Notes To Self – Week 12

5255295740_d12c1c173c_b(JenniferFlickr)

What’s a note to self? It’s something you kinda know, but you don’t always ‘really’ know it. You know?

You sometimes need to be reminded of it. By yourself, often. These are notes to self you can write as a friendly reminder.

Here are my recent notes to self. Enjoy.

1) Don’t run to the bathroom. No matter how busy you are, no matter how little time you have between meetings. To ANY bystander, it will look like you are about to pee your pants or have diarrhea. Not a good look. Don’t do it.

2) Slacking off feels so much better after being productive. Seriously, you will enjoy it a million times more. Work first, play/slack later.

3) If you need help with being productive, how about this EPIC movie soundtrack list that makes you get shit done. Next to techno, this type of music works WONDERS for me. It has Harry Potter, Sherlock and the Lion King music in it.

(The last one made me burst out in tears while writing and giving Manfriend the scare of his life.)

4) The most powerful response to someone telling you they think you’re a bitch, that you don’t deserve what you have or that you think you are [enter uninteresting negative adjective here]?

Okay.

Don’t fuel it. You think I am a certain way. Okay. Doesn’t mean I think you’re right. It means I’m okay with you thinking that.

5) You know that moment where you grab your phone while you were doing something? Yeah. That moment means that you’re bored with the first activity. And that if you can, you should stop. Stop and go do something else. (For me this happens during the second episode of anything and during the third episode of House of Cards, which I think is AMAZING)

6) One of the ways to stay happy is to stay close to yourself. Cuddle up to yourself.Hang out with your own soul. Embrace your thoughts and feelings. It helps you stay whole, and I believe this is good for you.

7) A great way to feel confident is by assuming you will get your way, with the bonus clause that if you don’t, you’ll figure out a way to make the alternative work for you. I’m terrible like that. I just assume things go my way, and if they don’t? Who cares! I’m a big girl. I’ll figure it out.

8) Want to look confident while you walk? Strengthen your core, bring shoulders down, make your neck long and stride while thinking the word “MURDER.” Source: Walk Like a Queen by Charlize Theron.

9) Be kind to little girls. You could be a rolemodel without you even knowing. You might be someone they look up to and you being nice to them could really influence the way they look at the world, themselves and other women.  So be friendly to the young girls you meet. This way they learn that other women are not the enemy.

10) You’re not as good as you think you are and you’re better than you think you are. The first sentence is a reminder to stay humble and continue to relentlessly work on whatever I want to do. The second sentence is to keep me happy and motivated to keep going. Weird, but I need the duality.

What is YOUR main note-to-self? Let me know in the comments, I wonder what you need to keep reminding yourself of. Cheers!

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17 comments

  1. I love these <3

    1) I deserve this.
    2) a slow, deep inhale will make everything better.
    3) happines is my natural State but other feelings are beautiful too (or lessons).
    4) Go, be, do, explore.
    5)everybody could do with a little more kindness.
    6) always trust.

  2. trust creates peace

    komt van een yogi-tea theezakje. Ik pieker snel, maar dan denk ik hieraan en denk ik heel bewust ‘het komt allemaal goed’ en het komt eigenlijk ook altijd goed 🙂

  3. Two very important ones for me:

    * Be the bigger person (via: http://zenhabits.net/offend/) / Pick your battles.

    * Spread love everywhere you go. Let no one ever come to you without leaving better and happier. (Mother Teresa) – As cheesy as this one may sound, I often need it, not being a saint myself 😉

  4. Ja nummer 9, sowieso! En “it’s not about you”. Iemand die chagrijnig doet in een winkel, iemand die raar reageert op een vraag, weet ik het: het heeft niets met mij te maken maar met die persoon. Dat scheelt veel ergernis, echt.

  5. Voor mij zijn twee quotes van Stephen Covey belangrijk:

    – If you wait to be acted upon, you will be acted upon (afwachten levert meestal het niet-gewenste maar wel verwachte negatieve resultaat op; oftewel, wees proactief)

    – It is our willing permission, our consent to what happens to us, that hurts us far more than what happens to us in the first place (we hebben niet altijd de controle over de gebeurtenissen in ons leven, maar wel over de manier waarop we erop reageren – we kunnen kiezen voor een bepaalde reactie. Dat vind ik persoonlijk best pittig af en toe, maar het voorkomt bij mij wel een hoop zelfmedelijden)

  6. I have a ‘not-to-do-list’ on a post-it on my computer. It serves as a note to self. It says:

    – Making people happy ay my own expense
    – Stressing out
    – Doing 100 things at the same time
    – Being afraid of mistakes and criticism
    – Saying ‘yes, but’ when I mean ‘no’
    – Unimportant activities in the morning

  7. reading this with my hands wrapped around a mug of hot tea felt like a hug.

    i’ve got an ever growing pile of post-it notes with reminders in a little box. new ones i stick to my closet, and when i feel like i’m done with it, the post-it goes into the box. current ones are “when you learn not to want things so badly, life comes to you.” (because when i forget this, i waste a lot of energy thinking about how i want things to be and what i want, and i never get it. when i let it go, i get what i want a lot of the time. mostly the wasted energy i hate, and the way it makes me super unhappy.) and “sometimes, i’ve believed as many as six impossible things before breakfast.” (like a nice cliché, but the thought that impossible things are possible and even if they aren’t that I can believe they’re possible and give no fucks, makes me happy and feel like i can breathe more freely.)

  8. HAHA I love nr. 8 <3333

    Mijn mantra van het moment is vooral 'Everything will be ok in the end. If it's not ok, it's not the end.'
    Maar ik voel ook veel voor jouw nr. 9. (Gatver, dat klinkt raar. Maar ik bedoel over het rolmodel zijn en aardig zijn.)

  9. Voor mij zijn de volgende notes to self nu vooral belangrijk:

    – niet uitstellen, maar gewoon doen.
    – keep calm and carry on. tijdens het schrijven van mijn scriptie had ik die maar als bureaublad achtergrond ingesteld. En de historische context is leuk.
    – alles komt goed.

    Die in het artikel en in de comments zijn ook heel herkenbaar 😉

  10. Haha love this! I think my main note would be something like everything happens for a reason, because I can get really upset with things and this sentence just helps me accept things the way they are.

  11. Nummer 2 is mijn belangrijkste note to self. En ook meteen die ene waar ik heel erg slecht in ben. Een andere: kom nou eens dat verdomde bed uit! Ik verdoe zo-veel-tijd aan in bed liggen. En als het dan eens echt nuttig is om vroeg naar bed te gaan; dan doe ik het natuurlijk niet. Grmbl.

  12. Very old and very true, by Sun Tzu

    ”She who knows when she can fight and when she cannot, will be victorious.”

    Or: pick your battles.
    And yes, I did change ‘he’ in ‘she’.