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| Photos by Nicole Marshall |
Everyone has those days, where they feel rubbish about themselves and the way they look. That feeling always happens to me in January. January has always been a hard month for me, I think it’s because it’s the month that I’m out and about, helping other people reach their goals and not focusing much on myself and my goals. I generally work late nights meaning I don’t see much sunlight, as I’ll be in the office for the full day. Don’t get me wrong, I love helping people reach their goals as I get this sense of achievement and proudness when someone I work with reaches their goal. After January, I always start to focus more on myself and start to look at what I can change in my life, to help me fall in love with myself and my life again.
I thought I would list a few things that I changed towards the end of January or will be changing in February to help motivate myself.
Join a gym and have a program.
If you read my January favourites – you will know that I joined Pure Gym in Newcastle. At first, I found it hard to fit in the sessions but now I have set times, I go and I plan my classes and what I’m going to on a Monday morning ready for the week ahead. The gym is my ‘me time’ it makes me feel better about myself. I’ve always been one of those people that when I’m exercising I feel more motivated about what is happening around me, I find the gym relaxes me and makes me focus on me – not the things I have no control over.
Focus on my skin
I have always been lucky that my skin has never been really bad but I recently decided that I need to make more of an effort with my skin. My sister got me a lot of Estee Lauder skin care for Christmas which meant that I didn’t have to go out and buy a full range. I started using the range, but I didn’t pay massive attention but now I’m really focusing on looking after my skin. I’m still not great at taking my make up off but I’m working on that.
Look into what I’m eating
I will say that I don’t eat terribly as my mam makes a lot of my meals and I would say 80% of them meals are healthy. I started at the end of January taking a lot of meals to work so I’m not snacking as much but I still do snack but it’s mainly on breakfast cereal bars which aren’t too bad. I bought Lean in 15 by Joe Wicks, at the end of January to try out some new recipes. I’ve always been bad with breakfast but because of an app I downloaded called Fabulous which is about making small changes to your day and making them become new habits. This has helped me drink slightly more water – as I’m terrible at doing this and I’ve started eating breakfast more often.
Try and spend more time with family, friends and boyfriend.
I recently was given more hours at my job meaning I’m working around 35 hours a week at my coaching job and then I have my part-time retail job at Fenwick Department store. As you can guess, I only get 1 day off which at the minute I spend with my boyfriend as I hardly spend any time with him so the little time I do have I want to spend with him. I hardly get to see my friends or family and definitely don’t have any me time. After a few weeks of thinking I think I’ve decided to leave my retail job it’s not 100% yet but I think I will be leaving at the end of February as it’s not making me happy about my life and I feel like I’m missing out on so much that is happening because I work too much. I’m hoping having a full weekend off that I will get to see my friends, do day trips out and about and just enjoy my life a bit more with the people I love.
Start having me time.
This is something I started doing with small steps, I started with leaving my phone on my bed side table at 10pm I would love to do this earlier but I’m a bit of a social media lover and find put my phone down really hard. My main me time is while at the gym but I want to start doing it more at home. I’m starting to read more and turning my TV off at 10pm. It could earlier now that Celebrity Big Brother has finished (don’t hate my rubbish TV choice). I’ve learnt over the last few months that having some time by yourself is important, even if that just 30 minutes walking the dog.
