Now I don’t want to alienate any non-religious readers, or any readers with different religious views so if you don’t want to read this post I completely understand! Having said that I promise it isn’t a post solely concerned with religion.

But today I want to talk about Lent.

Because for me the idea is important.

Lent is the perfect time for making a special effort. For reflection. For renewal.

I remember one of the former priests at my church saying once that Lent shouldn’t just be an excuse to give up something, for example sweets, because that demeans the meaning of Lent, it represents so much more than that.

Now I have absolutely nothing against non-religious people using Lent solely as motivation to give something up, sometimes it can be useful to have that defined time period, especially as many people are simultaneously trying to give something up. But I do get irritated when fellow religious people do the same.

That very same priest said that it was better in many ways to give your time for something good, rather than just giving something up.

I like this approach.

I really think that this can work for anyone no matter their religious views or lifestyle.

For example if you are someone who is constantly working to help other people and never resting, you can take the time to do something caring for yourself. Or for people like me, who spend a lot of time focusing on your own life and problems (I do try not to be like this!) you can take the time, each day, to focus on doing something good for others. It could be something simple like making sure you compliment someone everyday, or it could be helping someone with something they struggle with, or it could be volunteering. The possibilities are practically endless.

I don’t think giving things up is always wrong though. I think taking the time to think about the meaning of Lent and then giving up something significant is a wonderful thing to do. I especially think giving up things which are harmful to you are important. Your body is after all the only body you are going to get, we need to take care of ourselves.

So this Lent, what am I going to do?

Well for once I have taken the time to stop and think about the meaning of Lent and about my own life.

There is a lot I can change for the better. I focused on being better.

1. I’m going to look after my body. This means no more junk food which is harmful for my body. It means limiting substances like caffeine and alcohol. This doesn’t mean that I am cutting out everything that some people would view as unhealthy! I just don’t want to eat anything that will make me feel guilty or harm the health of my body. I still plan on baking, I will still (hopefully) go out to the restaurant and I will still go for coffee. I just won’t eat bought, processed food which is full of harmful substances like high levels of sugar, saturated or trans fats, excess salt or potentially harmful chemical additives.

2. I am also  going to pay attention to my body’s natural signals which  means getting enough sleep each night. It means exercising in every way I can. It also means making sure I take the time to rest when my body needs it, not straining it too far. My body is a temple and I will treat it as one.

3. I am going to devote some time everyday for personal reflection. Time for prayer. Time for reflection on my day, what I did that made me happy, what I did that negatively affected me. Time for meditation and time for thankfulness. Taking this time everyday can help you to grow as a person, it can help you understand yourself and make you appreciate your life more.

4. I am going to do something positive for someone else everyday. Take the time to help someone. Compliment someone meaningfully everyday. Always be polite. Smile at people. Take the time to ask people how they are and really listen to them. This too is such an important part of growing as a person and can bring you a lot of happiness. Not only this but it is a chance to give something back to the world and to the people you love.

In a way they echo my resolutions this year. I guess this is because these are the things I want to do to become a better person. I want to them for me, for the people I care about and of course for God.

I don’t think these actions, these promises are uniquely relevant to Christians. I believe that everyone can implement actions like these in their everyday lives.

Even if you are completely and utterly atheist, making an effort to improve your life, to focus more on being happy and positive and to look after yourself, is so so important and really can make your quality of life so much better!

…..

I hope this post hasn’t been too deep for any of you and if you were put off by the religious content I apologise, I did try to make it fairly ambiguous so that it could mean something to all of my readers!

Are you giving anything up for Lent?
What are your thoughts on improving the quality of your life?
What efforts do you make to be happier in life?

When I go visit Tom I always have a brilliant time.

It doesn’t matter if the weekend is packed full of activities or completely relaxed and spent at home, I never fail to leave happy.

Long-distance is really difficult, I’m not going to lie, but it does have some positives! The best thing about it is that every time you are reunited the time spent together is so precious and feels that extra bit special

We had a mixture of activity and relaxation, the perfect balance really.

We went for walks along the beautiful river.

We saw the first signs of Spring’s arrival.

We watched films (50/50, The Adjustment Bureau and K-Pax) and munched cookies (and un-pictured toffee popcorn!).

We sat in cafes, drank coffee and shared chocolate fudge cake.

We cooked tasty and healthy food. This is a plate of whole wheat pasta and tomato sauce with onions, peppers, quorn chicken, ham, garlic and spices – delicious.

And most importantly, we spent some magical moments together!

Hope your weeks are turning out well

What did you do this weekend?
What have you got planned this week, anything special?

p.s. Thank you so much for all of your brilliant advice on my last post! Your suggestions were all fantastic and I will be replying to all of your comments tomorrow

p.p.s. I hope you all had a lovely Shrove Tuesday/Mardi Gras/Pancake day!

Or maybe fitness has a problem with me.

I know, I know. I workout quite a lot when my pain levels are low.

I don’t mean that I don’t enjoy working out – I do. I just have quite a big problem with my fitness capabilities: my stamina.

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For instance, let me show you last week’s workouts:

Monday – Rest day. I was pretty drained from my weekend with Alice.
Tuesday – 1hr 30 of Pilates.
Wednesday – Level 1 of 30 Day Shred.
Thursday – 10 mins HIIT workout + 30 mins Upper-body strength workout.
Friday – Was going to be 40 mins at the gym but I woke up really sore and as I had to get the train that afternoon it wasn’t really possible.

Doesn’t look too bad right?

I mean, ignoring Friday which didn’t go to plan, I would say that wasn’t bad and actually pretty damn good for someone with Fibromyalgia! But the problem is that I am really struggling at the gym or when doing any other form of cardio.

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The thing is, none of my workouts really help me build up my stamina and the issue with my situation is that often my pain prevents me from staying on any of the cardio machines (or cycling) for very long. Obviously because of this I never get a chance to really build up my stamina. Back before all of my problems started developing I used to dance every weekend and was pretty with walking and cycling, as things got progressively worse I had to stop being so active and my stamina has never really recovered. I’m trying to build it back up but it really isn’t easy!

Not to mention that when I’m going through a particularly ‘low’ patch with high levels of pain and fatigue I just can’t find the energy to do much exercise, if any. So obviously this has a big negative impact on my stamina and endurance…

Basically I’m in a bit of a conundrum!

Aaaand this is where you, my lovely readers, come in

I know a lot of you are serious fitness buffs and I want your advice. How on earth can I build up my stamina levels with all of my restrictions??

…..

In other news I have had a really lovely time with Tom this weekend. Today was our last day, I’m back on the train tomorrow morning for a 3-hour trip and then straight to a drama seminar!

I love being here, it’s great to get away from the ‘bubble’ that is my university, it’s a beautiful place, and Tom never fails to make me happy.

It’s bittersweet really.

I hope you all had a great first day back at school/uni/work!

Advice? Suggestions? Anecdotes of personal experience?
Also, any exciting happenings this week?

• I eat the same breakfast everyday.

• I am glued to my phone. Luckily not literally. I just can’t leave the house without it or I feel naked. It just goes to show the way technology has changed things in our society.

• I have bitten my nails for as long as I can remember. I have a clear memory of a specific incident, aged 3 at nursery, of being told off for it. I desperately want to stop – it’s a horrid habit. Unfortunately I do it when I’m stressed and to be honest that’s most of the time at the moment! Please don’t me.

• I love my veg but I don’t really enjoy salads. I know, I’m supposed to be into a healthy lifestyle… Let me explain, I don’t like salads with lettuce. I just find it hard to swallow the stuff!

So there you have it, my 7 random confessions

What’s your confession for the week?

I hope you are all having a fantastic weekend, I am having a lovely weekend with Tom, it’s so nice to be together again.

I’m afraid I’ll probably be quite absent for the next couple of days, it just means I’ll have lots of fabulous posts to catch up on!

In the meantime I wrote a guest post for the lovely Allie on my big life decision so go check out Allie’s brilliant blog Forgotten Beast to read it

Enjoy the rest of the weekend everyone, I have a post scheduled for tomorrow so I’m not leaving you completely

I sure have missed him!

But this evening I am hopping on a train and traveling up north to spend the weekend with him

I’m so ridiculously excited about it, I’ve spent the week telling pretty much everyone I know. I can’t help it, I  just can’t wait to be with him again.

So today because I missed writing my own post yesterday I have a fun little questionnaire planned.

The other day the lovely Laurence from Fit Peanut tagged my in her 11 Things post but I’ve already written one here. So I thought, why not just answer her questions so that you can all learn a little bit more about me (as if you weren’t all already sick of hearing about me!)

1. Dark chocolate or Milk chocolate?

For me definitely dark. I like mine to be 60-70% so not super bitter. But milk chocolate gets too sickly for me. Strangely enough I do like white chocolate which is pretty sickly! My favourite chocolate has to be dark chocolate pralines though. Mmmmmm.

These will do:

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2. When did you feel proud?

I felt proud last Friday when I got the results of my courseworks back and not only passed them all but got really good grades I really wasn’t expecting to do so well seeing how much I struggled last term and so, although I hate saying things like this as I’m always worried about sounding big-headed, I was pretty proud of myself!

3.Do you have any siblings?

Yes, one sister called Alice, she’s 16 next month. We’re born three years apart minus a week so March is a busy month for our family! I love my sister to bits, we’re really close and she’s a hilarious person to hang out with She came to visit me here at uni last weekend and we had a fantastic time.

4. Harry Potter or Twilight?

HARRY POTTER. I can’t even compare them. Although I didn’t mind the Twilight series as books they just completely lack the imagination and the character of the Harry Potter books. Not to mention that I grew up with Harry Potter, the books were with me from age 8 through to age 14 and they still bring me immense enjoyment when I read them. Not to mention that they effectively taught me to love reading (clichéd I know).

5. Have you ever gone to France (my country!)?

Yes heaps of times! I’m half French (my Mother is from the North of France) and I have a lot of family there. We have been several times a year since I was born, both to visit family and just on holiday. I love France and the culture there. It’s a very big part of me

6. Do you believe in friendship between guys and girls?

I believe in friendship between anyone. That is to say that I don’t think it matters what gender, race, culture, family background, upbringing etc you have, your friends don’t have to have lots in common with you. I have a wide mix of friends and I don’t really pay much attention to their gender. Having said that I do think that sometimes in relationships between men and women sex can become an issue: one person may find themselves becoming attracted to the other.

7. Left or right-handed?

Right-handed.

8. If you had a chance to switch bodies with someone you admire, would you do it?

No I don’t think so, I can imagine it would do more harm than good. I struggle very much with low self-esteem and I wouldn’t want to break the tenuous control I have over my insecurities.

9. What is the weirdest thing you do in your everyday life?

I don’t know if I do anything that weird! I’m not a terribly exciting person I have a daily checklist on my whiteboard that some would find strange I guess!

10. Did you ever check you ex-boyfriend’s facebook page?

I don’t really have any ex-boyfriends (Tom and I got together two days after my fifteenth birthday) so I don’t have this issue, thank goodness!

11. If you won the lottery, would you keep working?

If I was doing a job I didn’t enjoy I would quit that but I am fairly sure I’d find myself something to do that I loved, even if it was poorly paid or part-time because I would get so bored without something structured to do. It would mean I could stay at home if I had any children though which is something I really hope I’ll be able to do!

So there you have it, another little insight into my mind…

Fascinating wasn’t it

Thank you for the questions Laurence!

Answer any of the questions you fancy or elaborate on one of my answers
Any exciting plans for the weekend?

But I have a link for you, I think it is something that absolutely EVERYONE should read. Something that everyone should post on their own blog, send to their friends, put on their facebook, tweet…

It is not just about the topic itself, which is a very VERY important issue and deserves to be brought to the attention of the world, it also highlights one of the things that is still so terribly wrong with our society.

When I first heard about what was happening, frankly I was shocked and appalled. This article examines just what is so horrendous about the situation:

Hello Giggles – ‘I’m Not Okay With Chris Brown Performing at the Grammys and I’m Not Sure Why You Are’

Please, please, please read it.

It is a fairly wordy article but it is an incredibly well written piece.

It’s something that I feel very passionate about and I hope you all do too.

Hope you’re all having a good week, I’ll be back with a post tomorrow!

Yep, it’s that time of the week again, it’s WIAW everyone! So a huge thank you to the fabulous Jenn over at Peas and Crayons, you are brilliant for creating this (she’s also pretty brilliant anyway!)

This morning I had a 9am lecture (my favourite one of the week – modern lit) so breakfast had to be easy and quick. I’m afraid it’s not very photogenic but I’m including it anyway… Sorry I’m not sorry

Weetabix (of course), raw oats and frozen strawberries. Is it strange that I eat weetabix at least once a day and it’s the breakfast I used to have as a small child?

Not that I really care, lots of what I do is a bit bizarre to most people anyway!

I love my Wednesday morning lecture, it’s pretty much always really interesting and I usually manage upwards of six sides of notes. I love my fountain pen, it keeps my writing fairly presentable even when I’m scrawling away at top speed. Having said that, I’m not a very quick writer. Does anyone at uni (or who went to uni) find that you end up leaving gaps in your notes where the lecturer went to quickly so you have to go through the slides later and fill in the bits you missed?

Please say it’s not just me…

Lunch was quick and easy as well:

Arrabiata tortelloni with a tiny drizzle of olive oil and plenty of Parmesan.

Most of my afternoon was spent in the Cafe Nero near campus chatting, reading and working with my lovely friend Kathryn I’m her ‘civilised’ friend (i.e. I don’t go out drinking like all of her other friends!) and we always have great conversations. We pretty much talk about anything and everything, from trashy gossip through to current affairs and ethics. Plus she’s a big fan of cafes and tea rooms like me so it’s lovely to have someone to drink coffee with.

I got what they call a ‘Caramelatte’ but with skimmed milk and no whipped cream. Essentially coffee and sugar really

I know what you’re thinking, where are all of the veg? After all it is WIAW Love Your Veggies Month!

Well don’t worry, I ate a whole carrot (not chopped, just peeled) whilst doing my seminar prep. Yes I looked a bit crazy and like I’m on some sort of diet. Unfortunately (or probably fortunately for you lot) there is no photographic evidence of me nibbling chomping on the carrot.

Dinner was also a vegetable affair:

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Covent Garden tomato and basil soup. Delish! (Sorry I forgot to take a photo!)

Although I’ve had my veg, frozen strawberries and an (unpictured) banana I feel like I’ve had A LOT of sugar. I watch what I eat and make mostly healthy choices but the one area that I tend to fall down in is sugar. I have decided that for the next couple of weeks I’m going to make a big effort to eat less of the stuff. Especially in its processed form, I don’t really mind if it’s just from fruit.

So there you have my, sort of, veggie WIAW

What did you have for breakfast as a small child?
Do you still eat some of your childhood foods?
What’s the best thing you’ve eaten so far this week?

p.s. If you enjoy listening to singing or just general music, here is (warning: I’m about to gush) the link to my wonderful boyfriend’s barbershop group FourTune singing Bring Him Home from Les Miserables. He is singing the lead and they all did a brilliant job. I’m majorly proud of Tom so I’d love it if you had a listen, and maybe even subscribe or like their facebook group

(Sorry for the shameless plugging! )

2. Have a leisurely breakfast whilst reading a bit more.

3. Eventually get ready. Wash and style your hair. Do your make up carefully. Feel good.

4. Have lunch with a good friend. Drink a skinny vanilla spice latte (or other beverage of your choice). Eat healthy and delicious food. Chat for 3 hours.

5. Do some work, be productive, just get something on the to-do list done.

6. Take a relaxing Pilates class for an hour and a half. Leave feeling thoroughly stretched and relaxed.

7. Enjoy a nutritious dinner. And a little treat, preferably chocolate.

8. Go to bed early with a hot water bottle and your book.

Happy Valentine’s Day everyone! Love you all <3

What did you for Valentine’s?
What’s your ideal way to relax?
Anything exciting planned this week/weekend?

I’m going up to visit Tom this weekend which I’m majorly excited for! It’s definitely contributing to my good mood today

We had a wonderful time together.

On Saturday we went around town, ate delicious pita plates and caught up.

Then on Sunday we went for lunch in a little restaurant near my accommodation. We ate amazing garlic and ginger marinated chicken salads with a shared bowl of hand-cut chips. Then we went for a little walk before stopping for hot chocolates. Then we bought some DVDs and doughnuts for a girly night in.

Bliss.

I love her, I am so lucky to have such a wonderful sister.

Thank you Alice for a lovely weekend

How was your weekend?
What’s your favourite hot drink at the moment?
What are you lucky to have?