Author: coffeeshopcynic

The Happiness Project: Adapt

- coffeeshopcynic

If you’ve been following along with my happiness project, you know that “play” was supposed to be my theme this month. I was planning on writing about Emerald City Comic Con and all the cosplays I was planning on doing there. As soon as ECCC was cancelled, I knew I needed to change my theme. So what better theme to adapt to than the theme “adapt” itself. 

I don’t even know where to start. This month has been trying, to say the least. We were bummed out about missing ECCC so we had a Lord of the Rings marathon and went to a distillery. This was only a few weeks ago (back when we were actually allowed to leave our houses) but it feels so much longer. 

It’s been hard to adapt to this new way of life. I already worked from home half the time anyway, so that wasn’t too difficult, but everything else seemed to be. Not only am I isolating, but I’m in the process of moving and finding a new job at the same time. 

My girlfriend and I signed a lease together and she recently moved in. I’m not officially moving in until June 1, just do to financials and giving my roommate time to find a new place (which might be impossible right now), but I’m staying here for a few weeks since we’re self-isolating together. This would have been a big change even without us being stuck together during a pandemic. It’s going well though. 

Now my job. So, I’m no longer job hunting since no one is hiring anyways. Luckily my contract at work has been extended again so that’s one less thing I need to worry about. 

I’m learning to adapt to not seeing my friends. I’ve been calling people more. Zoom meetings are a thing I’d never heard of and am now using all the time. Podcasting is now a thing we’re doing remotely. I miss going outside and seeing people but all these things are so necessary. 

I’m making sure to keep up with my routines and good habits to keep up my mental health. Just like everyone else, I’m just trying my best to adapt to this new way of living. 

Mental Health and the News: COVID-19

- coffeeshopcynic

We interrupt our regularly scheduled episode to talk about COVID-19 and how the news may affect your anxiety. We hope to ease some anxiety and remind you that we’re all in this together.

Theme song by Tyson Kerr. 

Resource List: 

Check out the latest episode of Not Enough Spoons

How Mental Health was Treated in History

- coffeeshopcynic

In our first of two special mental health in history episodes, Alicen and Andrea talk about how mental health used to be treated. Who knew lobotomies would be one of the better ways? 

Theme song by Tyson Kerr. 

Resource List: 

Check out the latest episode of Not Enough Spoons

The Happiness Project: Remembrance

- coffeeshopcynic

Remember back in November when I said that month didn’t go how I thought it would? Yeah, that was cute. I had no clue what February had in store for me but it certainly didn’t turn out as planned. 

I didn’t have a whole lot planned for this month other than my usual tribute to my mom. Since 2016 I’ve been getting tattoos on the anniversary of her death. I’m not really sure how it started happening but considering she always wanted one but was too afraid, I thought it was fitting. She died on February 3, 2010, so this year was the ten year anniversary and I was going to get a special tattoo for her. My very first tattoo was a rose and I was going to get a sunflower (her favourite flower) to go with it. However, the date rolled around and I didn’t have the money for a tattoo and also I wasn’t as in love with the idea as I once was. I still want a sunflower for my mom but I think it’s going to be in a different style than the rose on my arm and in a different spot. 

I didn’t realize this month was going to have so many romantic milestones that meant so much until they happened. If my girlfriend is reading this, I apologize in advance but you were warned. So I have a tendency to dwell on the negative so if something happened with my ex that was bad or bittersweet it affects how I view it now. Confused yet? Let me give some examples directly from this month. One thing my ex did was say she loved me before she actually meant it. Not saying she never did, but she didn’t the first time she didn’t. My current girlfriend and I exchanged these words recently and it was so different. It was thought out and we were both sure. It felt so nice to actually feel confident in this. 

If anyone has read this blog for a while, you know how I feel about Valentine’s day. I mean last time I tried to be romantic before this year, I just about cut my finger off. (Please see that story here) This year we had a nice Valentine’s day and I didn’t feel the bittersweet feelings of the past. Why? Cause I’m finally healing and that’s amazing to me. 

Another thing I have issues with is trip planning because it’s bitten me in the ass before so when Angela (the girlfriend, in case I haven’t mentioned her name on here before) mentioned we should go to Montreal for our one year anniversary I was more than a little hesitant. Trust me, I want to go but also what if she changes her mind? Well! I’m happy to say our flights are booked so guess she’s stuck with me now. 

The last thing to do with relationships this month was bowling. Why bowling? Let me explain. So bowling was something I used to do with my mom because she was competitive as hell and she liked to beat us all. And she did. Every. Single. Time. So anyway. A couple of years ago I thought I would try it again since it never seemed the same without her. So on the day that would’ve been her birthday, my ex and I went. And then she broke up with me the next day. So yeah. There went my idea to get back into bowling. However I recently went with my girlfriend and my best friend and we were all terrible, but also we had so much fun! 

It sounds like I’m speaking negatively about my ex, but I’m really not. I think there’s always been a part of me that feels like I don’t deserve to be happy in my relationship though because my last one ended less than well. That’s not her fault. That’s my own mindset. And I think I’m finally to the point where I can remember the past and also realize I deserve the present and future. 

Changing lanes now, in a month I thought would be about my mom, it ended up not being about her a lot at all. However, it became a lot about family. I actually made an effort to talk to my parents and grandmother more. I’d like to say this was a conscious effort just because I should, but it took a little bit of a wake-up call first. My best friend’s mom (who I consider family) had a stroke. She’s fine, honest, I just saw her and if it wasn’t for the walker you’d never know. However, it reminded me that life is short. So I’m trying to remember all the good times now. And maybe call my parents more often. 

Join me next month for March’s theme “play”, which hopefully actually goes the way I intend it.

Mental Health and Social Media

- coffeeshopcynic

This week Andrea and Alicen dissect how social media can affect your mental health. Spoiler alert: it shockingly isn’t all bad. 

Theme song by Tyson Kerr. 

Resource List: 

Check out the latest episode of Not Enough Spoons

Narcissistic Personality Disorder and Echoism

- coffeeshopcynic

This week Alicen and Alicen give you a two for one episode as they cover both Narcissistic Personality Disorder and Echoism. 

Theme song by Tyson Kerr. 

Resource List: 

Check out the latest episode of Not Enough Spoons

The Happiness Project: Power

- coffeeshopcynic

It’s a new year and I thought power would be the perfect theme for January. I have a friend who always calls me a superhero, and I never really believe her but I’m trying to. So this month has been all about taking my own power back and taking care of myself. In fact, Andrea and I did a podcast episode about how we’re going to take better care of ourselves in 2020, that you can listen to here.

Back in 2018, I got really into makeup. I’d also been into it, but I got really into it. I would spend hours watching makeup tutorials on Instagram and youtube while trying to perfect the perfect cat eye and learn what the hell highlighter was. 2019 was the year I got slightly obsessed with skincare. Suddenly I did more than just wash my face and slap some moisturizer on (if I even remembered to do that). I had a routine and more fancy skincare products than I could even name. This year it’s going to be oral hygiene and haircare. I brush my teeth daily (though twice a day could be iffy sometimes), but that was about it. I’ve been trying really hard to not only make sure I brush them twice a day, no matter what but floss and use mouthwash as well. For low spoon days when choosing between showering and brushing my teeth is just too much, I have a travel toothbrush and toothpaste in my shower so I can do both at once. I’ve set a reminder on my phone every night so I actually floss. It may seem overkill, but oral hygiene is really important and I’m just trying to get better at it. Is JVN proud of me yet?

As for hair care, I’ve been pretty brutal to my hair over the years. It’s already curly and very dry and damaged, to begin with, and then I’ve also spent the past ten years of my life, dying, bleaching, straightening, and doing everything else that’s bad for it. I’ve finally decided to give it a break. I’ve been bleaching it blonde for cosplays for a long time now, and I’m finally letting it grow out into it’s natural mousey, dishwater blonde state. I bought satin pillowcases, were are much better for curly hair. I regularly do hair masks and use products designed for damaged curly hair. Another thing I’ve been doing is trying to be more mindful of how I tie my hair up. With unruly hair, it’s so tempting to just throw it up in a tight elastic and forget about it. I’ve switched to gentler methods of putting up my hair such as these types of ties, or the fun spiral ones that look like old telephone cords. I’m also trying to wear my hair down more. As for bedtime, if my hair is wet I put it in a braid, but I’m trying not to sleep with wet hair as often, which is a bit of a challenge since I’ve always been an evening showerer.

Food and fitness is another goal of mine. Not going to lie, I’ve been failing at fitness this month. I’ve kind of been working out, but not really. So that’s a thing I definitely need to work harder on. As for food, I’m cooking at home more and really loving my new crockpot as well as sheet pan recipes (both are incredibly low spoon). It’s snacks I’m more focused on though. I always buy good food for meals, but I never think to buy snack food and then when I get hungry between meals I end up resorting to going and getting junk. So I’ve filled my kitchen with nice healthy snacks, and am eating a lot more fruits and vegetables. I feel a lot better and it also has the added bonus of seeing my pet rats happy because I share my healthy snacks with them.

I’m trying to make more healthy choices for my mental health as well. I usually watch all the movies nominated for an Oscar (you can read my blog post about lasts year’s here), but this year I’ve finally decided to not even attempt to watch them all and to just watch what I want to watch. First of all, the Oscars are earlier this year so there is less than a month between when the nominations are announced and when the award show airs. It’s a lot of work to watch 30 something movies in a month and it’s kind of stressful. I wasn’t about to do it this year in like three weeks. Also, there were movies this year that were nominated that I didn’t even want to watch because I knew they wouldn’t be good for my mental health (I’m looking at you Joker!). I’m not saying I’ll never watch all the movies nominated for Oscars again, but this year I’ve just decided it’s not for me. Besides, it might be fun to just guess what’s going to win at random.

I’m also starting to prepare for some big life changes. I’m looking for a new job since my contract is up in April. I honestly don’t really know what I want to do yet, so I’m doing some self-searching to see what might be a good position for me. I’m also starting to clean and purge my apartment since I will be moving in with my girlfriend over the summer. I know that’s a ways away, but I’m a bit of a hoarder so it’s going to take a while to go through all my stuff. Anyways, big things are happening.

The Happiness Project: Joy

- coffeeshopcynic

I have a love/hate relationship with Christmas. I love it but also it majorly stresses me out. I feel so much pressure to make it perfect and to enjoy it. The money aspect always stresses me out and I usually choose to make Christmas gifts late enough that I’m scrambling to finish on time. 

Then there’s the family aspect. I love my family, I really do but they can also be a bit… Much. I’m from a small town in the interior of BC and things are certainly different there than they are here in Vancouver. I get annoyed with small-town life and none of them seem to understand why I love the city so much. I love visiting my family but it’s also exhausting. So many people and so much going on. I always know that I’m thoroughly exhausted by the end of the holiday season, so I wanted to make it a nice and relaxing month with a lot of things that bring me joy. 

My month was filled with Christmas activities. I kicked it all off by decorating my apartment and my rats’ cage with all my decorations. I treated myself to two advent calendars this year. One from Lindt now that I can eat chocolate again, and a tea calendar from David’s tea. We had our annual craft exchange at the caffe I hang out at. I crocheted a friend a blanket for it, and even though I was a little disappointed that I ran out of time and couldn’t make it as long as I wanted it to be, it still turned out pretty well. My girlfriend and I went to Glow, which is a Christmas light display, and even though it was disappointing, it was a lot of fun. She also surprised me with tickets to go see my first Cirque de Soleil show, which was absolutely amazing. I went to my first work Christmas party. It wasn’t for my own work but a friend invited me to go with them and it was great. It helped that the food was free and that there was a lot of wine involved. My friends and I also held our annual bad Netflix Christmas movie and gin night. Another tradition I did this year was Sistermas. Andrea, my self-proclaimed sister, and I spent the last couple of Christmases together but this year since we were both going home to our families, we decided to have it earlier in the month. I stayed over after Gin night and we went for brunch the next morning before doing some Christmas shopping and going back to Andrea’s for cat cuddles and some Christmas movies. The following weekend was the annual Christmas party with the nerds at the caffe. As per usual we all ate too much food, were forced to watch the worst Christmas short film known to mankind (if you feel like being tortured like we were, go check out “Treevenge”, but honestly, don’t do it), and had a super fun white elephant gift exchange. The last Christmas event I did before going home to my hometown was going to the Burnaby Heritage Museum with another friend. I’d never been and it was so much fun to go with her since she used to volunteer there and told me so much information about it. Naturally, I did celebrate Christmas with my family once I got to my home town, but really all my Christmas activities happened while I was still in Vancouver. 

It wasn’t just holiday activities that brought me joy this month. I tried to find joy in all the little things. Self-care was a huge deal for me this month. I made a self-care advent calendar and didn’t follow it every day but followed it as much as I could. I also continued reading a lot and finished out the year with a total of 140 books read in 2019. Along with reading, writing and podcasting were other things that not only brought me joy in December but brought me joy in 2019 in general. Between this blog, my writing for WWEST, and my writing for Sartorial Geek, I published 31 blog posts. I also launched my own podcast with my co-host Andrea, and we published 16 episodes. 

The last thing that brought me a lot of joy this month was Star Wars. Everyone who knows me knows how much I love everything to do with Star Wars, so between the new movie and The Mandalorian (I love you Baby Yoda!) I was in my own nerdy heaven. I have a couple more posts on the go about Star Wars, so I’m not going to say any more about it here, but it certainly brought me a lot of joy.

I ended the month spending New Year’s Eve with my girlfriend and a friend watching movies from our childhood and eating too much junk food. Not the wild party that’s expected, but I preferred this so much more. 2019 was a year full of challenges, but also a lot of joy. Join me next month for “power”.