So I decided I needed to get back to being comfortable with myself again. I’m a big fan of protecting your peace and that includes spending time alone just doing every day things. So I began with the easiest ones of going to the shop or walks by myself again. To be honest this was the lazy way of easing into it, just hop in the car and off I go and I was always too distracted in shops to notice I was alone to be honest.

The harder part for me was doing something that was typically done with someone, for example lunch in a cafe. Sounds simple enough but if you have spent a long time never going anywhere alone this can be a very alien feeling to you. It felt that way to me anyway but I wanted to get back to pottering around by myself. I grabbed my book and off I went in my car to find somewhere, anywhere really that I could have a chunk of time to myself.

Ended up in a small seaside town of all things, not much in the way of tourism which was perfect. I wandered around a bit to get my bearings before sitting on the beach and reading for a while. No music and no other distractions, just simply listening to the waves and birds around me. With the lack of tourism attractions this meant the beach was actually very quiet minus the odd dog or two coming flying out of nowhere towards me in hopes of treats.

Honestly I’m not really sure how long I was sat there for, I think I just read until I got hungry but there was so many cafes around so this gave me a second chance to just wander about working out which ones looked the best to try. Have to be honest, I went in and immediately wanted to leave. Not because of anything they did but just my own self being there alone and everyone looks at the door when it opens just made me want to turn heel.

Stomach had other plans though, it was running the show so I did force myself into the cafe and sit myself down in the corner out the way. Now I was still fully armed with my book or my phone, but the point was to not need these things to be alone. No one should need a form of armour just to eat by themselves.

I forgot how easy it was to just be alone, I realised that sounds weird but as I said when you spend so much time around other people. The idea of doing things alone sometimes throws your mind through a bit of a loop.

In a rather funny turn of events, I have now spent so much time learning to be by myself again and protecting my own peace that I now rarely entertain the idea of hanging out with many people. Clearly I need to work on balance a bit better but oh well.

The point to this is that I hope you take yourself out, and I don’t mean by assassination. Take yourself on the lunch date, take yourself on a woodland walk or go to the cinema yourself. Why do we feel we need to go do these things with someone or we can’t do it at all?

Sure it’s nice to enjoy things with someone, but if no one is available don’t let that be the thing that stops you from doing something. There might be other people there in the same boat and you may end up making a friend. Unless you are like me and have resting bitch face so no one talks to you… try smiling or something I don’t know.

Point being! Go do the thing. Go date yourself and treat yourself to days out and you never know what it could end up turning into.

B x

Social Media issues

How much time do you HONESTLY spend, on social media?

I couldn’t answer this question, because I didn’t know. Turns out, it was a fair amount.
Did I just say was? why yes I did! Since finding out how much time i was needlessly spending on it, I’ve made a very clear point of stopping it altogether when it isn’t really needed.

Now before everyone jumps on me, I totally understand texting, facebook messenger and staying in contact through social media. That to me is absolutely fine, well doing whatever you want with it is absolutely fine as well, but for me I was spending hours really just scrolling through pages.  Liking a few posts here and there, sharing a meme or whatever it was I was doing.

Positive impacts of Social Media: This can vary really but social media can be used widely for motivation, spreading awareness about issues that are important. Raising money for charities by reaching a larger audience. Connecting with like minded people and sharing videos or pictures of your life for your friends and family to see. Help you get inspired for changes in your life even if it is just redecorating a room. The list goes on really.

Negative impacts of Social Media: Bottom line… Mental health. There have been many studies proving that the increased use of social media apps has drastically had an impact on peoples mental health causing them to have low self esteem and higher risk of depression and various disorders. Only seeing snippets of peoples life has cause so many people to compare their life or body to others and then judge themselves heavily because they don’t believe they have it has good as the random influences or friend that they are looking at on various platforms.

It can also have heavy impact on sleeping patterns, which again can lead to issues in mental states. Can turn into sleep disorders as well that ends up with your body functioning differently or not as well as it used to.

A lot of people can constantly go ‘Like chasing’ and link it to their own form of self validation believing the more likes they get the more popular they are, or better a person they are. This can be a hard cycle to get out of for some or most people. They find themselves wanting to be on social media, even though they don’t know what for and the reply is often ‘Just scrolling’ or ‘Just messing about’.

Now, I’m not saying that everyone who uses Social Media is like this, i’m talking about massive excessive use. So I had a good think and thought back to what I used to do before fancy phones and the days of Myspace (yep, that old) and I remember being extremely active and always having something to do and never really being bored.

SO! I took to the mean streets of fife!…. Kidding, I asked my friends how often they use it, why they use it, and what they do that isn’t social media related. A lot of the same answers, a fair amount through the day and use for “banter” and ” chatting” and scrolling through pages for updates. When I asked about non social media related things, there was a fair bit of silence.

So for the past two maybe three weeks, I have been actively avoiding my phone and social media related things unless I get a notification of someone messaging me or asking me something. My on screen time dropped massively and I got loads done around the house, was far more social with friends in person. I also kept up to date with my own writing schedule and even got ahead of it.
I’ve been sleeping better, not feeling so grumpy or irritated. Also feeling happier within myself, I don’t feel the need to compare any part of my life or self to anyone.

However I’ve also missed engagements, birthdays and surprise party invites… apparently I rely on facebook to notify me of these things so… my bad? Also the irony of posting this on a blog site, and mostly on twitter as well while talking about the issues of social media, It is not lost on me but as mentioned before, it’s one of the best ways to reach an audience and spread awareness!

I would honestly recommend putting the phone down, the laptop away and just try having a day without going on social media and see how better you feel, or how much time you realise you have to be doing things, because honestly it was a shock to my system when i realised it.

B x

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