17 Things 2017 Has Taught Me

Sunday 31 December 2017

17 Things 2017 Has Taught Me

Well, 2017, you've been one hell of a ride.

As I sit and reflect on all that has occurred this year, I can't help but feel proud of everything I have accomplished. Like, on a personal level. (SIDENOTE: I'm trying so hard to not be political in this post!)

So here it is, guys: as we wave goodbye to 2017, I give you 17 things I have learned this year, and hope to take with me into the future.

17. Find Time for What You Love

Having a job sucks. Full-time education sucks. Responsibility sucks. Trying to be an adult sucks. It sometimes feels like an endless cycle of shittiness that I cannot escape. But this year has taught me to take time for myself. I have read the books I have wanted to read for the first time in nearly two years. I light candles and take baths (not apologising for being that basic). I exercise because I want to. I make time to go outside everyday and take in my surroundings. I try to find happiness in everything I do because, believe me, it makes getting out of bed in a morning a lot easier!

16. Feel the Fear and do it Anyway

Growing up is the scariest thing in the world to me. People around me are getting older; I'm having to start thinking about 'big girl jobs' post-uni, and it's all new and exciting but so, so frightening. The safety bubble of student life is slowly deflating: but why drown when you can swim? It's all challenging but I'm not going to stop living my life because I'm scared.

15. It's OK to be Selfish

I have a classic case of chronic 'yes-ness'; I always have been a victim of it. I seem to always spread myself too thin, have my fingers dipped in just one too many pies because I am just terrified of saying 'no' to people. Well...not anymore! I've taken it upon myself to learn to say 'no' to people for my own sanity. And that's ok.

14. Taking 'Me Time' is a Good Thing

I've learned to embrace my own company because it is just as valuable as anybody else's. Silence can be golden. It's probably been one of the hardest things to learn to do but most definitely been rewarding. I take the time to reflect, to clear my mind, to simply stop and be. In a city like London, to just be seems impossible but in those quiet moments, I feel rejuvenated and healthy.

13. Kindness will Never be a Weakness...

It's my biggest strength. It takes so much to be kind; it's a real power. I honestly sleep better knowing that I try to make my contribution to this world as positive as I can. Wanting the very best for everyone can never be bad; as the saying goes: "treat others the way you want to be treated."

12. ...But Never be a Pushover

Kindness is a great thing, but it doesn't equate to weakness. I have stopped letting people walk all over me. Stop letting people treat you like you are small. You are not small. I stand up for what I think is right and good; I fight for what I deserve. I know my worth and I hold that dear to me.

11. Stop Putting so Much Pressure on Yourself

I have always prided myself on being a hard-worker. I enjoy challenging myself. What I don't enjoy is stretching myself so thin that I crash and burn and don't succeed at all. I may have high expectations of myself, but this year has taught me that those expectations can't always matter. Being realistic is important.

10. Travel

This year has afforded me the most wonderful opportunities to explore places I never thought I'd see, experience cultures I have always wanted to partake in. I can only see the positives that travelling offers. It reminds me that there is a world outside of university, outside of London, outside of England. Travelling broadens horizons and offers perspective and I can only hope to see more of the world in the years to come!

9. Don't Just Feel; Talk.

I'm the worst at opening up *sighs*. I know it; my friends know it (yes Millie, I'm talking about you ;)!) I just hate feeling like a burden or that I'm whining over nothing. But this year I have made a real conscious effort to open up more to those closest to me. Slowly, I'm getting better and I think it helps. 'A problem shared is a problem halved', after all. Well, I'm not too sure if I believe that but I've learned that my the people I love will never think me a burden or reject my ask for help. I really hope to improve!

8. Not Everyone is Rooting for you

Another thing this year has taught me is that not everyone is looking out for you. Not everyone wants you to succeed. It's shit that people in this world are like this but, hey, it clearly their problem and - most importantly - it's not your problem to fix. Transform their desire to see you fail into your own personal drive. Nothing is going to make you stand taller than people trying to push you down.

7. Know Your Worth

Don't let anyone make you think you are worth any less. This year has taught me my own self-worth, my own value, and no one can take that away from me. You are valid in every single way. Your time, your energy, your efforts are as important as anyone else's. No-one should make you feel otherwise.

6. Tell Your Loved Ones You Love Them

Knowing you're loved is the most beautiful feeling in the world: share it. Your loved ones need to know how much you love them. They aren't going to be here forever.

5. A Patriarchy Still Exists and it's Not OK.

Would this really be a post written by Kerry if it didn't incorporate issues of gender equality?! STAND UP LADIES! 2017 most definitely was our year but it's only just the beginning.

4. Confidence is Key...and if you aren't, pretend!

It's all about how you present yourself. I will never be taken seriously in all walks of life if I can't say "I can do this!" Believing in yourself is the first step to greatness; how can you accomplish anything if you are scared to fail? Take a deep breath and jump...and if you can't, then get someone to push you; we all need a little bit of help now and then!

3. Stay True to Yourself

Stay loyal and honest with yourself. Never be ashamed of who you are because, at the end of the day, what is cool about being like somebody else? One more time for the people in the back...YOU ARE IMPORTANT; YOU ARE SPECIAL; YOU ARE LOVED FOR BEING YOU!!!!!!!!!!!

2. Everything Happens for a Reason

This year has proved to me that karma is real...and that it's the biggest bitch about! There is purpose to everything and the cyclical nature of life just serves to prove it. What goes around comes around. Innit.

1. There's Beauty in Everything...you Just Need to Look Harder

Sometimes, don't you just want to wake up and cancel the day and just start again tomorrow? It's dark and it's cold and you have no energy or time and you just think it would be easier to hide away from the world. I never let myself do this. Neither should you. Even if it just the smallest of things, there is always something to be seen and appreciated - a cute dog on the tube, a hug from your friend, a text from your Mam. Everyday there is a reason to get up and live. For reference see the image below: meet Kevin, the happiest dog the District Line ever saw.

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I'm a Feminist Who Wears Pink...You Ok There?

Wednesday 27 December 2017

I'm a Feminist Who Wears Pink...You Ok There?

Little girls are, for the most part, taught that women can be anything. It's a great message; I am more than for it (#girlpower.) I know I can be anything I want to be. I know my gender shouldn't define my prospects. However, I also know that although my gender shouldn't be an obstacle, at some point it most definitely will (and already has been, but we'll get into that another time.) I mean, can we really say that we are promoting gender equality, when the message we consistently send out is that in order to achieve anything significant, girls need to adopt stereotypically-masculine traits. Like, sure you can be a girl and solve a quadratic equation, but you can't solve it wearing a dress. You can chair a meeting, but not wearing gels with crystal diamonds on the thumbnail. You can fix a car tyre, but not while wearing lipstick.

I mean, everyone knows that lipstick prevents people from being competent.

What I am getting at is this: why can't I participate in the feminine behaviours associated with my gender and be a boss-ass bitch? Surely, it can't mean I'm a failed feminist, right?

I've wanted to write this post for a while, but the trigger for it can be pinned down to a recent video of a certain famous race car driver's comments regarding his nephew, laughing whilst claiming "boys don't wear dresses!" It completely sums up my perspective of where gender equality fails. Wearing a dress - arguably the epitome of all that is feminine - is weak; it's laughable. It is the complete and utter devaluation of femininity. It is the reason why everyone is fine with a little girl playing with car toys and balks at a little boy wearing a dress. It's less about enforcing rigidly defined gender roles on boys and girls, and more about straight up fucking misogyny. Anything regarded as "feminine" is still seen by men and women alike as occupying lower status.

We see the devaluation of femininity play out frequently. There's the whole trope of "you throw/run/hit like a girl," not to mention the fact that "girl" is routinely used as an insult among boys and men. Women are advised to tone down their femininity—less ruffles, less makeup, less flashy jewellery; more dark pant-suits with clean lines—if they want to be taken seriously at their jobs. And while the backlash against the hyper-gendering of little girls—the ubiquitousness of the culture of Princess, tutus and a pink colour palette—is just as important as the hyper-gendering of little boys, there is occasionally an anti-femme tone that creeps into the discourse.

There's a difference between gender expectations and freedom of choice. There's nothing wrong with plastic tiaras and pastel colours, but they shouldn't be pushed onto little girls as a means of gendering. Like, for example, I've seen toy 'ambulances' that come in shades of pink and blue, which is super annoying on one level as it sends the 'subtle' (lol) message that girls need some kind of special girl car to be a successful girl paramedic. But on another level, I guess there is nothing objectively wrong with a pink toy ambulance. When people ask "Why can't girls just play with a regular toy?" I always wonder why the pink ambulance can't be the "regular" toy? I mean, I know why, but it's frustrating to constantly see the stereotypically-masculine version of any given toy being hailed as the "regular", while the feminine version is sniffed at.

What I'm trying to get at, I think, is the idea that gender equality doesn't mean that everything has to be androgynous. It means that all the girly things we've been taught to disdain should be seen as being just as good as all the masculine stuff we've been taught to embrace.

The way forward isn't to teach girls to be more like boys—that's just the same old patriarchal shit of privileging masculinity over femininity. Instead, we should be teaching all kids that wearing skirts and loving pink and wanting to play rugby are totally cool and fine ways to be. There's nothing inherently bad about being feminine; it's enforcing femininity on people as a means of oppression that's the problem. We feminists fight for breaking the gender binary, which is for sure an admirable idea that should be tackled with enthusiasm. But as we move towards viewing gender as more of an all-encompassing spectrum, we need to make sure that spectrum includes the colour pink.

*omg look at that: a little girl wearing pink and blue...groundbreaking.

*photo creds to my mam.

© Kerry Maxwell 2017

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I Don't Know!

Saturday 23 December 2017

I Don't Know!

When I tell people I have a blog, and that I love to write, the first question they ask is what I write about. And I bloody hate it. Every time I hear it, I grit my teeth and form a tight smile because, well to be honest, I never know how to reply. *fyi, the theme of 'not-knowing' is going to be mentioned here. A lot. Just an early warning :)*

I'm still trying to find my line of thought when it comes to writing. I was going to say "niche" but I don't want to sound like some overly pretentious wannabe! Because of this, my posts are rather sporadic and random; they don't seem to link, which pisses me right off. Not that I want to categorise my blog into a certain genre of writing; I just sometimes think it would be easy to give my blog a 'type', as it were: like, a lifestyle blog, or travel writing, or reviews. I'd just like some definition.

Maybe that's what I'm trying to get at. This place is exactly that...a place. An empty sheet, a blank document, a plain page, ready for me to word-vomit all over it when inspiration strikes.

Because isn't that what writing is about? Maybe it's just me...I don't know!*told you*

It's my safety net but also manages to be somewhat out of my comfort zone. It's definitely my security blanket; I know I can write and I know I can write well, but the content I want to write about can be riskily controversial, controversially risky...if you read my earlier post about 'The Unpleasantries of Writing', you'll see my point - oh my, that was the most dire plug in the history of the world. Virtual apology extended.

I don't know.*yet again* Maybe I'm just overthinking the whole thing. I'm saying that I want to define my blog and give it a genre, yet I don't want to categorise it. I'm saying writing is both in and out of my comfort zone. I'm just a walking, talking, breathing, WRITING contradiction really! I'm thinking of a point and completely reversing it...

And not to sound like a complete cheesepuff, a lightbulb has literally just switched on in my brain. You know the feeling: when the fog lifts and all becomes clear, and you can't type quick enough in case you lose the flow! Thinking. I'm writing what I'm thinking. My blog is simply a stream of consciousness. It doesn't need to make sense - I mean, who's thoughts really make logical sense? It's just me sharing my perspective. I don't need to categorise it into anything else; I don't need to limit it to the confines of a genre. My blog is composed of my thoughts, feelings, ideas, and whatever weird and wonderful shit comes out of my mind. It's limitless. Endless. That should be good enough, right?


© Kerry Maxwell 2017

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Stop Attacking Me for Liking Christmas!

Monday 18 December 2017

Stop Attacking Me for Liking Christmas!

I firmly believe that Christmas isn’t just one day; it’s not simply ‘seasonal’ or a ‘holiday.’ Rather, Christmas is a lifestyle choice. And believe you me, it is never too early to celebrate! 

Bright, summer evenings are dead and gone, Halloween is a ghost (unapologetically punny!) and Bonfire Night… well, it’s hardly relevant, really. 

It might only be November whilst I am writing this, but the Christmas season has hit us – and boy has it hit us hard. You find yourself negotiating your way through precariously balanced towers of selection boxes in supermarkets and walking by stacks of wrapping paper.  You then convince yourself that buying an entire cheeseboard for your tea tonight is probably not the smartest idea when you have normal, non-seasonal food at home. 

I’m not ashamed to admit that I bash Christmas harder than the other reindeer bash Rudolph at the end of the song. The Christmas markets are up, the adverts are on and everything is beginning to look pretty and magical. However, I kind of feel like the only festive gal around. Every time I begin to hum a Christmas tune and try to share snapchats of Winter Wonderland, I automatically get shut down. “It’s too early!”, says Scrooge. “It’s not even December”, says the Grinch.

But rather than shun the holiday season, claiming that an elf dies every time you switch on Home Alone, why not embrace an extra month of Christmas cheer? It can lighten up a dreary life to no end as well as brighten up your student housing. Decorations are the answer to everything: crack in the wall? Cover it with tinsel! Bulbs gone? Fairy lights are the answer! And we all know that shoving a Christmas tree in the corner will hide that damp spot no problem. There you have it: Christmas brings love, joy and masks your dump of a house.

And how can we talk about the festive season without mentioning food? The sooner you embrace Christmas, the sooner you can start skipping the gym and stuffing your face with pies, chocolate and anything ‘naughty but nice’. Christmas equates to indulgence; perhaps instead of being a Grinch, you should stuff your mouth with segments of chocolate orange and hush. You also have the perfect justification for day drinking: Baileys at 3pm? It’s Christmas. 

Hang on…why am I justifying my passion for Christmas? Do you know what? To all those claiming I’m too ‘extra’ for celebrating Christmas a month too early…Fa La La La fuck

you. Go off and live in your non-seasonal caves of wintry doom and gloom. If I want to wrap myself in sparkly Christmas lights while listening to Mariah Carey and drowning in a bath of mincemeat and mulled wine in November, I’m going to.

So please hold your arguments about how Christmas has been killed by consumerism or how you “don’t really do Christmas”. Stop attacking those of us trying to be festive. Take a break from fighting capitalism, embrace the excess glitter and get in the fucking spirit *adjusts pink-Christmas-cracker-crown on head*.

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