So, this is it! My new blog. Don’t watch the photo on the home page and here. They're not professional but they're the only current pictures of myself that I like enough to use at the moment. Let's be honest - things have been a bit peak since the birth of my twins fourth months ago.
Has hair been washed? Have toenails been painted? These are serious questions and since the last few months have been so real, the answer to both is a firm, resounding ‘No’. Getting through the fourth trimester is tough anyway, but couple that with the lockdown and twins… well, that’s a recipe for post-partum if you ask me. And I do not say that lightly. So, take my offering you lucky people, and let's celebrate the presence of lipstick and a bit of cleavage, shall we? Yes, yes, I do indeed know that if I'm about that blogging life then I'd better get hold of a decent camera and I'll get to that but just let me be great OK?
This is so scary for me. Some people are all the way out there and for them, a blog is nothing. But for me, this symbolises so much. You see, I feel like I’ve lived so much of my life making the choices that others wanted for me instead of walking my own path. My friends would characterise me as confident and I definitely can be, but for so long I was incredibly fearful. I still am in many ways but this time, there’s a difference.
The difference is that I now have two young daughters to think about and even though putting myself out there might be scary, I know that I have to do it because they’re watching me. They’re watching and learning from me and I want to teach them to be fearless, to put 100% into everything they do and to create space for themselves in a world that so often doesn’t create space for little girls like them. I want to teach them to make their own happiness and to pursue their dreams with fervour – regardless of what anyone else may think, including me. I want to teach them to be brave and that their future is in their own hands, even when it may seem as though the odds are stacked against them.
I have felt that way at times, that the odds are stacked against me. I’ve had more than my fill of painful experiences in the last few years and I lost some of the blind faith and fearlessness that I used to have. I started to retreat into a shell and lose sight of who I was and what was important to me. But I’ve also done a lot of soul-searching and so much work to get to where I am today. To me, this blog feels like the very representation of moving on. It feels like taking the first step in the direction I want to be heading in.
I’m really just trying to see how high I can fly, you know? There are so many things I want to do; I couldn’t outline them all here even if I wanted to. Sometimes my ambition scares me, and then my perfectionism paralyses me – but publishing this blog post is definitely a good start.
Now, I can’t give you any promises on what I’ll write about – you and I will explore that together. I’m at a very pivotal stage in my life: I married the man of my dreams nearly two years ago and I’m a new mother – so my new family is a defining, major part of my life. But I have changed so much in the last few years and I now find myself eager to take on new challenges, to discover new things and find out where my talents can take me.
I do know that I don’t want to be put in a box – no, I can’t be put in a box and I’ll resist the pressure to conform with my whole being because that’s who I am at my core: a free spirit. And with everything that’s been going on in the world recently, I owe it to myself, more than ever, to be who I want to be, the way I want to be, when I want to be, and that time is now. I’m not a cookie-cutter mum who says all the right things and dresses accordingly. So, I'll say the things I want to say on this blog, whatever those things will be. I will swear, I will codeswitch, I will ramble, I may rant, and if it’s not the done thing then I probably won’t give a fuck because that’s a very real part of me too.
This is my space, my time and my world – so I’ll be writing about things that are interesting and important to me. I’m just grateful that you’ve stopped by.
Xx
Zara