Diary 001
I thought it might be nice to do a little post checking in with you guys now that the longest January ever is finally over and the year has truly begun! So I hung out on my stairwell with a cup of tea contemplating what I’ve been up to the past few weeks. I’m back into the swing of term and although it’s been so busy still I feel like I’m settling into everything much more easily and quickly. Part of it I think is just having a more casual and relaxed mindset with regard to work. I quite literally have to make the mental effort to reverse some of my thought processes sometimes, but it seems to be working.
I’ve also put in place the beginnings of a fitness regime (I say this because I haven’t properly got a system yet - that’s the plan for this week). I’ve been nervous about rejoining a gym and trying to incorporate it into my life along with everything else but I think it’s time to finally make it a habit for the physical and mental benefits. I was never much interested in sports or exercise as a kid, always preferring to be sat reading somewhere immensely comfortable. For this reason I’ve never really been strong or fast, or appreciated the ability of my body at all. I think it’s important to make these habits now whilst I’m relatively young, and I will definitely be taking you guys along with me if you’re interested over the next few months. Everyone who knows me knows I am extraordinarily lazy, so it’ll be interesting to see if I can turn that around. I’m hoping by immortalising this sentiment here on the blog it might actually happen for me this year. My plan is to have one personal training class a week because every time I’ve tried to do this gym thing before I have failed, and I need someone to show me the ropes and push me harder than I would myself. I’m also going to be doing yoga once a week, and then hopefully two workouts by myself too. I would love to know if any of you are planning on getting fitter this year and what your methods are.
I had a sad skincare realisation last week. As you guys know, I spend a few months last year weaning myself off skincare and makeup that contained silicones or dimethicone, which I discovered were contributing to some of the skin issues I'd been having. But for some stupid reason, I completely neglected to check through my face powders. I think it must have something to do with the fact that they don't necessarily ~feel~ like they are contributing to acne because they are dry formulas, but of course, all my favourite powders contained talc which is notoriously bad for acne-prone skin and dimethicone, including the Laura Mercier Translucent Loose Setting Powder and the Giorgio Armani Luminous Silk Powder. I even packed more on in the areas I was having trouble with to prevent oil forming! So I have switched to the bareMinerals Mineral Veil in the hopes that it will help.
I’m also trying to plan ahead a little bit for my dissertation this year to try and ease some of the stress. I have a mini deadline for an aspect of it a week after my next set of essays, so it would be great to have a clear research plan for it by the end of the semester. This week I’m going to start dedicating a day a week to some intense research. The problem with this kind of plan is usually that it gets replaced by more urgent work, but I’m hoping if I stay on top of things it might just happen. I also have a 'reading week' coming up in a couple of weeks which I’m going to dedicate to it, too, and I’m hoping that will be fruitful. I read a really interesting chapter from a book about 'geontology' in the final week of one of my courses last semester, so that’s my starting point so far (bit niche, there). I’ll probably read the rest of the book that the chapter came from and see where I end up.
Finally, last night I went to see Daniel Caesar at Koko in Camden and he was so good live! If you haven't come across him yet and you're looking for some chilled R&B/soul, you will love him.
Hope you guys enjoyed this little random diary blogpost, if you’d like to see more of this kind of thing please let me know. One of my favourite things about the blog so far is just summing up some of these disparate parts of my life and putting my thoughts down about them. Sometimes it can seem like I’m weirdly stretched across lots of different ‘things’ and it’s nice to bring them all together here and also to use it as a mind dump and clear my head.
In these pics I’m wearing this gorgeous All Saints jumper that I got for Christmas, the trousers from the Topshop suit I wore on my instagram (fairly) recently, and also my new Daniel Wellington watch, which I’m in love with. I love the simplicity of their watches and how they can work with everything. You can use the code SUNBEAMS on their website now for 15% off everything, and they're doing the sweetest little heart charms with every leather watch at the moment.
This blogpost is sponsored by Daniel Wellington.
Watch - Daniel Wellington
Jumper - All Saints (similar linked below)
Trousers - Topshop
Shoes - Fenty x Puma
