When you choose to be positive, you choose your future. — Unknown
Woke up way too early again on a Saturday morning. I have been working through a lot of personal stuff and the thoughts are noisy and intrusive. I’ve always loved Brené Brown’s advice to sit in the discomfort of one’s vulnerability, because exposure to discomfort builds tolerance and resilience. So I’m choosing to sit with the head full of noise. Picking out the strands that I can pick out will help, and telling myself those that I can’t can stay jumbled. They’re for sorting out another day.
@yellywelly
We’re told these days that we can choose our future, that we can control what happens to us. If we manifest using specific words, if we behave a certain way, if we one day decide to radically change our lives in pursuit of the future we want, if we eat less/more of certain foods…it all boils down to controlling something we haven’t even experienced yet.
The only thing we can control is how we react to our environment. We react to our environment through small daily actions that become routine and habitual. When things become routine, they become predictable. This is how you can predict the future.
“But predictable is boring!” I’m sure a lot of you will say. And to that I say, NO IT IS NOT! When we habitually strive to find joy, when we routinely try to look for the positive, it becomes second nature, it becomes part of who we are, and that’s how we bake positivity and hope into our future. When we choose to view everything as potentially filled with light and joy, we choose a future filled with exactly that. The future will always be an unknown quantity, but if we sit with the knowledge that, whatever it is, there will always be hope that it could be shining, shimmering, splendid, that is the exciting part of it all.
What small thing will you do today that your future self will thank you for?
The opposite of scarcity is not abundance. It is enough. — Brené Brown
I am exhausted.
The movement, the jockeying for position everywhere, the perpetual motion towards perfection (physically, psychologically, financially…), we’ve been led to believe that that particular brass ring is reachable. But is it really? There is self-improvement and there is getting in that hamster wheel thinking you need to get to 100%. We have been programmed to work harder, accumulate more, to consume more, to be more attractive, to be healthier, to climb higher, to be more aware, to be better, to be more, to constantly raise the bar…
But what if what we have right now is enough? What if accepting that when our needs are met, when we can be happy, when we feel contentment, when things are enough, when what we have is sufficient is what we should be doing? What if all we need to do is understand that what we have to actually work towards is the appreciation of what we have, that that is enough?
What if what we have, what we are, what if it’s ENOUGH?
I’ve heard it said so many times and in a multitude of iterations: If you have something to do, do it. Do it now. Before fear or self-doubt takes hold!
I’m a planner…and a procrastinator. I hide the procrastination behind beautifully engineered plans that are, eventually, expertly executed. My mom was also famously a don’t-do-until-due person. She did everything flawlessly too, but under great haste. I always used to joke that my procrastination was genetic.
One day, I read somewhere that procrastination was fear of failure in disguise. And THAT was a lightbulb moment. It felt like a string of fairly lights started twinkling! In my case, it was most certainly the most lethal of combinations: my need for perfection and my fear of failure. I was putting off doing things because my nervous system saw the situation or task as a threat — because in my head I was going to fail spectacularly, people would l see me as a fraud, and I would again, get tangible proof that I am inept, incapable, and a complete impostor.
I am learning to stop listening to the Negative Nancy in my head. Because I know what I can do and I am actually really capable. I am learning to face the wall of anxiety and tackle the paralysis. I am:
🏷️ Naming it: Fear of failure / missing the mark
🔨 Breaking it down into manageable tasks
⏱️ Giving myself 10/15 mins to accomplish tasks
🧘🏻♀️Forcing myself to breathe through the anxiety.
I am a work in progress. But I am naming my imperfections. I am naming my fears. I am facing them. Slowly. Surely. One by one.
I know that every day is different. Life, these days, seems to be more challenging than usual. So many people have been saying that they’re finding everyday that little bit more difficult.
I’d like a purely good day, though. One where I don’t have to pivot the mindset. I know the low mood might have something to do with my recent anxiety issues. Nevertheless, I’d like a really good day, please. Or at least a pause in the sleep deprivation, the overthinking, and the over-worrying. I’m exhausted.
I’d really like to have the opportunity to get off the spinning world for a bit and just be in a bubble.
Yes, yes, I realise that that might be called a vacation. But going away for a holiday is a band-aid. I’d like to not to rip the band-aid off. I realise that there is a lot of work to be done and I am prepared to work. But really, I’d just like a sunshiny, smiley, happy day.
Success is a journey, and every single day is a beautiful mile. — Unknown
I’m going through quite an anxious period in my life. Because it feels like everything is up in the air and I don’t necessarily know which way is up. I have this list of (inspirational) quotes and, because I’m pedantic and persnickety (I also like old, interesting terms), I will go through the list, one item at a time, in order. I’m in the section of my quotes that seems to be one quote after another about success. It’s making me anxious because, what have I got to say about success? My current situation feels more like a disaster, and so far removed from success.
But okay, let’s not make this about me. Or at least, let’s try.
What is your definition of success? Some people are planners, and success is ticking off items on a list to get to the end of a project. Some people are thinkers, and success is finally arriving at a conclusion after testing ideas. Some people are creatives, and success is finally breathing life into a body of work. But all this is success in relation to productivity. For some people, there is no need to produce; success is being able to have a good day, to have a chance to laugh, to breathe, to just be.
Is it just me, or does society these days focus on having something to point to, where we say, “I made that!” It just feels like we’re on this perpetual hamster wheel of production. It feels like everything has become a commodity and the measure of success relates to a list of assets, and in order to build that list, one has to either produce or acquire.
I enjoy pace and I enjoy the challenge of finding solutions right away. I know I can sprint along with the best of them. But lately, I’ve been feeling exhausted. I’ve been questioning the constant need to chase…everything. Maybe this is why I feel so lost, so disconnected. Maybe I’m missing being able to have time and space. Because while I know I can do things quickly and efficiently, I like to be able to process, at a pace that is my own, in an environment that is less frenzied and frantic. But when success is only measured by what you can show for yourself, the journey — the wrestling, the questioning, the becoming — gets dismissed as inefficiency. But that part of the journey is where the real work happens.
Have we forgotten to appreciate the time it takes to travel? Have we forgotten that the journey isn’t just merely arriving at the destination? Have we forgotten that it’s the experiences between departure and arrival that make the journey? That’s where the lessons are learned. That’s where the memories are made. That’s where the experience is created, where expertise is gained. Because while you have a destination in mind, the things that happen in between change where you get to.
Tomorrow is not a threat. It is a promise.— Unknown
I’ve been going through a really anxious period in my life, filled with uncertainty. I’ve been vacillating between feeling convicted that I’m doing the right thing, and then doubting my decision to put myself (my health and my self-advocacy) first. I’ve not been sleeping. I think my subconscious has been dreading the future because there is so much uncertainty about it, and it has been preventing my brain from switching off and resting, thinking there is danger when I get to tomorrow.
When you are a person who lives with anxiety, the future is something that is an unknown space where anything and everything can (and if your anxiety is to be believed) and will go wrong. But that’s the thing. Tomorrow, the future, is unknown. So while there is the possibility that things could go wrong, there is also the equal possibility that things could go VERY right.
Maybe that’s the reframe that needs to happen: tomorrow, the future, IS NOT a guarantee of danger. There is every chance that things could go very right. Maybe that possibility is the best thing to hold on to.
Whenever I work on something, I start with the WHY. Because things start with intent, why I’m working on what I’m working on.
In an ideal world, once I know my whys and my whats, I’ll figure out the hows, whens and the how much’s. So there’s a need to identify the required information so I can finish my project, and then I fact-check it to make sure the information is current.
Then I organise the information I have into a sane, pragmatic, see-everything-at-a-glance pattern so I can bring everything together and finish what I started.
In the case of my AI workbook, I used post-its. Post-its are so useful for working things out, and not just making sure you remember your to-do’s.
A man who can’t bear to share his habits is a man who needs to quit them.
— Stephen King
I’m sharing a re-established habit.
I used to post pictures of my cups with quotes and my random thoughts daily in my stories on Instagram. I did it every single day for nearly 3 years! It helped me start my day with inspiration, motivation, and if anything, I got my whinge out for the day.
I stopped doing that for a while. I’m not sure why. Maybe because life was busy, because all I kept doing was whinge about how busy my work was, because…I’m really not sure why I stopped, but I did. And it did feel like something was lost.
So I’ve started it up again. Posting a morning cup post and an evening cup post. To set up my day, and to close the circle in the evening. It’s helping. Somehow. I’ve created a dedicated page to my cups (I found a typo and I can’t unsee it. But because it’s a posted p
I’ve been quietly working on something on the side for a while now. It’s taken quite a while to get it to where it is (mostly because I kept starting, restarting, editing, red-penning it to hell). But I finally shared it on LinkedIn! 👀 So what did I do?
I created the 28 Day AI Challenge Workbook — a structured, printable workbook that walks you through 28 AI tools across 4 weeks, one tool at a time. No jargon. No coding. No assuming you already know what any of it means. AI kind of intimidated me. Everyone around me seemed to be talking about it like it was the most natural thing in the world and I was just… nodding along. I didn’t want to admit I had no idea where to actually start.
So I decided to do something about it. I wanted it to be an honest, practical guidance and hands-on exercises that help you actually get to grips with AI rather than just reading about it.
It covers everything from ChatGPT and Claude to image generation, video tools, automation and beyond — and it’s written for people like me. People who are curious but have been putting it off. EAs, PAs, admin professionals, anyone in a busy office role who suspects AI could genuinely save them time but doesn’t know where to begin.
I’m really proud of this one. It started as a personal project to stop feeling so daunted by AI and it turned into something I genuinely think could help a lot of people. Also, I had fun using post-its to map out my process and decide what I wanted to include in it!
It’s available now as a digital download.
Please would you help me by buying it? I would really appreciate it! The link to get it is below!👇
Yellywelly 