Kenya!!

Having got over the major dilemna of the morning... no pink nail varnish for toes to match the fingers, i have consoled with orange toes and pink fingers and am now heading off for a two week 'trip of a lifetime' to Kenya and Zanzibar.
Expect to hear from me again around the 21st Aug!!
with love and warmth,
Anna Katharina

A prized possession

‘Take care of yourself’. A phrase so often passed between us, a phrase that I’m sure is often appreciated and dismissed, not even thought about. But what if we did actually stop to consider this request? What if we stopped to realise the significance of this? Would we feel any differently about ourselves?

For someone to ask us to take care of ourselves, they have to love us in such a way that they care for our wellbeing – it matters to them how we are. Think of it as a prized possession they are entrusting to our care, they love it so dearly that not only are they trusting their precious thing to you but they are also showing you how much they love you.

So if they think you’re worth taking care of, believe it yourself. And look after yourself. They think you deserve it, and so you should. 

The Blackberry... a real addiction

On my way to town this morning for a beauty treatment and some me time mooching around the shops by the river, I got half way and realised I had forgotten my phone. My faithful blackberry was not with me. I was consumed with panic, I was alone. Totally alone. I say I had planned some me time… what I probably should have said was ‘me and my blackberry’ time.  I had no time to go back for it, I had to continue…alone.

On the radio yesterday there was a news bulletin about the number of people apparently addicted to their mobile phones, and after my terrifying realisation this morning, there is certainly no denying it. But what is it about our phones that mean we cannot be without them?

I am certainly not addicted to the phone itself – it makes annoying noises (specifically chosen so I know the ringing is mine), and the keys are too small for any human to use. So what was it that went through my mind this morning in the moment of shock when I realised I had left it behind? There was nothing to save me from awkward moments when we all opt to pretend to text or suddenly have an urgent phonecall we must attend to, if my appointment time was changed there would be no way of knowing, and what if a member of my family picked it up and browsed my messages and pictures?! Shock horror!!

But the thing that got to me most was that if someone wanted to get hold of me, or simply chat to me, they couldn’t. If I wanted to get in touch with someone, I couldn’t. So is this what we are all afraid of? Being alone? Being isolated and cut off from our friends and family? I have always been one for ‘me time’ and I am quite happy in my own company, but ‘me time’ without my blackberry? Another matter altogether!! Is it the physical confirmation that we have people who talk to us, that want to communicate with us that makes us so attached to our phones?

It is a natural human instinct to want to be with and in touch with others. Rarely do you find a human living completely isolated from society, and completely alone, and it is very sad if we do. So I don’t think we should criticise or question our addiction to our phones for the love of communication; it is necessary for survival. What I do think we should question is our fear of being on our own. Once I had relaxed into the fact that my phone and I were going to spend the morning apart, I thoroughly enjoyed it. It was nice not to feel obliged to be a call centre. It was nice to really recognise what I was feeling, what I was doing, and how I was interacting with those around me.

It is ok to be on your own. You don’t need constant reassurance of who you are and the fact that people love you. You are loved and appreciated; the fact that you have contacts on your phone proves this. People always care. So take the time to trust this; trust the support network you have around you, and learn what it feels like just to be you.

Take the leap, leave your phone behind and go out on your own. You’ll be ok. Your phone and your friends will still be waiting for you when you get back. Mine was… on the kitchen table, exactly where I had left it. 

Boys and shells

A little boy of about 3 years old approached me today as I was sitting on the beach. He was holding out something in his hand to me and talking animatedly. Realising he was eager to tell or show me something I held out my hand thinking he wanted to give to me whatever it was he was showing me. It was a small shell, very beautiful and with intricate detail. He chatted away to me with so much eagerness, desperate for me to admire and praise him for the find. I reached out to touch it in my appreciation, but he would not let go of it. He proceeded to walk happily away and show it to someone else, clutching it to his chest in between each admirer.

This child, barely the height of my knee, reflected something very precious. He had something beautiful to be admired, and he wanted to share this with everyone. But he did not give it away; he did not expose himself to theft, nor put himself in a vulnerable position. Yet he shared the beauty. We are often terrified of being hurt, we are terrified of being intimidated, and so we do not reach out to others. We build up walls around us to protect us, and as a result, we do not reach those we could.

But we can, and we don’t have to get hurt. We can all share what we have with others without being exploited, damaged or used. We don’t have to be hurt. If we keep hold of who we are: our belief systems, our self-respect, our self-love, just as the little boy kept hold of his shell, we can offer ourselves: our beauty and our knowledge, to help others and reach out to them. Without being hurt.

Make sure you know who you are. Be firm in what you believe in, be firm in your respect of yourself; keep all this close. And then reach out. Extend your boundaries, compliment a stranger, approach someone you find intimidating, pick up a child who has fallen over, and welcome those who are crying with open arms.

The world needs to see your beauty. And it doesn’t mean you have to lose yourself. It doesn’t mean you have to get hurt.  

A tiny child came up to me, a strange young woman, because he wanted to share the beauty of his shell. Be like that small child. Be fearless and reach out to others to share what you can offer. It doesn’t mean you will lose yourself.  

with love and warmth, anna-katharina

Hungry, Starving

A little while ago one of my closest friends  said to me, ‘You know Ann’, when I first met you I thought you were really quiet and moody. I’ve just realised that will have been the time when you were getting over the bad break up, now  I know you I know you’re one of the bubbliest, craziest people around!

Standing posing for a photograph a couple of weeks ago, my boyfriend looked like he was wincing and with one lazy arm. Had you gone up close you will have seen a major sling contraption hidden behind him, pull his T’shirt to one side and you will have seen a bandage covering a wound which can only be described as creditable to a WW2 wound.

What is my point? My point is that by looking at someone ,  you can never ever judge  what you see; you never know the full story. Today the Daily Mail caught my eye as ‘ANOREXIA’ was blaring loudly from the front page. As I read the article it entitled, my anger turned to burning fury. According to the article, the rise in the number of young girls being diagnosed with eating disorders, particularly anorexia, is due to girls being more and more conscious of their figure in a skinny orientated society.

I want to make it clear now that THIS. IS. RUBBISH. What four year old wants to attract a boy and have a flatter stomach than her friends?! What four year old takes this to the extent that she will become terrified of food and be consumed with guilt after eating half an apple?! No four year old that’s whom. I know of NO eating disorder case in which the sufferer is purely striving to look like what she sees in the magazine. Rather, the sufferers are deeply unhappy and emotionally traumatised. They are looking to the ideals shown around them to try and obtain some sort of happiness and break from their pain. They copy parent behaviour in an effort to please or get attention.

A four year old child with anorexia is not image conscious.  She crying for security, happiness, comfort, attention, ease from her pain, explanation, control, regularity. And in the majority of cases, she wants to be loved.

I looked like I was stick thin and craving to look like the models. But rather, I was in pain: I had lost my brother, I had been bullied for 14 years, my emotional development was not complete. I once visited a girl in hospital who had not eaten for 7 weeks. She had been abused and neglected all through her childhood. She was forgotten, in pain, and thought she was disgusting. She thought she was a mistake.

Do not judge an eating disorder by what you see. These sufferers, male and female alike, re exactly that: suffers. Not model striving attention seekers. These perceptions have GOT TO BE CHANGED.

Please, please, if you do nothing else, advertise this blog to at least one of your friends. Tell someone the truth and help me to beat this, once and for all. 

A little Lady Gaga

A little Lady Gaga…

I probably like most other people, thought for a long time that Lady Gaga was simply a moderately insane artist, gifted at music but lacking in worldy earthliness. However, whilst reading my precious monthly edition of Glamour, I came across a quote from her. It read:

‘Don’t let anyone dim your light because it is too bright. Tell them to get sunglasses’.

                In that one moment my estimation of the woman rocketed, she really knows what she is talking about.

Don’t be afraid of being who you are because you are afraid of being too different, too loud, too weird, too confident. You cannot be. If you spend your entire life trying to be like the people around you you’ll never ever be satisfied. In order to be like everyone else you will have to change yourself because you are not everyone else. As a result, you wont be who you really are and so your friends might not be the people the relationships with whom will be the most fulfilling for you, the clothes you wear may not be the ones which are specifically suited to you, you as a unique individual will not be seen.

I don’t mean dance up the high street in a meat dress, unless you have run out of cotton or fancy a snack. I mean be you. If you don’t like the hoody everyone else is wearing don’t wear it. If you are can’t stand the popular milk chocolate but would rather a bar of the 90% stuff, you eat the 90% stuff. Do you want people to know you as you or one of many?

You were born an original, don’t die a copy. Don’t be afraid to be who you are, because that is the person everyone else wants to know. After all, ‘they’ are ‘everyone else’, so that position is already been taken. The position as you, however, is still available, and only you can fill it.

 with love and warmth, Anna Katharina

Lost in the clouds

Yesterday my boyfriend and I decided to go and climb Moel Famau in North Wales. Being I, the daughter of a professor in geography, and he a student of geology, one would have thought a hill such as Moel  famau, with a car park at the bottom and sign posted routes up and down, shouldn’t present too much of a challenge. I ask you to think again.

We achieved the climb within no time at all, but were not rewarded with a view due to the dense cloud cover which had become thicker. There was something magical about standing at the top, surrounded by cloud with nothing to be seen except one another, the monument and cloud. The magic for me came in knowing how much there was around us, how much beauty, and how much extent to the horizon; and yet we were enveloped in such thick cloud nothing was to be seen. There was a silence as well. Not a complete silence, for we could hear the cloud and the mist whistling around the peak; yet nothing else was to be heard. We knew not north, nor south. We could not tell the direction we had come from, nor the direction down. But we knew the path was there.

Walking into the cloud, we laughed as we heard voices around us; other walkers also exploring through the mist. As we walked, a style would appear in front of us, then a sign post, then a turn in the path. At a turning point where there were two paths we realised we had no idea which way we should be going. We did not know where to go, we could not see where we were in relation to where we should be and the GPS on my phone told us that it ‘could not find location’. We were lost. Laughing, we picked a path and set off.  As we walked, the cloud wrapped around us; sometimes allowing us to see a couple of metres in front, sometimes barely a foot and yet without fail, signs would appear, styles would emerge, the path would widen. By the time we eventually found the car again several hours later, the cloud had lifted, we could see around us, we could see where we had come from, and where we were driving to.  

During the 6 years I was ill, there were times when I could not see. When I was so emotionally stuck and in so much pain I did not know what to do. I didn’t know where to go, I didn’t know how to get to where I wanted to be. I couldn’t see where I wanted to be, I could visualise it in my head, but I couldn’t see it. I couldn’t see how to get all the way there. But what I could see every time, was a very small thing which could make a little bit of difference. A piece of dairy milk to taste, 5 minutes to cut off the obsessive morning power walk, one more traumatic memory to relive and work through. And with every small step I took, the next step would suddenly become visible when it hadn’t before. And then the next, and then the next. Until finally, I am living the dream I had but could not see.

Life is sometimes black. Sometimes we feel lost, we cannot see the way forward, only the way we have come. And every time it is so tempting to take that route we have just travelled because it is the only one we know and the only one we can see. We are scared of the way forward because we do not know it and we cannot see it. But turning round will never get you to where you want to go. Always take that step forwards, because even if it is not visible now, the way will emerge. The cloud will lift, and life will become light again.

Never give up, never turn around. Even if you feel like you are blind and the world is black. I didn’t know what the future held, I didn’t know how to recover. But I didn’t want more starvation. I didn’t want more black. So one step every day brought me slowly out of the clouds. And I did reach what I was aiming for.

However thick the cloud, you’ll always find the way because you know the way is there. And if you keep the people you love close, anything is possible.