31 Dec 2013

Self-guided education manifesto

Recently I stumbled upon the self-guided education manifesto by Scott Dinsmore. It is available on his web page. Basically, it consists of the elements shown in the picture below:

found @liveyourlegend


My favourite piece of advice of above:
  1. it never ends: no it doesn't There is no aim or destination that once is reached allows you to stop and relax and enjoy your earned fruits. It is a lifestyle and as such it never ends.
  2. learn who you are: know your patterns, know your weaknesses, know what you motivates you, know what you love and what you hate (both specifically mentioned in the manifesto above as well :-))
  3. everything is a lesson: even if something does not work out as intended and expected, it was not a waste of time. On the contrary. Try to perceive it as a lesson and be sure that next time you will do better because of this experience. If you focus too much on the bad features of an experience, it will drag you down and you will miss the opportunity to grow and improve. 
  4. build things: theory is important but it is more important to put this theory in practice and build things. Things that exist and are useful are the best advertisement and the business card in the world. The is nothing more gratifying than theory that has been shown to work.
Self-guided education is neither a diet nor a torture. It also never ends as it is a lifestyle and should be embraced.

And don't forget that although it surely is important to also find people who think that you are crazy, it also is very important to have like-minded people around you that support and inspire you in both who you are at the moment and who you want to be in the future. The people you are surrounding yourself with can make you or break your future. So try to find the proper environment that supports you and does not hinder you.

Our life is a gift. Let's make it count!

6 Sept 2013

Art of living / Lebenskunst

"Lebenskunst ist die Kunst des richtigen Weglassens. Das fängt beim Reden an und endet beim Dekolletee."
- Coco Chanel


found @flickr

The art of living is the art of leaving out the right things. This starts with knowing what to talk about and ends with knowing what to show with the décolleté.
- Coco Chanel

21 Jul 2013

Healthy Breakfast

I try to live healthy at the moment. As I don't have much time, I don't cook often, unfortunately. But the summer and the availability of fruits and vegetables allows everyone to have healthy breakfasts. For breakfast, I try to have different fruits and vegetables. For lunch, I usually go into the cantine.

The best and cheapest fruits and vegetables can be found at the farmers market. I usually go there once a week and buy as many fruits and vegetables I can in order to make sure to have my five a day (and usually I have much more than just 5 a day :-)) for the following week. 

Below is my breakfast of today. I also had a huge cup green tea and a coffee with it. (I love to drink both in the morning.)


How was your breakfast today?

1 Jul 2013

Beauty Empties May and June

As promised, although I don't have much time, I still do share my - admittedly at the moment quite boring empties. During the last 2 months, I emptied/ decluttered 15 products - so, I am catching up. ;-)

Here is a picture of all products having left me in May and July:

Unfortunately, I don't have such a nice window sill anymore and have to take pictures on the carpet with worse light.

All the emptied or decluttered products are cleaning or soothing products. I didn't use up or declutter any makeup products this time. I don't have many products with me here, so I just have favourites and didn't get using them up yet. And as they are favourites, I won't declutter any of them either. 

19 Jun 2013

Beauty Empties March and April

A bit belated again but finally here it is: my beauty empties post for March and April. As I moved to the UK in March, I was very busy with becoming acquainted with my new work and finding a nice place to live and, hence, did not have much time to use (up) cosmetics products. Furthermore, I moved with a light luggage that did not allow me to bring too many beauty items with me. The only items I brought with me were an eye cream, a face cream, very few body care items (I think these were just the Alverde shower gel and body lotion shown below and they were even just both half full) and a couple of make up essentials. My skin certainly missed the extra care it got during the last months and dried out. So, I was really glad when I finally had a permanent location and a flat for myself in April and started to use more skin care again. So, have a look at what I emptied in March and April below. 

A side note: I've been in Germany in April as well and decluttered a lot of beauty items. Unfortunately, I didn't count them and also didn't take pictures because I was in a rush but I feel very releaved and it actually was nothing worth mentioning. It were products of cheap german drug store brands that didn't convince me anyway and as I am currently trying to shrink the amount of my makeup possessions to the gems I really use and adore, it was a necessary step towards a tiny beauty collection the goldilocks way. ;-)

This is an overview of everything I used up in March and April (note, however, that the Burt's Bees bodylotion was not useable as I got a really strong allergy against some of its ingredients):