On Being Alone & Balancing My Time as an Introvert
(some links used are affiliate links which means I earn a small amount of commission if an item is purchased)
Top- Topshop
I love being alone. I am a self-proclaimed introvert and, generally, time alone is something I always look forward to. I remember when I was younger, in my early teens, I would saviour weekend nights spent only with myself; I could stay up as late as I wanted to and do whatever I pleased with my time, which usually involved writing blog posts (on a blog that no longer exists), scrolling through Tumblr and reading. My time alone now is spent much in the same way, apart from that Instagram has replaced Tumblr (which is probably for the best because despite Instagram’s many issues, at least it isn’t trying to convince me that thigh gaps are cool.)
It seems then that time spent with myself is time to be creative. It’s also time to binge-watch my favourite Netflix shows, don’t get me wrong. But I definitely spend most of my alone time working on creative projects and if I do spend too much time with other people, I quickly develop an itch to be on my own, so I can re-charge and work on these things that I love and care about so much.
I find the ideas surrounding extroverts and introverts interesting and largely baffling. I often question how anyone could re-charge by spending time with others because it is so natural to me to restore my energy by being on my own. This isn’t necessarily because I relax in conventional ways when I’m on my own; most of my time spent doing ‘nothing’ (i.e. watching TV, chatting and generally chilling) is when I’m with my boyfriend and my friends and, as I just explained, most of my alone time is spent working, even if I am working on things I enjoy. It sounds kind of counterintuitive really: I relax when I’m with others but I re-charge when I’m on my own.
But I don’t think re-charging and relaxing are necessarily the same thing. It’s true that I feel exhausted after spending the entire day socialising or even just being around other people but collapsing into bed and binge-watching TV isn’t always the answer to that. More often than not, turning to my blog or other projects that I’m a part of feels like the ideal way to end my days. I think I crave this kind of ending to my day because I feel the most like myself when I’m doing something creative/something that I’m interested in. And I think that’s what this concept of ‘re-charging’ is all about- where it is that you feel most like yourself. Alone or with others? Watching TV or working? etc.
I don’t think there’s a right or wrong answer to the question of where you feel most yourself but I do think that my ways of re-charging can be problematic. Re-charging by working (even work that I enjoy) can definitely cause problems, namely me becoming completely over-worked (how many times can I say work in a sentence?) It’s pretty normal for me to leave my house at 9am and stay in university till 5pm, to come home, eat something and spend the rest of my night working on my blog with maybe an hour of Netflix when it gets to about 10pm. This isn’t me pushing myself because I feel like I have to, (I find it very frustrating when people force themselves to work more than they need to just to feel worthy), it’s because I want to, well when it comes to my blog anyway! I love my blog and I love working on it. It makes me feel good and if I didn’t do it in the evenings and on the weekend, I wouldn’t have time to do it at all.
But re-charging in this way certainly does blur some lines of what is work and what isn’t, and how far enforced relaxation (even if relaxing in the conventional way isn’t what I feel like doing) is necessary. Right now, it feels like this way of living works for me. But then again, I haven’t been to university in a week (it’s the Easter Break) and a couple of weeks ago when I had been enforcing this routine for 8 weeks straight and was feeling burnt out to say the least, I might have felt very differently.
I love being alone but maybe I don’t quite know how to yet in the ways that are best for me and my mental and physical health. I think as I grow older and learn more and more about myself (and I hopefully spend my days doing work that fulfils me creatively so I don’t have to spend my nights doing so), I’ll learn what is best for me though, and I hope Ii find a healthy balance between genuinely relaxing whilst also being able to re-charge, whatever that phrase really means.
Writing this post has made me realised that being alone is much more complicated than many people, including myself, like to think. Maybe I’m just thinking into it too much (I mean, I am an English Literature student so that’s a fair assumption) but considering much of my time is spent by myself, I think this is a worthy topic as any to spend my time thinking and writing about.
Let me know how you feel about being alone in the comments! Do you love it or hate it? Are you an introvert, an extrovert or somewhere in between? As you might be able to tell, I’m very interested in this topic so I’m keen to hear your thoughts!
you might also like…
Creating Content For Yourself vs. Conforming to 'the Algorithm' | Being Creative Online
‘The algorithm’ is something that is ominously referred to by pretty much everyone who uses social media for creative or commercial purposes. It is basically what Instagram uses to determine whose photos will be placed at the top of people’s feeds and will be allowed the most engagement, which Instagram gained the power to do after it got rid of chronological feeds (this article is much better at explaining it than I am). No one really knows how it works although there are many theories and assumptions surrounding it, for example, that ‘the algorithm’ prefers iPhone photos to photos taken on digital/professional cameras. But who knows if it really is the algorithm that prefers that or just users of Instagram? Either way, it is true that some posts do better than others based on many things that are often different for everyone.
Because certain posts tend to do ‘well’ (i.e. receive good engagement), it can be tempting to only create the kind of content that performs well. But what if that’s not your favourite kind of content to create? I’ve been blogging for almost a year now and the lines can sometimes become a little blurry when it comes to thinking about what the content I like to create is, because I think I can become subconsciously influenced by the likes and the shares to think the content I enjoy producing is the content that performs well, when that isn’t necessarily the case.
I’ve been thinking about it a lot recently because I really want my blog and social media to remain as a creative, fun and positive space for me to be in. As soon as I started going through my blog and Instagram and picking out the images and posts that were my favourites, it became clear that my favourite imagery is always film photography based. Creating imagery using film photography is, annoyingly, the most expensive and time-consuming way to do so, which is why I haven’t done it consistently, but it’s undoubtedly my favourite.
Despite this, not one of my top 9 images on Instagram are film based. 2 of them (including my post with the highest engagement) are mirror selfies, 2 of them are photos in which I’m wearing outfits I threw on quickly, that I didn’t like very much, and then asked my boyfriend to quickly take a photo of me in outside a train station. The others, minus one, were all taken on my iPhone during day-to-day life. Clearly then, my photos that receive the most engagement are actually the ones that require very little effort to create. This sounds good right? Quick outfit shots are easy enough for me! This is definitely what I thought for a little while.
But I started to feel so creatively stifled in creating this kind of easy content. This wasn’t so much with my blog, as this content largely stayed the same other than the imagery, but very much so with Instagram where the content is purely visual. Just because it was easy, and maybe purely because it was easy, it doesn’t mean it was fulfilling. So I’ve recently decided to shoot more and more of my imagery using my film camera, like with this post! I’m not currently making any money from my blog or my Instagram and I’m trying to look at this as an opportunity to create content that I personally love and creatively fulfils me because there is no real gain to my content performing well other than that it feeds my ego!
Sam, my boyfriend, very kindly spent a day in Liverpool with me last weekend shooting lots of photos on my film camera, some of which I included in this post. I love how all of the photos have turned out, especially these ones! I originally wore this outfit to London Fashion Week but didn’t get any photos of me wearing it, so I thought I’d take this opportunity to re-wear it and capture some images in one of my favourite parts of Liverpool, the beautiful Georgian Quarter.
I’m feeling super excited about more of my content being film photography based! Although it is expensive, it’s an investment I’m willing to make because there’s nothing I love more than sharing my film photography (as well as my writing) and photos taken on my film camera are ALWAYS my favourites.
My content isn’t going to change too much though, especially over here on my blog as I’ve never really felt the creative restrictions I sometimes experience on Instagram through blogging, probably because there aren’t any algorithms trying to dictate what I should post over here! Just expect lots more film photography and maybe some more style/fashion content on the blog.
I’d love to hear about your experiences with the Instagram ‘algorithm’ and being creative online. I am also interested, despite my ramblings about my creative freedom, to hear what content of mine, or generally, you like to read/see online, so please let me know in the comments!
you might also like…
Finding Fresh Inspiration
With a new season, usually comes fresh inspiration and this year I've been feeling it more than ever thanks to the UK's prolonged periods of cold weather and premature heatwaves (talking about the weather in the first sentence might be a new record for me). The snow we experienced in mid-March really made me feel down and I was so sick of wearing winter clothes by that point that I was wearing pretty much the same thing every single day. So when temperatures hit above 20 degrees celsius in April I was SO ready to bring out my summer wardrobe. Summer is my favourite time of year generally but especially style-wise. I definitely do still feel this bout of inspiration when the weather starts to cool down during the month of October (but lets not talk about that right now as I'm ready to bask in the warm weather) but that's usually over within a few weeks when I realise it's actually too cold to wear anything that looks remotely nice. Summer styling is something I never get fed up of- I've been considering moving to a warmer climate when I'm older more and more recently- and with this style inspiration comes inspiration in all other parts of my life.
Summer is my favourite time for clothes because there's always something new and everything you're buying is a little bit more affordable so it's easier to play around with trends a bit more than it is in the winter. It means you can wear skirts and dresses, instead of trousers or tights (which tend to ruin most outfits for me) and generally just gives you so many more options when getting dressed in the morning.
This outfit was one I wore during last weekend's lovely warm weather (although it wasn't long until I changed into a skirt instead of jeans- us Brits really cannot hack a bit of sun unless we're wearing minimal amounts of clothing). I do really love this outfit though. It was inspired by the wonderful Liv Purvis who has been talking about how much she loves wearing white at the moment, and sharing some beautiful photos to exemplify this. I actually bought the top I'm wearing after seeing Liv wearing it on her Insta Stories a couple of months ago and it's been one of my most worn pieces since. The Los Angeles print is super cool and always makes my outfit feel more summery, as it is pretty much summer all year round in LA (not jealous/bitter at all). I've shared these jeans before on the blog but I bloody love them at the moment.They fit perfectly and switching a blue jean for a white pair is a great way to update your wardrobe for the new season.
Now, let's talk about these shoes. THESE SHOES. £4 in Primark- yes really! I am always blown away by how cheap Primark really is and although I can't always find amazing pieces in the clothing department, they pretty much always have a great collection of shoes. I picked up a different pair, that I'm sure will be on the blog soon, for £6 and I just couldn't believe that I had bought two pairs of shoes that I loved for a tenner! These gingham pumps are much more comfortable than I thought they would be. I have seriously wide feet so I'm always worried about wearing flat shoes like this but I actually think they're really flattering on my wide feet as they kind of have a slimming effect. These sunglasses are also a new purchase from Mango and I think they're so great. It's really nice to have a neutral pair of sunglasses that aren't black but that go with everything. Plus, the subtle cat-eye shape is probably my favourite in a pair of sunglasses as I find them quite flattering. And ,of course, I'm wearing my trusty Zara straw bag. Swapping a leather-style bag out for a straw bag really is a great way to update your style for summer though.
Summer doesn't just bring style inspiration for me though. It's the time where I feel my most creative and motivated. I think this is mostly due to the fact that I've been in education and sitting exams for the past 4 years. So the first few months of summer are usually, for me, spent working extremely hard and forcing myself to be motivated and the remaining months are time for me to let myself go and relax, which always evokes lots of creative energy. This year, I'm in my first year of university, which means the work I do does not count to my overall grade, so there isn't as much pressure as there has been over the past few years. Because of this, my motivational levels for revision have dropped a little bit but my creativity is in overdrive! I always feel like I have to suppress some of the things I enjoy during exams in order to focus which, in turn, makes me want to do them more. This year I'm letting myself do them more than usual but I still feel a little restricted because of UNI, which is frustrating but also just makes me so excited for summer.
I remember reading Just Kids by Patti Smith during my A-Levels last summer (this is a must-read BTW) and because this book shows off the extent to which Patti is such an incredibly creative person, it really lit a spark of creativity for me, which I wasn't able to release until after my exams. This book and this feeling are reminiscent of summer to me now. I'm thinking of re-reading it, or another book of hers, in the next few months to hopefully inspire me even more.
I'd love to hear what inspires you creatively, whether it's a particular season, a book or anything else! I have a good feeling about the next few months of summer and I'm hoping all this inspiration will manifest itself in my blog. So stay tuned!
Top- ASOS (sold out, ASOS stock some other great Daisy Street t-shirts though)
Jeans- Vintage (similar here)
Shoes- Primark (should still be available in store)
Sunglasses- Mango
Bag- Zara