Change & The Fear of Being Judged

We are currently going through a really weird time aren't we? I mean, we are in a really unusual situation right now and because of the Covid-19 pandemic a lot of us currently are adjusting to working from home for the first time ever. I have somewhat settled into a routine, but it really has taken me what feels like a lifetime! I still have my moments where I remember everything that is going on and I have a bit of a meltdown, but for the most part I think I am adjusting to remote working. Having all of this time at home has really given me time and perspective. I had my little bit of a struggle with this situation, but I have come to terms with whats going on and I have kind of become a lot more motivated. I really want to use this time wisely and make the most of this time at home. I really want to make the most of my time.

Anyone who knows me off of the internet knows I have never really been one for fitness and exercise, if anything I tend to avoid it as much as I can. For the very first two full weeks of social distancing I stayed inside for a full two weeks. All I did for that time was constant college work and constant sleep, and it wasn't good for my head. So in the past couple of days I've been challenging myself on making long walks/runs a priority, because not only does it give me something to do for an hour during the day but its a nice break from constant work. To my own surprise it's actually become something I have been really enjoying and I really look forward to it everyday and I do really want to be more mindful about how important regular exercise actually is.

I have also really been thinking about the future and what I want to do. I love fashion and I really want to start to turn this blog into a fashion and accessories blog, just to share what my own personal style is and to talk about the things I love. Not being able to see the people I love outside my family has given me time to think about it, and it is something I have wanted to do for years. Life is too short - the past few weeks have proved to us that anything can happen. So why not do something that I want to do?

I've always had the fear of being judged, but I'm not so scared of it anymore.

So maybe it's time for Change.

How to Stop Procrastination While Working from Home

My Top 5 Tips for Working from Home.

The world is currently consumed with endless information about the Coronavirus. It is a time of uncertainty and it's hard to know when exactly things will go back to normal again. I'm currently doing my Masters Degree, and like many others now have to work from home to complete my degree. I have never worked at home before really, and it's safe to say that the struggle is real! I, like many other students, find some sort of strange comfort doing my assignments in the Library. It is something I definitely took for granted along with the ability to go to college and meet my classmates in person to discuss group projects. It has only been four days of self-isolation but as an extrovert, I do feel like I am going slightly crazy without human contact outside of my family.

Over the next few days, I have decided to keep my mind at ease I will be going through some topics which could in turn help someone else. (It also gives my mind something to do that isn't college work!!)

Today I am going to talk about a few things that have been helping me to stop procrastinate and get work done!!

1 - Make a clear workspace at home.

This is more important than I realised. My very first day working at home I just sat in bed with my laptop all day and trust me, it was the worst idea ever! Not only was I distracted by literally everything in my room, but being in bed made me a little bit too relaxed. I fell asleep twice and by the time it came around to bedtime I was wide awake and I was completely restless. So my advice is find yourself any other space! Even if it is just your kitchen table, work from there and keep your sleeping space separate from your workspace.

2 - Get into a Routine

Get yourself get into a proper routine. Plan a time to start work and and a time you want to finish at. Work your usual college/office hours. Tell yourself you will work from 9am to 6pm and after that leave the rest of the work until the next day. If you even want to be more flexible during the day assign your work hours to what times you feel you can get the best quality work done - your 'peak' times. Having some form of routine will help you to stay focused and motivated.

3 - Allow yourself to take a break.

I cannot stress this enough! Working from home for the first two days gave me a really blurry view of what was work and what was a break. I found myself consistently on my laptop for hours and at the end of it my brain just felt like mush. Give yourself breaks, go for a walk (working from home doesn't mean you can't go for a walk!!!), have a break while eating, have a coffee break, etc. Having suitable breaks to clear your head will prevent you from crashing and help you to focus more. Pomodoro is an excellent app I have been using on my laptop, which lets me know when to take a break from work.

4 - Turn off your Phone.

This ones self explanatory! It just takes one notification which can lead to hours of scrolling. Use your phone as a reward for your breaks/end of work day.

5 - Set Smaller/More Realistic Goals.

You are not going to be able to write an entire thesis today. Set yourself 200 words today. Continue this over the next few weeks and eventually it will be completed. Setting realistic expectations will prevent stress and it will stop procrastination as it makes a project less overwhelming.



Thank you for taking the time to read thought my blog post, and I really do hope some of these tips can help someone else out. Working from home is a lot more difficult than people realise, and procrastination is so easy to do! Hopefully once all of this chaos from the Coronavirus passes we can all get back into our normal routines soon!

Reflections of my Undergrad

I'm currently doing my postgraduate degree in Marketing, so coming from an Arts Undergraduate degree I knew there would immediately be a lot of challenges for me. I graduated from my Bachelor of Arts degree in 2019, and I started my Masters course straight away the same year. A lot of people, including my friends and family questioned whether or not this was the right next step - all of my friends decided to take this year out of the school system to take a break and work. This really made me question whether or not I was doing the right thing. Was I wrong? Was I going to burn out? Would a break from college be better for me?

This made me really look back and reflect on my three years as an undergrad. I thought about it a lot, as I really wanted to make sure I was doing the right thing for myself. Even though my three years in college were the best years of my life, I look back and I can remember feeling so anxious and scared all of the time. My first year of college I really didn't make as much of an effort as I would have liked. Moving away from home so young was so much harder than I expected, and making friends was difficult and terrifying. I remember a conversation I had with my friend before our exams started and we both agreed on dropping out of college and not returning for our second year, for absolutely no reason. Settling in a new place took so much time.

I loved studying Sociology, but I always had an underlying feeling in that degree that it wasn't something I wanted to make a career out of, and even if I did want to I had no idea how. Prior to entering the course I was in love with Photography, Video Editing, Graphic Design and other interests that were really creative. In some ways I felt that studying something like Sociology was interesting, but it wasn't the right fit for me.

After a lot of breakdowns with my guidance councillor in college and a lot of research into Masters degrees, I came towards the idea of Marketing. I didn't have any business background before this course which was something that worried me, but the more I learned about it the more excited I got about it. I applied, went forward to an interview to discuss the course and I was later accepted. I am currently in the second semester of the course and I can honestly say it's crazy how sometimes everything that is right for you can just fall into place.

I don't regret my Undergraduate degree as I learned so much from it and I did really enjoy it, but it's so nice doing something that just feels right for me and makes me feel excited to be a creative person again. If anyone out there is reading this and they feel stuck in something, talk to somebody and research what out there could be right for you. Don't settle for anything that doesn't make you happy.

UCC Enactus - Food for Thought.

Food for Thought Committee 2017/18.

While studying at University College Cork, I joined Enactus, which is a society made for entrepreneurial collaborations. I met Kieran Cunnane and became a part of his creation, a group called Food for Thought. Food For Thought was a mental health initiative that aimed to shed light on mental health issues and to aid those experiencing them. The Food for Thought project allowed students to use food as a catalyst to bring people together. While at food for thought, students were free to discuss their journey with mental illness and to encourage positive mental health practices. We cooked, prepared and ate food together which acted as a catalyst to make friends to bring everyone together. It was a safe space away from the stresses of college and the pressures of college nightlife for students to bond and make friends.

The chef and I preparing a main course.

A local chef volunteered to help watch over us during the cooking practices and taught us may tips and tricks to become better at cooking. During my time at Food for Thought, I helped to organise events while also posting on the Facebook page weekly. It was a really nice project where for a full year we helped to fight the stigma of mental health issues and create lifelong friendships. Thank you to Cork Penny Dinners for their kindness and sharing their kitchen and dining area with us during this time and for all of the advice they gave to young people who attended the events. Food for Thought was such a success and to this day it's one of the projects I am most proud to have been a part of, and some of my best memories of college are during my time taking part. All photos taken by Ali McCarthy.

Click here to see Food for Thought's Facebook Page

GOAL Global Collaboration

GOAL Global's Collaboration with University of Limerick

As a part of our Masters in Marketing & Consumption in Society, we were given a project to collaborate with GOAL and create an event to raise awareness for Climate Change issues in the world. Our class was split into two teams: A local team and a Global team. There were 26 students in the class, so each group had 13 members. The local teams project was to raise awareness of climate change by focusing on how local actions have global impact in society. The global team’s project focused on climate change at a global/worldwide level while portraying how we can help this global issue   in our daily lives locally. By giving half of the classroom an angle of research each, we each gained interesting insights on how we can both raise awareness and aid the issue of climate change. Both teams also had to organise and market an event in relation to their group’s main focus.

GOAL Mile University of Limerick 2019.

The local team divided into 3 sub-groups, as did the global team. This division into sub-groups within a larger team gave each student an opportunity to come up with their own marketing campaign for their events.

The local team organised an event on the University of Limerick campus, where they would hold a talk about climate change. This event was open for anyone to attend. The speakers included members of the UL Environmental Society and Sinead McDonnell, the Environment Awareness & Education Officer for the Limerick city council. This talk would both educate the listeners of the local impacts of climate change and what individuals can do daily to reduce the global issues which are affected. Subgroup one focused on a social media campaign. They used Instagram and they shared articles and videos on the issue of climate change while also promoting the event. They also designed their own images which visually showed the impact of climate change locally while also sharing facts and tips towards helping the issue. Subgroup two focused on the impact of plastic cups locally. They deeply researched the impact plastic cups had on the environment, and they educated themselves and students on campus about the benefits of reusable cups. They also arranged their own reusable cups and gave them out to students at the event. The third subgroup arranged the venue for the event, while also creating and promoting their own social media campaign to raise awareness to the climate issues we face locally on a daily basis.

The global team organised the well-known GOAL Mile event on the UL campus. This event was to raise funds and awareness for GOAL and the issue of Climate Change. I was happy to be a part of the first subgroups team. Subgroup one focused on the social media campaign by using Instagram and Facebook. Their main vision was towards re-sensitising individuals to the problem Climate Change, and by doing this the group researched facts and solutions to the issue while also promoting the GOAL Mile event. They released these facts and solutions every day on their social media platforms and also created a digital pamphlet which included all of the groups research and made it available online for readers. My job within this group was to take information and designed by members of my team and post daily updates on instagram and facebook and actively engage with followers. I also designed and created the pamphlet. Subgroup two took charge of organising the venue, music on the day and had a marquee and prizes available on the day of the event. The group designed posters which advertised the event and distributed them around the University. They also created informative posts and a video walking to the location of the event, and shared them onto the Instagram page. The third subgroup created videos to share on the Instagram page which gave detailed animations and facts about the issue of climate change while also promoting the event. Flyers were designed and handed out by the group, along with stickers which promoted the event and its social media pages. They tracked the progress of the event on the day, and gathered statistics of how the event went. They also created a promotional video of our event for GOAL to use to promote future events, edited by Sean O'Farrell.

Both events gained fantastic insights online, and both events were enjoyable and very informative for those who attended. As a class we would like to thank GOAL for allowing us to have this opportunity to promote two fantastic events for an important cause and thank you for all of their help and support throughout both projects. Click here to be directed to GOAL Global!