Thursday 26 June 2014

Your Soul could never grow old, it's Evergreen // OOTD

'...because even in the mundane and even in the simplicity of everyday life, there is good, there is happiness and there is beauty' 

Shirt; Urban Outfitters || Black top; Matalan || Jeans; New Look

Keeping it simple with a black top and bright orange/red shirt ohhh yeaaaaaah. I love the colour of the Urban Outfitters shirt and it's extra baggy which is great to just throw on for extra layers. The weather has been super lovely recently and a couple of friends from uni are leaving back to their home countries so I've been hanging out with them before they jet off across the world. One of the things I love about University in general is just the diverse range of people you will meet. I haven't traveled that much before but within the couple of years that I have been at uni I've learnt so much about different cultures and customs and interacted with people from countries I'd only dreamt of visiting. I've met people from Asia, Thailand, Greece, Cyprus, Romania, Saudi Arabia, South Africa, Germany and so many other places I'd be here for a while if I were to list them all. I think a part of it are my chosen courses as I guess they typically attract international students but it's definitely something that will stand out about uni for me.

On a different note, I'm on the hunt for a new/better quality camera so if anyone can recommend any great ones that they take super awesome cool blog pictures with then do let me know!

Currently, I am loving:


Check out my latest YouTube video HERE 
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Friday 20 June 2014

Some thoughts on blogging

So I have been toying with the idea of deleting my blog for about three months now but I guess the fact that I'm writing this post to explain that means that I won't. Probably. But I'm just finding it extremely weird how even though blogging is a hobby, it's still a hobby that can stress you out or put a certain type of pressure on you, most of the time without you even realising it. I think a big part of that is because the main reason I started my blog in the first place was because I wanted to use it as space to showcase my work. And even though I've started focusing on outfit and fashion posts, I initially started with just writing 'articles' and thoughts and musings on Life.  I started blogging at University and as much as it is a hobby and I (still) enjoy it, it was always for the intent of showcasing it to future possible employers because that's what I was told constantly. Every time I spoke to lecturers or a career adviser - if you want to work in media, start a blog. Obviously having a blog doesn't mean you'll instantly get an interview but it can help. Even writing this I feel like I'm overthinking it because, to be honest, my blog is minuscule compared to others but that's fine because I never started it with that intention. I didn't even know you could make an actual career out of blogigng to be honest, although I don't think anyone did - it just kind of happened. Blogging is great and you can experiment with any type of blog content you want - fashion, outfit posts, make-up reviews, written posts, lifestyle, photography or videos and probably many more that I'm missing out. You can interact with other bloggers, join blogging chats, meet and become friends with bloggers - it's a very big community. You can be as creative as you want and have 100% control over the creativity. Yet sometimes I feel like that's a double edged sword because you can get stuck taking the same type of photos, or the same outfit posts or writing about the same things. It's great to have a 'style' and yes it's still creative, and it's important that your content stays consistent, but it's still sort of 'stuck in it's ways'. I'm trying to think how best to explain this but I don't think I'm doing a good job ha! Anyway, I decided to take a step back and just think seriously about the direction I wanted to take it. I've done that many times before but this time all I could think about was how it would be easier to just delete it.  Yet, there is something about deleting it that would signal that blogging is just another venture that I tried, got bored of and gave it up. I'm not bored of it though.

Hmmm, if any of that made any sense to you then well done because even I'm confused by it ha! But I thought I would share this feeling and see if anyone has ever felt this and has ever been caught in the limbo between 'blogging is a hobby and something I can do when I have the time and it will let me experiment with being creative' and 'blogging will be a great way to showcase my creative talents and I can use it to make me stand out a bit in the job market so I better make sure that my blog is as great as it can be'.


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Tuesday 3 June 2014

How to deal with pain // Musings




'That's the thing about pain... It demands to be felt.'


I am told by Tumblr that this is a John Green quote. Well, John Green, you are absolutely right. Pain, emotional, physical, mental, small, big, fleeting or long lasting demands to be felt, screaming out for tears and attention. In the lonely hours of 3am or the bustling chaos of the morning commute, pain is not limited by time.  It won't wait until a quiet afternoon when you're ready to deal with it, it will intrude - uninterrupted, unannounced, just like that. And, like anything else on this planet, it can come in all shapes and sizes -  a memory, a feeling, a person, a word, sentences, phone calls, actions... A simple headache that seems resistant to paractamol... Heartache, that seems embedded in your soul.

'Demands to be felt...' No escaping, no running, no ignoring. But yet we try to numb, mask or conceal in any way we think possible. Who can blame us though, who wants to deal with any form of pain. Because it can be hard to find the strength, courage or time to move on, to heal, to fight it, one on one, and win.  But that's the thing about trying to numb any type of pain. It's still there until you face it, multiple times if you have to, and you come out of the battle with nothing more than a scar to tell the story.  So, pain. You must feel it, but not let it consume you, you must acknowledge its presence, but no need to make it feel at home, and above all, you must use it. Use it as motive to create - a poem, a blog post, a piece of art, music, new experiences, new relationships.  It demands to be felt, but it doesn't have to win.



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Find me on: YouTube | Bloglovin | Twitter | Instagram: @thatgirlsaadiya