Work-life balance

Sometimes, it's unavoidable. You have that looming project deadline, when your colleague needs your help with something, at the same time you get an email asking for something urgently, but you get distracted by your phone blowing up and your husband is wondering why you aren't on your way home yet, because you had plans tonight. You feel like you're getting pulled in ten different directions, and in all reality not one of those things is getting the full attention it deserves. So how do you go about making sure all these things get done, everyone is happy and you keep your sanity? I am certainly no expert, and oftentimes I fail miserably. But here are my top five tips for trying to get the best work-life balance you possibly can.

1. Breathe and plan.
I am a big believer in planning, and plan a significant portion of my life! When you have a thousand requests and tasks in front of you, it can be overwhelming. The first 30 minutes of every work day are spent reviewing the daily tasks in my diary, adding anything that was leftover from the day before that I didn't get finished, and prioritising. Whatever is most urgent gets done first, and the rest follows. Be realistic with colleagues as early as possible, letting them know when you will be able to deliver something. Under-promise and over-deliver. Better to say you won't get it done before Friday, and find yourself able to deliver Wednesday morning, than vice-versa. If the day starts to look pretty heavy, review every task and move anything you can to another day. Nothing feels more overwhelming than 25 tasks on your list and no plan.

2. Do and break.
When I start each task, I set my phone timer for 25 minutes. In this time, I don't let myself get distracted by emails or phone messages. The next 25 minutes are for the job at hand, and it is surprising how much can get done in those 25 minutes when you are strictly focused. When the 25 minutes are up, I allow myself five minutes to check emails, add those syns to my online Slimming World diary, nip to the loo, make a coffee - those five minutes are to get odd things done so I can start the next 25 minutes fully refreshed and ready to focus on the next part.

3. Buffer zone
In the main, this is possible for me. I understand that sometimes, other employers expect a 24-hr on call employee. But the reality is that you are not contracted for that. Your client can wait, and the world will continue to turn. Your health, sanity and family are more important than living to work, and making your bosses' wallets fatter, with no benefit to you and at the expense of time with your loved ones that you cannot get back. Admittedly, I have a long commute, which is a perfect buffer zone, but everyone has some kind of commute from leaving work to closing the door behind them as they get home. Be that two hours or ten minutes, use that time to really distance yourself from the day. Listing all your tasks in a diary or planner helps, as everything is written down and not having to be kept in your head. Read a book, a blog, listen to an audiobook, a podcast, a guided meditation, do breathing exercises, listen to your favourite album, watch an episode of something hilarious on Netflix, waste away some time on Youtube... unless you are driving, then please look at the road. But you can do the listening ones. The point is to escape. Changing the scenery in your mind can work wonders as a distraction, leaving you ready to greet your loved ones when you come home with your full attention.

4. Date night
Not exclusively for your other halves, scheduling 'date nights' with girlfriends, cousins, aunts, whoever it may be, is important. If you have a work meeting in your diary, you wouldn't not show up, and these meetings should be treated with the same reverence and respect. Scheduling this time in advance, like you would a meeting, means you are less likely to break it, or bump it off for a report that you've been working on. Planning something doesn't have to be expensive - a simple walk in the park or a coffee in the evening can take just an hour from your day, but it keeps you in touch with the people that matter and with what's going on in their lives. Not only will that be great for them, it will work wonders for your own mood and mental stress. Sharing is caring, people. And when it comes to making time for your special someone, this is a no-brainer. You've chosen to spend your life (or at least the current portion of your life) with this person, and that relationship needs attention, love and care.

5. Look after number one
You are no use to anyone if you are burned out and paying half attention to your relationship, your pet or your work. Creating a buffer zone between your day and your night is a great way of giving your brain the rest it needs. Then, when you get home, make a lovely meal, listen to some music, run a bath and light some candles, have a glass of wine, get lost in a boxset or a book, meet your friend for coffee, call someone you haven't spoken to in a while. Do what you love in this time. It will leave your head and heart ready for a great night's sleep. Get your eight hours, or as close as you can - I aim for at least four days of full eight hours sleep in the week. Eat right, move when you can, and enjoy catching ZZZs. They will mean you are ready to go to work the next day refreshed, fulfilled and happier, which will shine through your work and make you calmer, and more able to face the day ahead.

World Smile Day :D

Today is World Smile Day - so I thought it would be a good time to talk about the things that make us smile. Everyday I am incredibly grateful for my little family and the safety and warmth and love in my wee home. They make me smile constantly. But here's some more off-the-wall things that really make me beam.

A well-made bed.

Coffee.

Old movies.

Crisp autumn weather.

Catchups with friends.

Marshmallows.

Friday evenings.

Saturday mornings.

My pup snoring.

Airports.

Youtube.

Books, books, books, magazines, and more books.

Book shops.

Coffee shops IN book shops.

Any body of water - from a bath to an ocean.

Hot, hot bubble baths.

Long pamerping sessions.

Gel manicures.

Autumn.

The Galgorm Resort and Spa.

Disney.

Wine.

Cocktails.

Travelling.

Planning.

Planning travelling.

The pictures.

What makes you smile?

Thoughts on turning 30

So today I turn 30. Thirty. 3-0. It's a number with a whole lot of baggage. Personally, I thought I would hate the whole business of turning 30. It has always felt like it was a big deal and a big life-changer, probably right up until about 27 years old. But really, now, I am not scared of it like I used to be. In fact, I think 30 is going to bring a lot of good things.

I feel so very happy with many things in my life. I met my husband and we started going out when we were in school. We survived four years of a long distance relationship, 3.5 while I was in Scotland and my husband remained in Ireland, and 6 months while I lived in the South of France. He is my whole world and my rock. Nothing is a struggle with him or for him. He has stood by me as I put myself through undergraduate and masters degrees, while I struggled finding myself when I relocated home to NI and worked out what the hell I was going to do with my life. He picks me up every single day and is literally the sun in my world, I could never be without him. So as I turn 30 and I look back on our 12 years together as a couple, I feel overcome with happiness that this beautiful man has chosen me and we are moving forward as a family together.

I have a great job that I really love going to each day. And sure, I could make more money, but I am doing something I really enjoy and in a field I never saw myself in. I work for a company that accepts people have a life outside of work, and I leave the office at 5pm pretty regularly and don't have to think about work when I'm home. And I get 30 days leave to spend seeing the world. I learn and I am challenged every day, and I work with a great and intelligent bunch of people.

I have a family scattered over the globe, but I see their faces every week. And we are close and love one another and spend time to find out what's going on with each other. I have a large extended family a lot closer to home, and we make time to be with one another and be true friends. I lost my nana last year, and that was the most difficult and biggest blow I have ever faced. I was with her when she passed away, holding her hand. I thank the universe every day for her, and for our special bond. She will hold my hand every day and guide me through the rest of my life. I thank my nana for her children: my uncles, my mother and my godmother. My godmother and I have only got closer since her passing, and she is a second mother to me and I love her from the bottom of my heart.

I have a very close-knit group of friends, who are in contact nearly every single day. We share highs, lows, tears and laughs together every year as we have done for the last 24 years now.

I feel so blessed that I go to bed each night in a clean, warm, secure home, with clothes on my back and food in my belly. I have the luxury of hot showers and fresh pyjamas. I have the luxury of getting up in the morning and choosing what I wear that day, from a variety of options. I travel to a job where I use my brain and my opinions are respected. I am using my education, that I paid relatively little for. I travel home in a beautiful car that my husband and I pay for with our full-time jobs. I wake up on a Saturday morning, and I make a gorgeous cup of coffee and read for pleasure. I walk my beloved little pup, who loves me endlessly and without hesitation. I fall asleep with my arms wrapped around the love of my life.

I know this post is soppy. And I know I may have pissed a few people off. But it's truly how I feel, I am so so lucky and so grateful for so much in my life. And milestones like this are the perfect opportunity to sit back and take stock of how things are. I have many downfalls, and I am trying to address them and I try to improve and grow every day. I could definitely be a better wife. I am overweight. I could do more around the house. I could be a better dog owner and go for more walks. I could be a better friend and pick the phone up more often. I could be a better sister and book flights to see my brother more often. He's the best friend I have known the longest, and sometimes I don't show him how much I love him.

And 30 won't change a lot of these things. I will continue to strive to be better. And I will continue to appreciate when I fail and try to learn something sunny and positive from that failure. I have this feeling that 30 isn't my milestone, and the 32 things before I'm 32 bucket list that I have is a more accurate milestone. I want to be at my target weight by 32. My house will be built and I'll be settled in it at 32. Maybe someday I'll share that list with you. 32 is the new 30.

Now for some cake.

Immigration and the EU - so many stances, so little time

Like so many others across the world, my heart broke in two seeing the pictures of Aylan Kurdi's lifeless little body washed up on the shores of Bodrum in Turkey - a startling dichotomy to Bodrum's beach holiday image. An innocent young child, who knew nothing but fear and civil war in his native Syria during his much-too-short three years in this world. He has unwillingly and unwittingly become the human face of the suffering of so many thousands of refugees fleeing a desperate situation. I have heard many compelling arguments and discussions on the topic over recent weeks, but with little Aylan a shift has come. There is a renewed urgency. A renewed sense of necessity and a renewed sense of shame, that the international community has to this point sat back and let such a disgusting human tragedy unfold before us.

This week, The Economist examined the level of countries' acceptance of migrants and refugees, and it made for harrowing and uncomfortable reading.

Germany and Sweden leading the way - from The Economist

This graphic shows the levels of accepted asylum applications in 2014, both total numbers and on a per capita basis. Germany accepted over 40,000 applications in 2014. Angela Merkel has pledged to take in another 800,000 in 2015 - and has said there is no legal limit to the number of refugees they will accept. Sweden is giving a home to refugees at a rate of over 300,000 per 100,000 people: 3:1.

Then on the other hand we have nations like the UK and Hungary. In 2014, Hungary accepted 9.4% of all asylum applications made in the country - the lowest of any of those countries studied. What a disgraceful statistic. In the Telegraph on 2nd September (before the world knew Aylan's name), there was a piece describing David Cameron's resistance to calls "for the UK to take its fair share" of migrants. "The Prime Minister refuses to heed calls for Britain to accept more refugees," the article's sub-heading went, claiming that Cameron will not bow to German pressure. Fast-forward, post-Aylan. Cameron has agreed to take "thousands", claiming no EU nation has done more to aid Syrians. "No European country has done more than Britain in this regard. Were it not for that massive aid, the numbers making the perilous journey to Europe today would be even higher," the Telegraph quotes him as saying. So how many thousands can we expect Britain to welcome with open arms? We won't know exact figures until next week, but according to UN refugee agency spokesperson Melissa Fleming, the UK is aiming to help 4,000 people. Four thousand people. Let's just remind ourselves of the German pledge to take 800,000. Let's let that all sink in for a minute.

And Ireland - shamefully resting at the bottom of the table of accepted asylum seekers. The bar on the chart is so small, I can't even make a guess at how many asylum seekers Ireland has taken in. Worth remembering at this point that these are asylum seekers, not the 'economic migrants' peddled in the Daily Mail. An asylum seeker: someone whose life is at such risk they need to live in another country. Ireland, with its rich history of repression, persecution and emigration should stand ashamed today that Aylan and all he represents are being ignored and refused a safe place to just live their lives.

And zooming outside of Europe - the Arab League, the UN, Canada, the US, Saudi Arabia - calls to help, to do more, to notice. It has transpired Aylan's family only attempted the perilous Mediterranean journey after having an asylum application rejected in Canada. Writing in The Globe and Mail, Mark Mackinnon states that the family's application was for asylum in British Columbia, where - oh, yeah - they had a family willing to sponsor them. Harper's government pledged to accept 20,000 asylum applications in 2015. At the time of Aylan's death, Canada had accepted just over 1,000. The figure should have been approximately 13 times higher.

Listening to Marian Finucane on RTE Radio 1 this morning, I heard one of the success stories: a Syrian refugee who now calls Ireland home. Responding to a caller's question on what she should bring on a mission to Greece next weekend to help those coming in to shore off the rubber dingies, he said "Food would be great. Some clothes if you can. And a smile and a hug, that's what they really need." A smile and a hug. Come on world, the time to act is now - Aylan's blood is on all of our hands.

Book Review - Americanah by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie

 Americanah - 4.5/5

I recently completed the final book in my summer reading list (see autumn TBR post for upcoming autumn list of books to be read). This book took me much longer than I expected to read, as I found myself slowing down to devour every single detail Adichie had put into the pages. I had never before read anything by this author, and to my memory nothing by a Nigerian author at all and I will certainly be back to read some of her others - Purple Hibiscus and Half of a Yellow Sun are currently sitting on my living room bookshelf. Some of the themes covered in the novel were those I had seen in other books and films I have encountered, but they felt born again and fresh.


Firstly, the blurb for those of you not familiar with the story:

As teenagers in a Lagos secondary school, Ifemelu and Obinze fall in love. Their Nigeria is under military dictatorship, and people are leaving the country if they can. Ifemelu—beautiful, self-assured—departs for America to study. She suffers defeats and triumphs, finds and loses relationships and friendships, all the while feeling the weight of something she never thought of back home: race. Obinze—the quiet, thoughtful son of a professor—had hoped to join her, but post-9/11 America will not let him in, and he plunges into a dangerous, undocumented life in London.

Years later, Obinze is a wealthy man in a newly democratic Nigeria, while Ifemelu has achieved success as a writer of an eye-opening blog about race in America. But when Ifemelu returns to Nigeria, and she and Obinze reignite their shared passion—for their homeland and for each other—they will face the toughest decisions of their lives.

Ifemelu and Obinze were extremely well-rounded characters, very raw and very honest - which made them very believable. What I liked most about Ifem's character (ironically) is that she was not always likeable. The majority of the novel is focused on Ifemelu's experiences of a life in America and the return to her homeland in Nigeria. I had never really considered the difference between 'non-American black' and 'black American' before, and Ifemelu (and by extension, Adichie) explores this during her time in America.

I watched an interview with Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie on Youtube, on International Author's Stage in which she explains the difference between an African American (someone who may have been forced to America by slavery) and American African (someone who comes more willingly). An interesting point of Ifemelu and Obinze's stories is that they are not forced from their country by war or famine. The aren't slaves forced to come to another country and leave all they have behind. Poverty isn't forcing them to leave Nigeria, in fact Obinze comes from a solidly middle-class family, while Ifemelu comes from a slightly poorer (but not desolate) situation. Ifemelu questions why when immigrants arrive on American shores with coloured skin, is it immediately assumed that they are fleeing warfare, when maybe all they want is a different life.

'Americanah', the term given to Nigerian people who return after a spell in America, does a great job of placing Ifemelu when she herself feels so displaced. She never feels American, and tries to shake the American accent she adopts. Yet, when she returns to Nigeria she is regularly called 'Americanah' and slips into subliminal American-isms. During her time in America, Ifemelu puts weight on, further losing her Nigerian identity and becoming more American. The author explores the themes of foreignness, growing and changing, returning home and, of course, race. A lot of these themes are very far removed from my everyday, and this made them fascinating to absorb. I enjoyed the paradox of race in America and Nigeria. "Dear Non-American Black, when you make the choice to come to America, you become black. Stop arguing. Stop saying I'm Jamaican or I'm Ghanaian. America doesn't care". You're only black in America, the author teaches us. There is no colour in Nigeria.

Obinze was a much more likeable character than Ifemelu, and as a reader I felt myself rooting for him all the time when he rarely achieved his dreams. He had a life-long obsession with America, only reading American books and investing himself in American culture. He did not make it to America, however, and spent some time in England as an illegal immigrant before being deported. His marriage to Kosi was very far removed from the loving and passionate relationship he experienced with Ifemelu, and this makes you feel for him - such a passionate and loving personality drowning in mediocre.

The movie adaptation of the book is currently in development, which I'm delighted about. Set to star Lupita N'yogo, it is pretty perfect casting. Despite the references to Obinze's small stature, I can't help but see Idris Elba cast in the film (he's not). Though maybe that says more about my Idris Elba obsession than anything.

An exceptional read, best I've had in a long time.