Don’t be crushed by failing to stick to your resolutions.
The third Sunday in January is when most people abandon their New Year’s resolutions.
It’s called Quitters Day. How’s that for negative connotations? Nobody likes a quitter, so the expression goes. I have to disagree.
It’s time to quit beating yourself up for doing okay at life.
The majority of us are going to be average. That’s not rocket science, it’s just a statistical reality. If we were all exceptional, none of us would be.
Quit setting the bar too high
Goals are good, but make them in small increments and celebrate each little achievement. It’s cool to write yourself a check for a million bucks and stick it on your fridge with a plan to cash it in one day. …
Some of them just can’t handle the truth.
You know those times when you tell friends about the sexist behaviour you’ve experienced?
If your friends are women, they will probably nod sympathetically or roll their eyes in that “tell me about it” way. Men will be shocked and appalled but they will commonly phrase their reaction as, “I find it hard to believe anyone behaves like that.”
You hear their sympathy, but listen to what is really being expressed with that response: disbelief.
As a woman, I have been experiencing sexism since before I even understood what it was.
When we weren’t allowed to wear pants at school because our uniform dictated skirts for the girls and pants only for the boys. …
My writing touched a sensitive nerve; here’s what to do if this happens to you.
Not everyone will love your writing, and it’s not your job to defend it to those who don’t.
Rule number one? Don’t engage. Just ignore the unsolicited criticism and move on. Focus on the occasional critiques that are helpful and useful — the ones that will actually help you improve your writing. Or better still the encouraging ones that tell you your writing is relatable.
No two people will have the exact same opinion on a piece of writing. …
Even after we were living apart, he couldn’t stop watching my every move.
I had that creepy feeling of someone watching me. Turns out it wasn’t paranoia.
“Paranoia is just a heightened sense of awareness.” — John Lennon
My divorce was about as long and painful as the one portrayed by Adam Driver and Scarlet Johansson in the movie “Marriage Story”. If you haven’t already seen it, it should carry a trigger warning for those divorcees who still haven’t quite paid off their lawyers’ fees.
I was attending one of the last few meetings with my high-class lawyer in a rather swanky part of the city of Edinburgh. …
If you’ve ever been disbelieved for telling the truth, you know how much it hurts.
When I told a guy I was dating I was writing a piece about the allegations against Woody Allen in the continued wake of the #metoo revelations, he sent me an article explaining how his partner Mia Farrow’s behaviour towards their children was questionable too. It was written by a woman, which made it seem more credible.
It didn’t change my thoughts on the situation, but it made me write a different article. This one.
The worrying trend in cases like this is that when women come forward in support of men, it lends credence to their already presumed innocence. As with Scarlett Johansson voicing her support of Allen, it makes it that much harder for other women to break rank from the sisterhood and tell a story that expresses an opposing view. …
Managing multiple profiles is easier than you think.
When I checked my stats for my second Medium account today, I was pleasantly surprised to see that my earnings for this month have already exceeded those for the whole of December.
I only have 56 followers so this was unexpected. My primary account (this one) has a few shy of 800 as I write this. My second account currently has better stats and higher earnings than my main one.
These are the top tips I’ve learned by creating a successful second account:
Top tip #1 — establish your primary account first
Wait until your first account is established and you know your way around Medium, how to publish, pitch publications, etc. Don’t even think about starting two accounts at the same time, unless you really know what you’re doing. …
You can live without luxuries but you can never overvalue the commodity of time.
Having four babies in my twenties and then one at forty has given me the unusual parenting advantage of hindsight.
There is nothing I regret more from the years when I had my older children at home, than putting things off until “later”.
If your children are small, you can be forgiven for thinking you will have them forever. But I can promise you the time will come, in all likelihood before you are ready for it, when they will be grown and flown and no longer needing you on a daily basis. And sometimes just not at all, ever.
“History will judge us by the difference we make in the everyday lives of children.” …
A victory that proves you can fight for what is right and win.
Scotland in the United Kingdom is famous for many things, but this one is something to be really proud of.
Our nation has become the first in the world where all period products are universally free to all who use them. Period.
We might not have managed to win our freedom from the rule of England and become a fully independent country, but we are asserting our unique place in the world by putting women’s needs at the forefront.
It helps that we have a woman at our helm — our First Minister, Nicola Sturgeon. She has normalised the discussion of menstruation in the chambers of government, also highlighting women’s issues such as menopause and endometriosis, and the environmental impact and sustainability of sanitary products. …
In a world of infection
Craving the closeness, warm skin next to mine,
Undercover cuddles in the dusk and the dawn.
Dangerous passions lurk while lovers are gone -
Deepening desire and gasping for air,
Lawful detention is a lonely affair.
Endlessly craving, not spooning, complaining -
Sheltered and soft, un-cuddled remaining
An acrostic poem, from a prompt by Adriana Sim.
I was tagged in a challenge to write an acrostic poem about a particular craving and I considered all the foods that I adore; which one could I write about?
I love French fries, I enjoy so many salty snacks that are moreish by design. Once you pop, you can’t get enough of them… and there are so many, how to choose just one? …
And I couldn’t be more proud of him.
Male suicide rates are at a scarily all-time high.
Of the people who reach the desperate point of deciding to end their lives in the US annually, 79% are males.
It is every parent’s worst nightmare to imagine the loss of their child. For them to take their own life is unthinkable.
But for too many parents this becomes a reality.
Suicide is the second leading cause of death in the world for those aged 15–24 years.
We need to be prepared to talk about it as a global community and figure out what’s going wrong.
For far too long, we have been telling our sons and men in society at large to “man up” and “grow a pair”. It’s not funny, it’s not clever, any more than sexist remarks about women are, but we’ve become immunized by constant exposure to them over the years. …
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