Be the change you want to see in the world

So I said it before and I'll say it again, I'm not the most energetic person and most of the time I am pretty lazy. Still there are some things that I'm very passionate about and for them I don't care how much work I have to do. One I have already presented you quite some time, its writing. To be published in some way is one of the main goals of my life, but there is also another one and this will be our topic today.

I told you I was making a video and as a matter of fact I managed to do so last weekend. I haven't worked on one in more than half a year, and even though I kind of missed it in general, this video had a purpose and there is a reason why I made it now and not a week later. 

Last year when I was still barely new to the whole YouTube world I read some tweets about a project called P4A, which stands for project for awesome. As a curious person with way too much time on my hand I clicked on one of the links that lead me to a live stream of this project. Basically we are talking of a YouTube based charity were every person that submits a video about their favourite charity has the chance of getting it streamed worldwide to all the people watching and thus promote the organisation they have picked.

I genuinely enjoyed myself last year while watching it and I made the decision then and there that next year I would participate with my favourite charity. So December came and I realized that it I was supposed to be revising and studying then, not making a video. I still secretly played with the idea and when I couldn't sleep last week I decided to just start writing what I wanted to say. After all I take pride in at least doing what I promised myself. I knew that it wasn't going to be hilarious or well scripted or anything, but as much as would've loved to make it brilliant, I couldn't do it in the time given. Also in my opinion it's great if someone has the talent to be witty just like that, but in this situation cause over creativity I'd say.

But what did I talk about? I choose the one charity that every person that knows me a little better has already heard of, because I love talking about it. It's the A21 campaign. Their goal is it to abolish modern day slavery and end human trafficking. Since I was fourteen or fifteen I had this idea in my head that I wanted to help females who became prostitutes if they wanted to get out of the business, no matter why it happened or where they are from. It was something that I carried along with me for some years and when I heard of this campaign my heart started beating very heavy in my chest. That was the summer a year ago. Ever since I've been trying my best to talk about it, and just spread the awareness. One day I will achieve my goal to work either with them or with a similar organisation, I will do my best for it.

If you are interested in the video, it is on the end of the post. I really need a microphone though because filming with my laptop on my legs that records every movement of my feet is not helping the quality at all. 
So now you know what I've been up to. Let me tell you, even though it was stressful once again I just love being active on the internet, writing posts, tweeting, facebook stalking, and making videos. 

Oh and if I'm not able to write again before Christmas: Merry Christmas and thanks a lot for reading my blog, I appreciate it a lot :D

Cheerio.

PS: I might just make my P4A video in October next year, just so it doesn't stand in the way of NaNo and my exams...

PPS:  The webside of the P4A for more information: http://www.projectforawesome.com/
The webside of the A21 campaign: http://www.thea21campaign.org/

Today I'm celebrating

Today is a good day. It is a good day even though I’m busy, I've spent most of my evening studying for my finals next week, even though I'm tired and my head hurts. It is good because even though this won't be a long post and the day is almost over, I still wanted to share some words with you. It has not only been a good day because I spent some time with a friend and I had some very good conversations, but because there are more things for me to celebrate than that. Today is a good day because it marks the anniversary of two very good and pleasant decisions I took.

Last year, on the 12/12/12 I did two things. First of all I created a YouTube account. At some point I got annoyed by checking daily if my favourite YouTubers did upload a new video, so making a subscription seemed the next step. Later I realized on which date I did it, which made me smile. Of course I did not plan on making videos anytime soon, I was way too intimidated by this new world that lied in front of me. No, I just created an account, but in the end it was that that enabled me to upload some videos and I'm genuinely just happy about having YouTube as a part of my life. Btw, if you wonder about new videos, I'll try my best to make one this weekend and I will fill you in very soon about that.

I mean just that would be enough to make me happy (yes, I'm easy to be pleased), but there is something else that happened a year ago on this day. I wrote my first post. Well technically it was not my first, and this blog excists since 2010, but I gave myself a fresh start on the 12th of december. Since then I have not only posted 50 posts, which means I almost made it to a weekly schedule (ok I cheated and left out some weeks and wrote more than one post in one week, but you know, life is busy), I also know that some people read my words on a regular basis and that makes me happy. I get encouraged about my writing, even though I'm aware just how far away my goals still are.

There are also other writing related things to celebrate. On the 15th of November I had two pleasant events in my life as a writer. I did not only win my 3rd NaNo, no, my site here also got its 1000th page view. In case you are wondering, yes I love checking my stats, and I also love dates. It just excites me.

So here we are, me the writer, you the reader. You might not be as excited as I am, or maybe you are. What I know is that you just read my words, which is a very enjoyable present for me. Let us celebrate the little things, the small pieces of happiness whirling around. Everyday there are things to be remembered, anniversaries to be thankful for, and today just happened to be a special happy day for me.

Basically here is to that, to more writing, more reading, more videos and more creating and creativity. I hope there are even bigger things to come for all of us

Cheerio.

How to solve a conflict

Hey there, I'm terribly sorry I haven't posted in a while. I'm in this massive stressing situations and I try everything I can to juggle all those things and I'm a massive fail. I'm sincerely sorry about not been having time to write.

I mean every word of what I wrote above, but it's also a good introduction to what I want to write about today. I bet every single one of us has been in the situation yet where things happened that weren't good. No matter if it was your fault, or the other person, arguments happen, people get disappointed and there is for sure a lot of frustration going on. I thought I could share with you the pieces of advice I gathered considering that topic.

First of all if someone does something that gets to you in a negative way, just tell them. There is no use in being angry with someone and not telling them, they might not even have realized that they did wrong. Having an open conversation never did no harm, and if it leads to a proper argument then there is a reason for it. There are people who get anger issues just because they are unable to talk about their feelings. Trust me; you prefer having a fight over being angry for the next twenty years.

First leads to second, before you actually go and announce a problem you should calm down first. I remember about three month ago a friend of mine did something that seriously pissed me off. It kind of included some other people who I knew wouldn't be around for very long, so I decided to wait till they had left. When I finally got to talk to that person I wasn’t madly angry anymore, but I still knew that she had to apologize or at least admit that she kind of did the wrong thing. We actually solved the whole thing like the true adults we (sometimes) are, but when I imagine what could've gone wrong and how we could've be mad at each other for a long time I'm happy how it ended up.

As a third point I have the whole thing about apologies. I remember as a kid when I acted up my Mum would accept my apology instantly, but she wouldn't make me feel like she forgave me before I actually said the words. Of course she was not angry for long, but I had to apologize first. Sometimes it felt, and it still does, like losing, as if saying I'm sorry is the equivalent of saying I'm weak. It is not. Admitting your own flaws shows that you are strong, but also that you are humble. It is strength and a virtue.

Now there is an important thing about apologies to be added. If you do it, then mean it. It shouldn't be a psychological trick or something. Also absolutely distance your words from what the other person might respond. Maybe he or she doesn't accept because you screwed up big time, maybe they need time as forgiveness is a process that can take a while. If that happens, deal with it, after all you just admitted having been an idiot, no need to commit idiocy once more right now. On the other hand we can assume that most of the time not only you did something wrong, but also the other person. Just because you seem to be reasonable and you show sense, doesn't determine that the other person does too. It would be great, yes, but your apology is a one man show. 

Oh and while we are at it, after admitting that you are a douchbag you could actually try to be less of a douchbag in the future, that would be very lovely and appreciated!

Let’s just say I got the utmost surprising apology of my entire life today and it kind of got overshadowed just hours after it. Still, if it was sincere then I appreciate it big time and I’m glad it took place anyway. It shows at least certain things. Sorry, not much of a specification here but some things are supposed to stay off the internet.

Anyway, I can’t promise to become a better blogger the next few weeks, but I’ll keep on trying my best.

Cheerio.

Selfie Time

I'm not sure if this is something everyone can relate to, if it's a girl problem or if it's just me who is affected by it, but let me tell you something. Sometimes I look in the mirror not just to check that I don't have any stains on my clothes or to check my face for leftover toothpaste, but in order to really look at me. As a matter of fact I assume that every single person who knows me has probably more of an idea about my face, its shape and generally how I look than I do. Sometimes when I share one of these intense looks with my own reflection it happens that I do not even recognize me anymore. Or maybe that's just the moment where I can truly see all my features unlike those short glimpses I get throughout the day.

Usually when I take a little more time to look at myself I start to see every flaw. I don't have pure skin, there is this scar on my forehead and I think that my face is genuinely not what I consider good looking. Of course there are also things about my body that I dislike, which add up to my vain unhappiness. I mean I know that I could do more for myself and I'd probably look better, I could wear more make-up, use skin care more regularly and dress better, but even though I think about these things doesn't mean that I think I should do them every day.

There are also other days luckily, in which I can't help but compliment myself, like for example the colour of my eyes, for how my hair lies or sometimes a shirt that I bought that suits me. Getting a compliment from a friend is cool and feels nice, but getting one from my harshest critic, me, feels just as good. Sometimes one of these I-kind-of-do-not-dislike-myself-that-much days can lead up to some pampering.

Sometimes I start to paint my nails, just because I can. I do not care on most days, yes, but I can enjoy treating myself with some make-up or nail polish from time to time. It might not end then; sometimes I want to embrace that good feeling even more so I start to look into my wardrobe for the right piece to enhance my beauty. When I found it I look into the mirror again. It's the same person I considered ugly the day before, the very same features, but my perspective has changed. It happens that I spend minutes just standing there, trying to understand why I can feel so different about my own body that has not really changed but just feels different. From time to time I'm done at this point, looking and trying to figure out my own self, but it there are also moments when I move on to another Level.

I hate photos of me. I don't mean I dislike pictures of me and my friends, I love them. I just don't like me alone in a photo. There are only two moments when it's ok for me to take a picture of myself. Firstly when my profile picture on facebook is so outdated that I managed to change my hairstyle twice since taking the last one (trust me, that did happen way too often) and secondly when I feel beautiful. As a result I have probably more selfies than you'd expect, but most of them were taken on about six days throughout my entire life.

Let me tell you, giving yourself an ego-selfie-photo shoot is a real joy. Some of my pictures look very very bad so I delete them just after taking, but others are very nice ones too. Don't be embarrassed to pose a little; no one is ever going to see them anyway, unless you decide to share them. Enjoy your own body, feel unashamed. Try out different angles, pull faces or use filters, whatever pleases you. Don't listen to anyone, not even yourself, when they tell you you're worthless or ugly as beauty is in the eye of the beholder. If you dislike cameras as much as I do then face it anyway, you don't want to look at all the beautiful photos of your friends and pretend all of them look incredibly good and you are the ugly duckling. It's not true. And remember, one thing is for sure, a picture says more than a thousand words.

Cheerio.

Hit me baby one more time

I should probably just stop making titles out of pop songs I don't even like, but the other option I had was "from Saul to Paul" which from the perspective of a non-church person sounds either bad or like absolutely nothing. Anyway, here is the thing.

There is this topic that has haunted me for a long time now and whenever it reappears in my head I struggle with it all over. If you dislike everything biblically touched then feel free to skip this paragraph from here on. Otherwise just continue it is actually something more or less relatable. I'm not sure if you are familiar with the biblical story, but there was this bad guy called Saul who wanted to haunt down all the Christians only some years after Jesus had died. He was very successful doing it until one day all of a sudden he had an encounter with Jesus himself and that changed his life forever. Usually this little story and his life are used as a metaphor to cheer up those who consider them self too flawed as that they could ever be used by God.

As a person who lived on this planet for nearly twenty years let me tell you two things. Firstly we are all flawed and broken human beings. We all have scars somewhere, visible or not. Secondly, still some people have it worse than others and I just know where my place is in that scale.

I am a lucky girl. Don't get me wrong, I remember this time a year ago I spent most of my nights crying myself to sleep. You can now either think I'm weak or you understand that the breaking point of everyone is different. As you can see it took me less than a year from the ground up again. My life consists of valleys and peaks and I make sure to enjoy the view from a viewpoint as long as I'm up there. The next little down is probably just around the corner, its shadows reaching for me. I should just be grateful for all the sun that I got during my life, but it's a source of fear instead.


There's this saying "God gives his hardest battles to his strongest soldiers". I mean if you are going through a hard time that sounds perfect, but when you know yourself that you handle things moderately then it's not as pleasant. This saying basically makes me the weakest soldier to ever join the forces. I honestly fear that I will not be taken seriously ever if my life resolves like this. Don't we all look up to those incredibly strong people who have not been taken down by anything?

Now don't get me wrong. I'm not asking for actual bad things to hit me, that'd just be plain stupid, no thanks. I also know what some people around me went through and I am very thankful that I didn't have to deal with it. Sometimes I just fear that due to me being what I call lucky, I do not understand how hard it actually is. Pain forms you, no one can tell me it doesn't. Imagine this piece of clay. It doesn't become a beautiful vase without some serious kneading, right? Humans are the same I think.

The fears get even worse when I think of what I want to do in the future. I might see some pretty terrible things later and I'm not absolutely positive that I can handle them. I've known that for a long time now and I still worry that that's the main reason why I'm not supposed to ever work in the field I plan to. What if I just fail due to my own weakness or because I simply won't be taken serious.

I'm a white girl, coming out of a family whit not too many issues. What do I know about the real world, about things like depression, violence, poverty, world hunger, drug abuse? Nothing. There are some other things I know though. I know that I'm willingly to learn about them. I want to listen, I want to help. I might not be strong yet, but I'll learn it, step by step, fight by fight. 

Sometimes I also feel like not yet awake. I think that there is more to me that I am now and I want to use my full potential. How do I wake up when I feel like I'm asleep all the time? How do I get past that stand-by mode, how do I awake the Paul that lives inside this lazy little Saul?

I think it's about transformation in general, about growing over you, again and again. You don't need to hit rock bottom, but you need to face fears. Everyone needs to fight their own battles, one demon at a time. If my biggest problem is my own laziness then that doesn't mean it's less of a problem than real life depression. Whatever hurts me is something I as a person cannot tolerate anymore. I might not have heroic stories afterwards, but I'll have personal growth and trust me, nothing is worse than standing still for too long.

Cheerio.

P.s. Sorry I'm lame, NaNoWriMo is eating my soul and my time. Which is a bad excuse but yeah .

Oh the joys of November

Soon, very very soon it will be my favourite month again. It wasn't anything spectacular until the year 2011, but since then I can't help but be excited for it. I even remember that the year before November was especially rough as I had to go through a lot of personal struggles (including a broken heart, hard times at school and health issues). Luckily those are now all over and as I said, November turned out to be my favourite month despite the cold weather. I have already told you pieces of it, but today I hope you get the whole picture of the adventure called NaNoWriMo.

NaNoWriMo stands for national novel writing month, but in fact it should be called "international" by now, as there are people all over the world participating in it. When I first heard of it during summer 2011, I had no idea about the journey that it would take me on. I thought the idea was plain crazy, but I've never been very opposed to such things. I decided to make an account immediately. The goal of NaNo is to get people to write. We all know that first drafts are very rough; the plot holes might be as deep as Marianas Trench and the character are as flat as a lake on a day without wind. Whilst we are aware of that, we also know that without producing anything you cannot improve. If you do not write, how are you supposed to get the stories out of your head? That's quite hard. So during the thirty days of November a participant is obligated to write 50,000 words, which are approximately 1666 words a day. 

You can't win anything, except for the words you write and the knowledge that you did it. To be fair that is pretty amazing and it feels brilliant. On the other hand it is hard work. It means scheduling, maybe lack of sleep and less time with your friends. Writing has to be on your list of priorities along with school and those things. I usually cut down on facebook and the general not writing related internet then. During my first year I was a senior, participated in a musical and as I said I wrote a novel of 85,000. It was intense but so so good. I may have already told you, but before this experience I considered myself neither creative nor a writer. Nowadays those things are very important features to me so yeah, I'm glad I figured that out.

Looking back there was a huge chance of me just not attempting it the first year, even after signing up, but the forums kept my spirit up. In October I joined the purple elephants, a group initially formed to help out one guy with his girl problems that brought together a bunch of cool people from different places. I think they are in their fourth year by now and they are some of the rare threads that stay active all year round. Basically all of them are very dear to me and were there for me in times where I couldn't talk with anyone in real life and they are open minded and supportive and I really really love them. Without them the noveling experience would be half as enjoyable and as I said, they keep you motivated with their excitement.

Now I want to tell you more about the two stories I wrote and the one I'll be writing this year. NaNo '11 was a very important for me. I wrote the story called "truth is stranger than fiction" which basically was a novel consisting of stories that happened to me and my friends, in addition of a lot of fiction. Through this I was able to get past some things that were bothering me for years and I learned just how good of a therapy writing is. To this day it's the only story that found an end, even though I have not managed to do any editing yet. I'm not sure if I ever could do something with it because it's so personal.

Last year I did something entirely different. Based on a nightmare I once had I created a dystopian world in which there was a thing called "the ritual" in which kids become adults. That story was called "Toward the light - Dem Licht entgegen" The whole thing was supposed to be very psychological, the world building killed me though and that's the reason why I stopped right after November. I'm still very fond of the novel but right now it's just to time and energy consuming.

This year I'm back to my used field, I want to write another young adult /teen’s novel. The basic idea is stolen from a guy I know. He wants to do a volunteer year and before he leaves he wants to sell his phone and delete his facebook account. That somewhat made me think. I'm pretty often on facebook and even the idea of not having a phone feels pretty uncomfortable for me. All in all that plan inspired and fascinated me a lot and I decided to use it, even though I felt very awkward at first. I always do when I use things that happen around me for a story, but I work best when I have at least a rough idea of what I'm talking about. I have to stress the fact that except for the very basic idea, the rest is pure fiction. I always fear that people might get me wrong when I write romantically stuff that is roughly based on someone I know. I am a writer and creativity knows no boundaries. 

Of course the general idea is not that spectacular, so I had to add a pinch of drama, some romance and several unexpected happenings. I also wanted to challenge my writing skills somehow, so I gave the story a twist. I have two main character. There is Elis, the guy who leaves for South America, and there is Chloë, a girl who is still in school. They used to be friends but drifted apart somehow. Now she writes him a letter because she is angry about what he did. She does not expect him to answer, but he does. The whole story is supposed to be narrated through those letters. Nothing else, no more descriptions, just a whole bunch of letters.

It will be quite hard, as there are only that much you can include into a letter about for example how they look like and about the very obvious things that they've known for ages, but I will try my best to figure out a way. I'm so looking forward to where this story may lead me.

So I'm sorry if I bored you to death, but bare with me during this time. Or just leave if you don't care :P

Cheerio.

P.S. This post is scheduled as I'm in Germany right now, just thought I'd tell you. 

Deadline? More like Lifeline!

Two things I see as given in my life, firstly I try to be as punctual as possible, secondly I'm terribly chaotic. So when you mix both of these together you get a person with an absolute need for pressure in order to finish something. If there is no due date then I'll probably procrastinate until either I run out of more irrelevant things to do or when pigs actually start to fly.

Here, have an example. I told you about this presentation I had in my last post. I actually wrote it the night before, making the PowerPoint presentation the very same day I had to stand in front of my class and talk about it. I tried to start earlier, but couldn't squeeze one mildly intelligent word out of my brains. Besides, you know what? The lecturer told me actually that I was rather good. Of course it wasn't perfect, but I never expected it to be anyway.

Another situation on which I realized that not everyone can actually withstand the tension* of last minute entries was when I wrote this big paper during my final year of school. I had all the information gathered but I was only able to write on it about four weeks before I had to hand it in, which considering the amount of time we had, was very little. Even my teacher made a remark on it saying he was slightly worried and admitting that he had no reason to. That also was the moment my mum could finally accept that I work in my own pace.

They even talk about this whole issue in the bible, I mean hello? What I'm talking about is written in Ecclesiastes and to be honest, that's part of the reason why this book is my favourite. Just read the verse and you might understand me. "To every thing there is a season, and a time to every purpose under the heaven."  [Eccl. 3:1; KJV]. I just feel like this sentence gets my way of thinking. It's not about pushing it off mindlessly, it's about doing it when you are ready, when the idea is ripe to become real.

That's also the reason why I try my hardest to keep a weekly schedule up, even when weekly isn't determined with a certain day. When I loosen up too much then I might quit, which is the last thing I want to do right now.

Finally this whole schedule thing gets more and more important as NaNo approaches fast. I think next week you'll hear more about it, as I want to introduce this fabulous project to all of you. The fact that you just have to get the right amount of words during November is the best push I can get. I don't want to see myself loosing, especially since I have won the past two years, of which the first my schedule was about to burst due to all the things I was involved. I'm pumped for it and almost set to go. On the other hand I need to have my time organized well or I might end up neglecting either school, writing or my social life, which I want to prevent from happening!

To sum this up, schedules and deadlines keep me motivated and help me organise, even though what I'm doing might look like a mess to orderly people. I simply flourish under pressure. They also provide me with good products instead of just some lightly planed bits and bobs, as last minute execution leaves way more time and room for good planning beforehand. It's probably best that everyone has their own way of dealing with their own time.

Cheerio.


* I am sorry, insider alert ;)