The one where I vlog instead of blog

Hello!

So I've moved onto YouTube! I've wanted to get into vlogging for so long, but as one who is so paranoid about negative comments I've always been very put off by vlogging, I don't mean getting bad criticism or feedback because obviously that is needed to move forward and improve yourself, but just general negativity for no particular reason, but then I thought well I'm doing it because I want to and I find it fun so why not!

I've made attempts in the past but only ever made a handful of videos and then just stopped, but as I am now in Gibraltar for the summer I thought lets go for it! And because my friend Michael who also vlogs and blogs has been encouraging me and asking me to start vlogging the moment I got to Gibraltar I liked that I had someone who was so keen for me to get into it so it was a nice boost to get started!

So yeah, here is my introduction video, it's very brief and here's hoping I keep this up!!

My First Vlog

The Deadline Rush

It's been almost a month since my last post!

I've just been busy really, I have uni deadlines and I spent two weeks home for Easter where I had lots of glorious fun! I spent most of the time hanging out with my oldest sister as she is on maternity leave so I was there to keep her company (and hang her washing out for her haha) and just generally trying to get out of the house more. I saw my other sister too to hang out with my nephew (who finally knows who I am and says my name :D!!!)

I've now been back at uni for 2 weeks, well I say back at uni, I don't actually have any classes, I just came back here to finish off all my work and pack up my stuff for summer. I am hopefully going home on the 17th of May for summer but so far it's still in limbo because my course is arranging a final week of events which might have stuff about dissertation that I'll need to hang around for, but I really hope I can go home on the 17th because if I don't go home that day I'll have to get the train home on my own which obviously is not fun!

These past two weeks have been crazy! I had to help my friend edit a film, then after we submitted that we had a showreel each to create within about 3 days and then we both had a reflective report to write and now I am finally on my final piece of work for second year. So far this final piece of work is proving a nightmare and it's the hardest essay I've had to do so far, in fact I'm not expecting anything higher than 50% if I even hit that! The theory modules really aren't my strong point! It's 2500 words and I did 1000 today, it's due tomorrow at midnight so tomorrow I have to finish it! But once I do it's going to be absolutely fantastic, I've told everyone the first thing I'm going to do when I submit my final piece of work for second year is go for a run! I know that's a crazy way of celebrating haha but I just wanna release some energy! Not to mention I am doing the Race For Life in June for the third year in a row, so any sort training will help haha!

We got lucky with that final piece of work because we got given a week extension, but at the same time I think if we didn't have that extension I would've done the work by now and already be finished!! But from what I can see on my Facebook I am far from the only one who has left it to the day before regardless of our extension haha!

I am so excited to get home for summer as I have some days out planned! So far only two days planned really, I am going to the Harry Potter Studio Tour with my boyfriend, my sister and my brother-in-law. I have been once before as I went with my college as an end of college trip but I always said I would go again if I got the chance and I've been saying since like last August that I would love to take my sister as she has always been a big Harry Potter fan too! So I'm so excited that I get to see three people experience it for the first time! I have to hold in all the secrets haha :)

My second day out planned is that I'm going to see the Lion King Musical in London! It all started like last November or December, me and my boyfriend were trying to decide what to do for our two year anniversary which was in January, because for our one year we didn't do anything special and we always felt like we should have done. So I started mentioning about the Lion King Musical because my friend has seen it before and she said it was absolutely epic, and I just thought it'd be really cool to actually go to the theatre and a London show! It turned out that we couldn't really afford to go for our two year anniversary as we needed quite a bit of money, so we dismissed it, but I had mentioned all of this to my mum and then for Christmas she got me a gift voucher towards the price of the ticket! We still couldn't go for our two years for various reasons, so we said we'd save it for June so we had time to save up money for it and so that it'd be a nice end of second year celebration! So we are very excited to go now :D

I am hoping to go on many days out when I go home for summer, I am trying to be a bit more spontaneous and I just want to generally get out of the house more, I am off to Gibraltar on the 18th of June to spend the rest of my summer there so hopefully I get a nice tan!!

There is more I feel like I want to blog about but I feel like this is already quite long so I apologise! But it feels nice to know I've actually had some stuff to talk about :D

Until next time, which will hopefully be soon!

Thanks for reading :D

Confidence

Having no confidence can really really hold you back in life, it's crazy really, you'd prefer to sit indoors where it's safe rather than make a phone call or speak to someone in a shop etc, I say this from cold hard experience. I am the utter worst when it comes to dealing with strangers or having to make a phone call or just doing something out of the ordinary. It makes it 110% worse for me though when someone is pressuring you, especially the confident people, they think they're helping you by pushing and pushing and pushing, but honestly there is literally nothing worse than that, there is nothing more soul crushing than someone being like 'Go on, go on, GO ON, GO ON YOU CAN DO IT WHAT ARE YOU SCARED OF, SERIOUSLY JUST DO IT.'

It quite literally makes you want the floor to swallow you up, and they just think they're helping. In my experience, the confident people don't know how to do deal with the unconfident people, because in their eyes it's just easy, just something you have to do and they believe we just need to be put on the spot, but really no, it makes it so much worse and puts us off those certain situations even more! It's not always easy for some people and the pressure is actually worse! I have been like that for a long time, especially with phone calls, when it comes to ringing companies and the like I just cannot handle it, I have to make sure no one can hear me on the phone, I hate knowing someone could be listening and I try to make sure I'm home alone if possible! I also don't like it if people are around watching me cook a meal or something, I feel like they're gonna be like 'Oh that's not how I would do it.' even though they probably don't give two shits haha. I don't like people watching me write emails or essays either, and I especially do not like people seeing my CV! I just feel like people are gonna judge and just tell me it's all wrong and what not, although I understand it's just advice and I know they're just trying to help, it's crazy haha. Pressure is literally the scariest part of being unconfident, the people think they're helping you by pushing you into it whereas it's the most terrifying thing, seriously. I can't even explain the feeling, for me, it feels like my insides are literally closing up, you can see the person who's trying to 'help' you actually start to get increasingly frustrated, and you just start to get frustrated at them for not just doing it for you if it's apparently so easy for them. Pressure is scary, and it makes it worse.

Maybe not all the time, there has been the odd occasion where I'm actually more scared of what the pressure is going to bring and how it's going to make me feel that I just tell them to shut up and then do what they want me to do (that doesn't mean to say the pressure is a good thing, it just means I'm scared of the attack I'm about to endure from being unconfident in the first place and then feeling guilty that I'm just a bit unconfident with some stuff!) In fact I've always said to myself and to a few others, if someone is unconfident, pushing them into it will actually make it worse and make them over think it too much, sometimes we just need a few moments to assess the situation and take the plunge ourselves, and then we feel a lot happier that we've managed to overcome that small hurdle of unconfidence.

I've always got the impression however that the confident people just don't understand it, to them it's so easy to do, and they just get angry at us, but it just doesn't help, everyone deals with things differently at the end of the day! For example, my dad doesn't know the meaning of unconfidence, (love you dad I'm not slating you I swear haha it's actually a good thing :P!!!) he would always be confused when any of us were too scared or unconfident to do something that just seemed soooo easy to do. One example is my mum needed to ring someone about a job (which is the one phone call which is now why they live in Gibraltar so yay mum for making the phone call proud of you haha!) and she, like I would be, was a bit nervous about doing it, but my dad was like 'Just do it Jayne! Just do it! If you don't do it you are wasting such a good opportunity you'd be stupid not to do it!' Or something like that. And although I 100% know my dad was being 100% supportive and encouraging in his eyes, it's difficult for the person on the other end who is dealing with the nerves and unconfidence, but when the confident person sees us nervous lot not wanting to do something they just don't get it! (Dad it's a great thing you're confident I'm not blaming you haha! And mum made the phone call in the end well done mum :P!!! Maybe dads pressure did work hahah! Love you guys!)

Anyways, I'm here writing this post today because lately I feel like my confidence has been getting better, and honestly it's a relief, when you learn that things aren't actually that scary (although you 100% know that already even when you aren't confident, you just can't explain why something is so f***ing difficult for you to do.)

Basically, it got to the point one day for me where it was kinda like 'shit aint gonna get done unless I get it done' and that was it, even if it was something small, like taking the plunge and asking a lecturer a question because your friends are also too scared to, or asking someone a question in a shop or *gasp* making a phone call without wanting to throw up! (haha!) It's just kinda like, if I don't do this I aint getting anywhere, the phone call thing is a big deal to me, I had to ring up a random actor for our short film, a completely random guy who we had put out a casting call for online, and I rang him without even questioning it! I mean, I still went upstairs on my own where no one would hear me haha, but usually I would've tried my very best to avoid that, it would make me all nervous and feel sick usually, but this I was just like look we need an actor, this guy has applied I am going to ring him, so I did! He didn't want the bloody part when I did ring him however! Haha, making my big brave phone call turn out to be nothin' :P!! But the point is I thought to myself, we're desperate for an actor, this guy has applied I'M GONNA DO IT RIGHT NOW, and I did, and it was easy and not scary and nothing happened!

And lately with the very small things, I've been happy to take that step that I usually wouldn't take or would get VERY worked up about it before actually doing it, it's nice really, I do feel a bit of freedom from it, I do feel like I might have opened up a few small things for myself because of it. It's nice. I still think I have a long way to go though, and I still CANNOT handle pressure from people, if everyone had been like 'Amanda ring this person, Amanda do it, Amanda you have to you just have to just DO IT!' I probably would've struggled a lot more. To get over the scariness I need to take the plunge myself without giving it too much thought and also knowing that I was the one who made the decision to get over the hurdle rather than being pressured into it, especially if the pressuring person is like 'I told you so.' Don't shoot down the scary hurdle I just got over by making it out like it shouldn't have been difficult in the first place because *news flash* it obviously was difficult for me!

But the main point here is that I do feel a bit more confident in myself to do the scary things that aren't actually all that scary, it really did just get to a point where you learn 'Ok, if I don't do this it's not gonna get done.' 'If I don't do this I'm going to be disappointing a lot of people.' And most importantly 'If I don't do this, I'm actually making my life more difficult.' I recognise when people aren't sure of doing something, and I feel like I am kinda good at saying 'I completely understand how you feel, I'm not going to pressure you, take your time but I understand if you don't wanna get over that hurdle today.' I feel like the time will come for anyone who is unconfident to finally realise 'I can do this!'

I'm worried about making this post just in case the few people who do read it might be like 'BUT AMANDA YOU'RE CONFIDENT NOW YOU SAID SO IN YOUR BLOG WHY ARE YOU TOO SCARED TO DO THIS?' I don't want it to be like that, I still want people to understand that giving pressure makes it wayyy more difficult, and I need them to say 'Ok I'll give you time to think about this and I don't want you to feel pressured.' Even if it's literally as small as making a phone call or asking someone a question, they're HUGE DEALS to unconfident people like myself, but I can do it, I can do it if I'm not pressured and don't have to over think it.

Anyways, I don't wanna repeat myself, but basically, I am pleased I can very slowly see myself getting out of this shell, but I still need time to be fully confident in stuff and I hope people understand that and don't just think after this blog post I'm ready to take on the world!

Sorry this is a crazy long post, I hope it's given you some food for thought or made you feel better about yourself if you too are unconfident! It's been nice to get this off my chest!

Until next time, bye! xx

Filming is FINISHED (we hope)

We finished filming yesterday WOOOHOOOOO (well providing there doesn't need to be any reshoots!!) and yes we obviously managed to find an actor, the day before we planned to shoot :P!!

We literally have no idea how it's gonna turn out, or if it's even gonna be long enough! (The brief says it has to be 10 minutes long!) But we managed to get some really cool shots and it's a cute little cheeky story so fingers crossed the end result is great!

In less than a week we break up for Easter, which I am so looking forward to! Except I have an essay to do over Easter, and to finish work for another module in this final week before Easter, but now filming is done it's a huge relief! After this week, I have three weeks of Easter but then only one final week of uni left!! My final deadline is the 5th of May! Fingers crossed for some good grades :P!

Also, today is my nephew Jacob's 3rd birthday!! I can't believe he is 3 already and he is so adorable! I'm looking forward to seeing him and my niece Cooper :) I don't have any crazy plans for Easter but hopefully I do get a nice day out or two, fingers crossed for nice weather anyways!

I felt like I had way more to blog about but apparently not... hopefully back soon with more interesting stuff to talk about haha..

Bye for now!

Stress Relief

As my last post stated, the stress levels are quite high at the moment, however I am here to say that some stress has been relieved and I am finally a bit more relaxed!

First things first, we finally have an actor for our film! After pushing back filming for 2 weeks we are filming next week, cutting it a bit fine as we break up for Easter quite soon! But hopefully everything should go OK, fingers crossed anyway! In a way it's worked out quite nicely, the 2 weeks of it being pushed back has given us time to get other work out of the way so we can fully focus on the film when it comes to the shoot.

I had an essay due today which I finished yesterday, and I actually feel relatively good about it! So fingers crossed I get a half decent grade for it, also yesterday I found out I bagged myself a First for a piece of work for the module we are shooting the film for, it's only worth 15% of the module but it's always nice to hear you got a First so that was definitely a bright light over all the stress I've had recently.

It's always a bit scary when a whole bunch of stuff gets on top of you and you don't know how to fix it to help yourself, so these small things turning out good have definitely made me feel better! I just have to get through the film shoot which I know is going to be quite long, but that's always the case with film shoots! They say the general rule is that however long you've planned for filming, you should double it, and then that's how long it'll probably take, film making really is a grueling task! I am very lucky to be in a group with very talented people, especially my friend Michael (find his awesome blog here) who without him, our films wouldn't be nearly as good! He's a very talented friend who definitely has a bright future ahead of him in this industry!

On a different note, but also related to stress relief, is that I have a new favourite song at the moment! It's nothing special but I do love a good dance jam, the song is called 'My Love' by Route 94, music like this just makes me wanna get out and do exciting things and have fun days out, but with my very tight student budget there's not much room for that haha! One day I hope to get back into a bit of vlogging, I'm just not sure people would really care about what I'd have to say or do! What I like about blogging is that you can kinda just spew out whatever you're thinking or feeling and it's kind of like some sort of diary, but people just read it if they want to haha! But there is something I like about vlogging, not to mention I do enjoy a bit of video editing and vlogging gives me the opportunity to do that!

I feel like to succeed in this is to combine those two things I just mentioned, I need to get out more so I'd have something interesting to vlog about! Fingers crossed that happens, I can dream haha!

Anyways more on that another time, I'm now off to listen to a bit of music and enjoy the fact that I haven't got any huge worries at the moment after the stress I've had!

Thanks for reading :)!

The Procrastination Post

Ok, I am panicking about my uni work now, so what better way to deal with it than to blog about it? Haha!

Basically, I am meant to be shooting a film all this week, in fact in a perfect world we would be finishing up today. However, that is not the case. Everything is planned, literally everything, we have permission for locations, equipment booked, pre-production finished etc. 'So what's the problem?' I hear you all shout. Well, we don't have a bloody actor.

We need a male lead, we have all the supporting actors, but not a damn lead. SOMEONE PLEASE BE IN OUR FILM. We were meant to film this week but THREE potential actors we could've used couldn't actually be used in the end, ergh. We have advertised for an actor but to no avail, we're not entirely sure what to do now, we're hoping to start filming next Monday... providing we have a male lead, it's not looking good.

On top of that, I have an essay due in 4 days, and I'm not even entirely sure how to do it. Not only that, I have a showreel to create for another module, as well as do some reading for an in class test. I'd like to point out I break up for Easter in 3 weeks, and this all basically needs to be done before that.

So today I am very much trying to get that essay done, so I can focus more on the stress of not having an actor, and focus on the stress of everything else too. Isn't that crazy, getting one piece of stress out of the way so I can focus on other pieces of stress, fun fun fun.

Not much else to say really, wish me luck guys, I'm gonna bloody need it!!

The one about me being an aunty... for the third time!

So, my sister is pregnant.

Yep yep yep, I just became an aunty for the second time to my adorable little niece Cooper (who is 6 weeks old today!) and was already an aunty to my adorable nephew Jacob (who is 3 on the 29th of March, so in 3 weeks today!) And then my sister told me the other day that she is pregnant! Due 9th of October, so Jacob is gonna be a big brother!

Yeah, don't worry, it wasn't the other sis who just had Cooper who is pregnant, that would've been crazy haha! The crazy thing about this is that when Cooper was born, you get some sort of relief, relief of the excitement and anticipation of waiting for so long, especially as my sister didn't find out the gender for Cooper so it was even more exciting to find out if it was gonna be a boy or girl! To be told 6 weeks after Cooper being born that my other sister is 10 weeks pregnant haha! The excitement and anticipation begins again! I had only been released of the excitement and anticipation 6 weeks ago and here we go again haha!

But I am excited! It's so cool that Jacob is gonna be a big bro! And it's so weird to think both my sisters are married with families now! Whereas I'm still at uni, still got my life decisions to make and not even remotely considering children at the moment!!

Also, by the time my sister gives birth, I'll be a third year at uni! Now that really is weird to think, high school felt like it lasted a life time, even my two years of college felt slower than this, but uni is flying by so fast! And it's mainly because we're barely in class! The higher into education you get, the less hours that is required! So time just flies past because I'm at home so much, obviously I have coursework to do, but doing it in the comfort of your home isn't so bad!

In fact, excluding the three weeks of Easter Break coming up, I only have FIVE WEEKS of my second year left, five weeks of actual uni classes, now, what, when, how? But also in those five weeks, as well as the three weeks of Easter, the work load is suddenly rather crazy! You spend the first half of the semester like woo yeah everything's relaxed and casual, and then suddenly the second half is when the deadlines start closing in and you have to get all of the work done in what feels like not enough time!

So all in all, I am very much looking forward to the 2nd of May (my final day of second year!) and looking forward to the summer! And when October rolls around I will have another niece or nephew!! Yay!

Thanks for reading! :)