Catching Up




            I have some catching up to do with the beautiful life challenge. This weekend I unintentionally had a technology break and a break from everything teaching. I left school on Friday excited for the weekend and ready to move to the second half of student teaching in 2nd grade. When I got home from school I looked into my bag a realized my laptop was still sitting at school attached to the promethean board. No computer for the weekend. I was really upset at the first thought that for the whole weekend I had no netflix or all of the important things on my computer. I was upset that I couldn't get any of my work done for the following week. But my roommate  kept saying to me, this will be good for you, you are addicted to technology. I kept telling myself she was over aggregating my need for technology. She reminded me there are many things I have mentioned not having time to do and perhaps this weekend free from my laptop would allow me to spend time doing those things. I started off the weekend by going to see our  campus musical "Company" which many of my friends are participating in. This gave me a chance to detach and as the weekend continued I spent time reading, writing, going for walks, sleeping, and scrapbooking. All things that I haven't done in many weeks because of student teaching and my technology. Last night as I sat in my room reading I realized how fantastic this technology and work break had been. It gave me the chance to reflect and spend time with myself without the influence of technology and media. Now we are catching up on the days on our blog so below you will find posts for days 10, 11, 12, 13, and 14.


 Day 10  
          This is probably one of the hardest prompts I've been given on this challenge. Not because its a hard topic or hard post filled with deeply personal information but its something that I am still working on. This post asks me to list awards and accomplishments that I have had in my life. I absolutely can not stand listing out the accomplishments in my life so this has been a long thought out post for me. I am not going to list all of my accomplishments at all. I am going to list to me, my most important accomplishment in my life. The most important accomplishment is definitely continuing to fight depression and anxiety. I had many options when it came to fighting my depression and anxiety. There are options and roads I could have taken that I don't even want to think about but I can tell you the choice to keep fighting is probably the hardest thing I have ever done and I consider where I am at with all of this to be my biggest accomplishment.  So there it is. I have given myself a little bit of credit and I continue to work on learning how to accept credit and praise for things in my life. It is definitely a work in progress.

 Day 11
         I have created a space for encouragement in my life after many years of turning it away and not allowing myself to create self encouragement. One of the skills that I gained long ago while at Foundations in the outpatient hospitalization program, was to create index cards with positive thoughts and happy thoughts written on them. Over the last 5 years I have accumulated many of these cards some written by me, some by friends. I had started the project writing them on my own and hanging them in my room but my freshmen year of college that changed. It became a project that I would write cards as well as some of my friends here at school. I remember one night when I really wasn't feeling myself a group of friends and I sitting with index cards and Mr. Sketch markers writing  index cards for a long while. I still have all those cards and cherish them when I am feeling down or just need a reminder about how loved I am and the positives in my life. This is one way I have created space for encouragement but there are many other ways I have as well. Creating space for encouragement can be hard but it is an important piece of the puzzle and healing process.

A picture of some of the cards that I have created or my friends have created over the years. 


Day 12
         Once again I have been faced with a challenging post. I am still learning to give myself credit and praise. It is still a work in progress. I have been challenged to write 10 things I like about myself. Bear with me as I write these.

  1. My will to keep fighting
  2. My ability to be highly organized
  3. My sensitivity to those around me 
  4. My new found ability to push out of my comfort zone
  5. My persistence to stay positive even when it is difficult 
  6. My strength to begin to share my story and accept my journey for what it is. 
  7. My faith
  8. The passion I have for the things I love 
  9. My determination to accomplish the things I have set my mind to. 
  10. My out of the box thinking and creativity. 


 Day 13
      What do I love in life? Well that is a loaded question. I could go on forever with a list of things that I love in my life. So instead of babbling on forever I decided to create a short list of some of the amazing things I have been blessed with that I love in life.

  • My Family
  • My Friends
  • My cuddly Beagle
  • Dew on the grass in the morning 
  • Falling leaves splashing colors across the landscape. 
  • A cup of coffee or tea with friends curled up in a blanket.
  • The freedom of playing flute and the feeling of soaring as I play. 
  • Chocolate Anything!! 
  • Paint splattered everywhere
  • Road Trips
  • Traveling and meeting new people
  • Children giggling and excited about something new
  • Fresh cut flowers
  • Skiing on a sunny winter day in the silence of the trees, just you and the snow
  • the freshness of 8am softball games on tournament days
  • The silence of morning
  • Sunrises

Day 14
     What is my dream job? Well this is a simple one.  Teaching elementary school whether it be general education or special education I have wanted to be an elementary school teacher since my first day of first grade. I love the excitement children bring each day with them to school and their ability to view the world in such a different way then adults. I love spending my day with kids and love the fact that you never know what they are going to say.

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