Peace in a Pod

Please, please - don’t X out of this after reading the title, I swear this has absolutely nothing to do with Covid, lockdowns and all those other sweat-inducing trigger words. But the hack I want to speak to today is a really valuable one I’ve been practicing in the last few months, and it involves liberal use of the word ‘zoom’, so consider yourselves warned. Don’t worry - there isn’t a quiz at the end. Tapestries are huge works of art that stretch across walls, and when you put all the pieces together, they tell a story. An overall narrative. Consider the tapestry as a metaphor for life. Oftentimes we are so guilty of fixating on one tiny chunk of that tapestry, like maybe a 10x10 inch piece out of the top corner, and magnifying it and wrapping ourselves up in it so much until it’s all we can see. Nothing else has come before this vignette and nothing else shall come after. This A3-sized nugget IS my whole life. This cognitive glitch is what I have begun to refer to as zooming in . ...

I know I said from the outset with this blog that I never intend to present myself as an all-knowing, all-seeing, omnipotent being who has all the answers to life’s problems (disclaimer: no such person exists). But this is really and truly the first piece I have written where I am acknowledging from the get-go that I grapple hugely with the issue I’m about to discuss, and I don't just mean a 'general' struggle - I'm talking about the actual present. Today’s topic is: having awkward conversations. The minute you read that, I guarantee a chill went down your spine. And why wouldn’t it? Humans HATE having awkward discussions. Our palms go sweaty at the mere thought of it. Our hearts race, our mouths go dry, our breathing becomes shallow. Some of us (ahem, me) are almost on the verge of tears before we’ve even begun. Why is this? I am currently reading ‘Daring Greatly’ by Brené Brown, gifted to me at Christmas by a good friend. Brown is a shame- and vulnerability-researche...

Feminism is the belief that men and women should have equal rights. It is literally that simple. A person doesn’t have to burn their bra, grow out their body hair or ‘hate men’ to be a feminist, and whoever told you that has a lot to answer for. Despite significant improvements in the lives of women (in the Western world) over the last 50 years, there still remains a gap between the ideal and the reality of what it means to exist as a woman in society. I don’t plan on getting into every aspect of feminism in one post - to try to do so would be extremely naive - so consider this the first of many discussions around a very meaningful and worthwhile topic. Today I want to get into what it means to be a successful woman. Chats with other women my age and older, as well as reading feminist literature over the last year in particular, have really helped refine my understanding of how success in life is portrayed to women. So basically there is a narrative in society that is sold to girls fro...

Judging by the title of this blog post, you may be forgiven for thinking that I have lost all concept of time in this lockdown and that a Halloween-related essay is about to unfold before your eyes. But sadly, readers, the reality is that ghosting is an all-year-round occurrence, and is something that has particularly piqued my interest as I meander down the road of self-discovery. As spooky and unexplainable a phenomenon as the Loch Ness Monster and UFOs? Or just an escape tactic we grasp for when we feel like our backs are to the wall? Let’s explore. A definition of ghosting is as follows: “abruptly cutting off contact with someone without giving that person any warning or explanation for doing so” (Gould, 2020). While the term is associated nowadays with the cessation of online or over-the-phone communication, the actuality of up and disappearing out of a relationship like a fart in the wind has always happened - I refer you to cinematic and real-life stories of husbands or wives wh...

Making a conscious decision to work on yourself and to commit to personal growth is an epiphany. It feels like you’ve been born again. It feels like a veil has been lifted and you can finally see clearly. And, unfortunately, one of the first things you see is just how unevolved and ignorant other people are, and how poorly they are handling life, whether they are aware of it or not. I realise how snobby and callous that sounds, but I mean it purely in a humorous sense and not disparagingly. Those of us who have chosen to be more proactive in how we live are by no means experts, nor are we even necessarily happier. But it is annoying to be a reflective person amid those who live more passively, and at times it can actually be quite disheartening too. I heard an opinion somewhere along the line (can’t remember where) that people go to therapy to deal with people in their lives who won’t go to therapy. Now, whether therapy is part of your self-help journey or not, the principle still stan...

I would like to start off this blog post by redefining the meaning of the phrase ‘self-help books’. Before I began ambling down this path of enlightenment, I would hear the above and think (ignorantly) “Self-help? That’s only for people with a mental problem” or “Only someone desperate and helpless would buy a self-help book”. I’m sure I wasn’t alone in having such flawed assumptions. In Ireland especially, we have quite a poor and twisted view of mental health and ill-health - a ‘shut-up-and-put-up’ culture has pervaded this country and especially the generations who grew up in an acutely Catholic society. Fast forward to 2020 where, in the last 5 years, the country has passed a marriage equality referendum as well as another concerning reproductive rights, and things look slightly better. So call them what you want - whether it’s self-help books, or personal development literature, or whatever - turning up for yourself and your mind is no longer considered a silly, fruity idea. Infac...

I think one of the most simultaneously hilarious and stupid things we have done as a society is create a taboo around mental health. We do this bizarre thing where we all struggle in private and pretend to everyone else, who is also struggling in private to further or lesser degrees, that we are managing perfectly fine. We have the audacity to think that our problems are unique and that it is utterly pointless to talk to anyone about them, and that is assuming we even realise we are having problems at all. The prevalence of social media platforms like Instagram that only show the highlight reel have definitely ramped this up too. ‘I am the only person who is stressed, who feels sad, who feels lonely, who feels less than.’ Before I became turned on to the idea of self-help at the end of last year, it seems crazy to think that I just ambled through life completely unaware of the fact that I have thoughts and feelings and values and anxieties that can all be actively reflected upon and qu...

Aloneness. Independence. Me-time. Being in one’s own company. Whatever you want to call it. As the years go by in our technologically advanced world, it is getting harder and harder to truly be by ourselves. And the thought of being by ourselves is something that actually scares the living daylights out of us too. We avoid being on our own insofar as we can help it. Whatever it is we want or need to do, it seems imperative for many of us that we be accompanied while doing so. Going to the bathroom on a night out, seeing a film, attending a match, going for a walk, holidaying. We would rather not do any of these things if it means going alone, and, rather worryingly, that includes the one about the toilet. And then, those times that we are by ourselves, in a waiting room, or on public transport, or when we get a few minutes of a break throughout the working day, we immediately gravitate towards our phones. We need to be scrolling, texting, checking notifications, consuming information i...