LONG TIME NO SPEAK

It has been a while..

I know.

I have been up and down health wise & on a daily basis don't know how I even feel, let alone be able to put it in writing.

The battle to find balance in our lives are difficult, beyond difficult.

We all want to succeed in finding inner peace, being the best versions of ourselves, have stable health & live pain free ( the dream ). However, in reality this is harder to achieve than maybe we first thought.

I am guilty of believing in magic overnight cures & I am also guilty of putting all my eggs in own basket & dedicating endless time to a cause believing it would be the 'fix.'

I am beginning to realise that I overlook 'key' objectives, small wins, successes & achievements. As in my mind I haven't reached all the goals I set out above. I am not saying they aren't achievable to some degree. However, I do question whether it becomes unhealthy to dwell on them all day long. I have seen a lot of posts on social media recently about 'toxic positivity.' Although I am always an advocate for positivity & a positive mindset, I can see this point of view.

Never allowing though negative emotions to come in, neglecting & dismissing them.. leading to far more trouble further down the line. We have our rose tinted glasses on believing if we just do X, Y, & Z we will feel 10 times better, feel happier, feel more a peace, be in less pain.

To a certain extent we may find positive ways within our goals that will help our lives, our health physically & mentally. What we have to understand is that we can't go in with that perfectionist mindset.

I will hold my hands up & admit to being guilty. Guilty of throwing myself all in to something, truly believing this is the ULIMATE problem solver.

My ideals in my head that I can eat X, Y, & Z suffer but bounce back, it will be ok & I will feel happier & enjoy life more. However, the suffering is often longer than my mind led me to believe it would be. It is harder to bounce back. This knocks us mentally & physically which is the opposite affect of what the goal was in the first place.

Next example: working on self-development will help you find inner peace. Whilst self-development is so, SO important in so many ways & can help us. We must understand that there is a trillion pound business out there that profit on the subjects we struggle with. So, most self-development books & programs help you to a certain point but they will never give you the goal you set in your mind. Why would they? They will stop paying for their books, stop watching their videos & so on.

There are a number of examples we can dive into but you get my drift. Having goals is amazing, they give us focus, determination & motivation but we also have to be realistic. We must be more level headed reasonable.

We need to be more alert & awake to people takin advantages of the weaker points in our lives we want to work on.

EVERY day I get messages on social media offering me products to cure my cure my Lyme, cure my insomnia, reduce my pain. Often these businesses aren't even legit. Yet, people do fall into the trap, they are so desperate to find relief that they give their money to these companies only to find out that they have paid for an over-priced product that had little effect, they were scammed or they didn't even receive the product & the business can no longer be traced.

As you know I try to be a positive, real, raw & honest on my social media platforms, documenting my journey, the hiccups I have, the mistakes I make & the lessons I learn.

I have felt lost & in a funk with my content recently. Fed up of trying to fit in, or fit a mold of what content I feel I should be putting out. It is easy to fall into a comparison trap or produce the same kind of content that everyone else is putting out because it seems to well for other people.

I am realising that we need to take 'other people' out of the game. We are our competition. Posting content that we believe is 'right' or 'content that people want.' Is more likely making you miserable than helping your wellbeing. Finding your point of difference is a challenged but I have brainstormed some ideas & I am excited over the coming weeks to begin sharing them with you.

I have kick started: Dilemmas With Soph on IGTV where I answer a few of your dilemmas each week, in hope I can help bring you some comfort and offer a direction to move forward in.

We have series 4 of Chronic But Iconic coming back next month. Discussing KEY topics like identity, comparisons, social media & much more.

I am going to be focusing on Instagram reels with positive & thought provoking content with a Sophie twist on there.

And I am going to be balancing my posts with mental health & learning, travel & lifestyle.

Yes, I want people to relate & find comfort in the content I put out, but I am learning that through ALL the battles I have fought, pain I have felt I also have a lot of thought provoking & helpful information to share.

My goal, has always been to be the best version of myself.

Over time, I lost focus, I got sucked into the toxic comparison cycle, muted myself & neglected the real me to become what I thought I should be. I know so many people are the same & over the coming weeks, months, years I want to help people rediscover their magic. In many different ways & formats.

We can't strive for perfection. It is a myth, a dream sadly sold to us for a hefty price to our physical & mental health EVERY day.

SO... my motto for now is to be:

' Perfectly imperfect,' & rock at it!'

So, should you. If you gave the day your all, you should be so very proud of yourself.

Your days, your health, your relationship with yourself don't have to be perfect. EVERYONE has their wobbles we just don't see them. Don't be hard on yourself.

You are rocking it.

I hope you find value, hope & learn something from this post.

If you don't already follow me over on Instagram my handle is: @sophiewardy , I put a lot of content out over there, so check it all out & I hope you have a great week.

* Need a little help 1-1, message me & let's discuss a plan of action, don't suffer in silence. *

Sophie xoxo