Life is Short…

May 4, 2015June 19, 20152 Comments

So we have all heard the old adage “Life is Short” and while I live by this mantra every day I wonder if the way I interpret this age old saying is correct.

I have always lived the way I have wanted to. I do not typically do things I don’t feel like doing and if I want to purchase something I typically do, after paying my bills first. I live within the boundaries I set for myself and no one else’s. If someone is a jerk and doesn’t deserve my time well then they don’t get any of my time. No one is an exception to that rule, that includes family, blood or otherwise.

There are many of you out there that I am sure do not agree with my take on this. But let’s pretend for a moment that you do. Our time spent living on this earth is short. A hundred years when you are 10 seems like a long time but when you are 40? Now that seems like no time at all. So why spend it doing something you hate or spending time with people who do not appreciate you?

I am sure that each and every one of you has been in a situation with a ‘difficult’ family member. We make excuses for them time and again because well ‘they’re family’. This is all well and good, no need to disown someone over a broken family heirloom or a missed birthday, but what about those family members who really screw you over? The ones that steal from you, abuse you mentally or physically, destroy your future, and/or stand in the way of your happiness? What do you do with those people?

My knee jerk reaction is to get as far away as possible. Just because you’re my family doesn’t mean you can treat me badly and then say sorry and everything will be alright. It just doesn’t work that way. Not in my world. So here is what I fundamentally do not understand. Your family can screw you over, mother, father, sister, aunt, brother and then you forgive them because ‘they’re family’. Why? What does that mean? Family shouldn’t mean a free pass to destroying your loved ones lives and getting to go on like nothing happened.

Family is about love and support, and to a certain extent forgiveness. But there are times when forgiveness doesn’t include continuing along with the unhealthy relationship. So how do you tell a family member ‘it’s over’? And how do you know it’s the right time? That the last straw has finally broken the camels back?

That is currently what I am struggling with. Because after all “Life is Short” and you can’t replace your family.

IPSY | Negative Online Reviews & Comments

April 23, 20159 Comments

Disclaimer: This is a rant. Which means it may annoy some people. You have been warned.

Ipsy was founded by YouTube beauty guru Michelle Phan and is a monthly beauty subscription service that is $10 a month and provides you with 4 deluxe beauty samples, and 1 full size item, all in a themed “glam bag” i.e. a cosmetic pouch. For $10 dollars it’s a really great deal especially if you are interested in trying new products, learning about new up and coming companies or trying out a deluxe item from a veteran company that you may not be willing to spend the money on. The one catch? You do not get to decide what comes in your bag every month and not everyone gets the same variation of products.

This leads to my rant. I have noticed after receiving the April Glam Bag that a few of the products for some subscribers have been damaged. There have also been issues where some packages have not arrived or arrived late and even some when subscribers have complained about be on the “waiting list” and wondering why they haven’t received their bag.

What really upsets me are those who instead of contacting Ipsy Care, which in my personal experience has been extremely responsive and considerate, they upload photos of broken products and comment on others photos about all their “issues” with Ipsy. So I would like to set a few things straight for these people.

If your products come damaged, contact Ipsy Care by email. They will send you a replacement at no cost to you. Ipsy does not have time to troll Instagram looking for subscribers who are posting images of their damaged products.
If you are on the “waiting list” you have to wait. This means you will not receive an Ipsy Glam Bag or be charged until Ipsy contacts you by email to notify you that you are off the waiting list. I am sorry you have to wait but we all were in your shoes at some point so get over it and stop complaining.
If you have not yet received your glam bag, first check your email. Did you receive your tracking number from Ipsy? No, then it hasn’t shipped yet, be patient. Yes, check your tracking number. If it says it was ‘delivered’ someone stole your shit so contact Ipsy Care. If the tracking says it’s ‘in transit’ then sit down and be patient the postal system does not move very quickly that is just reality.
If the month ends and you still not received your bag, contact Ipsy Care. They will either send you another bag or issue a refund. Your choice.

And last but not least please remember the world does not revolve around you. Ipsy has thousands of subscribers they have to work with and while they strive to make each of us happy sometimes you have to put in some work of your own to get what you want. Being negative on social media does not guarantee happiness. At least not for us ‘normal’ people.

Please stop bashing the company or the service and products they provide. Just unsubscribe and move on with your life.

Thanks for reading. Please share to spread the message.

Eating an Orange with a Fork

March 9, 2015March 9, 20155 Comments

Today I ate an orange with a fork… and a knife. It occurred to me that I had never done this before and at 25 years old I no longer have a lot of firsts. So in the spirit of firsts I wanted to document this moment. Kind of like a baby book. Now on to why I ate an orange with a fork and knife.

Back in October there were a lot of changes happening in my life and I decided it was also a good time to make some healthier changes. So with my mothers help I started trying to make healthier food choices and attend the gym. My biggest issue with food is that I don’t eat enough and when I do eat I usually eat the wrong things. Feeding myself is my biggest annoyance (showering comes in second, if you are a girl you probably understand). I have to do it everyday at least three times a day, I have to spend money on it, I have to pick the right food (whatever that is), and I have to prep it, cook it and package it to bring to work. Don’t even get me started on how I also need to find time to eat it while I am busy at work.

So that brings me to the orange and the fork. Today my fiance packed my lunch (he is awesome) and in it was an orange. I like oranges and orange juice, I hate having to peel and eat an orange. I also hate how many snacks I am required to eat on a gym day. I also hate the gym (more on that in another post). This is where the fork comes in (finally). Forcing myself to eat the orange I decided to treat it like a nice steak, cutting it up into smaller pieces and eating it slowly. Tricking myself into thinking I was eating something way better helped me make it through the whole thing and I know later when I am at the gym I will b glad I did.

So I was wondering if this would work for other things I don’t really enjoy eating. Have you ever tried tricking yourself into eating something because it was healthy or you knew you needed it for energy later? Maybe this is normal and I am late to the game but I am pretty happy with my discovery.

Annoying Pinterest People

March 9, 2015March 9, 2015Leave a comment

Disclaimer: This is a rant. Which means it may annoy some people. You have been warned.

Do you ever scroll through Pinterest and see some of the things your friends or acquaintances have pinned and immediately think to yourself there is no way that person is ever going to get their shit together and accomplish that? Well that thought occurs to me almost every time I find myself on Pinterest.

Today for instance someone I was friends with but haven’t spoken with in ages has been posting a lot of home DIY and decor related posts. Let’s call her Sally. Well Sally is in her early thirties, has one divorce under her belt from a marriage that didn’t last a year, no kids, and still hasn’t completed her degree. She goes through men like most people go through paper towels and her specialty is taking dudes V-Cards. Sally has been in a relationship for a year now, according to Facebook, and it looks like she is finally moving in with her man. So naturally, like most women, she is starting to cover Pinterest in home decor inspiration or “Pinsperation”. Now I know everything I have said is totally judgemental but sorry not sorry, I need to rant.

Because I was friends with her for a several years I know her living habits, with and without men, and when she was married. She is not a “Suzy homemaker”, Martha DIY sort of girl. So when she starts covering my feed with images of beautiful renovated kitchens and bathrooms I want to scream. WHO ARE YOU KIDDING? You will never do that unless you hit the Lotto and can hire someone else to do it. Why do people feel the need to constantly Pin things that are totally unrealistic. Even for inspiration? This girl hasn’t DIY’d a day in her life, I am not even sure she knows how to do the dishes.

So yes I am totally being a judger. But in this particular situation I am annoyed so I need to rant. And I realize I am probably less annoyed with her Pins than I am with her lifestyle choices. I just hate that people try to use social media to make their lives look better than they really are. Like why can’t she Pin a “10 ways to make a relationship work” article or “How to keep your house tidy 101”? That would be a lot more realistic and i could deal with the honesty. And let’s be honest I would read both those articles too because you can never have too much knowledge right?

Well rant over. I feel better now. Thanks.

Broken

December 4, 2014January 16, 2015Leave a comment

This is a new feeling, though I have felt it before. It was a different time, a different place and with different people. The feeling is a little hard to describe so I will try to put it into a story that is about my life.

My family is not traditional. the last three generations of women have had their children outside of marriage and/or they divorced the father of their children. Do to this trend my family is made up of many other families, with families of their own. Most of my closest relatives are not related by blood.

Growing up I never felt that my family was different from any other. It never bothered me that I didn’t have a father, or that I lived with my grandparents (one of which was not my blood relative). It never seemed strange that my two favorite cousins weren’t “technically” related to me. Too put it in perspective out of nine cousins only one is related to me by blood and he was born when I was 11.

None of this felt odd, none of it mattered. I love them and they loved me. At least that is what I thought.

I never believed that blood was thicker than water or that because someone is your “family” you must always forgive and forget. I have seen too many people come and go. I’ve seen too many relationships shrivel and fade away.

I thought that my family knew something that other more traditional families didn’t. How to love unconditionally regardless of where someone came from. I was wrong.

At 25 years old I have felt the sting of my familial relationships shrivel and fade away. I’ve given my heart, shared my feelings with these people and watched them stare back in anger. Now I know what my “family” is really about. It is every man, woman, and child for themselves, for their own happiness regardless of the consequences.

Finally I have felt this sting, this indescribable pain from the last human being I ever though could make me feel this way. The feeling I am trying to describe is the feeling of being a stranger to the one person who knows you the best. The feeling of being a stranger to your own mother.

And so now I feel broken. For once in my entire life I do not know where to go from here.

If your interested in being a Lost Girl or Lost Boy (or any other oxygen breathing organism) then come back tomorrow because I bet it’s a lot more fun being lost together. To make it easy just press the “Follow” button on the upper right hand side of this page and get email updates every time I post.

Bitchy Resting Face

November 15, 2014January 16, 2015Leave a comment

Does anyone keep track of all the times your life has gone the opposite direction that you wanted it to? I like to. Maybe I don’t like to keep track but I do anyway. For some reason we have a tendency to focus on the negative rather than the positive. Even knowing that about ourselves there are those of us that still an’t change the way our minds are programmed.

I do not know why I can’t change the way my mind seems to go straight to the bad moments. The worst is that they seem to go straight to the bad moments during other particularly bad moments. Obviously this is something I would like to change about myself.

What makes this even worse are the people who judge the rest of us “Negative Nancy’s”. The worst is when someone without anxiety expects you to just turn off your anxiety. I am not sure about the rest of the world but my anxiety makes me grouchy a lot. I am constantly characterized as the “bitch” or the negative one in my group. Most of the time when I am saying negative things or being a downer it’s because I’m currently dealing with some form of anxiety caused by the current situation or some larger situation happening in my life.

I can’t just turn this off or “just relax”. This is a huge pet peeve of mine when someone tells me to “relax”. I would like to see them relax with their mind going 300 mph thinking about something that scares the crap out of them. Seriously.

And don’t even get me started on the people who are constantly asking me “what’s wrong?” First off if something was indeed wrong I would share it with you if I wanted to, you asking doesn’t mean I am obligated to tell you. Second I have bitchy resting face so most of the time nothing is wrong (also never trust anyone who smiles all the time) and again if something was wrong I would tell you if I felt it was any of your business. And finally when I tell you what is wrong don’t look at me like I’m complaining or being negative. You asked and I told you, if you didn’t want to be supportive or try to help then don’t ask in the first place.

So that is my rant for this evening. See you tomorrow.

How Did I Get Here?

November 14, 2014January 16, 2015Leave a comment

Have you ever found yourself stopping what you are doing and asking yourself how you got here? If the answer is no go ahead and stop reading and take a moment, close your eyes and ask yourself how did I get here? Go ahead, I can wait.

Done?

Ok now most likely what happened is you though about the physical path you took to get to your current location. Or maybe you thought about the path that brought you to this blog. Both of those are ok but what I hope happened, because this means I am not alone, is that you questioned the path in life that brought you to this moment. The decisions you made, accidents that happened (happy or otherwise) that brought you to this moment in your life.

I find myself doing this a lot and most of the time it happens by accident. I stop whatever I am doing and try to determine the path that brought me here. Obviously there is no real way to summarize 25 years of decisions, accidents, and small seemingly insignificant defining moments. So basically I am constantly wasting my own time. But for some reason I can’t stop thinking about it.

This also makes me obsessed with the passing of time. For many reasons time scares me. The biggest reason is the fear of when my time runs out. The unknown of having no more minutes left in your life. It’s true that while I don’t fear the act of dying, I fear what may or may not come after it. While I am not a religious person I like to tell myself there is something bigger than all that surrounds us while we are living. But like I said in my first post I never believe anything I tell myself. So I suffer through the constant anxiety because you can’t ignore time, it’s expressed in everything we do from our alarm clocks in the morning to making sure we catch our favorite television show at night.

On that note my computer clock is telling me I should go to bed because I have to work in the morning.

If you have ever asked the “How Did I Get Here?” question please feel free to leave a comment about your experience. And/or if you suffer with the same anxiety regarding “the end” (of time) please leave a comment about your experience and how you deal with it.

Until the next time I don’t feel like sleeping… – KL

Lost Girl

November 13, 2014January 16, 2015Leave a comment

Have you ever said something to yourself, whether out loud or in your head, like “I do not want to die” and even you didn’t believe it?

I have.

Like the title of this post “Lost Girl”. This doesn’t technically describe me, at least not in the physical sense as I was blessed with an excellent sense of direction, but because I believe nothing I tell myself.

I am lost in the non-physical sense. Lost in my own mind, lost to everyone around me and lost in life.

I have always known where I wanted to be but not how to get there. Like most of you I take direction from the advice of family and friends, I learn from their mistakes as well as my own. But I can’t seem get to where I want to be and I have no idea why.

So this is the intro to my blog. If your interested in being a Lost Girl or Lost Boy (or any other oxygen breathing organism) then come back tomorrow because I bet it’s a lot more fun being lost together.