Whats new (copy) cat....?

Ladies we have all had that friend inhigh school, you know, the one who loved your Tammy Girl dress so much and thenturned up the next day wearing the exact same one, she was the girl who fanciedthe boy you did and had no shame in getting in there first to kiss him, whilstwearing your favorite lip balm.  Shestopped eating meat when you made the choice to be vegetarian despite hatingall vegetables and she painted her room pink when you did (complete withmatching New Kids on the Block poster!) Now dealing with a copycat friend whenyou are twelve is difficult, so how do you do it as an adult? Yep, sadly ladiesthe end of our teenage years does not necessarily mean the end of the copy cat girl.

The old proverb teaches us thatimitation is the sincerest form of flattery, but feeling like someone has stolenyour identity can be annoying and frustrating. Of course we all think,and are actively encouraged to be, unique and original. Yet while this is true,there are always going to be other people who share our interests, ideals and ideas.In fact some of our greatest relationships are built on common interests; I metone of my loveliest, closest friends bonding over a mutual love of Jo Malone ona hen weekend. And of course we met people who inspire us, expose us to thingswe had not previously seen and this does change and shape who we are.  The point is, there’s a line between merelyusing someone as a life style inspiration, and going all single-white-female. Youknow she’s bordering on full-blown clone when she has adopted not only yourblog style, she has no shame in spouting off your opinions and passions as ifthey were her own, she copies your hash tags on Twitter and suddenly become ayoga-enthusiast overnight as well as trying to give ill informed advice on yourareas of specialism and adopts your life philosophy as her own. If this soundsfamiliar, sorry to say ladies, you have single white female on your hands.

The awkward part is when friends andfamily start to notice that you have a permanent shadow who is copying you. Howdo you explain it? It takes a while to notice yourself as no one is that egotisticalto think they have a stalker/copycat issue initially. But slowly and surely theevidence builds up so you even deny it to yourself.You could try to take this as an opportunity to change things is your own life,to try new looks or style choices, to find other interests, to create a newadventure or to experiment with new life philosophies.   If shestarts to copy these, it is a definite that you have indeed picked yourself upa full-fledged copycat.

The real frustration comes from thatdespite dropping a million and one hints the copycat just doesn’t seem to getit! You can try being blunt with her and yet she appears incapable of findingher own set of thoughts and opinions. Obviously you could just try and acceptthe fact that you clearly have such amazing, taste and style, that someonewants to be exactly like you whilst keeping your fingers crossed the copycatwill eventually grow bored of you and start picking up inspiration elsewhere,just keep your fingers crossed she doesn’t move on to your bestie for her next inspirationfix!

At the end of the day I am not one oflifes haters and I try to never look back in anger, I believe in karma, what you give is what you get returned. I truly wish people only happiness in their lives. I know a copycatcan't help being a copycat. She might have low self-esteem, have problemstrusting her own instincts, or has maybe grown up being a sheep,and is still to find who she is.  Whateverthe case, it's difficult to have any respect for a person who depends on youand your ideas to shape who she is and her life. So, for me, whilstyou can copyright your blog (mine is!) it is a shame you can’t copyright yourlife to. So for me it is time to pull the plug on this copy machineand let this chapter close……..xX

Stopping to Smell the Roses.......

Ladies imagine the scene (as I am sure you can very well!) you get in from a busy day, you have been in back to back meetings, your lunch is still half eaten in the foot well of your car, the cup of tea a colleague kindly made you at 9am that morning is still sat there, cold and untouched, your phone is flashing with unreturned calls and texts and you have committed yourself to doing some one a favour tonight, which you honestly don’t mind doing and want to do but how do you fit it all in. This is all without giving time to our beloved other half and the little ones! The thing is sometimes life is moving so fast we don't even know what's good for us. Can we ever stop and smell the roses? Or are we living life at a million miles an hour and have no idea how to hit the brakes? Are we unknowingly spiriling out of control, doing too much and spreading ourselves to thin? Are we encouraged so often to say yes more, to regret the things we have done as opposed to the ones that we haven’t, that we are doing it all and not stopping to appreciate it? Between an average 40+ hours working week, friends, family and relationships where is the 'me' time we so badly need? As women, we actively encourage and inspire each other to have it all. To live wild and free yet do it carrying all the daily responsibilities that we have taken on. That’s quite a huge ask of any one.

Interestingly, men on the other hand, don’t appear to have this problem. They can get home from work, dinner will be on the table (thanks to us) then it is a quick shower and change before giving the xbox / friends/ football some much deserved attention! Yet we are running around in Kurt Geiger’s finest sky scrapper high heels, All Saints pencil skirt and Chanel lipstick (unsmudged) doing ten things at once. How do they do it….?

For most ladies ‘me time’ involves some serious internet retail therapy (no time to go to real life shops and the mirrors are so unflattering!) some time with Sky+ and no alarm clock screaming at us at 6am. But sometimes, for most of us, the hardest thing is to switch off and take some time out. To put our phone on silent, make a do list of we want to do and decline the social invitations we are swamped with.

Life (well the Indian consulate and is crazy slow processing system) has recently forced me to take some time off. A first in my world really as I am not a sit still and talk about the dream kinda gal. But much more of a grab life by both hands, enjoy the ride and live the dream type of person. So a week off with nothing to accept wait for India to let me in came as quite a shock to the system! The first few days were a little confusing with no work and no massive urgent commitments to attend to, I felt like I was at University again. But slowly I got used to it and began to stop and smell the roses. I baked cakes, shopped until I dropped, had pamper sessions, watched films, did more yoga and running than usual and ate, a lot, with no calorie counting. The freedom was incredible. So as I reflected on my week off I realised the true pleasure in all this. The true pleasure in my time off has been in being able to see my loved ones enjoyment in sharing these experiences. I can’t imagine baking a cake and having no friends to dig in with their forks eagerly poised before it is even out of the oven or to enjoy the stillness of a swim and sauna session without one off your besties joining you. What is the point in baking cakes or buying new dresses if there is no one to share them with? So as I take a deep breath, put on my favourite Bobby Brown lip-gloss, slip on my highest Office heels, square my shoulders and head back into the race of life I realised that so as long we have wonderful friends and family supporting and surrounding us we may be in that race but we have already won first place xX.

Every woman needs a man who will ruin her lipstick, not her mascara ( @Benefit_UK_IRE #mascarathonuk) xX

It's a well known fact amongst us ladies that no man is worth your tears and the one who is won't make you cry. Which is great in theory and I know we would all love to find the perfect man who would do anything to make us happy, who would move mountains to be with us and would willingly do anything to make us smile (and no I'm not talking materialistically!!).  For the most part, we can sort of agree that, our boyfriends/husbands are generally ok. Yes they might forget things you consider important (birthdays, anniversaries and milk on the way home), yes they might be blind to any tasks that need doing (house work, DIY, car related type things) and yes they come home drink, rambling rubbish, dropping kebab everywhere and ranting about nothing. And, no, they don't understand our love for shoes/make up /hand bags or have any insight into why we feel the need to take so long to get ready. But essentially they will listen to us going on, make us a cup of tea when we get home at the end of a hard day, make an effort to spend time getting to know our friends and support us no matter what. Admittedly when your cleaning up spilt kebab, fetching glasses of water to soothe the hangover and pretending to listen to what ever they are going on about whilst tripping over their XBox it can be hard to remember that essentially underneath all this is a lovely, decent man, who cares very much. But we know he is.... Of course there will be arguments, disagreements and times when you just don't get on (no its NOT permanent PMT boys!).  It is well documented by psychologists that the art of a heated discussion is in fact good for a relationship. To be able to develop a skill set where abouts you can talk to your partner, calmly, put you point across and not just place blame is a very positive thing. This in turn can make your relationship stronger and bring you much closer together.  But sadly for 1 in 4 women this goes too far, and they will experience domestic violence over their lifetimes and between 6-10% of women will suffer domestic violence in a given year (Council of Europe, 2002). The subject of Domestic Violence is a some what controversial one. Much of what happens (as with all abuse) goes on behind closed doors. Out of sight tragically means, for most, out of mind. The facts in black and white are shocking enough in themselves and make for uncomfortable reading.  Two women are killed every week in England and Wales by a current or former partner (Homicide Statistics, 1998) and one woman is killed every three days. Domestic violence has a higher rate of repeat victimisation than any other crime (Home Office, July 2002) and it takes on average, a woman to be assaulted 35 times before her first call to the police (Jaffe, 1982). Every minute police in the UK receive a domestic assistance call – yet only 35% of domestic violence incidents are reported to the police (Stanko, 2000 & Home Office, 2002) The 2001/02 British Crime Survey (BCS) found that there were an estimated 635,000 incidents of domestic violence in England and Wales. 81% of the victims were women and 19% were men. Domestic violence incidents also made up nearly 22% of all violent incidents reported by participants in the BCS (Home Office, July 2002).  Whilst the figures themselves are frightening the reality of domestic violence is even more chilling. It can come as physical, emotional, financial or sexual abuse, but more often than not is a combination of all of them. It strips a woman of her confidence, self worth and independence.  Statically speaking, very sadly, the impact of domestic violence will touch us all in our life times. It could be family, friends or even ourselves and the effect it can have lasts years after the scars have faded. Like all abuse the only way to end it is to challenge it, to ensure that it isn't brushed under the carpetbag or accepted as a social norm and most importantly that there are services in place to support women who need to access them.  So ladies put on your lipstick, grab the girls and support  @Benefit_UK_IRE #mascarathonuk via sponsorship and retweeting!!  *All information was gathered from www.refuge.org.uk who's website offer support and advice xX