A Room of My Own 1 weeks ago

Rediscovering Physical Journaling and Creative Pursuits

It’s been over a month since my last blog post. I had decided to step away for a bit and focus on the physical world around me, as I felt like I was living too much inside my digital artifacts. And once you step away from writing for a while, it slowly becomes easier and easier not to write anything at all. Every now and then I’ll come across a topic and think, this would make a good blog post , and then immediately stop myself from writing it. Part of that is probably the thought of, who actually cares what I write anyway? But every so often I get a lovely email from someone who read one of my posts and resonated with it, or someone signs my guestbook, which I always appreciate. And then I remember that while it’s a small community, there are people out there who relate to what I write in the same way I relate to what others write. I also stepped away from my RSS feed for a while. I subscribe to a lot of personal blogs, and I needed a break from that too, so I deleted my RSS reader from my phone. A few weeks ago, though, I reinstalled it and slowly started catching up with some of my favourite bloggers. I really admire people who blog regularly. I think it helps with formulating thoughts and making sense of things over time. But one unexpectedly good outcome of stepping back from digital spaces was rediscovering paper journaling. I’ve always journaled, literally ever since I learned how to write. Last year, though, I experimented with voice journaling using an app called Untold. I actually enjoyed it quite a lot. It was easy to put my headphones on while driving to or from work and just dump my thoughts into the app. The recordings stayed there, and the app would surface patterns and reflections over time. One thing it did particularly well was reminding me about things I’d said weeks earlier. It would notice recurring themes and say things like, “You mentioned this was one of the most important factors for your wellbeing.” In my case, it kept circling back to something that feels embarrassingly superficial but is clearly important to me - feeling comfortable within a weight range that feels acceptable to me. I hadn’t even realised how often I talked about it until the app pointed it out. There were genuinely useful insights in there. But there was also a lot of AI slop. At one point my daughter, who is nine, joined me while I was recording. I jokingly said something like, “My daughter doesn’t need me anymore,” and she immediately replied, “How dare you? I always need you.” After that, the app became obsessed with this interaction. It kept bringing it up in these deeply earnest reflections like: “How did you feel when your daughter strongly expressed her need for you?” We still laugh and joke about it. What I eventually realised, though, is that speaking thoughts into an app does not affect my wellbeing in the same way writing on paper does. So during this little “detox” period, I started carrying around a composition notebook again. I journal in it several times a week, and also whenever I’m upset or need to untangle something in my head. I’m already halfway through it. And honestly, it’s done wonders for me. At the same time, I think I’ve finally reached a point where I’m comfortable with my overall journaling system. I now treat Day One as my single source of truth. Everything eventually ends up there in some form. I freely journal on paper without worrying about digitising things immediately. Then at the end of each month, I scan the handwritten entries into their corresponding dates in Day One. ▶︎ Sidenote on PDFs in Day One I tag those entries as “paper journal” and leave them attached to the relevant dates so they’ll pop up in “On This Day” memories years from now. Day One has basically become the archive of my life. Photos, voice notes, things my kids said, books I’ve read, emails I want to keep, random memories - it all goes there eventually. At the end of every month I also export both the JSON and PDF versions for backup. It took a long time to get to this point. I’d been struggling with a journaling project where I scanned all my journal entries from the past five years - the journals that are here with me in New Zealand. A lot of my other journals are back home in Bosnia, from a time when I journaled far more than I do now. That will be a big project for someday, and I’m still not sure I’ll tackle it. But I have the last five years sorted, and I’m gradually gathering the courage to let those paper journals go now that they’re safely scanned and backed up. It was a big project, and I resented myself a little for the compulsion to do it at all. But something that came out of my time away was a realization: even though none of these things make any difference to anyone but me, they are my creative outlet. They are what I want to do. But as a mother and a wife working full-time, it is surprisingly difficult to justify taking time for creative pursuits that don’t obviously “produce” anything. I constantly feel the need to defend (to myself) the time I spend organising journals, building albums, preserving memories, or writing things nobody may ever read. Which brings me to the actual reason I wanted to write this post. I’ve started working on my novel again. A few years ago I finished a draft and paid for a professional manuscript assessment. The assessor gave me detailed chapter-by-chapter feedback: what worked, what didn’t, what needed restructuring, and what was already strong. I remember reading the assessment excitedly and importing all the notes into Dabble Writer (the writing app I moved to after Scrivener, though that’s probably a post for another time.) I organised everything carefully, set it all up properly… and then abandoned it completely. That was almost four years ago. Two weeks ago I opened the project again. And this time I want to approach it differently. I want to stop treating creative work as something indulgent that needs to be earned after every practical responsibility has been fulfilled. I want to keep journaling the way I do now, keep feeding things into my “single source of truth,” and stop overthinking whether any of it is productive enough to deserve my time. I’ll end this post with a quote from Cheryl Richardson’s latest post - something I saved as my guiding quote for May. I’ve learned something important by not postponing joy: Nothing catastrophic happens when you make pleasure a higher priority in your daily life. Instead, it softens the edges of the day, stretches time in the most delicious way, and reminds us that life isn’t something to be earned—it’s something to be lived.

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A Room of My Own 1 months ago

Craving Quiet: Stepping Away for a While

Lately I've realised that even though I'm barely on social media, my life still feels 95% digital. I don't post on LinkedIn. My Instagram account mostly exists so I can open links people send me when I absolutely have to. I only keep a fake Facebook account for Marketplace and I use my real account (I've had it since the beginning of Facebook and all my friends live there so it stays) for Messenger only. But there is more than social media to occupy our time now. My days are still full of feeds, links, apps, messages (whatsapp groups and such), digital projects, and little things I feel like I should be keeping up with. And they are easy to keep up with, my phone is always in my hand anyway. RELATED: I Choose Living Over Documenting On the Compulsion to Record The Journal Project I Can’t Quit The Art of Organizing (Things That Don’t Need to Be Organized) At work we showcase our AI agents and I wonder (from my anecdotal experience) if we are creating more busy work for ourselves and replacing reflection and with it, the actual prouctivity and output and good old ““getting the job done.” Most of our work meetings now have extensive transcripts that turn into minutes, notes, action points and insights. I remember when the output of such a meeting would be 2-3 points that we actually remembered. AI Generated Workslop certainly is a thing now. I need a break from it all. And from all the self-imposed shoulds such as scanning my old journals into Day One. Backing up Day One, which hasn't been backed up in a while. An external hard drive backup that's probably a year overdue. A Trello board full of things I want to do but don't really want to or have to do, or maybe I want to do them but can't justify the time when I already feel so busy. After a full day of work and virtual meetings, I feel completely depleted. Those self-imposed obligations, things that used to be fun because they were few and far between, are no longer acceptable. I used to sneak in 15 minutes of personal things at work. Now when I have a break, I'd rather grab a coffee with someone or go for a walk. I crave analog. I crave nature. I crave quiet thinking time (not with a meditation app). I have made some changes already and they seem to be sticking. We have dinner at the table now, which has been good, at least we get some family time before everyone retreats to their own corners. We used to eat while watching a show together as a family, which is fine every now and then, but it was too much of it all. But still my phone is somewhere nearby, and I'm half-watching TV and half-checking a message or voice journaling into an app. None of it is thoughtful. It's just me blabbering. My brain feels like it's all over the place. I used to be able to sit with my own thoughts. I haven't been able to do that in a long time. My daughter broke her arm two weeks ago. She has a purple cast all her friends signed, and she was wondering whether to keep it when it comes off. I told her how I broke my arm as a kid, and she asked if I kept my cast. I said I would have liked to, but what we have now is better. I can take a clear photo of hers and she'll have that memory without keeping the physical thing. Then she asked if I had a photo of mine. I didn't. It never even occurred to me. Back then we took maybe 20 photos a year, if that, and they were all the more precious for it. Now I'm struggling to keep my monthly saves under 150 photos and screenshots, most of which I probably don't need. RELATED: My Photo Management and Memory Keeping Workflow I love my Day One journals , I really do. I just exported all of 2025 to PDF and JSON. But reading back through it, it's every tiny minutia of my life. I like to think it'll be interesting to me one day. Probably not to anyone else. And I wonder whether the time I spent on it was worth it. Yes, there are some insights there , but nothing that I didn’t already know. Had I allowed myself that thinking time instead of outsourcing it to AI. RELATED: Committing to the Thinking Life If my house burned down and I lost everything, the memories that matter are still in my head. I'm a cumulative experience of all of it. Do I need the artifact to know who I am? I still have journals from my 20s and 30s sitting back home in Bosnia. Thick ones, full of pasted tickets and stubs and mementos. I haven't looked at them in years but I can't let them go. My plan is to eventually scan them, maybe pay one of my kids to do it since they won't be able to read my handwriting anyway. RELATED: Letting Go of Old Journals and Mementos But anyway. The point is, I just need a break. From reading things online, from note-keeping, from digital journaling, blogging, saving notes and highlights (even my Readwise subscription feels intrusive now), from all of it. I've decided to do a 30-day digital detox. Within reason, because I still have to work. But I'm off until Tuesday, so I have a few days to ease into it. I'm lucky and privileged that I can do this. That I can shut down for a while and stop following things I can't influence and let go of expectations I put on myself. So that's what I'm doing. Simplifying my phone, deleting apps, putting the phone away when I get home. If we're watching something as a family, fine. One episode. But otherwise, even if I'm bored and restless, I'll go for a walk or play a board game, read a book. Journal (on paper). I'll do nothing, like I used to. Go to bed early. Meet a friend for coffee (and be more proactive about that). It's all become too hard because easy distractions that scratch the itch of everything are too easy. Calm my mind. Slow down. It's been too much. Time to reclaim myself. And if you've gotten this far, the world is reminding me once again of E.M. Forster's The Machine Stops , which I wrote about in 2020 . It feels eerily even more relevant now.

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A Room of My Own 2 months ago

What My 2025 Journal Taught Me

Last week I exported my entire Day One journal for 2025 (just the text file) and ran it through ChatGPT, mostly out of curiosity. None of the conclusions were surprising and I could have (and probably did) come to most of them myself. However, it was nice seeing them written out clearly. It was also nice being able to ask follow-up questions, dig a bit deeper into the patterns, and even read some of the insights out loud to my husband. But seeing it all laid out clearly made a few lessons impossible to ignore. When I looked at the entries where I sounded the most content, they all had the same ingredients. Just simple things: swimming in the sea sitting on the beach walking outside quiet mornings with coffee time with my children small family adventures or road trips Those entries have a noticeably calmer tone (according to ChatGPT). It’s a good reminder that the things that regulate me best are actually low-stimulus and simple . Just being outside and present. Another pattern that appeared again and again in my journal: frustration with complexity and that is small, everyday complexity: organising systems digital tools social expectations managing other people’s behaviour I often catch myself mid-entry realising I’m spending time optimising systems instead of actually living (which i discover over and over, in my journaling and on this blog) It’s funny because my brain loves building systems (just look at these entries). But my journal makes it clear they don’t actually make me happier. RELATED:   The Cost of Organizing Ideas – But I Keep Doing It Anyway One theme runs through almost the entire year: awareness of time passing. I write about: my son growing up noticing my daughter becoming her own person reflections on aging wanting to live more fully frustration about wasting time More than anything, 2025 feels like a year where I started asking myself (although probably not just 2025 and what am I going to do about it): Am I actually living the life I want, or just organising it? RELATED: The Art of Organizing (Things That Don’t Need to Be Organized) If there is one clear emotional anchor in my journal, it’s my relationship with my children. Many of the most meaningful entries revolve around them: teaching them how to swim in open water lunch dates with one or both of them watching them grow more independent their humour and imagination small family moments Even tiny everyday experiences become meaningful when I write about them. Reading the year back made me realise that parenthood isn’t just part of my life - it’s the emotional core of it. Another thing that stood out: my tone changes when I travel. Camping trips. Road trips. Travelling back to my home country Visiting other countries During those entries I sound more reflective, more observant, and more alive. Again, duh! My journal also shows a constant push and pull between two sides of myself. One side is the project manager (at home and at work) : organisation productivity digital structure The other side is the observer and writer : noticing small moments reflecting on life When the organisational side takes over too much, I start to feel off balance. My happiest entries happen when structure supports reflection, not when structure replaces it. One of the clearest patterns in the entire journal actually surprised me. The strongest predictor of whether my day felt good or bad wasn’t work, productivity, or even journaling. It was movement. Especially walking. On days where I walk, swim, or do yoga, the tone of the entry is noticeably calmer and clearer (again, according to ChatGPT) On days where I stay indoors on the computer (especially if I end up working from home), I’m far more likely to spiral into overthinking. Even better is when three things happen together: movement (walking/yoga) being outside low pressure (no digital tasks) When those align, everything seems to reset. Looking across all the entries, one theme keeps appearing. The life I seem to want most is actually very simple. It looks something like this: quiet mornings with coffee and reading daily movement outside meaningful work, but not obsessive productivity small adventures with the kids travel (and this includes locally) when possible writing as a natural outlet And I didn’t need ChatGPT to tell me this, though. I already know it, and yet I keep creating complexity (wanting to control) where my life clearly works better with simplicity (letting go of control). So  summed up, the lesson of 2025 is this: Not how to improve my systems. But how to protect the breathing room that makes life feel like living. I only have to make sure I do. The Journal Project I Can’t Quit The Art of Organizing (Things That Don’t Need to Be Organized) Do Fewer Things, Do Them Well The Cost of Organizing Ideas – But I Keep Doing It Anyway A Journey Through Journaling, Tracking and Memories with Day One Committing to the Thinking Life swimming in the sea sitting on the beach walking outside quiet mornings with coffee time with my children small family adventures or road trips organising systems digital tools social expectations managing other people’s behaviour my son growing up noticing my daughter becoming her own person reflections on aging wanting to live more fully frustration about wasting time teaching them how to swim in open water lunch dates with one or both of them watching them grow more independent their humour and imagination small family moments organisation productivity digital structure noticing small moments reflecting on life movement (walking/yoga) being outside low pressure (no digital tasks) quiet mornings with coffee and reading daily movement outside meaningful work, but not obsessive productivity small adventures with the kids travel (and this includes locally) when possible writing as a natural outlet

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A Room of My Own 2 months ago

Why I Stopped Writing Weekly Notes

I really enjoy reading weekly notes on other people’s blogs. There are several that I follow who do this regularly. I’ve always thought it would be such a cool thing to have - a space to explore my thoughts, things that happened, links I found interesting, or articles I read. So this year, on 01 Jan, I decided I would do it too. I kept it up for exactly six weeks. But after I wrote my latest post, Living Over Documenting , I realized something about my weekly notes. They take more time than I’d like. If they’re public, they need to be curated. They’re more moderated than if I were writing just for myself, or for whoever might read my diary/digital log years from now. Even when I try to keep them simple, it still takes at least 45 minutes to publish. And then it started feeling like a burden on Monday to keep up with it. Of course, I didn’t want to miss a week. I liked starting with “Week 1” and the date and then continuing. I didn’t want to break the sequence. But I was heavily editing what went on there. There were things I wanted to capture that just weren’t right for a public blog, or would have taken too long to explain if someone was reading and didn’t understand the context. In other words, it got too complicated. But I did like the idea of having a 52-week record of my year. As I wrote in my memory-keeping post , I still want some kind of artifact that documents the year. As I wrote in that post, I used to go pretty crazy with it - big photo books documenting every single detail of my (or more likely, my kids lives). That also used to take a lot of time (which I no longer want to spend). What I’d love instead is something that captures the main points of each year, it’s 52 weeks. Something I can later drop into ChatGPT or another AI and query. For example: give me all our trips this year, big or small. Or list the events. Then I can pull that into a family photo book with just a few selected photos. So I am continuing weekly notes, just in private. Writing privately means I can include names, dates, addresses, locations, whatever I want, without curating or editing so much. The concept of weekly notes is still a really good one. I admire people who share theirs publicly and make them personal. I enjoy reading them. It’s just not me. I Choose Living Over Documenting My Photo Management and Memory Keeping Workflow On the Compulsion to Record

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A Room of My Own 3 months ago

I Choose Living Over Documenting

Over the past few weeks, I’ve been sitting with a growing feeling that my life has (once again! unfortunately, this is not the first time) become… busy in a very specific way. Not busy with people or experiences or even work, but busy with tools. With systems. With capturing, tracking, logging, and organising. At some point, and this keeps happening, I start living inside my artifacts. It doesn’t happen all at once. It creeps in quietly - every new app, every new method, every new process… disguised as something fun and even mildly productive. I capture thoughts in Day One. I open monthly notes in Bear. Then weekly notes. Weekly notes become blog posts (which I actually kind of like and will probably keep) . Then I add a monthly recap. Then trackers - books, movies, mood, walking, yoga, food. The purpose is, I tell myself, to consolidate. Reflect. Optimise. Learn something profound about myself, I guess. But most of it was probably because I can , because it gives me a sense of control, like tidying up and minimising my house when my work and life get too busy and too frantic. The moment of clarity came last week. I’d just finished my January monthly recap that I added to my monthly Bear notes , a system I am trialling. I’d written it carefully, linked all my blog posts to it, and spent a good 45 minutes on it. And then Bear didn’t sync due to some Bear Web glitch. The whole thing disappeared. My first reaction was annoyance as I was getting ready to write it all again. And then clarity. I realised I didn’t actually want to do it again. Or even recover it. In fact, I didn’t want to be doing it at all. I deleted the monthly recaps. I kept a very simple monthly note, but that may go as well if it doesn’t prove to be useful. I’m stopping movie tracking entirely. I’ll keep book tracking , but only because that’s where I consolidate notes and highlights, and I like having it in one place. I still journal in Day One, and my blog will remain my creative outlet - writing when I want to write, not because I put any pressure on myself to write. And I’m done trying to tie it all together into some grand, optimised life dashboard. What I really want is to come home and do nothing. Or go for a walk. Or do something small with the kids. Yesterday I went for a walk at lunchtime without my headphones and realised how rare it’s become to just be out of my head. Not recording my thoughts into an app (it’s such a cool app, though; I will share more about it soon). But that’s the part that’s been bothering me the most - how much time I’ve spent thinking about and analyzing my life instead of living it. I even caught myself halfway through justifying a new laptop purchase, as if the answer to anything was more tech. I don’t need a new MacBook. I don’t need better tools. I need fewer of them. So here are some notes to self. living over documenting. to focus on work while I’m at work. to focus on my kids and my life when I’m not. presence over optimisation. tools that support me while I live my life. to finish things, let things go, and stop carrying half-alive projects in my head. living over documenting. to focus on work while I’m at work. to focus on my kids and my life when I’m not. presence over optimisation. tools that support me while I live my life. to finish things, let things go, and stop carrying half-alive projects in my head.

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A Room of My Own 3 months ago

2026-6: Week Notes

It was a short week at work thanks to the Waitangi Day long weekend. Over the last five years we’ve lived in New Zealand, my family has built a tradition of going camping over that weekend. You can usually count on decent weather over that weekend (wasn’t that great this year unfortunatelly but good enough. 🏕️We went camping by the river again, a spot the kids absolutely love. They spent hours swimming, it was too cold to me, but just being there was perfect. And just as I started properly relaxing, it was time to pack up and head home. ⛺️We’ve been talking about upgrading our tent and are looking at a Zempire one that seems like a good fit for how we actually camp. That said, I think I’ll save the whole camping and gear rabbit hole for a separate post maybe 📚I finished reading The Safekeep by Yael van der Wouden this week and really enjoyed it. It felt relatable in a lot of way (war is unfair, so unfair). I’m looking forward to talking about it at book club. 📖Lately, I’ve been reading a lot about minimalism and decluttering. Minimalism feels so close and yet always just out of reach. People often comment on how minimalist our home is, but to me, it’s still not minimalist enough . I want to be much more ruthless about what I actually need versus what I’m keeping simply because I have space for it. That’s very much a work in progress. And my husband’s tendency to keep every gift anyone has ever given him definitely doesn’t help 📍Work itself has been intense. When things are this busy, I feel depleted and don’t have much energy left for blogging or creative hobbies. In those phases, I mostly want to read or do something physical. Even if it is sorting out a drawer or clearing a shelf… or getting rid of something. There’s professional development I want to do, but right now I just feel too tired to engage with it properly. 🪑I booked an appointment with a psychotherapist for the first time. Work covers a few mental health sessions, and I feel like I’m at a point where talking things through could help. I chose someone who felt like a good fit, hard to explain why, but something resonated. We’re meeting online tomorrow, and I want to talk about the expectations I place on myself, where I feel I fall short, and my ongoing anxiety. 📸On a more practical note, I mostly kept up with my photo management for January. I didn’t finish everything, but I did most of it. 🤓I’ve also decided to buy a new Kindle. My current one is about 15 years old and still works perfectly, but newer Paperwhites let you email highlights directly from the device. I read a lot of PDFs and want my highlights to flow straight into Readwise without any friction (at the moment I have to manually transfer it using a cable). I also tried the latest Paperwhite recently, and it’s fast . Once you experience that, it’s hard to go back. The plan is to keep one Kindle in my bedroom for bedtime reading and one for the living room. Small luxury, but I’m really looking forward to it. I tried to buy it yesterday, but the shop was out of stock. Will try again later.

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A Room of My Own 3 months ago

A Note on Blogging Anonymously

This blog is anonymous. I wrote a bit about that in my blogging journey , how I made the mistake of announcing my first blog to all my friends and family then got self-conscious, and how that really stifled what I wanted to write about. I wrote about it in more detail in another post, but the simple version is this: this space is mine, a Room of My Own . Blogging felt like it belonged to a privileged few (a leftover belief from the early 2000s — I binged on those blogs like no other), and it wasn’t until Facebook that writing in public under my own name felt accessible. I also believed continuation had to be earned - that validation or “success” would give me permission to keep going. That whole thing around visibility and validation is captured so well in this quote from Baby Reindeer …because… because fame encompasses judgment, right? And I… I feared judgment my entire life. That’s why I wanted fame, because when you’re famous, people see you as that, famous. They’re not thinking all the other things that I’m scared they’re thinking. Like, “That guy’s a loser or a drip or a fucking fa*ggot.” They think, “It’s the guy from that thing.” “It’s the funny guy.” And I wanted so badly to be the funny guy. “Why keep your blog anonymous, why not just journal then?” someone asked me after we emailed about one of my blog posts. And although I do journal privately, writing publicly (even anonymously) does something different. When I know someone might read what I’m saying, I have to distil the idea. It forces clarity. I stop rambling and try to focus. And the bonus is that sometimes what I write resonates with someone else, and we exchange ideas. Over the last few years, and through my blogging struggle (I hate that it was a struggle: start, stop, change domains, shut down, start again), I’ve also realised that what I want to write about here isn’t something I know many people in real life are interested in. And even when I do try to have those conversations, I don’t really get anywhere in depth. It almost feels like there’s no real interest in topics that are admittedly a bit niche: do I put my notes in Obsidian or Bear? Where do admin notes live? How do I track the books I read? Or my thoughts on success, scarcity, work, life, and all that. There are probably people in real life who are interested in productivity and examining life this way, but maybe, like me, they keep those opinions elsewhere. I do sometimes talk about productivity. People love discussing it at a high level, but I want details: where do you put your meeting notes? How do you track your to-dos, personal vs team vs project? Every now and then I meet someone at work who enthusiastically walks me through their  system, how they streamline OneNote with Teams and Outlook (which I also use at work). I love picking up little bits and pieces. And on that note, I secretly admire people who don’t care about any of this and just… get on with it somehow. What I’m trying to say is that I don’t necessarily need people who know me to know what I think about certain topics. Some things just aren’t for your professional life. For me, there’s a clear separation between work and life, and I like to keep it that way. Even though I do make friends at work, as I wrote about in (my very first!) blog post What Happens When Your 9–5 Defines You I still want a professional boundary between what I say here and who I am at work. I want the freedom to write whatever I want, without worrying whether it’s work-appropriate. If I want to write about weight loss, menopause, or something else like that, I don’t need everyone (not that everyone would be reading it, but it would feel that way to me) at work knowing about it. If I want to write about relationships, I haven’t really, so far, but I want that option, without wondering who might read it. My blog has mostly been about my favourite topic in the world: obsessing over tools - how I use them, why I use them - and optimising processes, alongside examining the life topics I tend to fixate on. I want this blog to be a mix of everything I am. Maybe if I wasn’t working, I’d feel comfortable opening it up at this point. But I haven’t told anyone about this blog at all. And if someone ever read it and worked out it was me, fine. But that’s not likely to happen any time soon. I know a lot of people use their blog as a professional CV. In some ways, I wish I could do that. I even had a domain with my full name, which has just expired. But I don’t think I’d ever be comfortable with it, and I don’t really need a static personal site. I have LinkedIn for that, and, I suppose,  I’m quite Gen X in that way. What I do want is a blog. Something I can be prolific on, or not, as much as I want. And that freedom, that anonymity, is what makes it possible.

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A Room of My Own 3 months ago

2026-5: Week Notes

Week 5: Mon 26 Jan – Sun 1 Feb “Inside myself is a place where I live all alone, and that’s where I renew my springs that never dry up.”  Pearl S. Buck. ✈️The week started a bit frantically, with a quick overnight trip to Auckland to help Mum get on her long journey home. Thirty-nine hours later, she arrived safely, and I could breathe a sigh of relief knowing she is happy back home. My sister and her children are certainly happy to have her back (they live close by) after almost three months visiting me in New Zealand. 🖥️From Wednesday onwards, I made a conscious effort to go into the office instead of working from home. I sometimes get more work done at home, but being around people really replenishes me (as well as drains me). Either way, I’m realising more and more that my mental health takes a hit if I don’t have regular, in-person interaction during the week. I feel there is a blog post coming about this. 📺I finished season four of The Morning Show (still excellent), and we’ve started watching Foundation together as a family. I watched the first two seasons on my own, but it’s a great show and I want to share it with the family. My husband is not a huge sci-fi fan, but usually, if I force him to watch a few episodes, he’ll get into it, like he did with The Walking Dead (he refused to watch a “zombie show” at first). That became the highlight of our COVID lockdown. We ended up watching all the seasons. RELATED: What I Learned from Watching the Nine Seasons of The Walking Dead During the Covid-19 Lockdown 👩‍💻I read this blog post about free time and hobbies that really resonated with me-spending lots of time on hobbies and things you enjoy isn’t a flaw or lack of discipline, but the point. It made me think about my blog and my memory keeping how often I treat it like something I need to justify and do in stolen pockets of time. 🤖Thanks to this post about AI privilege I’ve been thinking about how embedded AI has become in my life, not just at work, but personally as well. I sometimes listen to Cal Newport’s podcast, and he talks about the unsustainability of generative AI models: the huge expense versus the revenue, and what that might mean long term. I’m so used to having AI there now that I genuinely worry about it being “taken away”. It always makes me think of that Broken Mirror episode where people are kept alive through subscriptions that keep going up and up until they can’t afford it anymore. It’s a really freaky episode, and it comes back to me every time I think about losing access to AI. 🎥Last year, I tracked (journaled). all my movie and TV watching and got some interesting (surprising!) results out of it. But I decided to stop doing that now. They aren’t entries I’m going to read again. I might mention in my journaling what movie or TV show I’m watching, but I don’t think I’ll keep a separate journal or list just for that. I think I’ll just delete it. ⛱️My husband’s brother was visiting, so we all gathered for fish and chips at his parents’ on Thursday night and decided to take a trip to Hanmer Springs soon and spend two nights, renting an Airbnb. It’s one of my favourite places I’ve visited in New Zealand, quite touristy, but with that Swiss alpine village vibe (I lived in Switzerland, so I know). 🩱If I were to retire in NZ, I think that would be my place of choice, a nice house within walking distance of the hot springs so I could get up in the morning, have a cuppa, walk over to the springs, soak up the warmth until lunchtime, then walk back home for lunch and whatever else I’d be doing in retirement. Go for walks, people-watch, write this blog… 🏡Planning to spend this weekend away from my laptop, doing physical things like walking, maybe going to the beach, reading in the garden (which totally counts as physical), and some tidying up, decluttering, and rearranging at home (I relax this way). 🏕️We’re off camping next (long) weekend, and I’m really looking forward to doing nothing but reading and swimming in the river. Hopefully the kids won’t be too bored, I’m craving a slow, boring weekend away from home.

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A Room of My Own 4 months ago

On Leaving, Starting Over, and Not Living in Fear

When I recorded my message for my son’s 16th birthday, (family from all over the world sent short messages, memories, and bits of advice) I surprised myself with what came out. My advice wasn’t about happiness, success, working hard. It was this: if your world ever starts to feel small, boxed in by a job, a situation, or a relationship - remember that walking away and starting over is always an option. Your world doesn’t have to stay small. Basically, my advice was to live and to live free. That came after telling him to take care of family relationships, because in the end, family is what stays. I’ve lived in different countries, moved for work, built and rebuilt communities, and started over more times than I can count. And yet, the thing I didn’t always do well was letting go. I stayed too long in situations because I was afraid of change, even when walking away would have been kinder to myself. There’s a fine line between quitting and knowing when you need a change. I know it’s almost a cliché now, but many years ago I attended a work training called Who Moved My Cheese . It happened, coincidentally, just a few months before a really stressful situation where we had no choice but to accept change…or perish. I’ll always be grateful to that trainer for preparing me to be Sniff and Scurry… well, maybe Haw. Not everyone has the same choices, of course, and I only have my own experience to draw from. But I do believe that simplicity helps. When you don’t need much, when you don’t build a life that traps you, you keep your freedom. That’s what I want him to know: protect your family relationships, live simply, and never forget that you can choose a different life. I told him not to live in fear. Life is big. The world is large. And sometimes the bravest, healthiest thing you can do is to walk away and start again, even if that means leaving everything behind. I wanted him to know that no place, no group, no situation has to be forever if it stops being right for him. The simplicity (I value it, I strive for it) is another form of freedom. When we release the “connoisseur lifestyle” and shed unnecessary attachments, we create space for what truly matters. We live at the Level of F…. you . I love being there. As I was saying this to him, I was reminded of something I said to my daughter several years ago. She must have been six or seven at the time. She was stuck in a painful little triangle of a friendship. Three girls, one of them passive, the other two (my daughter being one of them) competing to dominate over her. My daughter came home in tears more than once, confused and hurt and trying to work out what she’d done wrong. It was painfully familiar. I had lived that exact dynamic as a child. I remembered my own mother sitting with me, trying to help me come up with plans to fix it, to say the right thing, to stay in it and make it work. I never really escaped my triangle, and it followed me through much of primary school (that’s almost eight years of suffering!) So this time, I said something different to my daughter. I told my daughter that we could analyse it all we liked and come up with strategies, but I wanted to tell her something I wished someone had told me back then. Leave them both to it. There are billions of people in the world. Don’t get hung up on two who make you unhappy. Let them be. Find someone else in your class. Start again. I wasn’t sure she’d take it in. But she did. She made new friends. Three years later and those two girls are an afterthought. Watching her do that, so simply and without drama was … healing. I think what traps us, as children and as adults, is a kind of scarcity thinking. We believe this is it. These are the only people. This is the only place. If we leave, we’ll lose everything. But the world is not small, even when our corner of it feels that way. Walking away isn’t failure. It isn’t giving up. Sometimes it’s choosing yourself. This applies to friendships, places, jobs, relationships, and entire chapters of life. Not everything needs fixing. Not everything needs endurance. Some things simply need leaving behind. If there’s one thing I hope my kids carry with them, it’s this: don’t live small out of fear. If something makes your world shrink, you’re allowed to make it big again. Even if that means walking away. Scarcity thinking keeps us trapped We cling because we think options are limited Walking away isn’t failure, it’s choosing yourself/choosing life This applies to friendships, places, jobs, and whole chapters of life Living at the Level of F* You Recognizing the Scarcity Mentality Don't Become a Connoisseur by JA Westenberg You’re Always Choosing How You Live Scarcity thinking keeps us trapped We cling because we think options are limited Walking away isn’t failure, it’s choosing yourself/choosing life This applies to friendships, places, jobs, and whole chapters of life

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A Room of My Own 4 months ago

Where Most of My Energy Goes These Days

As I mentioned in my weekly notes from last week , and also in some insights from this week’s note , I noticed how easily I slip into managing everyone’s time and behaviour when I’m physically around (I work from home a lot while the kids are on summer holidays). It also made me notice, again, where most of my mental energy actually goes outside of work. One big chunk goes into managing my food and weight. It genuinely feels like a part-time job some weeks, just thinking about it. I’ve been reflecting on the idea of making clearer rules for myself so I’m not constantly negotiating in my head about what I should or shouldn’t eat. This quote I once saved from Gretchen Rubin’s book really resonates with me. “What’s wonderful for me is that in the past, the presence of that ice cream or those Oreos would have been a big distraction. Could I have one, two? One bite, two bites, a tiny bowl, another tiny bowl….and so on. So boring, so draining to battle a craving! Now that I never eat that stuff, I don’t think about it. It doesn’t tempt me any more than a package of uncooked rice. This means less conflict, because I used to be annoyed when my husband bought ice cream, because while he is a Moderator, I’m not. But now he can buy all the ice cream he wants. Why? I don’t eat sugar!… One crucial thing to note about cravings is that they grow with the promise of fulfillment. I eat this way all the time—on vacation, on Christmas Day, on my birthday, at a dinner party at a friend’s house.” I think she is fully keto or paleo or something which I wouldn’t do but I do agree with the underlying idea of deciding once and removing the ongoing decision fatigue. Being slightly stricter upfront might actually give me more peace and free up energy. The second big energy drain is navigating the kids and electronics. We technically have rules, but rules only matter if they’re enforced, and that’s where things don’t really happen. We all just give in. My son just turned sixteen, and it feels wrong putting consequences in place when he should really be self-regulating. On some level, I understand that the world has changed and kids live differently now, and that I’m pushing them toward a world that no longer exists; like when I was younger and we played outside and hung out for hours on end (aka a Stranger Things childhood). Still, I keep coming back to the idea that it’s not just about limiting screen time, but about offering/having high-quality leisure to replace it (as suggested by Cal Newport in his book Digital Minimalism ). To be fair, my son actually does this well with surfing and being outdoors when he has the chance, but it just doesn’t happen as often as I’d (and probably he’d) like. I had a good, honest conversation with my son about this. I told him that at sixteen, I sometimes feel like my active raising is mostly done and that the choices are increasingly his. He didn’t love how that landed and said it felt like I was giving up on him (which is probably how I sounded  - exasperated! ). I tend to see him as capable and sensible and assume he shouldn’t need me to impose boundaries anymore, but maybe he really does. I don’t really have a good answer to any of this yet. Mostly I’m just noticing where my energy leaks, where I make things harder than they need to be, and where a little more clarity or structure might actually create more freedom. Less negotiating in my head. Fewer battles. More space for the things that actually matter. More trust. Trust should be our mantra. It is the secret to the most successful parenting and also the secret to enjoying it. Trust in our child, along with  the magic word “wait” , help us to stay our course when friends, family, and unenlightened professionals imply that we’re not doing enough, and/or our child isn’t keeping up. Trust will remind us to let go of  personal expectations for our child  and to instead recognize and support the expectations she has for herself.  Trust, trust, trust.  It will never lead us astray. Janet Lansbury

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A Room of My Own 4 months ago

2026-4: Week Notes

I wrote a blog post about a scarcity mentality a while back, and with the way my thinking is shifting now, it feels like time to revisit it. When I’m in scarcity mode, I hold tightly to what I have, focus on costs, and think small. An abundance mindset is the opposite - thinking bigger, seeing opportunities, taking risks, and trusting myself. A voice journaling app I’m experimenting with (blog post to follow) surfaced this snippet for me. I feel seen. From your journal entries, I notice a pattern of placing intense pressure on yourself - managing your weight, monitoring your children’s electronics use, organizing your home, and maintaining social connections all while holding down a demanding job. You’re expending enormous energy trying to control various aspects of life, which is leaving you exhausted and often resentful. There’s an underlying belief that happiness lies on the other side of perfect control, yet this pursuit itself may be preventing the contentment you seek. 🤕This week, I felt physically heavier than usual, a combination of inactivity, disrupted routine, and too much time indoors. Sleep was inconsistent, and I carried a low-grade restlessness throughout the week. I suspect some of that is connected to my mum getting ready to go home after staying with us for almost three months. Even when things are good, transitions like this tend to stir things up in me, emotionally and physically. 💨I worked from home all week, which helped me catch up on work and feel on top of things professionally. But it also meant long stretches of sitting and very little natural movement. With the weather being awful, my usual walks didn’t happen, and I can feel the impact of that in my body and energy. I really, really need to keep moving. When I don’t move enough and slip into being too sedentary (which is very easy for me, since both my work and my real interests are mostly sedentary), it affects everything. 🍴And with that my eating became unstructured and I can feel the results of not eating the way I usually do. I know there’s a lot of stigma around counting calories and structured eating, but I really need to eat “clean” to feel well. This continuation of December habits has really started to take a toll on my mental wellbeing.  It’s always interesting how clearly the body reflects what the week has been like. 👥We had people over during the week, which was really nice, but it also reminded me how easily hosting can turn into a mini-event (3+ hours). I don’t always have the energy for that, and I need to find a way to keep inviting people in while also putting some gentle limits around it. 📺Evenings were mostly spent in front of the TV.  We saw The Housemaid at the cinema, and at home watched Wayward (TV Show) and Damsel (the movie). None of them were particularly good but they served a purpose for light, undemanding, and easy to watch when I didn’t have the headspace for anything deeper. There was a lot of zoning out this week, which felt both necessary and unsatisfying. 📚I could say that my highlight was reading The Life Impossible by Matt Haig . I loved curling up with it before bed each night. It had just the right mix of interesting characters and fantasy, with a few life lessons thrown in. ☀️☀️☀️I’m ending the week with the intention to gently reset. Cleaner, simpler food. Daily movement, even if it’s minimal. Fewer autopilot evenings.☀️☀️☀️ PREVIOUS: 2026-3: Week Notes

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A Room of My Own 4 months ago

2026-3: Week Notes

🎂My son turned 16 on the 16th of January. That alone sent me into a lot of reflection. Who he is right now. The boy he’s becoming. How proud I am of him, and how much I genuinely enjoy his company these days. It also sent me back to some older thinking of mine, especially this post about parenting from a scarcity mindset . I notice how easily I still slip into fear when things don’t look the way I imagined they “should” at this age. Teenage life feels so different now: more time at home, less roaming, fewer unsupervised adventures. My very anecdotal sense is that this isn’t just us, but I still wonder what’s being gained and what might be missing. I keep coming back to this quote from Janet Lansbury ( her website  and books have been a lifesaver for me as a  new mother ). I know it, I believe it, and yet I often lose sight of it when fear creeps in: “it’s easy to lose our way when our  success-driven society  doesn’t encourage (or really even recognize) our number one duty as parents: forging a relationship with our child that is grounded in trust, acceptance and respect.” Alongside all of that big thinking, this snippet form this blog post keeps resurfacing for me: Normal day, let me be aware of the treasure you are. Let me learn from you, love you, bless you before you depart. Let me not pass you by in quest of some rare and perfect tomorrow. Let me hold you while I may, for it may not always be so. — Mary Jean Irion 🎥For my son’s birthday, I had an idea that ended up working even better than I hoped. I asked family from around the world to send short birthday videos with wishes or advice. It took hours to pull together and edit down to about ten minutes, but he absolutely loved it. More than I expected, actually. The main intention was to help him feel connected to family, especially given how isolating life in New Zealand can feel at times when most of our people are far away. 🌎My advice to him: don’t live small. If a situation makes your world feel tight or unsustainable, it’s okay to walk away and start again. The world is big, and it’s okay to leave things and people behind. I truly believe this, even though I’ve often struggled to follow it myself. Work-wise, things are getting busier again. I’m back in the office more consistently, more people are returning from leave, and the pace is picking up. Mum is still here after three months, but it feels like the right moment for both of us to return to our own routines. There are mixed feelings there, as always: gratitude for the time together, and the familiar frustration of how hard New Zealand is for older family (and anyone really) to visit. 🧘On the body and wellbeing front, I managed about 15 consecutive days of daily yoga, which feels really good. Eating slipped a bit, though, so I’m planning (not yet doing, mind you) to bring that back into balance. I ordered some meal replacement shakes (I know, I know) and I’m planning a one-week cleanse as a reset. I still dilligently track calories, and I know I’ve been consistently going over maintenance. The weight gain reflects that, unfortunately. Socially, I’m slowly doing more, in line with what I wrote about in my 2026 direction . We had some neighbours over this weekend, and it went really well. Even when I don’t feel like organising, I almost always feel more fulfilled afterwards. It’s a good reminder of why I keep nudging myself to say yes to socializing. 🍿I finished watching Dark Matter and was surprised to learn there’s another season coming, because it felt pretty complete to me. But I’ll take it. I loved it. I also started the latest season of The Morning Show as my solo show, and we kept up our birthday tradition with my son: takeaways and a movie of his choice ( Thor: Ragnarok ). Finally, I can feel another decluttering phase coming on. I’ve placed an order at the local library for a stack of books on minimalism and decluttering, and I’m planning to take that project slowly and savour it. Right now, the idea of simplifying my space feels grounding rather than urgent, and that feels like the right energy to bring to it. PREVIOUS: 2026-2: Week Notes

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A Room of My Own 4 months ago

My Photo Management and Memory Keeping Workflow

Photo management and memory-keeping have been a work in progress for me for a very long time. Honestly, ever since smartphones made it easy to take endless photos, and especially since I had my first child, this has been something of an obsession for me. My first serious attempt at documenting life was scrapbooking. I went all in. Four massive three-ring binders in a 12x12 format of my pregnancy and my son’s first year of life, documenting absolutely everything. They are huge, heavy, and a bit strange to look at now. I am not particularly artistic, and it shows. But at the time, it felt important. He was not a great sleeper, and I have vivid memories of working on those albums late at night while trying to get him to settle. Digital memory-keeping came later. Services like Shutterfly, and then Mixbook, completely changed how I approached this. I started creating 12×12 digital photo books, one per year, plus separate books for more significant family trips. As with scrapbooking, I initially went overboard. Some of those books are absolute monsters. For example, 2012 has four photo books, roughly one every three months, because I could never pare it down and there was also a page limit. Over time, though, I learned to be more picky about which photos to include. A good example is my daughter’s first-year book. She was born six and a half years after my son, and her book is much more restrained: around 100 pages, easy to leaf through, and one she genuinely loves looking at. I never went back to redo the older, oversized books and digitize the scrapbook. However, it’s on my to do list. I keep a list of photo books I’d love to make someday, when life is slower. For now, I’m focused on keeping up as I go. That said, memory-keeping is also something I constantly question. I wonder about the point of making physical photo books, whether anyone really cares, and whether it’s worth the effort. I don’t know anyone in real life who does what I do. And yet, every time I ask my family if I should stop making the photo books, the answer is always no. My kids love them. They are a lot of work, though. I recently read in The Fun Habit by Mike Rucker something that reinforces what I’ve felt instinctively for years: memories don’t stop mattering once the moment is over. When we intentionally hold on to them, both the good and the hard, they continue to contribute to our well-being long after the fun has passed. Rather than treating experiences as fleeting, Rucker frames remembering as a way of extending their value. By revisiting and reflecting on what we’ve lived through, we give those moments more weight, more meaning, and a longer life. In that sense, memory-keeping isn’t indulgent or sentimental, it’s a practical habit that helps joy last. Works for me. This year, I decided to try something different. Instead of letting everything pile up until the end of the year, I created a recurring monthly photo-management card in Trello. It’s due at the end of each month and has a simple checklist: Go through all the photos on my phone and sort and delete Upload that month’s photos and videos to Dropbox, into the relevant monthly folder Upload the best photos to Mixbook and add anything noteworthy from Day One to complement them Delete the photos from my phone The Trello card resets itself once I tick everything off, so the process keeps looping. My hope is that if I stay on top of this monthly, the end of the year will feel manageable instead of overwhelming. I have also started weekly notes on the blog this year. If that sticks, it will help memory keeping as well. We’ll see how it goes. NOTE: The 2025 photo book is still sitting on my to-do list. All the photos are uploaded to Mixbook, but I still need to actually build the album and weave in little quotes and moments from Day One. I keep snippets of things my kids say there, and they love discovering those tucked into the photo books. Before I get into the set workflow for 2026, here are a few photos of the photobooks I’ve made so far. (2018 and 2020 are missing - both years were particularly chaotic, so I didn’t get around to memory-keeping, but they’re on the to-do list too.) iPhone — taking and editing photos Dropbox — archiving and storage Day One — daily journaling and memory keeping Mixbook — digital photo books ⠀ I edit all photos on the go on my iPhone, deleting as I go. By the end of each month, I manually upload the edited photos to a designated monthly folder in Dropbox. I upload the 10-20 of the best photos to Mixbook. Once the photos are safely in Dropbox, I delete them from my iPhone I save snippets, screenshots, and things my kids say in Day One for safekeeping. I use those notes alongside the photos when creating photo books in Mixbook I create one photo book per year, unless we go on holiday or have a special event - in that case, I make a separate book . Aim for no more than 350 photos per year. Select 10–20 photos per month for Mixbook (more if needed - be flexible). Note: My iPhone automatically uploads all photos to Dropbox, but this is backup only. I delete those once the edited photos and videos are manually uploaded to their proper folders. I keep all videos in one folder per year. Favourite videos are also saved in Day One. I plan to eventually create a clearly named “favourites” folder - that’s a future project, not something I worry about now Letting Go of Old Journals and Mementos Why Did I Wait So Long to Start Using Day One? A Journey Through Journaling, Tracking and Memories with Day One The Journal Project I Can’t Quit On the Compulsion to Record Go through all the photos on my phone and sort and delete Upload that month’s photos and videos to Dropbox, into the relevant monthly folder Upload the best photos to Mixbook and add anything noteworthy from Day One to complement them Delete the photos from my phone iPhone — taking and editing photos Dropbox — archiving and storage Day One — daily journaling and memory keeping Mixbook — digital photo books ⠀ I edit all photos on the go on my iPhone, deleting as I go. By the end of each month, I manually upload the edited photos to a designated monthly folder in Dropbox. I upload the 10-20 of the best photos to Mixbook. Once the photos are safely in Dropbox, I delete them from my iPhone I save snippets, screenshots, and things my kids say in Day One for safekeeping. I use those notes alongside the photos when creating photo books in Mixbook I create one photo book per year, unless we go on holiday or have a special event - in that case, I make a separate book . Aim for no more than 350 photos per year. Select 10–20 photos per month for Mixbook (more if needed - be flexible). I keep all videos in one folder per year. Favourite videos are also saved in Day One. I plan to eventually create a clearly named “favourites” folder - that’s a future project, not something I worry about now

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A Room of My Own 4 months ago

2026-2: Week Notes

This week felt like a slow, slightly awkward return to routine. I worked from home , which I’m grateful for, but with the kids home (summer holidays) and my mum visiting, it took a surprising amount of energy to focus and do anything at all. Not productive necessarily. Just not completely stagnant. I noticed how easily I slip into managing everyone’s time and behavior when I’m physically around. It also made me notice, again, where most of my mental energy actually goes outside of work. One big chunk goes into managing my food and weight (as much as I hate to admit it). The second big energy drain is navigating the kids and electronics. (I am just mentioning it here, but I plan to write about it some more later). A bright spot was spending time creating my 2026 direction. I realised I don’t really want achievement-style goals right now. I want a way of being. My central theme is “Let myself be happier.” With gentler yoga goals, I managed to do yoga every day this week (15–20 minutes). I can already feel the difference. I went for almost two weeks without it and could feel myself getting stiffer. It doesn’t take long at this age. On the fun side, I’ve been watching Dark Matter and thinking about regret and the paths we don’t take. I’ve always enjoyed Blake Crouch’s work. It’s slightly terrifying and bordering on hard sci-fi. I also discovered (and loved!) Pluribus . If you’ve watched it, do the Others remind you of ChatGPT or other GenAI? (to save from spoiling it for anyone, I won’t say why). Family movie nights were dominated by Avatar rewatches and finally seeing the latest one in the cinema last night. It’s three and a half hours long, which honestly felt offensive. I kept thinking, who does James Cameron think he is, taking that much of my life? It was beautiful and fine, but not three-and-a-half-hours good. I would have happily traded that time for three more episodes of Pluribus. That said, the kids loved it, especially my (almost sixteen year old) son. My husband had a terrible cough, so I ended up sleeping on a mattress on the floor in my daughter’s room so everyone (maybe not him) could get some sleep, especially with my mum in the guest room. It reminded me (again) how much I care about furniture being practical and multi-use. I still regret not insisting on couches you can properly sleep on. Where I come from, all couches can become beds. It just makes sense to me. I don’t like furniture that only serves one purpose, no matter how pretty it may be. This also nudged me back toward the idea of doing another round of simplifying at home, not because the house is cluttered, but because less always feels lighter to me (makes me feel lighter, I guess). I will make a plan. Maybe start in February or so. Socially, I’m moving toward my 2026 direction of hosting gatherings and bringing people together. Drinks with a neighbour, lunches with my mum and the kids, and long phone calls with friends overseas. The first gathering of neighbours for 2026 is booked for next Saturday (granted, my husband organised that one, but nevertheless). I’ve been thinking more about how many social catch-ups become pure life recaps and updates rather than shared experiences. The life itself is lived somewhere else, not inside the friendship. I’d like to experiment with hosting and gatherings that create something memorable together, not just conversation. That idea has been sitting with me. Because of that, I’m feeling more drawn to creating gatherings that have some kind of purpose or shared experience, not just conversation. I’m reading The Life Impossible by Matt Haig. I usually enjoy his books. The lessons and themes tend to be obvious, a bit like Paulo Coelho, but that’s part of the appeal and probably why they’re so popular. And also, I have no idea where this book is taking me. It’s also nice to see an older protagonist. The main character is 72. I also just finished Better Than Happiness: The True Antidote to Discontent by Gregory P. Smith, a memoir I picked up from the library intending to skim, but it fascinated me enough to read the whole thing. There were some really nice insights around acceptance, self-acceptance, anger, and learning how to actually live in the present moment. “In some ways, it’s a paradox. To change something we first have to accept it for what it is. Only through accepting my perceived flows and limitations? Could I see that there were pathways to improvement? The same applied when it came to learning to accept one of the biggest conundrums in my life, the man in the mirror. Self acceptance is the main reason I’m not only here today, but able to look at myself in the mirror.” Overall, the week felt reflective. I’m noticing how hard I still am on myself and trying to soften that. Self-acceptance! If this year really is about letting myself be happier, then noticing these small choices and energy leaks feels like the right place to start. PREVIOUS WEEK: 2026-1: Week Notes One big chunk goes into managing my food and weight (as much as I hate to admit it). The second big energy drain is navigating the kids and electronics.

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A Room of My Own 4 months ago

My 2026 Direction (Not Goals)

I realised something when I started thinking about my goals for 2026 (as I mentioned I would in my first week notes ) - it’s that I don’t really have any. Not in the way I usually do, anyway. Normally, I like goals. I like SMART goals, systems, structure, clarity, and measurable things. This time, when I genuinely asked myself what I wanted to accomplish this year, nothing specific came up. Apart from losing the three kilos I gained over the last few months, there were no big achievements I wanted to set and measure. It turns out, I don’t need to do anything this year. But I want to be. I want to inhabit my life a little more fully, with a bit more ease and a bit less self-generated pressure. I think this might be a middle-aged thing. I’m turning forty-nine this year (in May!). What eventually surfaced for me was a direction rather than goals. The phrase that resonated with me is “let myself be happier”. I first came across it a long time ago reading an article about The Five Regrets of the Dying. It didn’t resonate at the time at all. I mean, why wouldn’t you let yourself be happier? What kind of weirdness is that? And yet here I am. I don’t let myself be happier, or even happy, very often. I have a long-standing habit of thinking there’s something else to fix or achieve before I’m allowed to be truly happy. But I do know there isn’t . So, as I said, instead of goals, I wrote myself a direction and a set of “do less of this” and “do more of that” intentions. After hours of tweaking, I ended up with a few (4) main areas. The first is letting myself be content. Doing less overthinking, less managing everyone, less getting stuck in negative loops or self-imposed rules about how things should be. More fun. More presence. More horizontal relationships instead of always being the responsible one who holds everything together. This one feels deceptively simple and probably the hardest. The second is moving daily and being kind to my body. Gentle movement. Daily yoga. Walking. Choosing food that actually supports my energy and how I want to feel. I already know what those foods are. I also had to be honest with myself that there is a weight range where I feel physically better, lighter, more like myself. I don’t love that this is true, especially at this age, when metabolism, lifestyle, and the abundance of food everywhere all make this harder than it used to be. But pretending it doesn’t matter, or that I have to accept weight gain as I age, also doesn’t help. The third is going with what genuinely feels good in the moment, not what I think should feel good. Less waiting for the perfect time to enjoy things. More small pleasures now. Taking myself out for walks and coffee. Journaling somewhere I actually enjoy being. Letting myself have solo time without guilt instead of always trying to drag my kids into “adventures” (that may or may not be fun for them) because I hate seeing them glued to screens. More small family trips. More hosting. More bringing people together. And being more intentional about saving for those experiences. The last piece is staying focused at work and continuing to grow professionally. Protecting thinking time . Capturing lessons and mistakes so I actually learn from them. Staying sharp and curious. And careful about getting too busy. It took me much longer than I expected to distill these “goals” into something simple. I had pages of notes, overlapping ideas, and half-formed intentions. At one point I ran the whole thing past my husband, partly to sanity-check myself and partly because he’s very good at cutting through my overthinking. That conversation helped me shorten and clarify what actually mattered, rather than keeping every idea just because I’d spent time thinking about it (and writing it down). Interestingly, he didn’t even think I needed the “stay focused at work and keep growing professionally” piece. His view was that I already do that naturally. I kept it in anyway, because I know how easily time (and focus/attention!) gets eaten by noise and busyness if I don’t actively protect them. At this stage of my life, direction, as opposed to specific goals, feels kinder and more realistic. If I genuinely let myself be happier (more grateful for what I already have? ), not later, not once everything is sorted, but inside ordinary days, that will be enough. If my energy goes a little more into living and a little less into managing, optimising, and worrying, that will be good enough. "Let myself be happier" A year of trusting the flow of life and choosing what genuinely feels good/fun— physically, mentally, and emotionally. Less fretting about what the kids are doing or how they “should” spend their time. Less trying to manage or optimise everyone else. Less complaining and negative narrative loops. Less overthinking. Less self-imposed rules. More separation of tasks and horizontal relationships [[ core ideas in The Courage to Be Disliked ]] More fun - do what’s fun, do what I want to do in the moment. More contentment — being happy with what I already have Eating food that doesn’t make me feel good or support my energy/wellbeing. Ignoring movement when I’m tired or busy. Daily yoga practice (my year-long commitment) [[Keeping a daily yoga practice for a year]]. Regular walking and gentle movement. Choosing food that supports how I want to feel (wfpb). Weight: 65-69 kg range (where I feel my best) Doing what I think I “should” - what others are doing. Waiting for the perfect moment to enjoy life. Solo time (e.g. coffee by myself in the mornings while writing, walking, solo lunches even) Remember that what is fun and fullfilling for me doesn’t have to be “productive”. Small adventures with family or just with Quentin: day trips, weekend road trips. Hosting gatherings and bringing people together. More time with Anna while she still wants the time - shared rituals and little traditions. Save intentionally for bigger travel goals. Taking work home mentally and physically. Deep focus while working. Protect daily thinking time Keep my idea system alive. Capture lessons learned and mistakes. Revisit my five-year direction. Keep learning and staying sharp professionally. [[ actions to take from How to Become CEO ]] The first is letting myself be content. The second is moving daily and being kind to my body. The third is going with what genuinely feels good in the moment, not what I think should feel good. The last piece is staying focused at work and continuing to grow professionally. Less fretting about what the kids are doing or how they “should” spend their time. Less trying to manage or optimise everyone else. Less complaining and negative narrative loops. Less overthinking. Less self-imposed rules. More separation of tasks and horizontal relationships [[ core ideas in The Courage to Be Disliked ]] More fun - do what’s fun, do what I want to do in the moment. More contentment — being happy with what I already have Eating food that doesn’t make me feel good or support my energy/wellbeing. Ignoring movement when I’m tired or busy. Daily yoga practice (my year-long commitment) [[Keeping a daily yoga practice for a year]]. Regular walking and gentle movement. Choosing food that supports how I want to feel (wfpb). Doing what I think I “should” - what others are doing. Waiting for the perfect moment to enjoy life. Solo time (e.g. coffee by myself in the mornings while writing, walking, solo lunches even) Remember that what is fun and fullfilling for me doesn’t have to be “productive”. Small adventures with family or just with Quentin: day trips, weekend road trips. Hosting gatherings and bringing people together. More time with Anna while she still wants the time - shared rituals and little traditions. Save intentionally for bigger travel goals. Taking work home mentally and physically. Deep focus while working. Protect daily thinking time Keep my idea system alive. Capture lessons learned and mistakes. Revisit my five-year direction. Keep learning and staying sharp professionally. [[ actions to take from How to Become CEO ]]

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A Room of My Own 4 months ago

On the Compulsion to Record

“When I gave such importance to archiving my life, it felt as if I was already dead,” said Karen Kingston , as if the moment we begin prioritising the archive, we step slightly out of life itself. The need to have reality confirmed and experience enhanced by photographs. The compulsion to write every thought down. These ideas keep circling me. I came across an Anaïs Nin quote again recently: “I am lying on a hammock, on the terrace of my room at the Hotel Mirador, the diary open on my knees, the sun shining on the diary, and I have no desire to write. The sun, the leaves, the shade, the warmth, are so alive that they lull the senses, calm the imagination. This is perfection. There is no need to portray, to preserve. It is eternal, it overwhelms you, it is complete.” Why can’t I, too, feel that there is no need to preserve? Why does it feel almost impossible to let a moment exist without turning it into words, photos, notes, some kind of proof that it mattered? Anaïs Nin wrote this long before phones, notes apps, and digital storage, before all that enables us to document our lives as evidence (although I did this compulsively in binders and notebooks before, even as a child; I was cataloguing life). I don’t only record happy moments. I record feelings. Thoughts. Confusion. RELATED: My Writing Life so Far I don’t think this means we should stop writing or remembering. But I do think it asks a difficult question: When does recording become a way of avoiding presence? When does organising life become a substitute for living it? And yet, on the flip side, in The Fun Habit by Mike Rucker , which I read recently, he talks about how memories, both good and bad, continue to shape our wellbeing long after the moment itself has passed. When you have something tangible, like a scrapbook or a journal, you don’t just remember the moment; you get to relive it. There’s real joy in that kind of time travel. So many of life’s peak moments are brief and surprisingly rare. Reminiscing lets us stretch those moments out far beyond their original window. We all experience this when we catch up with friends we haven’t seen in years, especially when there’s shared history, and suddenly you’re laughing about old stories like no time has passed at all. Curation plays a role too, says Rucker. Memory keeping isn’t about documenting everything equally; it’s about highlighting the good, and also gently shaping how we hold the harder moments. I try to do this intentionally in my own memory keeping. That thought gives me comfort, and a bit of reassurance that all this effort isn’t for nothing. It’s helping me carry joy, meaning, and connection forward, not just archive the past. Maybe the real practice isn’t to give it all up (as I truly love better systems, better archives, better memory-keeping), but knowing when to stop. When to close the journal. When to trust that a moment doesn’t need to be saved to be real. Maybe one day I’ll sit somewhere warm and quiet, and feel,  genuinely, that there is no need to portray, to preserve. Just to be… Letting Go of Old Journals and Mementos The Cost of Organizing Ideas – But I Keep Doing It Anyway The Journal Project I Can’t Quit Letting Go of the Fear of Losing Data The Art of Organizing (Things That Don’t Need to Be Organized) If You Want to Capture Ideas, You Are Lost Why can’t I, too, feel that there is no need to preserve? Why does it feel almost impossible to let a moment exist without turning it into words, photos, notes, some kind of proof that it mattered? When does recording become a way of avoiding presence? When does organising life become a substitute for living it?

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A Room of My Own 4 months ago

You’re Always Choosing How You Live

I recently finished reading a book that took me a really long time to get through: The Courage to Be Disliked . I highlight regularly when I read, and this one still stood out for the number of passages I wanted to keep. The reason it took me so long, though, is the way it’s written, as a dialogue between a student and a philosopher. I found that format a bit hard to follow at times, and it slowed me down. It’s probably much longer than it needs to be. Still, the gems of Adlerian psychology (its individual psychology and opposition to any kind of dualistic value system that treats the mind as separate from the body) really shine through, distilled for a wider audience and translated into ideas that are easy to follow and relate to. I kept all my highlights, but I’ve also been condensing them into notes so I can easily come back to the ideas that really landed for me. I already know this is a book I’ll revisit  (I read it on Kindle, but I also have the physical copy, which I’m eager to highlight with a pen in hand) Two ideas in particular stood out for me at this stage of my life. The first is the idea of separation of tasks . The core idea is that most relationship problems come from interfering in other people’s tasks, their thoughts, choices, and responsibilities - or letting them interfere in ours. It sounds simple, but it’s not easy to live out, especially in close relationships. Right now, I’m really noticing this in my relationship with my teenager and how he chooses to spend his free time. It’s uncomfortable to sit with the boundary between what’s genuinely my responsibility and what actually belongs to him. I can feel how quickly concern turns into control, or how easily care becomes interference. This idea keeps nudging me to step back and ask: whose task is this, really? I even wrote it down for myself as a note: His task → How he chooses to spend his free time. My task → Creating healthy and clear boundaries, consistency,  and values/structure in the home. The second idea that really resonated is building horizontal relationships  - relationships where we relate to each other as equals, rather than through hierarchy, control, or superiority. It’s about moving away from power dynamics and toward mutual respect, responsibility, and trust. Not just with friends or colleagues, but in families too. In relation to my teenager, I am guiding, not controlling. Together, these two ideas feel quietly radical (even though I think we all intuitively know this is how it should be). They challenge a lot of the ways we’re taught to manage, fix, and influence the people around us. They ask for more personal responsibility, more emotional maturity, and more trust in others - and in ourselves. My mum is staying with us at the moment, and I definitely have opinions about how she spends her time (and she has opinions about mine too, although she’s become less judgmental as she’s gotten older). We’ve talked about these ideas from the book, and now when I catch myself wanting to criticise, I’ll say something like: “I want to tell you to go for a walk instead of playing so much mahjong on your phone because you need to stay fit, but that’s your task, not mine.” We usually laugh. But honestly, it’s not easy. I notice older, more mature people often seem much better at this, more accepting of other people’s tasks, and more focused on simply doing their own (and gently guiding). I wanted to capture these ideas in my notes so I can come back to them regularly. I think they’re going to shape the direction I’m taking in 2026. Or at least, that’s the hope. I also sprinkled some quotes from the book throughout. Your life is not determined by your past, your trauma, or your emotions. You are always choosing your way of living right now . Change is possible at any moment—but it requires courage. Adlerian psychology rejects the idea that the past causes who you are (etiology). Instead, it says we act toward goals (teleology). Emotions like anger, anxiety, or fear are tools we use to achieve goals (e.g., avoiding responsibility, asserting power, not changing). Past experiences don’t define you; the meaning you give them does. Personality is a chosen lifestyle, not something fixed. People say they want to change, but often choose not to because the current way of living is familiar and predictable—even if painful. Change means uncertainty, criticism, and possible failure. Unhappiness comes from a lack of courage, not a lack of ability. ⠀ “PHILOSOPHER: Don’t you see? In a word, anger is a tool that can be taken out as needed. It can be put away the moment the phone rings, and pulled out again after one hangs up. The mother isn’t yelling in anger she cannot control. She is simply using the anger to overpower her daughter with a loud voice and thereby assert her opinions.” Every problem ultimately involves relationships with others. Feelings of inferiority only exist because we compare ourselves to others. Superiority complexes (boasting, victimhood, self-pity) are just inverted inferiority. Life becomes painful when it turns into a competition. “YOUTH: So I am making up flaws in other people just so that I can avoid my life tasks, and furthermore, so I can avoid interpersonal relationships? And I am running away by thinking of other people as my enemies? PHILOSOPHER: That’s right. Adler called the state of coming up with all manner of pretexts in order to avoid the life tasks the “life-lie.” Life isn’t about winning or losing. Healthy inferiority is comparing yourself to your ideal self, not to others. True freedom comes from withdrawing from comparison altogether. “PHILOSOPHER: Look, no matter how much you want to be Y, you cannot be reborn as him. You are not Y. It’s okay for you to be you. However, I am not saying it’s fine to be “just as you are.” If you are unable to really feel happy, then it’s clear that things aren’t right just as they are. You’ve got to put one foot in front of the other, and not stop.” Most relationship problems come from interfering in other people’s tasks or letting them interfere in yours. You are responsible for your actions, not how others react. Let others judge, approve, or dislike you - that’s their task. Trying to control others (even “for their own good”) is manipulation “Separating one’s tasks is not an egocentric thing. Intervening in other people’s tasks is essentially an egocentric way of thinking, however. Parents force their children to study; they meddle in their life and marriage choices. That is nothing other than an egocentric way of thinking.” Wanting approval makes you unfree. Living to meet others’ expectations means living their life, not yours. Freedom means accepting that some people won’t like you. Being disliked is not failure—it’s proof you’re living authentically. “Many people think that the interpersonal relationship cards are held by the other person. That is why they wonder, How does that person feel about me? and end up living in such a way as to satisfy the wishes of other people. But if they can grasp the separation of tasks, they will notice that they are holding all the cards. This is a new way of thinking.” No praising, no rebuking—both are forms of control. Treat others as equals (“equal but not the same”). You’re not trying to dominate, impress, win approval, or avoid being judged. Encouragement replaces judgment. Gratitude builds connection; praise undermines confidence. Horizontal relationships support: Self-acceptance (you don’t need to rank yourself) Healthy boundaries (not over-responsible for others) Courage (you act based on values, not fear of judgment) Real connection (less performance, more authenticity) “It is fine to just let go of it. Living in fear of one’s relationships falling apart is an unfree way to live, in which one is living for other people.” You don’t need to “love yourself” or affirm yourself. Accept what you can’t change; focus on what you can. Worth comes from feeling useful to others , not from being special. Contribution, not recognition, is the source of confidence and courage. ⠀ “PHILOSOPHER: You’re wrong. You notice only your shortcomings because you’ve resolved to not start liking yourself. In order to not like yourself, you don’t see your strong points and focus only on your shortcomings. First, understand this point. YOUTH: I have resolved to not start liking myself? PHILOSOPHER: That’s right. To you, not liking yourself is a virtue.” You’re not the center of the world; you’re part of a community. A sense of belonging is earned by contributing, not demanded. Shift from self-focus (“How am I seen?”) to social interest (“How can I help?”). “Do not cling to the small community right in front of you. There will always be more ‘you and I,’ and more ‘everyone,’ and larger communities that exist.” “It is about having concern for others, building horizontal relationships, and taking the approach of encouragement. All these things connect to the deep life awareness of “I am of use to someone,” and in turn, to your courage to live.” Life is not a straight line or a story, it’s a series of moments. Past and future are excuses we use to avoid living fully now. The greatest life-lie is postponing life. A life lived earnestly in each moment is already complete. “PHILOSOPHER: The greatest life-lie of all is to not live here and now. It is to look at the past and the future, cast a dim light on one’s entire life, and believe that one has been able to see something. Until now, you have turned away from the here and now and shone a light only on invented pasts and futures. You have told a great lie to your life, to these irreplaceable moments.” “As long as we postpone life, we can never go anywhere and will pass our days only one after the next in dull monotony, because we think of here and now as just a preparatory period, as a time for patience. But a “here and now” in which one is studying for an entrance examination in the distant future, for example, is the real thing.” Life has no inherent meaning. You give it meaning through contribution to others. That contribution is the “guiding star” for a free and happy life. “life in general has no meaning whatsoever. But you can assign meaning to that life. And you are the only one who can assign meaning to your” His task → How he chooses to spend his free time. My task → Creating healthy and clear boundaries, consistency,  and values/structure in the home. Adlerian psychology rejects the idea that the past causes who you are (etiology). Instead, it says we act toward goals (teleology). Emotions like anger, anxiety, or fear are tools we use to achieve goals (e.g., avoiding responsibility, asserting power, not changing). Past experiences don’t define you; the meaning you give them does. Personality is a chosen lifestyle, not something fixed. People say they want to change, but often choose not to because the current way of living is familiar and predictable—even if painful. Change means uncertainty, criticism, and possible failure. Unhappiness comes from a lack of courage, not a lack of ability. ⠀ Every problem ultimately involves relationships with others. Feelings of inferiority only exist because we compare ourselves to others. Superiority complexes (boasting, victimhood, self-pity) are just inverted inferiority. Life becomes painful when it turns into a competition. Life isn’t about winning or losing. Healthy inferiority is comparing yourself to your ideal self, not to others. True freedom comes from withdrawing from comparison altogether. Most relationship problems come from interfering in other people’s tasks or letting them interfere in yours. You are responsible for your actions, not how others react. Let others judge, approve, or dislike you - that’s their task. Trying to control others (even “for their own good”) is manipulation Wanting approval makes you unfree. Living to meet others’ expectations means living their life, not yours. Freedom means accepting that some people won’t like you. Being disliked is not failure—it’s proof you’re living authentically. No praising, no rebuking—both are forms of control. Treat others as equals (“equal but not the same”). You’re not trying to dominate, impress, win approval, or avoid being judged. Encouragement replaces judgment. Gratitude builds connection; praise undermines confidence. Self-acceptance (you don’t need to rank yourself) Healthy boundaries (not over-responsible for others) Courage (you act based on values, not fear of judgment) Real connection (less performance, more authenticity) You don’t need to “love yourself” or affirm yourself. Accept what you can’t change; focus on what you can. Worth comes from feeling useful to others , not from being special. Contribution, not recognition, is the source of confidence and courage. ⠀ You’re not the center of the world; you’re part of a community. A sense of belonging is earned by contributing, not demanded. Shift from self-focus (“How am I seen?”) to social interest (“How can I help?”). Life is not a straight line or a story, it’s a series of moments. Past and future are excuses we use to avoid living fully now. The greatest life-lie is postponing life. A life lived earnestly in each moment is already complete. Life has no inherent meaning. You give it meaning through contribution to others. That contribution is the “guiding star” for a free and happy life.

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A Room of My Own 4 months ago

Apparently I’ve Been “Interstitial” Journaling All Along

I recently came across a blog post about interstitial journaling . Interstitial journaling apparently combines notes, to-do and time tracking in one. It’s funny how these things become “all the rage” when someone names them and popularises them, when in reality, many of us who cling to our journals have probably been doing some version of it for years. I know I have. For as long as I can remember, I’ve had a journal; not always in a structured way, but more as a place to talk to myself. I never thought of it as a technique; it was just something I did. I’d jot down the time and date, write about what was happening, berate myself over mistakes, work through challenges, and plan my next steps. It wasn’t about recording my life in a traditional diary sense - it was a way to process things in real-time, to be my own sounding board. Or something to fall back on when things get tough. That being said, giving something a name can make it more accessible, helping more people discover and benefit from it. These days, I use Day One for this kind of journaling, especially at work. I keep the web version open throughout the day, using it to vent, clarify my thoughts, and track how I spend my time. It helps me see patterns in my work, keep myself accountable, and avoid the stress of last-minute deadlines. I also use voice journaling when out and about, when I want to jot down a thought while walking or driving, and then add the transcript to Day One, my single source of truth. I kind of miss my physical journal because it was always my faithful companion, going everywhere with me. I was always a one-notebook girl, using one notebook for work and personal journaling, to-dos, and everything else until I finished it. At the height of my journaling, and before smartphones, I would go through a notebook in 3–4 months (that’s a project waiting for some free time for me to digitise all those notebooks in Day One and, if I am brave enough, let go of the physical copies that take up a significant part of my wardrobe cupboard). I tried to revive the physical, take-everywhere-with-me notebook, but while I still journal on paper every now and then and have long writing sessions, lugging a notebook around is no longer conducive to my lifestyle. I am often out and about with only my phone in my pocket and no handbag of any kind. At work, I am in front of my computer and it is just easier to jot things down there. Or dictate on my phone. But I still do have a small, cute notebook (A5) in my work bag, and it does sit on my desk when I work, because… well… every now and then I need to think on paper. It turns out I’ve been practicing interstitial journaling all along—I just called it … well.. journaling. Why Did I Wait So Long to Start Using Day One? The Journal Project I Can’t Quit

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A Room of My Own 4 months ago

2026-1: Week Notes

For a while now, I’ve been playing with the idea of starting weekly notes on my blog. And if I’m ever going to do it, it feels like it needs to start cleanly, with the first week of the year. While I generally think I don’t need to share a lot of my very personal life here, I do like reading other people’s weekly notes. There is something excitingly voyeuristic about diving into other people’s weeknotes and what they choose to put in there. I also like the idea of having a weekly recap. As I mentioned in my One Year With Bear  post, I’ve been playing with the idea of some kind of weekly planning schedule, and this feels like it could go hand in hand with a weekly recap I could do every Sunday. This is not journaling, and I don’t want it to be. I don’t want it to be long. Just a few main points of what I did, what I learned, and what caught my attention. If I manage to do this for 52 weeks, I’ll have a pretty nice yearly recap. I used this week to prepare for 2026. I did my yearly reflections and managed to come up with about twenty highlights from last year. I wanted to set some goals, which I actually do every year. I know there are a whole lot of blog posts now starting with “I don’t do New Year’s resolutions, but…”. I always do set goals for myself at the beginning of the year. January feels like a clean slate. And I do try to make them SMART.  In 2025, the SMART ones got done. The high-level/generic ones didn’t. For example, I had a goal that said “dedicate time to hobbies like writing, memory keeping, and creative projects”, and I didn’t do almost any of that, apart from bits here and there. That’s something I want to be much more specific about when I set my 2026 goals (I plan to do that in Week 2). I spent time organising my writing and my blogging. Anyone following this blog may have noticed that I was quite prolific in the past few days. I published six (6) blog posts this week . That is mostly because I’m not working at the moment, had some time on my hands, and wasn’t completely sick of looking at my computer. A lot of what I published had been sitting in drafts for a while. What I really noticed was how much I enjoyed my slow mornings. I would wake up while the kids were still asleep, my husband would bring me a cup of coffee, and I would stay in bed for one, sometimes two or even three hours. I was sorting through my Bear notes, my journaling, my blogging, and writing. It was one of the more enjoyable things I’ve done in a while. True me time. I signed up for a free yoga challenge with Yoga Download , thinking that 2026 should be the year where I do yoga every day. I used to be a member a while back, but there was always so much (too much!) to choose from that I would end up overwhelmed and not doing anything at all. I started on 01 Jan and the class itself was great, but it was thirty minutes long, and the following ones were forty-five minutes. It felt daunting, so I ended up not doing any yoga at all after that. Once again, I fell into the same trap of starting off overly ambitious. Today, I went back to my trusted Down Dog  Yoga, where I can choose the length of the practice, the type, the voice, and how much they talk. Daily yoga is important to me, especially for my back, flexibility, and overall wellbeing, but it needs to be realistic. From experience, I know that even 15 to 20 minutes a day is enough to build stamina, strength, and flexibility. I didn’t do as well with food and walking as I wanted to, and routines are a bit messy at the moment. The kids are on holiday, my mum is visiting, and the dynamics at home are different. I’ve been trying to go with the flow, mostly successfully, apart from the sugar overeating, which always makes me feel worse. I am re-reading  The Easy Way to Quit Sugar  to get back into it. I stopped smoking over a decade ago using this method, and I trust it for everything. I’ve also been trialling a simple mood tracking app for the past two weeks. Unsurprisingly, it confirmed what I already know. Not moving enough and not eating well have the biggest negative impact on my mood. Time to do better in weeks 2 and 3. We are still starting this year, right? I’m hoping to keep space for blogging this year. Whether it’s useful/productive or not doesn’t really matter. The fact is - writing it makes me feel good, and it makes me feel even better knowing that others with similar thoughts might read it.

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A Room of My Own 4 months ago

Where I Keep My “Bookmarks”

I recently got an email from a reader my blog (thank you for reading and reaching out!) who asked me how I keep track of my bookmarks. The short answer is: I don’t. Not in the traditional sense. I don’t really “bookmark” anything anymore. What I actually keep is a pile of short(ish) notes on all sorts of subjects, and those all live in Bear, tagged as topics with relevant nested tags. RELATED: One Year With Bear I used to be one of those people who clipped full web articles into Evernote and bookmarked every website I ever liked. Articles, quotes, screenshots, recipes, all of it went in there. At some point I realised I was hoarding information I’d never look at again, although it is now fun to occasionally find a full article someone once wrote on a blog that’s long gone, still sitting there in my Evernote backup. These days I keep far less, but even with that shift I still have over 2,000 notes in Bear. They’ve built up over the years: little observations, bits of learning, snippets from books, random thoughts I didn’t want to lose. Everything gets tagged by topic. That’s my whole system. If something feels worth keeping, I’ll drop it into Bear, tidy it up a little, and add the tag or tags it belongs with. Occasionally I’ll add backlinks to connect related notes, but I don’t force it. Some topics get deep enough that I end up with a dedicated tag I keep adding to until the “obsession” fades. RELATED: Refuse to Choose: Too Many Interests to Pick Just One? I’ve tried a bunch of “proper” bookmarking tools over the years. Pocket. Readwise Reader. Raindrop. Also my web browser. Without fail, they all turned into giant holding bins of things I meant to read “one day.” However, the time to read an article truly is the moment you encounter it or the moment you search for it. Everything else is not relevant now and will probably never be read again. It just adds to mental and digital clutter and overwhelm. Over the years, I learned to delete everything I saved to read later. And now, even when I still send articles to Readwise Reader, I am 99% sure I’ll end up deleting them later, unread. Saved links without context just become clutter. If something grabs me enough to keep, I’d rather save the idea in my notes, with the URL for credit. That works for me because it feels like I’m tending to something, not piling things up. A note has to earn its place. If it’s not worth the small effort of processing and tagging, I probably don’t need it. That said, I completely understand the appeal to save and bookmark, esp. that tools like Reader or Raindrop make it so easy to do that. Been there, done that. Admittedly, I still have a “links” tag as a nested tag under the main #resources tag in Bear, where I save links to websites on various topics that I’d like to explore at some point. There are 38 notes under that tag as of today, and today was the first time I checked it in a year. When I need something or a website to access, I just search it. I still read a few newsletters that go straight into my Yahoo “Subscribed” folder. RELATED: Beware of This Online Time Suck (Examine Your Subscriptions) I also subscribe to a lot of personal blogs like mine via RSS Feeder, and while I don’t read everything all the time, Feeder lets me quickly scan and dip into whatever catches my attention. It feels nice and low-pressure. Take it or leave it. And it’s free. If I read something I want to save, I do it right away by adding it to Bear and processing it there. RELATED:  My Digital Workflow (Jan 2026 Edition) I think I’ll take some time to round up all my newsletters and my current RSS subscriptions in a blog post. Seeing everything in one place gives it a bit more context and a sense of quantity. I actively unsubscribe from everything I don’t need or am no longer interested in. And I don’t “bookmark.” Not really. Not anymore.

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