Help! I'm addicted to my smart phone...

Hello everybody!
Before I start I just want to apologise for the inactivity..just the same as everybody else's my life has been going at 200mph and I have felt a lack of inspiration of what to write about recently. Anyway here we go..

So, I don't know about anybody else but as much as I love my Iphone, I bloody hate it as the same time and I'm addicted.
It's amazing for staying in contact with people who may be far away, or staying in contact for safety reasons. It has GPS so you can almost never get lost, there's all sorts of social media apps so that you can stay updated as to what all your friends and/or celebrities are doing at all hours. etc, etc

However, sometimes at weekends or holidays I find that I can't get off my mobile without a pretty decent distraction. Even if I'm just cleaning my bedroom, every ten minutes I stop and see if anybody has updated their Snapchat story! Personally, I don't reaaaaally know why I do this because in reality I'm not overly interested in what you're having for dinner or how cute your pet kitten is. (Don't get me wrong, I adore kittens.) Therefore I shouldn't really feel this urge to refresh Instagram or Twitter...

I don't know if it's just me who feels this way or other people have these habits too?
Also like when you go out for dinner with a friend or partner etc, why do we sit and stare at our smart phones when we have a real life living human to talk to directly in front of us?!?! I'm definitely not a saint at this one, I just don't understand why we do this.

It's pretty depressing to think about how consumed we are in social media and how instead of living in the moment we are more fussed about taking an 'artsy' photograph for Instagram to show the world how great things are.. or not..
The Internet has this crazy ability which allows people to create their own identity. You can change your name, age, nationality, wealth, diet, lifestyle to be perceived in a totally different way.

I'm sure not all generations are as obsessed as my generation are or seem to be, I don't know. It just seems sad to think that all these years are going by and all we care about is when the new Iphone 7 is going to be released.


Rant over! I hope you enjoyed this little post, um sorry if it was a bit angry.. Please feel free to tweet me (oh the irony) @LauraHayley129 or in the comments section below! I would love to hear your thoughts!

Thank You so much for reading and please check out some of my other material if you enjoyed this one :) Have a lovely weekend!

This inspiration behind this post ----> 

http://i.imgur.com/FcqvUM3.jpg

The incredible pressure of results day

So here I am, sat in my bedroom having another sleepless night leading up to results day.
Now I might be crazy but this day is heavily looming and with each second I find my stomach turning at the thought of opening that dreaded envelope.

This year seems so incredibly terrifying. Maybe I'm just a bit crazy and an extreme over thinker but all I can imagine is seeing those grades and being a complete disappointment to the world. My parents, friendship groups, boyfriend..

Now I know that grades aren't everything but the pressure I'm personally feeling at this very moment in time is paramount. I'm currently as stressed as I have ever been in my entire life - apart from actually sitting the exams which tore me up and left me sobbing into my pillow on numerous occasions. The strange part is that in reality I should not be at all stressed! I mean, come on, I'm on an awesome 6 week holiday where I'm spending most of my days relaxing watching films or seeing friends but its becoming unbearable.

A bit of background is necessary here I think;
I sat my GCSE's and worked my butt off to get decent grades. I mean studying for hours every night, doing excessive homework etc and in the end I achieved one A*,6 A's and 6 B's. This made me, my parents, my whole family very proud because as a youngster I really struggled with academic stuff.

Of course many would argue that 'hey, you did amazingly last year! You have nothing to worry about this time round!' But really, really?!? Are you serious?

Getting decent grades did not come naturally and saying that does not help AT ALL.
'You'll be fine Laura, stop worrying for goodness sakes.'

I'm sorry, but I don't think you can fully understand the pressure that you have created by assuming that all is going to be well and good again this year.
In a way, having good grades at GCSE, personally I've found that it suddenly increases the pressure to do good again this year. This, in turn, increases the potential amount of disappointment and shock from everyone else.

So when I say that I want to open the envelope on my own, please don't get offended. I'm purely trying to save myself from a mental breakdown if all goes to shit.

I don't know how you feel, but I care about what people think. Everyone says not too, but sometimes that is just impossible.

 Sometimes, we need to be alone, sometimes we need to be with people.

Can someone PLEASE reassure me that I'm not the only person who is feeling this right now/has felt it?

Scary University decisions

For those of you who don't already know I currently attend Sixth form and will soon have to begin applying to University..but this really isn't as easy as it seems, at least in my head it isn't.
Everybody seems to say a different thing about University depending on their perspective.

Sixth form says 'go go go' - because of statistics and their reputation, they don't actually seem to care too much about the individual apparently...
Graduates either do exactly what they want and get the job they wanted or they end up doing a job completely unrelated to their degree which could potentially be seen as a waste of £30,000..
My parents personally try to stay objective and just want me to be happy I think but there is always that pressure to do well of course because I want to make my parents proud which is pretty normal I think.
Friends say no, its a waste of time, you'll have to make all new friends if you go to University and move away and lets not forget about the dept.
Other people just say that you should go to University if you know exactly what job you want to have etc but who really truly knows EXACTLY what job they can get which will satisfy them for their whole entire lives, of course there are some exceptions but I'm definitely not one of them.

So at the moment, deciding on whether I should even attend University is very very blurry. Personally, I'm a very undecided, easily influenced person who can change their life goals in a split second making the choice even harder.

Then there's the part of choosing a course and a place to go to and where to live and ahhhh so much to think about. It just all seems crazy and scary because making the wrong decision here could really negatively impact what happens in the future from my perspective.

Some people would say that an apprenticeship or a different alternative to university is a better option but then you hear the statistics such as ' Graduates Earn £200,000 more than those without a degree'. ( http://www.graduates.co.uk/the-graduate-premium/) Yeah, I'm just a little bit stuck and confused right now I guess :(

So please if you have an opinion or any suggestions on how I can make the right decision for me, I would love to hear about it!! Or maybe you're going through the same problems as me, let me know and we can discuss!

At the end of the day, I find security in thinking that whatever happens, will happen for a reason. 
For example If I completely fail my a-levels, then maybe I was never meant to go to uni but something else will crop up.
(This will also help me cope on results day haha..)

Thank you for reading! Please check out my other posts if you enjoyed this one and please feel free to comment or send me a message.

5 steps to surviving a chaotic lifestyle without breaking down!

Okay, so firstly I attend sixth form 5/7 days of the week. The other two days I decided to get a job in a very popular discount clothes shop. So this does not leave me with a single day of rest in a week, it's great I know.. I also go dancing 3 times a week for a total of 7 hours per week..

Anyway I'm not going to complain about that anymore as it was completely my choice to get the job and go dancing etc and that isn't what this post is supposed to be about.
But from spending my weekends working in this store, dancing and juggling college work it has taught me a couple of ways to cope with people and to handle a chaotic lifestyle:

1) First of all, it really helps to know that you ARE allowed a break.
It's not going to kill you if you take that evening off from doing the dishes or housework for example. You are allowed to have the occasional cheeky netflix binge. Personally I find when I begin to feel like I'm drowning in stress, going out with someone, taking a hot bath, watching You tube; anything can help as long you can turn your brain off for a bit. If you can take half an hour to relax, things will seem clearer. Okay yeah you may have just lost half an hour in which you could've been studying or whatever but at least now you'll be able to organise what you really need to do and when. Everything should just seem a bit clearer, if it's not maybe try writing it down. Sometimes I feel like my head is just juggling so much information I feel on the brink of explosion but if I can empty those thoughts slightly, it can help to relieve the pressure.

2) You can say no.
This one I really need to work on oops.. By this second point, I mean like saying no to going out with friends or doing that extra shift at work. If you've been working hard all week and then they ask you to go in super early on that Sunday morning, you do not have to do it. You are allowed to have that extra couple hours sleep which will really help you function. Of course it's important to be kind and helpful to others etc but you can't forget about yourself. 

3) Stress will come in waves.
For me, this is a big one. I find that I can build up tension inside myself and it just keeps going until I feel like I'm drowning in pressure and stress and anxiety and bleuuuuuugh. No thanks! When you reach that point that's when you need to take 10 minutes out. Break away from the world and this might sound weird but think about how big the universe is and how insignificant whatever you're stressing about really is. Remembering that stress comes in waves helps me because it just reminds me that things will calm down. Things will get better, it's how life works. Life will throw you a challenge, you either take it on or you run, either way it will stretch you and your abilities.

4) Look after your physical necessities.
This kinda links in with number 2 but its very important that you look after yourself! Don't stay up all night watching TV if you've got work early in the morning. You're going to need that sleep so that tomorrow doesn't seem so bad. Eat healthily, exercise blah blah blah, yeah do it. That McDonald's is not going to fill you up for long enough, have some proper food and remember that you are literally what you eat. Say you eat junk food all week, and say some of it gets stored as fat. When you look at your body in the mirror and see that you've gained those couple of extra pounds, it's literally that cheeseburger but in a different form. You are made of whatever you put in your body. A moment on the lips, forever on the hips.
The exercise? I just do it because afterwards, its like 'fuck yeah' I'm doing something goooood.

5) It's worth it.
Always remember that your hard work will pay off, there is a reason as to why you do this with your life.

 If it's not okay, it's not the end.

Thank you for readind, please share this if you found it interesting/ helpful! Goodnight:)

Election day! A young person's perspective...

So, politics.
Today, if you weren't already aware, is election day in the UK. This is where anybody over the age of 18 can vote for who they want to run the country for the next few years basically.

As a British teen, I do not like the fact that my knowledge of politics and the parties, candidates etc is very very limited. All I know is that you can vote a polling station and the main parties are the Conservatives, Labour, Liberal Democrats, UKIP and the Green Party (I think).

Yes I have basic knowledge of what each party kind of wants but who I would vote for? No clue.

It's funny because you hear about lots of parties trying to get young people's votes because they usually don't bother voting etc. There is a reason for why we don't bother. Of course some people just don't really care and can't be bothered but I would say that its more down to the fact that we don't understand.
We hear rumours from newspapers, television, the internet, other people about some parties being very violent, corrupt, a bit wacky, all about upper class people/ lower class people and sometimes that it doesn't matter who you vote for, nothing will change.
 This information can be very subjective and biased of course because whoever is telling you this information has got a purpose to get you to vote for a particular party otherwise they probably wouldn't be talking to you.

To solve the lack of knowledge of politics in young people, I would suggest having lessons in politics and just being able to learn about who's who, what they want for Britain and their history perhaps. Okay so yeah, some people may object which is fair enough but surely knowing about who will run the country is much more important that Pythagoras's theorem?!
Children ARE the future. They will one day be standing up against each other trying to rule the country, that's a fact.

However, I understand that It would be very hard to deliver this information objectively, as all teachers would have their own personal opinions and beliefs, which kinda throws the idea of being taught about politics in schools out of the window but how else can we learn about this stuff?

I once again, do not have the answer, it's just something that irritates me as I feel like I'm really missing out but I would not want to jeopardise this country with my lack of understanding.

Thank you for reading, what do you think?
Just a disclaimer, of course this is my own personal experience, maybe you went to a school were they taught you this stuff? Let me know how you learnt about politics and who to vote for. Who influenced you?

What is the point?

Do you ever sit there at the brink of explosion wondering, what is the point?

I do this increasing amounts everyday, and its kind of getting scary now. It's like you've worked hard all day at work/college etc and then you come home, have to do the housework, look after siblings, go to the gym whatever it is. Then at the weekends you may have a part time job or you may have to dedicate your time to something else like seeing family for example.
Now, when do you get a break? When do you get to sit down and just relax?

There seems to never be a time to just be happy.

Personally, I feel like in this life, you don't ever get to relax and be content. You're always on the move for work, other people, anything. There is always something that's broken/wrong in life.

This could just be me who's having a bit of a shit time at the moment but maybe not. All this just makes me think; whats the point in living if you're not happy?

Why would anyone want to live 80 years complaining and having a miserable time?!?!?

I know I certainly wouldn't.

It's just that my life course ahead of me seems so depressing.

Age 5 = Start school. (this process refers to my life as a person in Britain).

Age 16 = Finish school and join a college/sixth form/apprenticeship.

Age 18 = Finish a-levels (etc) and go to uni.

Age 21 = Finish University and go into employment.

Work for the next 45 years approximately, just trying to earn enough money for my family etc.

Age 66 = Retire and enjoy living for a few years (about 4).

Age 70 = Get some sort of age-related disease.

Age 80+ = Probably die from some painful disease.

The End.

Personally this sounds utterly awful. Who would want to go from education, work, retirement and then practically death??

                                                            What is the point?

I just think that the society we live in is somehow broken and people can't enjoy themselves anymore, no wonder the depression rate is so high nowadays.

The thing is though, WE ARE THE LUCKY ONES.

In my situation, I am very privileged. I have a roof over my head, a loving family who will support me, food for every meal and many lovely luxuries which I take for granted. I know that this is very very wrong but unless you've not had those wonderful things then how can you develop appreciation for them?

 So when you put it like that, suddenly our life course looks bright. We are lucky to have schools and an opportunity for an education. We are lucky to be able to go into employment and earn money. We are lucky that we can retire as many people across the world have to work till their dead.

Why does it look so bleak then? 

And how can we start appreciating the things we take for granted because that needs to happen immediately if we ever want to be happy.

Honestly, I have no idea.

Okay so that was just something to think about, pretty damn deep but hey. Have a nice day, let me know what you think.

 

What is love?

This is a intertesting, complex topic; but lets just dive straight in...
I believe that there are 3 types of love;
1. The first type is all about loving an object or something that you own. For example I love my Iphone, I would probably be lost without it as I heavily rely on it to my disappointment...(see my last post for more information!) Yes I love it, but I'm not attracted to it and the love is not unconditional. If the phone breaks or whatever, I'm not going to love it anymore, I'll probably go and buy a Samsung, if you get the picture.
You can love this inanimate object but its not love that you could feel with a person because it has no ability to love you back.

2. So, the second type of love is the kind of love you feel for family and friends. It is unconditional and you love these people because you've spent alot of time with them and they've sculpted who you are as a person. You provide emotional support for eachother and you have the capability to forgive eachother if you make a mistake. Not like an Iphone, you're much more likely to forgive a person for their mistakes if you love them because you care about them and don't want to lose them. However this desn't mean that you're in any way attracted to them or in love with them. You love them for who they are and for everything they've done for you and they should appreciate everything you've done for them as well.

3. This third type is waaaay different to the other two. This is true love. The kind you see in Disney films between Princes and Princesses. This, obviously, can be a very nice thing, especially if the person loves you back. It can be absoluteley wonderful.
Now, I'm still pretty young and as you would expect I do not have much experience with this kind of love because of my age etc. Hopefully I've still got quite a bit of life to go where I will gain these experiences and memories. I reckon this third kind can be very beautiful. Personally, I'm only just beginning to get a taste of this.
This love originally develops as lust. Some people may call it 'love at first sight' but in my opinion its just attraction at first sight. It's not deep love because you need to spend your precious time with that person for deep love to really develop.
So it starts with attraction, like a little crush you would get in the playground as a kid. And then you get to know them, instead of just loving the way they look you start loving who they are as a person. You fall in love with the little details, and the attraction is no longer just to those sparkiling blue eyes, or those ripped abs for example. You're seeing past the outer shell of that person.
I mentioned earlier that this kind can be very beautiful but I believe that it can also be very destructive and damaging as well because it's so powerful. There are negatives to everything, nothing is perfect, life is not a movie. Some might argue that this destructive side is very painful and can ruin your life as you're in a very vunerable position which is totally understandable.
However the power and strength of the third kind, I think, can almost be seen in a positive way. For example, you're worried about what they're doing, who they're hanging out with etc and obviously that hurts because you're scared of losing that person. BUT without that slight fear, would you really love that person?
For me, I like to see it as proof, yes its okay to be jealous because it means that I'm not fooling myself. I'm not making this love up through rose tinted glasses, it's really there.


Just something that popped into my head on a walk to Sixth Form one morning. Have a good evening, thank you for reading!
What do you think? Have I got it all wrong or does this make sense?

Things change/Perception

Over the past couple of months things have changed, going to go with a solid 8 or so.

So so so much has changed. It can be very scary to think about how everything can stay the same for a very long time and then one day, bang.

Friendships that you thought were going to last a lifetime becuase you'd hung out for the past 4 years practically everyday and then you find out that they hated you all along. Its an amazing experience if you haven't had that one already..

Or the opposite side of that and people who you thought 'na I'll never be friends with them, eugh' you end up being very close to them. Its scary. Pretty much everything in our world is exactly what we make of it. Of course we can't change other people decisions which could in turn affect us but we can almost make anything happen if you believe in it enough and want it enough.

Now yeah, that does sound really silly. "If you want it enough, you can get it". Obviously you couldn't just nip to Tescos and buy a unicorn because you wanted one, thats not going to happen.

But If something in your life is upsetting you, someone or something then hope is not lost. Of course not everything goes by this principle and thats not what I'm saying.
All it is, is that if you really want that thing then there is a way to it becuase your world that you see out of your eyes is exactly what you make of it.

How do we know that this world we live in isn't just what we've created in our own minds?

Perception can't be the answer but?



Kind diverted off of the subject there but hey ho, this is just a way of emptying my mind I guess aha..