So it's been a while. In fact I haven't posted anything this year, not since November 2014.I have thought about it, but I've never quite got round to it or I haven't felt up to it. There's a few reasons why. First of all, I got fed up of it, not bored or anything but I guess my interest changed. I didn't quite know what I wanted to write about, I haven't found my niche. Also, I stopped reading blogs. I still watched vlogs, but I just stopped reading and so I sort of felt out of the loop and not quite with everything.
I'm just going to come out and say it. For the past couple of months I haven't felt myself and to be honest it's been really hard. I'm not saying it as some big sob story but it's something I wanted to get off my chest. I've always had pretty bad anxiety through life it's just the type of person I am but this year it's really got on top of me and made me not want to do anything. I've really pushed myself to still be myself, but it's just made me so miserable. In more recent weeks I haven't wanted to do anything. Anxiety through the roof, panic attacks and bad moods. It really hasn't been great. But I think more than anything I need to just get myself back into the things I used to enjoy, blogging being one of them.
Anxiety just made the little things a lot harder: going to lectures, assignments, working on weekends, weekly shopping, driving home. So anything extra just seemed to be really difficult, there was no way I could push myself more than I felt comfortable. In my head, my daily life had just seems to grow. Like everything that I had to do was a much bigger deal than before, and I found myself making myself worry because it felt normal. I had a very difficult relationship with the anxiety, but now I feel like I'm getting back on top of it.
To make me feel a bit more inspired I've decided to give this space a bit of re-vamp. I have a new interactive design which has taken me absolutely ages to install and personalise. It's still not quite done, but I'm incredibly proud of it so far (since I had to learn about all the codes and design graphic-y stuff myself) so I was too excited not to share it with you now! Eventually everything will look clearer and run a lot smoother, but for now this will do.
I'm not committing to this completely. I'm only going to post when I get time and when I feel like it. But I think trying to get some posts down might help me to distract myself. So, if there's any suggestions for posts I would love to hear them. What's your favourite thing to read on a blog? I personally love baking posts, organisation posts and short stories or poetry because I can be a bit of a nerd sometimes.
I really hope I can post some more soon, and I hope you will all enjoy reading them again.

• fry lite
• 4 new potatoes
• 1 large carrot
• quarter of an onion
• 4 mushrooms
• salmon
• natural fat free yoghurt
• tomato puree
• egg

• salt
• chilli
• tumeri
• curry
• cumin
• black pepper
• five spice pepper
• coriander leaf

 

1. I love tea. To me it's a perfect way to relax and a good mug of tea is just very comforting to me.
2. I love finishing an excellent book. The feeling afterwards where you just reflect on the book and you actually miss it. Yeah, that really makes me happy.
3. Being outside. Something about being outside just makes me feel excited and free. I love feeling the breeze and just moving around. I love it especially when it's sunny!
4. Spending  time with people when there's no technology around and it's just one on one. It's just great to talk with no distractions and its just very raw and natural. I just love it.
5. Watching a whole tv series in a day. It actually feels like an achievement haha. It's kind of like point number 2 (finishing a great book) especially when it's a great show. I also think it's great when I watch them with Tom because then I actually have someone to talk about it to.
6. Spontaneous days out. Those days when you wake up, plan doing nothing and then it's like 2oh hey lets go to the beach" or "hey why don't we just go to the cinemas even thought it's already 9pm?". I love those moments.
7. Blogging and networking. The whole blogging network thing just amazes me. It just so fun and great to meet new people who love the same things you do. It's great to see so much community!
8. Pinterest. It's like my favourite internet site. It makes me happy because I feel so inspired from Pinterest, you'll see for yourself. It's just a beautiful site.
9. Reminiscing. Lying on my bed on a sunny day with the window open so the breeze can come in and just thinking about the past makes me ridiculously happy. It's very soothing almost like meditation and just really helps me to regain perspective on everything. I love it.
10. Long showers. Soothing, satisfying, rejuvenating and wonderful. Who wouldn't be happy?

Ok. I don't really know how to start this post. I guess I should start with saying that I am no way a health professional nor have I spoken to one about my own personal experiences in this area. I've noticed recently that a lot more people are being open and honest about anxiety and stress, now it just doesn't seem so much of a big deal as what it used to be. Before, I suppose you could say people were more conserved around the topic and felt that maybe it would be better to dismiss it rather than face it. But recently I've seen a lot of tweets, blogs and videos around the subject, very open and helpful videos about personal experiences of anxiety which I think is just fantastic. I know that sounds crazy, but I love hearing people talking about it because it makes me feel a whole load better about it.
I thought I would share my own experience with you for that same reason.
I've always worried and stressed a lot through my whole life, usually over nothing. I can sometimes be in a room where there is nothing wrong at all and then suddenly my stomach starts turning and I suddenly feel very hot and smothered. My chest gets very red and I sometimes even feel like I can't breathe or I feel sick. I've had a few panic attacks, no where near as many as some people and I haven't had one for a while now which I am very grateful for. But what I will say about them is that they really are not nice and they make me feel extremely embarrassed and almost helpless. I haven't been diagnosed with anxiety but I feel that maybe (especially this time last year) I definitely suffered with it.
What I mean by this is that instead of me being worried when I was supposed to be, like before taking a test or before singing in front of a group of people, I literally felt worried over absolutely nothing and I felt like it a lot. Even now when I don't consider myself to suffer with anxiety I still say I worry more than the average person should. I think this is partly due to my obsessive attitude. This is also a trait I've had since a very young age. For example, if I plan to do something at a certain place and at a certain time and then suddenly plans change I do not deal with that well and I find it very difficult for me to change my sense of mind. For example if I arranged with my friend to meet at McDonalds and then 10 minutes before I leave they want to meet me at Subway instead, I just can't really comprehend the change which actually makes me anxious.
I know this sounds ridiculous but when I watched Zoella's video on youtube the other day she described a person with anxiety as the car in the street that their alarm is triggered by a little gust of wind when actually there is nothing to be alarmed about at all. This made so much sense to me and actually made me feel a little relieved. A lot of people I know understand that I tend to stress a lot about things that don't need to be stressed over, but I have really improved especially over the last year.
One thing that has really helped me (I think) has been moving away from home and realising that I am responsible for myself. It was sort of a wake up call in realising that I can't just go back to my house and snuggle up in bed with a cup of tea every time I'm anxious. It's helped me find other ways of dealing with it other than being in my 'comfort zone'. For example, I'll make myself a cup of tea and just have a bit of a breather to reflect on what's going on and to ask myself 'what actually is the problem'. I love taking long showers, they are just so relaxing to me and just really help to de-stress me. I also like to take some 'me-time' and watch youtube videos, blog, read or watch tv or something, even go outside or shopping online, anything to take my mind off being anxious. Something else I've found to be really helpful is being around people I love. Friends that I have made in university, old friends and family are all so wonderful to me. It really helps sometimes to just sit down and just tell them how you feel. Even though I may feel embarrassed I've found that most times I feel way more relieved when I've spoken about it. Tom has helped me so much over the years to deal with me being obsessive and anxious, without him I'd be so much worse. I am so grateful and lucky to have him. He's made me realise that instead of thinking about the worst possible outcome always think of the best possible outcome.

Since starting my blog I've now got nearly 60 followers on bloglovin'. Now, I know lots of people are going to be like -yeah ok but Tanya Burr has over a million followers... but I've just started blogging and I think 60 followers is pretty darn good. I'm so impressed that I've stuck to it because it's something I've wanted to do for a really long time. A lot of people ask me now, "why do you blog?", "why did you choose beauty?" and "what are you going to do with it?".
When I was around 14 one day I came home from school, face red with spots and scraggy hair, I just felt sad. I know this is going to sound a bit depressing but just roll with me- I just didn't know who I was or what I wanted to be. I was in that phase. Even though I had loads of fantastic friends I had really low self esteem. If somebody made any sort of slight remark at me I reacted like it was the end of the world. At this point in my life I had very wonky teeth, I had given up swimming for my group and so I started gaining weight, I was stressed with my school work and I was a moody teenager. I came home that day and I typed into the internet 'make up to cover spots'. I thought if I could sort my spots it would solve all my problems haha. And in a way, it kind of did.
I managed to stumble upon Fleur De Force's YouTube channel that night and I watched ALL of her videos. I know it sounds sad, but I learned so so so much. I stayed up way past my bed time that night and the next day I went shopping and bought a whole new make up kit. From there I found Tanya, Ingrid, Essie, Anna, Lilly, Ameliana all of them! Then I managed to stumble upon blogs too. Sooner or later watching videos and reading blogs took up the majority of my time, I found my passion. With reading and watching all the videos I learned how to make myself look and feel better on the days I didn't feel s great, and then my esteem started to rocket!
When I turned 15 I decided to make a YouTube channel, "this is what I want to do" I said to myself. I made an evening skin care video and within a day I took it straight down. One person had commented on it that the music in my video was too loud and so I took it down. I tried this on a number of occasions, but it always resulted in me with an empty YouTube channel. I decided to leave it. I carried on watching and reading though, but I just felt that my creative side wasn't really fulfilled. I loved acting and analysing plays in school because my own ideas and opinions were put forward and made into something great, so when I went to University I missed that a lot.
Tom understood that I was frustrated with this and really encouraged me to start small and start with a blog so that maybe one day I will post a YouTube video. It's crazy that it's taken me 4 years to start blogging, but it's one of the best decisions I've ever made. I know I'm not great at it yet, but with practice I'll get better. So now I've decided it's time for me to face my fear and start YouTube, it's just a matter of getting a good camera and set up and I'll be on my way! I would love to blog and vlog as a full time job. Maybe one day I'll be lucky enough to do that, if not I still really want to carry on with this is the future. And for anyone who wants to blog/vlog and is just a bit nervous, JUST DO IT! You'll be so happy that you did!