Advice

How To Survive Your 30s

January 24, 2014

Oh here comes a pep talk…just kiddin!

Seriously, I’m not gonna bore you with a huge ass post about how enlightened I am now that I am in my 30s and how mother teresa has spoken to me in my dreams about how to become a better human being. None of that stuff, ’cause I ain’t enlightened and I am a mess. A pretty happy mess.

So I just turned 31 (did you wish me a happy birthday? RUDE!), and it happened so fast I can’t even believe it. I swear, it felt like yesterday when I was blowing candles for my 30th birthday and now BOOM! 31 hit me in the face…with all its glory, its wisdom and its saggy tits.

Since I survived the so called “dirty thirty” – which if you ask me, turning 30 wasn’t as dirty as I thought it would be, or maybe it’s just that my perv threshold has expanded, anyways – I do have a teeny bit of advice for ya, young (and not so young) ducklings.

Be Selective:

Remember in high school when you wanted to be friends with everyone? Especially with that crazy bitch you hated but she had connections to all the cool peeps? (Let’s call this bitchy entity “Becky”).

Well, it’s time to get rid of Becky and her entire army of merry assholes. By cleaning up your circle of friends and making time ONLY for those who you truly care, you’ll save yourself a whole lot of trouble and stress. I’m not saying you should become a patchouli-stinking-bergamot-tea-drinking hermit hippie, not at all. You should still be polite, sociable, and gracious, but you should focus on spending MORE time with those you love and WAY LESS time (or no time at all) with those who you feel will eventually fade away.

Take Care of Yo Self and Treat Yo Self:

Once you leave behind the realm of your 20s your metabolism pretty much goes all like “fuck this. peace *mic drop*” and eating twinkies for fun and drinkin’ booze everyday becomes a death sentence. You soon change from going out to cure the hangover so you can drink again to having brunch with friends, sippin’ on tomato juice and complaining about how much gas vodka gives you.

With all these changes is normal to sometimes feel like giving up, but you shouldn’t! Yo body is a temple, and you should keep it Taj Mahal fabulous ’til the day you die. Squeezing a bit of exercise here and there is not that hard, and adding healthy things to your diet is easy. Take baby steps, don’t overwhelm yourself. Do it for your self-esteem and pride and treat yo self! It’s ok to eat that donut, just don’t eat the whole box.

We gotta live a little for fucks sakes!

Go Big, Bold, and Amazeballs or Go Home:

The clock is ticking, you ain’t getting any younger and the longer you wait to do something the shittier and harder will get. Total honesty here. I’m not sugar coating it with “oh it’s ok if you’re 70 and decide to bungee jump!” Sure…if you want your spine to split in half!

This is your time to seize as many opportunities as you can, to try different things, to fail, to achieve, to fuck shit up. Now more than ever you should ditch those feelings of “guilt” for doing something you like – guilt because someone else thinks it’s not a good idea. Sure, you can listen to their advice, but at the end of the day, you MUST listen your inner voice – can you hear it? It’s saying GO FOR IT!!

What’s the worst that could happen? You fail? Meh, if anything your balls just got bigger.

Create Like Crazy:

Yes, create, create, create. Almost to the point of being insane about it. Doesn’t matter what it is; food, photos, art, design, crafts. Use your god given talents (not talking about your ability to juice an orange with your twerking) and use them everyday if possible. Again, baby steps, create small stuff and go from there. When you create something you learn so much! You basically figure out the things you like and the things you hate about it. It’s an awesome journey of fuckery! No really, it is. You discover so much about yourself, it’s crazy.

Most importantly, do it for fun. Don’t try to get paid for it, don’t have any expectations. Just create for the sake of it. Treat it as a little mind retreat to think about other stuff that is not related to paying bills, talking to your mother, or trying to score a date.

So there. That wasn’t too bad, was it?! I guess this post is a bit of a part 2 to last years (super popular post btw) Finding Success in Your 30s..

If you have some wisdom you wanna share with us, leave it in the comments below (please do!). Now if you excuse me, I gotta stuff my face with cake and gotta put a bit of alcohol in my blood stream. Cheers and happy weekend!

Image Credit
From top to bottom:
- Fuck Yeah by Friends of Type
- I’m not with stupid anymore by Wesley Bird
- I wear black… by Gymlife
- If not now when by WRDNBNR
- Make something awesome by Zeke Tucker

About Food, Design, and Personal Challenges

October 17, 2013

Hey yo! So you may have seen that I have a nifty new series on SF Girl by Bay called Edible Rooms; where food and design find each other and make sweet sweet love.

This series has become a total favourite of mine! Scouting the web for inspiring interiors and doing research to match the recipe feels like heaven to me (I know, geek central). But not everything is just fun and “oh I’m gonna pin this and pin that” – each posts is actually quite challenging! Trying to find the perfect recipe that will bring together all the colours and textures in a room is no easy task, plus there’s also the props, mood, styling, editing, etc, etc. Quite the list eh?

That being said, this new series has been an AMAZING learning opportunity.

So why I am saying all this to you? ‘Cause you gotta try it! By that I don’t mean the recipes (well, yes, you should try those too) – what I mean is YOU HAVE TO GET OUT OF YOUR COMFORT ZONE NOW. Seriously, the amount of stuff you learn from stepping away from your normal routine is incredible. Yes, it is frightening as fuck, and yes, you will feel like a loser when things don’t turn out the way you expected but hey, you’re one step closer to “perfection” (whatever that looks like to you).

Take a challenge, any challenge, and go with it. It may be for your own blog, instagram account, or just for fun – whatever your reason, just do it.

And here’s an extra tip: keep a journal of your new challenges. I know, journals can be lame, but mine has very little words in it! Mine is just full of clippings and photos of original posts I have created – and my friends – the rewards of seeing your work come to life are SO fulfilling. Plus, by having a creative journal you can keep track of your style and how it evolves. You can also take note of the things you need to improve and the things you enjoy the most (and the least).

So friend, I’m here to tell ya: CHALLENGE YOURSELF! Time is ticking and opportunities don’t just show up at the door. You gotta hunt them down! And to be a good hunter you gotta practice. GO!

To see all the recipes from the photos above check out Edible Rooms on SF Girl By Bay

Blog Labs: Very Successful People Say “No”

July 29, 2013

“The difference between successful people and very successful people is that very successful people say ‘no’ to almost everything” [Warren Buffeti]

I’d like to start the week with a little bit of a pep talk (I know what you’re saying “oh pleeease, it’s Monday!” but trust me, this is a good one). I recently read this amazing book called Manage Your Day-To-Day by 99U, which is a brilliant little compendium of tips from top entrepreneurs that will help you sharpen your creative mind.

Now, this is not gonna be a book review but a reflection on how some of these tips DO WORK. There’s one that’s on top of my list right no: How to say “no”. It’s kind of embarrassing to see how many of us struggle to say no – whether it be to your boss, your partner, friends, etc. For crying out loud, it’s a two-letter word, how hard can it be?!

Social media, our jobs, the economy – so many factors have bound our power to say no. We feel we are the mercy of our inboxes, demanding to get a response asap. Our cellphones have become an extra limb and no matter where we go we are always “ON”. We are like honey boo boo hooked on go-go juice – except we are not consuming copious amounts of mountain dew mixed with redbull, instead we are consuming insane amounts of information.

So how do we disconnect? How do we stop this invisible force that’s slowly draining our creative batteries (and sometimes even our relationships)? We stop it by saying NO. NO to answering calls after 10PM. NO to responding emails after 5PM. NO to giving up a weekend getaway so you can schedule some posts. NO to incessantly refreshing your FB, Pinterest, Instagram feed instead of being outside taking some sun or reading a book. NO to responding to that not-at-all-urgent tweet so you make some time to practice your twerking in front of the mirror.

Try it (the twerking included). Give it a go. Say YES. YES to giving up a post on your blog so you can hike a mountain with your lovely buddies. YES to ditching not-so-important emails to grab a beer with your best pal. YES to watching a scary movie by yourself and going to bed late. YES to finally finishing that book that’s been collecting dust by your night stand. YES to stuffing your face with a strawberry shortcake McFlurry all while rocking a dafuck-you-lookin-at attitude.

I know it’s not easy and I am no authority on this (fuck, I should be in bed already), but I want to encourage all of you to try it. Just say YES to one thing and you’ll see – and feel – the rewards of spending quality time with friends and with yourself. When you turn off your phone/computer/tablet and you let your brain run wild, amazing things happen.

This past weekend I said NO to scheduling “extra posts just in case” and I went out with friends. We went hiking, watched some fireworks, shared a sinful dessert (actually I ate it all), had some coffee (which I accidentally poured over my crotch). Little things that put a HUGE smile on my face (except the burnt crotch). Don’t get me wrong, I LOVE my interwebz and its rewards, but they’ll never come close to the feeling of having stomach cramps ‘from laughing with friends. Remember that “very successful” is not always related to business – baking a cake and relaxing at home definitely count as being a very successful person.

Become successful at taking care of yourself! And may the odds be forever in your favour.

What are your thoughts on this? Is it easy for you to say NO? Are you trying to say YES more often? Do you unplug?

All Images: Artful Desperado

Finding Success in Your 30′s

March 21, 2013

Hi friends! Today we are going to have a little chat about Finding Success in your 30′s – and since I cannot go for coffee with all of you, I decided to make this topic into a blog chat; a friendly debate where we talk about our struggles, successes, and everything in between. I encourage you to voice your opinion – don’t be afraid! The Artful Desperado readers are quite an awesome gang, so go ahead, comment and make new friends! (Note: you don’t have to be in your 30′s to participate).

Read all about it after the jump! See the Rest of this Post

Blog Labs: How To Fund Your Next Blogging Adventure

February 19, 2013

This is part two of the Plan Your Next Blogging Aventure series.

Hello! Welcome back to yet another fun-tastic Blog Labs (I am loving this mini series about blogging). Today we’re going to talk about How To Fund Your Next Blogging Adventure. In part one, we talked about choosing a conference that suits your needs. In this second part, we’re going to tackle the scary part of planning – the money!

See the Rest of this Post

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