- 7 days wiser
(unless this decision making process involves clothes. Clothes I'm always 110% sure about!). You may be wondering what kind of a blog post I'm rambling on about, and its not in the norm for me, but occasionally I see, hear, read or witness things that really inspire and widen my train of thought.
It's Monday morning and I've just had my first day interning at Woman's / Essentials Magazine in London. Im exhausted from the 6.30am wake up call, but I'm also inspired by the day I've just had as a real life Fashion Assistant, (not something I would have ever dreamed I'd be doing only a year ago!). I slump down on the train from Stratford Int. unusually happy that I've actually been able to find a seat, and I settle down, whip out my new book, turn the first page and I read....
...and reading this book is pretty much all I've done this week when I've had the slightest chance of getting a quick page in. On the tube even if its just for the duration of one stop [a page down], on the 30 minute train to London, the 20 minute tube to work, even when I've been squished like sardines in a can on the tube attempting to hold 3 bags and sweating like I'm trying to create Niagara Falls. The book has still stayed intently in my hands.
So its been a week, and despite commuting 3 hours out of my day and working for 7, I have finished this brilliant and endearing book! When I first picked it up off Tesco's best seller shelf I never thought it would be this insightful to me, or make me see the underlying message its sending all of us. I just read the blurb and thought it was another fun little chick flick to read, easy rom-com, cute! I'd finished all Sophie Kinsella's books so it was onto the next one! Now I couldn't be happier that I picked it up by chance. There are very few books that have such large impacts on me and stay with me for life, but I know this one will.
'Written in the stars' by Ali Harris
If you're looking for a good book, a sense of direction or even just a pastime for the holidays then I would highly recommend snatching this one off the shelves. Plus, if nothing else at least it will stop the awkward moments on the tube where you don't know quite where to look, trying not to catch peoples eyes one too many times incase they think you're a weird stalker.
So why do I want to marry this book. Well, it did warn me on the cover that it was for any girl that had ever wondered what if? Like i said, we all do it, but what if things were just always meant to turn out the way they do. If, no matter which path you took, or choice you chose, you'd always end up right where you were meant to be. I know people have probably ranted onto you about this before when you're up at 4am crying over the right course to take, what uni to go to or simply which dress to wear to prom. But I've never really thought that it could actually be true. I'm not saying that God has a plan for us all and really we have no decisions to make at all. Thats not what I'm saying. But I think that some things, because of the people we are, and the people we have grown to be. Some things will always happen down to the decisions we make as individuals somewhere along the line.
I don't want to tell you all about this book and the story behind it, because its not the storyline thats inspiring, its the message it delivers as a mantra for us all. It may be because my birthday is in October like the main characters, or the fact that my birthday always reminds me of a loss, maybe its just that I like to take time to "find myself". I don't know, but what I do know is, after reading it I felt like for once I could relax a little and stop letting the decisions weigh me down, because somehow, it will end up how it was always meant to.
Looking back at how parts of your life have looped, twisted in odd patterns and even feel like they've repeated themselves to where they are now, I think some of you will agree that it almost seems like they HAD to do that for the outcome of where you are today. And even if maybe at one fork of the path you took the other route, it would always lead you back on track for the main road, you would have just taken a different route.
There are many inspiring points in this book, and endless quotes I could turn to and write, but I'll go with this one, as this section of the book really get's to me...
We always seem to focus on the final event when looking back at curtail points on our never-endling timeline of life. But what we never take into account are all the other baby decisions that are made day to day. Not just by you, but everyone else around you, that shape and create that focal point in your life. So stop looking back and thinking that everything around that decision laid on your shoulders, because the truth is, your final decision making was probably the last final step of many to get to that point.
" The universe doesn't fracture, the stars don't just split because of one decision you make. Life goes on, just in a slightly different way."
O x
