Anoya

I didn’t complete the goal as in ‘I know what I want to do with my life’, but in a different way. I was reading through my goals, which I do every now and then, and I read ‘learn to live in the present’ right before I read ‘figure out what I want to do with my life’. Most people ask you about your long-term goals. I learned that I was so busy trying to figure out what I wanted to do with my life that I forgot I’m living Now, in the present. I want to be happy. I want to be happy in the future, but all we have is Now. And thus I’ve decided I want to let go of what I want to do with my life, since I started to pressure myself about ‘making up my mind’ about it, because some people in my surroundings were pressuring me because ‘everybody knows what they want to be/do with their lives’. I decided I don’t need to know what I’ll do in 5 or 10 years. I decided that I want to be happy. Right now. :) 9 months ago

I haven’t really stopped buying stuff, but I tend to only buy stuff which I’m really going to use.

Also, I started to sell the things I don’t use on a website, kind of like the Dutch eBay. Feels kind of good and I can definitely use the money instead of having things in my house that I don’t use in the first place :) 9 months ago

Lol, I just only got an email that this post had a new reply. May 20th isn’t really new anymore :B

I think I recently read it on Isac’s page as well, it’s indeed very fitting! <3 11 months ago

I think I’m already enjoying the little things in life. I realized this after some questions I received on my photography. I’m a macro photographer. How can a macro photographer not enjoy the little things in life? That’d mean I wouldn’t enjoy being a macro photographer, right?

I also realized I’m already doing this because I just saved a snails life. Sounds so silly when I read it now, haha. I wrote an entry about it a few minutes ago when I checked off ‘make a difference’, and meanwhile I came to the realization that I’m already appreciating the little things in life. I enjoy seeing my cat sleep on the couch in the sun, not a care in the world. I enjoy watching a little girl across the street imitating her father who’s doing his warming up before his morning run. I enjoy watching little ducklings stumbling over their own floppy feet. Those to me are the little things that are actually the big things, and I’m trying to enjoy them to the fullest.

I’ll continue doing this, but I completed my goal for now :) 12 months ago

I realized today that ‘making a difference’ doesn’t have to be a huge thing. It’s actually what you make of it. I was just reading through my list of things and below this goal was ‘appreciate the little things in life’. I then realized I made a small difference today. Or well, to me it was small, but for this little animal it was lifesaving :D

I was standing on my roof terrace just a few hours ago when I saw a little snail dangling from a spider web. Unable to reach anything solid it just seemed so – literally – lost. I picked up the snail, removed the spider web and ‘set it free’ on the wet tiles since it had just rained.

A little difference to me, a probably lifesaving difference for this little snail. And making such a small difference made me happy, that’s the most important thing about it all :) 12 months ago

I was talking to a friend of mine and the memories we share and suddenly I realized we’ve already done this in Croatia a few years ago. We hadn’t seen each other in 8 years and we needed to catch up. We did, from 9.30 in the everning ‘til 7 in the morning. Walking through places we memorized and talking about our memories, our current lives and the little things in life. We sat in the harbor of Paradise Beach, Lopar, Croatia watching the sun come up.

..I can’t believe I forgot it, since I’m very fond of the memory. I guess I didn’t make the connection to it being on my 43 things to do-list. 14 months ago

Well, I haven’t been reading too much since I moved houses, but most of all I forgot to mention the books I read here.

I finished two last month, one from ‘Annemarie van Gaal – Succes’ and the other one’s ‘De grote vriendelijke George’ – Dave Nasser, which is about the biggest dog alive/biggest dog ever. It’s a fun book to read and I read through it in a couple of days. Right now I’ve started another book from Paulien Cornelisse, who is a Dutch writer/stand up comedian with a passion for the Dutch language. Great fun book so far :)

Anyway, I’ll be continuing this ‘thing to do’ again, because I do want to read at least one book per month. 14 months ago

I’ve been living here for a few months now and it’s starting to feel more like home. I can relax when I get home from work and I can do what I want when I want it. I bought a lot more decorations the last few months, things that are typically ‘me’ and because of this it’s been feeling a lot more like Home. I still have the entire upper floor to do, because ever since I moved in I haven’t done much on that floor besides looking around and wonder what the hell to do with the space (I have a living room, bed room and kitchen on the first floor, which is basically everything I need). The only room that I often use on the upper floor is the bathroom which doesn’t need any work anymore, so there’s an entire 2nd bedroom to use for.. something.

Anyway, ‘home’. I’m getting there. Not quite there yet, so I won’t be ticking it off of my list just yet! 16 months ago

Ever since I became a Community Volunteer for deviantART.com I barely had time to continue photography or even enjoy nature offline. Since December 1st I’m back to being a regular senior member of the community and since then I’ve had more free time and thus more time for walking, photography or other things I enjoy doing to relax. I’ve been out to shoot a couple of time these last few months and it’s been great! Hope to continue doing this in 2012! 16 months ago

I was doing good with the loan, until I got my own place in August 2011. Furniture, paint, decorating, everything was more expensive than I thought (or hoped) it would be. The debt grew again, but I’m on a mission to pay it off as soon as I can. It won’t be in 2012, but I can still try to pay most of it. I bought myself a book on how to handle money better, not in the way that I spend more than I have, but how to save up money, get a better idea of what I spend and on what that exactly is. The book is interesting and I’ve got quite a few ideas on what to do (and not do) in 2012. 16 months ago

I finally have ‘the’ house where I think I can make a home. ‘Home’ is where your heart is and right now it’s still in my parents’ house and the house I grew up in. I thought it would be easy to make a ‘home’ but I guess it’s more difficult than I thought at first. Slowly it’s becoming more ‘me’, the more and more paint goes on the walls, doors, etc. Today I’ve brought the first few boxes and I started unpacking instantly. I don’t want to live in between all these boxes (plus I can reuse the boxes to pack the other things) and it’s already starting to look a bit like a house where you can live instead of all these empty IKEA furniture.

I do love IKEA though, don’t get me wrong.

I’m very busy creating a beautiful home and I hope it won’t take too long before I can proudly tick this off my list :) 21 months ago

Thanks so much for your reply and I’m so sorry for my late response. It’s good to read that you still feel like you, or at least most of the time. I realized a few months ago that I wasn’t the person who I wanted to be and it didn’t feel like ‘me’ either. Currently my therapist and I are focusing on anger/rage and sadness, because that’s a huge part of my OCD. The more angry or sad I become, the more I need to do and clean, etc.

I hope you’ll continue to feel more and more like You and that you’ll be able to deal with everything, especially the traumatic events. I’ve learned I can’t forget them, but I’m still learning to live with them.

Thank you for sharing! <3 21 months ago

I’ve actually taught myself how to crochet last year or so. Not just crochet, like everyone imagines old ladies doing, but I make little animals mainly, as baby gifts, birthday gifts, just random gifts. People love them and the best thing about it is that most of them never expected me to make ‘em haha. They know I do photography, but they’ve never expected me to do anything like this :)

I’m not considering this ‘done’ though, I want to learn a lot more! 23 months ago

Well, it’s not like I haven’t been reading, ‘cause I’ve been reading my ass off. It’s just that I haven’t really finished a book every month. I think I’ve been reading about 5 books at the same time (which actually represents the months I haven’t filled out yet, hm!).

Two days ago I started reading ‘The to-do list’ from Mike Gayle and it’s seriously epic. It’s about a guy who writes a To-do list with 1277 things he needs/wants to do within the next 12 months, before his 37th birthday. It actually sounds like something I’d do myself, so it’s pretty familiar. Who knows! 23 months ago

Starting to look like something I had in mind, but I’d like to get another 10 to 15 cm :)

My hairdresser says it’s looking good and healthy, but I still get my usual haircuts. 23 months ago

The title sounds weird now I’m reading it again, but it’s true. I’ve been in therapy (again) for 8 or 9 months or so, and I’m finally starting to get to know ‘me’. I’ve had so many labels that I couldn’t see anything but the labels anymore. Yes I have OCD, but I’m also just Nancy who loves to organize things, not just because I have to, but because I want to. It makes it easier to find stuff, so why try to ‘cure’ that?

I was called agoraphobic, and yes, part of me might be, but mainly I was (and am) just scared of people. Not even ‘people’ really, but the things they do, how close they’re standing to me when I need to wait in line at a store, the noise they make, the fact some people are completely unpredictable frightens the shit out of me. Odd as it may sound, I loved figuring that out about myself, instead of hearing from some psychiatrist that I’m an agoraphobic and not knowing exactly what it even meant in my case. I hate not knowing if there’ll be a parking-space somewhere and thus I won’t go at all if I think about it too long. And thus my new therapist (of 8/9 months) told me I should make lists. To-do-lists, grocery lists, give myself assignments. Tell someone with OCD to make a list, haha. It’s awesome! And it actually Works!

This is just really the start of it all though, but I can’t say I’m regretting therapy so far. It was scary at first, but I’d almost say it’s fun getting to know yourself, no matter how mixed up someone else made you feel. Labels or not, I wanted to get to know Me. 23 months ago

Not doing as good as I thought I would when I took the loan to begin with, but I’ve paid off 1/3rd of the entire amount and it felt good when I just did a huge money transfer to the account with the loan.

I’m going to try to pay it all by the end of this year, but I think that’s a little too much to ask for, so I want to get it done at least before my next birthday (June 2nd, 2012). 23 months ago