Turning 20

I saw someone post on twitter this morning that turning 20 counts as 'growing up'. WHAT?! Nobody informed me of this when I turned 20 last september and I know it's a little daunting not being a teenager anymore but I can't help but look forward to how much better my adult life is going to be in comparison to my teenage years.

These are the years of university, jobs, careers, parties, travels, engagements, weddings, maybe even children if you're quick enough haha. These are the years when independence actually means independence rather than living away from home but still getting your parents to pay the bills. Quite frankly I love the prospect of really making the decisions which build the rest of my life, I like being in control of that. 

Let's not lie though, it is difficult to be independent. I have experienced the difficulties of trying to find a part-time job at university, trying and constantly failing with budgeting, balancing working for money and working for my degree, and most of all the struggle of buying something you love but you just can't afford. These are the things which can really drag you down and make being independent much harder but we have to remember that these things take time. Time and mistakes are very good at making you learn and change your habits which is what your 20s are about. Make the mistakes and learn from them to develop into the person you are going to be. At the end of the day, you need the difficulties in life to really appreciate the best times. 

Enjoy turning 20 and take everything in your stride!

K xo

Scary Second Year

So second year has hit me... hard.

The past few weeks have taught me that I need to learn to say 'no' a lot more or just be a lot less interested in everything that goes on around campus. I have to admit that I am ridiculously nosey. I have learned this through deciding at the end of first year that I'd like to be involved in society committees and have some responsibility for second year, fair enough. However, my first year self cleverly decided, along with taking awful notes all year and barely reading a single book, that I could manage a role on FOUR society committees. Really?

Okay, I love it. I love every society I'm involved in: Oxfam, the campus Jazz band, CSM Netball, and the English Society. I love the people, the events, the socialising, the meetings, the organising. I also love sleep... But that isn't possible right now.

I like to be busy and this seemed like the best way to stay as busy as I can for the rest of the year. I have made a plan to chill out society involvement around serious hand-ins and especially around my exams, just in case I actually want to revise this year (next joke, please). I would definitely advise first years to get as involved as possible while they still have the chance and their marks don't really matter as much. My involvement in societies during first year gave me so much experience and I met so many new people just by turning up to things, it wasn't hard. P.S. Society and Sport involvement looks AMAZING on a CV (not joking, you get experience doing something you love) and I'm definitely ahead of the employability game with my experience. Just need to sort my grades out now...

Thanks,

K xo