Alice Catherine

Ever feel like you’re in a bit of a mental rut? All the resources you need are at your fingertips, but you’d rather procrastinate, ultimately making things a lot harder for yourself in the long run…

Stay with me, I promise this post isn’t going to be as downbeat as that brief introduction. I just wanted to chat about how this time of year can make a lot of us feel. The constant push and pull between striving to be the best versions of ourselves, and then just wanting to hide under the duvet until the sun makes an appearance again. Balance is hard. It’s something you have to work at every single day, and it’s really easy to become demotivated. That all too familiar feeling of being ‘stuck’ with no real desire to keep fighting for the best out of each day.

It happens to me every now and then. As a creative person, I generally feel my happiest when I’m creating things I’m proud of and being productive. It gives me this natural high that’s incomparable. I feel like this sort of elevated social being when I’ve had a really great work day – I want to cook something fancy for tea, I want to meet up with friends, I start making all these plans for the year ahead…

When I’ve had a crappy work week, I feel the total opposite. I feel uninspired, I pick at everything I’ve created up until this point, and I start questioning whether I’m even in the right career. Ahh the dramatics of working mostly alone and being a freelancer. It can be a rollercoaster of emotions at the best of times, but there’s something that I’ve realised over the past few months that has really changed my outlook on it all…

We have to show up. Not just for other people, but for ourselves. It sounds pretty simple but I think a huge part of being an adult is realising that we often have to do things we don’t feel like doing in order to live a balanced life. All moods are temporary, and negative moods won’t shift unless we shift ourselves too. It could something as simple as not cancelling on that drink with your mate after an awful day tied to your desk – it might just be the antidote you need to break a negative cycle.

Exercise is a great example of this too – I hate going to the gym but once I’m there I never regret it. I always come away feeling like a better version of myself, and I can then apply this mental clarity to my work projects. It’s become really important to me but for other reasons than I first anticipated. I thought a flat stomach and less wobbly legs might be my motivation, but they have fast become things that are irrelevant to me. Exercise is something that I can feel good about achieving even when everything else feels doomed. It’s a lifestyle change that I’ve benefited from massively, and it’s slowly giving me a confidence that’s seeping into all other areas of my life…

I’m very good at talking myself out of stuff and letting my anxiety take over my personality. It’s the way I’ve always been, and as adult, I’ve really tried to adopt a mindset that avoids me doing this as much as possible. I try and show up for myself more than ever before. Whether it’s to that early morning gym session that I’m dreading, a local event where I could meet new people, or simply replying to those emails that I’ve been putting off.

It’s sounds cliche but we have to try and be present in these everyday moments in order to achieve health and happiness along the way. We all have a tendency to be our own worst enemies, but we also have the power to be our own best friends and biggest cheerleaders. So on those mornings where I’d rather launch my laptop out of the window and forget the world….

I open the curtains, I brush my teeth, I take myself for a coffee in town somewhere. I try to show up for myself  – it doesn’t matter how big or small that might be. It’s always possible that good things are just beyond the negative mood that I’ve got myself tangled up in, and I believe that these good things happen when you let go of things you can’t change, and start shifting energy into what you can… 

Photographs taken by Catherine Booty 

Dress c/0 – Arket, Trench Coat c/0 – Arket, Boots c/o – Grenson, Bag – Chylak, Necklaces – Mimi et Toi & Chloé, Headband – Accessorise

SHOP THE LOOK