Reflections

It's been a crazy one, hasn't it? I'm not going to say I've had a brilliant year, but I'm not going to say that I've had a terrible one either. Let's face it, it's had more ups and downs than the Grand Old Duke Of York, but you can learn just as much from the ditch at the bottom as you can standing at the top of mountains. And sometimes a little bit more. So here's a little bit of a reflection on the things I've learned this year....

This year I made a decision. I made the decision to take my previous twelve months, and re-write it. It was one of the hardest decisions I've ever had to make as it meant choosing to do something that had the potential to make me very happy but also to disappoint a lot of the best people in my life. It turned out to be the right thing but it was a scary time for me.

I also got quite ill. Maybe more than once. And I'm not going to lie about it, every moment of it sucked. The first time I was so ill that I couldn't sit my exams, I was barely able to leave the house, I didn't feel like myself and I spent a long time coming to terms with what was actually wrong. The second time I caught some unknown virus that left my immune system very weak and my body exhausted unable to do much more exercise than walk to lectures each day (and sometimes less). But this taught me to be patient with myself. It taught me that if you let people know what's going on, they're usually happy to find a way to help out. That's something I still have a hard time remembering.

This year I ran my first half marathon. I was so proud of myself for completing it,and enjoyed every minute of it. The Great North Run inspired me to carry on, to sign up for bigger challenges, and help others enjoy the sport as much as I do by volunteering with running local running groups, wherever I happen to be in the country. It taught me that self-belief can be as influential as training for big events. It helped me realise that I can do just about anything I set my mind on and that sometimes the biggest obstacles aren't really obstacles at all.

And then I sprained my ankle. Twice. I was annoyed and frustrated to end up in a hospital with a doctor telling me I wouldn't be able to do sport for 4-8 weeks but I'm stubborn I guess. I struggled to rest, but I learnt to respect my body a lot more than I had been doing and that sped up my recovery. In a backward sort of way, it was potentially one of the best things that could have happened to me because when I was able to race again I managed to PB my 5k time on three consecutive weeks.

Disney. I went to Walt Disney World for the first time at the age of 19 and oh my god it was the best place that I have ever been to. I guess it was just magical and taught me to never grow up,  and that  all of your wishes and dreams can come true if only you believe in them hard enough.

And here I am, after another long gap between posts (but lets forget about that for a little while), ready to rock in 2017 and make it the best year yet. Another year full of scary mistakes, and scary decisions, because if we didn't have those, we wouldn't learn. And if we didn't learn, we wouldn't be moving forwards.

Keep smiling,
Kathryn x

What's going on?

Golly I've not been here for a while - and I've definitely missed it! I'm not going to make too many excuses about my absence, I've just been busy in various forms. So here's a quick update for you...

I've moved back to university in my favourite part of the country (though I'm sure a lot of people say that about their university city). I'm back in Durham and I didn't realise until I moved back just how much I missed the picturesque views, the friendly atmosphere as well as the freedom to be my own person!

Following on from that, I've changed course so technically I'm in my first year again. I'm sure I'll talk more about this in the future when life's a little more certain but in short, I passed the first year of my maths degree but realised I only enjoyed around half of the course and didn't like the look of progression routes. Therefore, I transferred to Natural Sciences, a degree in which I have a lot more flexibility and choice to study particular areas that interest me in more detail (including areas of maths, computer science and even a cheeky little bit of sport!)

Asides from studying I've taken on a few new roles in college which I can't really talk about in too much detail yet, but they're going well and although they're taking up a lot of my time it's super duper amazing to see the effect my roles have on other people. I'm also still doing lots of sport, despite a recent injury, so have been coxing men's boats at local head races (i.e doing rowing stuff and shouting/steering) and will be swimming in a competition at Sheffield in the next few weeks.

I think that's all for now and I can assure you I'll be posting a lot more regularly over the next few months. In the mean time, I'd love to hear what you're all up to so comment down below or leave a link to your blog

Keep smiling,
Kathryn xox