New Year Goals 2017

Happy new year friends! I hope you all have had a safe and fun celebration as we ring in the year 2017. It's crazy to think that this year has already come to an end. Another year has flown by and I still don't feel like I have accomplished as much as I had hoped to. Now, there is always room for improvement and during this past couple of weeks, I've been thinking about what I accomplished well this year and what else I would like to improve on.

Goals are hard to achieve if they're (1) unrealistic (2) not written down and (3) if you have no game plan. Goals are a long process and they don't happen overnight. You must stay patient and never give up. There will be plenty of times you fail but the battle is to continue fighting for what you want to achieve. Whenever I write out my goals, I like to create a step by step plan as to how I am going to achieve them. For example, this year I plan to apply to occupational therapy school. In order for me to do that, I must complete my classes in time, make sure I have more than enough volunteer hours, study and plan on when I'm going to take the GRE  and make my application the best-looking application anyone has ever seen.
Goals are like a slow and long climb up a 100 story building. You climb and climb until there's an obstacle in your way. Either you let that obstacle defeat you or you toughen up, kick that obstacles butt and continue your journey forward. There will be so many different obstacles that fall into your path but it is all about the end result. Never give up on what you want in life because anything is possible as long as you put your heart, time and soul into it ❤️.

Now before I continue my blog post I'd love to know what your goals are this year. No matter how big or small your goal is, go ahead and leave your goals in the comment section below.

1. Schedule myself some downtime to read a book, meditate, knit, light a candle - take some time to do something I love each day.
2. Prioritize my health. Continue being pescatarian and avoid all dairy.
3. Find exercises that work for me. I'm planning on following the BBG workout craze.
4. Focus on finding happiness by laughing a little more, giving a little more and caring a little less.
5. MORE SELF-LOVE. Accept who I am as a person and to never compare myself to anyone.
6. Apply to occupational therapy school. Work now, play later.
7. Blog at least once a week. I truly love creating content that can relate to others. 
8. Step outside of my comfort zone and explore the world more.
9. Keep a tidy environment.When your environment is clear your mind is clear. Marie Kondo, here I come!
10. Find amazing recipes and learn how to utilize spices in my foods.
11. Save money. Whether it's for school, vacations or for any big future life events.

I hope you all have a fabulous 2017. Focus on the good things in life and let the past be the past. Thanks for stopping by. Also, don't forget to leave a comment below with what your goals are this year.


XO, Nessa

Holiday Madness.

Hello everyone and happy holidays! I hope each and every one of you spends these holidays with your loved one.

The holidays are always a crazy time of year. People start stressing about their money, the number of gifts they need to buy, what food they'll make for their holiday gathering and how they'll ever afford getting from point A to point B. This time of the year people also become a bit more selfish. Just always remember, regardless of the holiday each person celebrates we were all brought to this earth for a reason and with that said we're all in this crazy world together. Relax, take a deep breathe and cherish what you have. It's not about the gifts, or the food, or the fabulous lifestyle you have. It's about surrounding yourself with love and appreciating what you have. 

XO, Nessa

Let Love Grow.

Love those who surround you. Appreciate them for all that they are and more. They are priceless and one of the best things about life. Accept the love that you deserve. Be happy <3

-Nessa

Why Long Distance Relationships Suck.

Relationships are a challenge and by adding distance to the equation makes it that much more challenging. It's such a beautiful feeling to be loved by someone. Previously, I've written about why long distance relationships are worth it however, this one is going to be the exact opposite of that. Recently Gary came to visit me in Los Angeles for about 2 weeks but, this past Sunday I had to drop him off at the airport again. I completely forgot how shitty of a feeling it is to say bye to someone that you love so damn much. Honestly, it's one of the most painful feelings in the world saying bye. To me it feels like my heart has been ripped out of my chest and trampled on by a freaking stampede of elephants. You feel so down and in your feelings for quite some time and then it's all okay again... For now.... Until...  

• You want to go on date night but all you can do is FaceTime your significant other.
• You'd like to go on an adventure on your day off.
• You really want to go get day drunk at a brewery.
• You really want to surprise someone and make them breakfast/lunch/dinner.
• You really would like to share a pizza with someone else.
• You really want to hold hands.
• You really want to cuddle.
• You just really really want a hug and kisses on your forehead.

Yeah so it sucks. Long distance relationships suck. That's all. Bye. I miss you already.

More Self Love

Recently I have come across several very compelling articles and videos online regarding "self-help" topics. As i've mentioned before, there are times where I look down on myself and feel as if I can be more than who I am today. Being unhappy isn't a choice that I choose when I first wake up. It just sort of happens?

Now, the world is constantly moving and changing and its going to keep moving whether we're ready or not. As each day passes by we learn from everything that we come across. The person that I am today is not the same person that I was yesterday and even tomorrow i'm not going to be the same person that I am today. Ingrid Nilsen put up a YouTube video today for her 1 year anniversary of coming out (watch it here) and what she was saying hit hard. She talks about being open to new possibilities and to not live in such a tight bubble. How living in the world of "I should's" and "I dont's"makes it so much more difficult to be who we are. We shouldn't feel obligated to be the same person for the rest of our life. We go through so many phases and we should accept all of those phases, move on, and have more self love.

When you don't love yourself other people have a hard time loving you too. It's really hard to fight off that inner voice inside of your head that is telling you what and what not to do and how you should and should not look. But you know what, you can do it! It takes so much bravery to choose to believe in something good. When we don't let ourselves be loved, we're denying ourself from happiness. Why would anybody do that to themselves? I'm not sure but i'm trying to figure it out as well. Only we can love ourselves as much as anybody else can. We are in charge of our lives and our own happiness. We are in control. It may not be easy and it may take a lot of work and self care but it is achievable. We'll have to make sacrifices but, we will make it.

I'm still learning. But i'll get there one day.
-Nessa

Where Are We Headed

I believe that I'm finally starting to accept the fact that I'm home for a good amount of time (only took me 8 months).It's been a very rough transition as you all may or may not know but I'm getting somewhere. I constantly ask myself who I want to be and where I would like to be in the next year, five years and sometimes even ten years. When I was younger I never truly understood why teachers would have us write goals down on a sheet of paper and keep it to ourselves to look over, but these past couple of years I've grown as a person and I've also learned a lot to finally realize just why exactly they have us do that

Creating a vision for ourselves helps us figure out just exactly what we want from life and what exactly it takes to achieve it. All it takes is 15 minutes with a pen and paper to jot down our goals. By doing this we are able to determine what exactly it is that we need to do to reach those goals. It will help keep us accountable to follow through with those tasks and not get lazy! Thinking into the future is a pretty scary thought. I honestly freak out every single time I think about it because it's full of uncertainty. However, if we set out goals for ourself, we will always have something that we're working towards. As long we take action towards reaching our goals we will always be moving forward. Reviewing our goals regularly can help us realize what your next step will be. Life is hard and it gets very frustrating when we don't see any progress towards your goals. The goals that we have written down is just like a stepping stone, it is a reminder as to how far we've come from to get from point A to point B in life. 
 As of right now my goals are a blur. I'm working towards them and I'm terrified of what comes next but I'm just trying to take it one step at a time. I would like to finish school, get into an OT program, move out of my parents house and start my life with my dog and whoever else is still with me at the time. 
 One last thing, make sure to never settle! We as humans tend to settle because we're simply afraid something better won't come along. We fear that were not good enough. Realize your worth and believe it or you won't attract something better. Inspire those around you and treat everybody with equal love and respect.


 Thanks for reading! See you all soon! -Nessa    

Escaping Materialism

Money can't buy you love and it can't buy you happiness either. Todays materialistic world has everybody itching to buy the latest technology, the trendiest clothes and whatever bigger and better things there may seem to be. It's so difficult for a lot of us to find joy in other aspects in life rather than materialistic aspects. It also doesn't help that everywhere we look there are messages about a certain item or a certain brand. They are either on the internet, billboards, television and even on blogs.

Anywho, what made me write this was that i've been noticing as I browse through Instagram, I have been noticing that plenty of people I follow post about their new trendy clothes, their newest technology, where they've been recently and so on and so forth. My question is why? Why must we share with the entire world what we're doing or what we bought ourselves? Why must we feel the need to get likes for everything that we own/do? It just makes no sense to me. Is it impossible to be happy alone? 100 likes versus 25 likes doesn't make you any better of a person. Just because you posted yourself in your new yeezy boosts lets say ... doesn't make you any cooler than the person sitting next to you.

Think back to when you were 10 years old. What made you happy then? There wasn't much materialistic influence on us quite yet. We'd probably get excited about going to the park and playing on the swings or even seeing a cute puppy across the street and probably wanting to go to the petting zoo at the farmers market. Think about the simple and small pleasures in life. It's okay to be "basic". I'd like to share a quote I came across a few years ago.

“Dreams shouldn’t be about what you can buy — they should be about what mark you leave in the world." -Claire Cross

Just do you boo boo. Also don't forget to be kind, love others and stay healthy. Thats all for now. Bye friends!

Long Distance Relationships

Hello friends, sorry for my hiatus! But, today I'd like to share a few thoughts on long distance relationships.

Being in a long distance relationship is so soo hard and I already knew that going into this relationship. As you may or may not know I moved back to California to be with my family (because I thought thats what they wanted). It's been about 5 months or so and I'm still having a hard time getting into the swing of things. With that being said, I haven't seen Gary in almost 5 months and it's pretty rough the first month or so being away from him. I cried a lot (like A LOT), I reminisced, I overthought everything, I had the worst anxiety i've ever had, I got moody and I cried some more. But, after awhile you start to feel okay. You start remember the little things, you start to remember what all made you fall in love with them in the first place. Whether that be the way they make you laugh to the way they silently tell you that they love you or even just the way that their hair looks through facetime that day. You hold on to it.. you cherish it and you just go with it. You take everything one step at a time and keep going on with your day. Before you know it you're back with that person again and everything seems perfect again.

Of course there are going to be fights and stupid misunderstandings and there will be times where all you want to do is cuddle or go to the grocery store and shop for different types of cereal. And times where you just want to throw your iPhone for lagging during facetime or something so minute that throws you over the edge for one single moment and just like that you have the thought of giving up. Because you can't remember how it feels to be with that person anymore or you just want to stop feeling this pain. I can't say that I myself wanted to give up on the relationship but I did feel like as if I was at my lowest point in life, I felt so empty, so alone even though I was surrounded by so much love from friends and family. I just felt so depressed and there was nothing anyone could really do about it. I was so tired of feeling the pain.

Now lets fast forward to when you see your significant other again. Once you see them, your heart starts pounding your world's spinning, your palms are sweating and you're hyperventilating all at once. Theres a rush of so many different emotions that you don't know what to do with yourself. You feel as if you're going to pass out but you don't. You hug them, you kiss them, and you hold them and never let go because after all that time apart you fall even in love again and you forget that the past however long without them even happened. It feels like just another dream, but its real.. you can see them, you can hear them, you can smell their scent and you can finally hold them. And it's the greatest feeling in the world. You then spend time holding hands, cuddling and doing all the little mushy things couples do until it's time for them to leave again. You become so grateful for the time that you two spend together and you wish they could stay longer. You hug and kiss and possibly cry your eyes out (me :])and then they're off and its back to the beginning. The waiting game begins, but you remember that it's all completely worth it.

Florida Trip - Day 2

Today I woke up at 9 to make myself some breakfast. I had a some oatmeal with brown sugar and one scrambled egg. I also made myself a PB&J sandwich which I was dying to eat haha! We anticipated on leaving the house at 10:30 but we ended up leaving a little bit later because we had a few errands to run before practice. Coach, a few of the girls and I all went to walmart to grab what we needed. I ended up not buying anything and just basically went because I was bored. After that we headed back to the house, picked up the rest of the girls and loaded up the van.

It took us about 30 minutes to get to the golf facility that we were practicing at today. We went to Orange County National today. This is my favorite practice facility, like if I were to go pro (which i'm not planning on) I would love to practice in a facility like this every day. First I did a few putting drills: one for my putting stroke, another one for practicing 3-4-5-8 footers and then a spiral drill. This took about an hour. After this we went over to the range where I hit a little bit of balls. I've in and out of sickness lately and well my golf swing has been feeling very weak and not too solid so I'm having a hard time committing to the golf ball. There were a few sour apples today and i'm not quite sure why. All I want to do is enjoy my time here and just live life. It's my last year of college golf and I want it to be even more fun as it has ever been. But it's not like i'm making my hopes really high. Anyways, after hitting on the range for about an hour and a half and struggling to find out what exactly I was doing wrong I headed over to the chipping facility where I practiced a variety of shots. I was only here for about 45 minutes until coach came up to me and asked me to play the short course with her.
So, we started playing on the short course and I had her look at my swing, basically my alignment is a little off, I'm throwing my club out down the wrong swing path and sometimes my shoulder starts my downswing. Now if you know anything golf all of this equals my golf ball going everywhere and anywhere.. So from that i've been having a hard time committing to my golf shots. Anywho we played all 9 holes and as we kept playing my shots started to feel a little more and more solid as we went through. By the time we finished it was already 6 o'clock. We've been here for 6 hours already... talk about a very long day.

We drove to a grocery store and all of us bought our own individual dinners. Some of us chose to cook and others just bought pre-made food from the store. After this we headed home and basically just hung around. Coach invited us to go to Downtown Disney but majority of us are way too tired. I made myself chicken noodle soup, and pesto pasta (weird combo I feel like). I called Gary and we talked about the future and grad school and what not. To be honest i'm not scared of what the future holds for us. I think the two of us will be just fine if we do end up having to go different directions for school.

Well, thats all for now. Bye friends, see you later.

Traveling To Florida For Spring Break!

Hello friends!

So this week is the start of spring break for a lot of college students. This year i'm spending it down in Florida with my lovely teammates. We have a lot of practicing to do before our first tournament! So we're not here to just mess around :).

Well we left campus yesterday at 1pm and we stopped somewhere in Georgia. This morning we woke up ate breakfast and headed out around 8:30AM. From here we only had about 4 hours left until we reached our destination. We made a stop for Starbucks and then another stop for Which Wich and cupcakes. 

From there we went to Ocala National to practice a little bit. We practiced for about 2 hours or so until we had to head to the house we were staying in. It took us about an hour to get to the place we were staying and unfortunately when we got to the house it was literally filthy. So the girls and I went down to the clubhouse and hung out in the patio area where we basically just hung out, ate dinner and socialized. I started getting attacked by bugs so I decided to go into the clubhouse. Hung out in here for another hour until we decided to walk back to the house. When we got back the house looked nice and clean. It's been a pretty long day so now we've all decided to take a shower and be bums for the rest of the day.

Yeah, it's been a pretty boring day. But I had a lot of fun hanging out with my team and just roaming around.

So you had a bad day... lets conquer it!

Bad days suck! But, they happen and all we can do is take the rest of the day by one thing at a time.

Today I had a pretty bad day which led to a full blown panic attack. I just got so overwhelmed with all of these little things until I just blew up. Throughout the day I just wanted to keep crying. I mean it wasn't really helping me deal with the bad day but thats all I really wanted to do. The more I kept crying the more I couldn't breathe and well that always sucks.

Anyways, the point of this post is to help you conquer your bad day!

1. Just keep breathing because everything is going to be okay
2. Even though things feel so crappy right now just try and make the best out of what you have
3. Drink some fluids and make sure to eat (don't over eat though hehe)
4. Take on tasks one thing at a time.
5. Find something that makes you calm and do it (I usually listen to music and ignore the rest of the world)
6. Don't dwell on the bad, but look at the positives. 
7. If you need to cry. DO it and OWN it!! I believe that crying helps.
8. Tomorrow is a new day to conquer. You got this!

My Plans for Thanksgiving Week

Hello again and happy holidays!

Thanksgiving has always been one of my favorite holidays to celebrate. Not only are there so many things that I am very fortunate and grateful for but I also am able to spend quality time with my family. Since i've been in college for the past three going on four years I've been spending my Thanksgiving around the East coast.

My freshman year I went with my sister and two of my teammates to Lebanon, KY. We ended up staying with one of the boys on the men's golf team. This trip is my favorite away from home Thanksgiving so far. As crazy as it sounds... I learned how to shoot a gun! We shot at clay pigeons and boy was that a blast. I mean, I wasn't very good at it but still I had a lot of fun trying. His house was so beautiful and his family was very hospitable. We spent the actual Thanksgiving day at two homes, his aunts? and his grandmas place where we ate a bunch of food! Also, this was my first time I went Black Friday shopping which I immediately regretted haha. Never again I say.

My sophmore year I went home with my roommate. Where I basically sat on my ass all day while I stuffed my face. During my junior year I also went home with my roommate except I decided to spice it up. Another girl on my team and I decided to take a trip down to Cincinnati, OH after actual Thanksgiving day. Here we went to the aquarium, read books, ate indian food, drove around the city, watched an orchestra and ate some more. I love traveling so this was a such a blast to explore around a city with friends.

This senior year I'm spending Thanksgiving with Gary and his family and then we're going on an adventure that i'll talk about here in a little bit. His family is coming down to his house and we're going to have Thanksgiving dinner. After that we're driving to Ohio to spend the night at his aunts house I believe and from there we're driving to New York! I've always wanted to go and I can't wait for what all I'm going to get to see and do. Did I mention that the hotel we're staying at is in the heart of Times Square. Yeah, I'm super duper excited :)! This year might just be the best Thanksgiving ever. I'll make sure to blog and post pictures about it too so you all join us on the adventure.

What are your plans for Thanksgiving this year?

Happy holidays again and I hope you all enjoy your Thanksgiving this year! Eat a lot and wear stretchy pants haha. Also, be safe with your travels! That's all for now. Bye friends.

My Coffee Monday #1

Hello friendliest friends!

Yesterday was an interesting day I was feeling pretty antisocial for the most part. Well, I woke up to Gary rummaging around in the room as he got ready for work. Once he left, I too decided to get ready. It's workout Mondays with the team. This is my favorite workout of the week however, when my teammates and I got to the workout room none of the trainers were there. We sat around for a bit and waited but nobody showed. We all decided to head over to Alumni for breakfast where we chit chatted for about an hour. I ran back to my room, looked over a few things for my test and headed over to starbucks. I grabbed myself a tall pike with 2 splendas and some 2% milk. I decided to sit around in the dining hall for about an hour before I ran around campus to do a few errands.

While I sipped on my coffee and looked over some notes for my classes a few thoughts came to mind. For one, I don't understand people and two I may or may not be a little overdramatic when it comes to certain things. I've always been a bit of a sensitive soul and I take a lot of things to heart. So, I may overreact to certain things that people tend to do.
After my two classes and an exam I headed back over to the dining hall where I browsed through other blogs, thought more about life and listened to Betty Who's most recent album. I left my room key at Gary's house so I eventually made my way back to his house to grab my keys. By the time I was done being a lazy bum it was time for me to get ready for a pre-thanksgiving dinner at coaches house. Ran back to my room, grabbed a few outfits and changed in a public restroom. I rode with Sarah and Jeanette out to coaches and we had some pretty good conversations about just how our day went and our feelings haha.
Once we got to coaches house we all talked in the living room for a bit before coach called us all to dinner. Todays menu consisted of: turkey, gravy, cranberry sauce, broccoli cheddar casserole, mashed potatoes and some salad. I grabbed a plate and piled up some food and munched away. Dinner was so good and I didn't want to stop eating. Home cooked meals are the one things that I always miss about home! Anyways, for dessert coach had apple pie, white cake with frosting and ice cream. I decided to go for the warm apple pie with ice cream of course but eventually, I ended up grabbing myself a mini slice of cake. I mean why eat a little when you can eat a lot haha! After that we all gathered around the table and laughed a lot. This put me in a much better mood.

I came back home to Gary playing solitaire like the little grandpa he is <3. After he beat his game (with cheating) we decided to play other card games. We played spit at first where I beat his ass and then we played egyptian war where he beat mine. We're both sore losers so you can only imagine how intense our games were lol. I forfeited eventually cause I was just getting super mad. We finished up the movie that we didn't finish last night 'Definitely Maybe'. It's one of my favorite movies so i've seen it a million times before. I ended up just falling asleep as he finished up the movie. I love him.

I go through spurts of being antisocial. They can either last a day a week or maybe even a month. I love being alone a lot of the times and well doing this today felt really really good. It's been a long time since i've done this 'antisocial' thing that I do. I feel like i've kind of forgotten the things that I do for myself that makes me happy and being alone is one of them. I also have been singing a lot more lately which is another thing that I enjoy. I've been so caught up with all of the joy from my actual relationship that I haven't really needed to do these things. But, the happiness i'm starting to realize that my relationship gives me isn't the same happy that I am able to give myself. Don't get me wrong though, i've never been more happy in my entire life. I literally can't ask for anything else in the world. k, be-yeh

Halloween: Say Boo To Drugs

Happy late halloween!

It was a cold gloomy rainy day out and I feel like every halloween is like this no matter where I am. Today I biked to workouts in the freezing cold and decided after that i'd go have breakfast at Alumni where I munched on cereal and oatmeal. I loaded a few loads of laundry and after that I made my way over to class. There were about 10 out of 30 people that showed up in class today, all we did was talk about a powerpoint which we finished in basically 30 minutes. Majority of the time I was online window shopping haha. By that time we got out it was 12:00PM, I biked over to ADUC and had lunch with Linnea and Andrea. But, they left me after like 5 minutes to go to class so I just sat there for 10 minutes and people watched. I saw some really strange costumes... one dude was dressed as the single ladies dancers and he was even wearing heels. Not to mention it was about 40 degrees out and there wasn't much to the outfit but, you work it boo boo ;)! After that I biked home and looked for what all to do in New York for Thanksgiving break. I must say I am really really excited and I can't wait to get there! Midway through that I ended up falling asleep with my laptop on my chest haha. But, by the time I woke up It was almost time to help out with the Say Boo To Drugs Treat Fest. Before doing that though I met up with Linnea and Katie and Alumni for a very early but quick dinner. 

The Say Boo To Drugs Treat Fest was interesting. This was the first year that me and my teammates had volunteered for this event. Majority of the time I was helping people out but I was able to snap a few pictures. I for the most part handed out wristbands to the cute little trick or treaters! I then made my way over to where the main event was being held. I was a door monitor haha, and all I had to do was make sure people didn't go through these two doors and that the exit was further down. I ended up quitting though and I made my way towards the volleyball game. By the time I got there we were leading 2-1 going into the 4th set against Belmont (No.2). Sadly, we ended up losing the game but it was a very close match. 

I biked back home and continued to browse for more places to see in New York. I tried to listen to Taylor Swifts new album and I wasn't into it. I've never really liked her but I gave it a shot at least. After that I grabbed a bowl of cereal and jumped into bed. Since I'm going to New York I thought I'd go and get inspired by watching some Gossip Girl on Netflix haha. I stayed up till 3AM watching until I finally decided to fall asleep. Watching series' on Netflix is addicting!

Well, thats all that I did for Halloween. What did you do? 

Where've you been?

Hello again. I've been gone for quite some time now and well i've been meaning to blog but I keep forgetting to. I am now back at college for my last year and I can't believe that this is it. That this is my last year of college (for now)! Time really does fly by!
So far this semester has been great. I'm actually doing well in school for once and I am so in love with life right now. This semesters golf season was a bit of a struggle for me especially during the first couple of tournaments I struggled (HARD) and I've gotten so frustrated that I wanted to throw my clubs off of a cliff or something. There were a lot of tears that have been shed but I pulled my head out of my ass and pulled my crap together. As a team however, we did a fantastic job. Out of 5 tournaments we only lost to 6 teams! Not to mention we also won a big tournament where we beat a top 40 ranked school. This season has left me with very high hopes for next semester.

Now on to my life... life is great and I couldn't ask for anything more. Like always everybody is constantly growing and changing and I know that I have done my fair share this semester. My first couple of years in college all I could think about is partying, partying, and partying. As of now i'd rather lay in bed and watch netflix or sit in a living room where i'd talk about life, laugh at jokes and just enjoy quality time with great friends. I enjoy being a grandma and I don't find any amusement behind getting intoxicated, going to a party and talking to strangers that i'd probably never want to encounter again. Not to mention I probably won't remember what all i've mentioned to them.
Besides that, i'd like to say that I am completely in love. I love spending time with him and i'm not even an ounce tired of him yet. I am forever thankful that I have met someone as caring, funny, understanding and down to earth as him. I fall in love with him more and more every day and I don't see myself ever stopping.

That's all for now. Happy Halloween and be safe with all of your festivities.
(below are random photos that i've taken throughout the semester)