Uncategorized – Lessons I learned after I turned 30

Cooking with Honey at Lageia village

A few months ago, whilst browsing on Instagram, I saw a story of a friend taking part in a pottery workshop at Fikardou village, it looked awesome! I love everything about local arts and crafts and any opportunity for hands on experience, something you don’t often come across in Cyprus (or if you do, is quite expensive to sign up for), so naturally I was intrigued and wanted to find out more about it.

A couple of days later I found out that was just one of many traditional cooking, crafts and arts FREE workshops funded by the Deputy Ministry of Tourism and ran at villages across the whole island, in an effort to boost local tourism, as the tourism sector was heavily impacted by the pandemic. From making halloumi and shoushoukos (a traditional sweet made with grape pudding and almonds) to weaving and embroidery to carving, the list went…

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Kopiaste – Green Monday (also known as Clean or Ash Monday) special

My most recent Kopiaste post. I hope you enjoy it!

Kopiaste

Some of my favourite childhood memories are of Green Monday days over the years. Running in the fields, flying a kite, hours long picnics enjoying fasting food (non-dairy, no meat, no fish except molluscs) in nature, with friends and family.

We get together to celebrate the first day of the next 40 days leading to Easter. Religion blending in beautifully with tradition.

That’s all what Green Monday is about.

I’ve missed the last 12 Green Mondays in Cyprus, so I really looked forward to it this year. Unfortunately the weather was not the best, so we celebrated it indoors and we were only allowed 4 guests, but it was still a great day!

I made a little video with all the delicious food my sisters and I prepared for the day as well as the ‘lagana’, a bread made especially for Green Monday and sweets we bought from the bakery.

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My 2021 New Year wish (also food poisoning, Yoga and other events of my NY’s day)

There’s a Greek saying (which may originate from other countries) that loosely translates to

” Whatever you do on New Year’s Day, you’ll do all year around”.

I’m not superstitious at all but after the year the whole planet has endured and considering I spent the last few days of the year and New Year’s Day lying down weak and in pain , I certainly hope this one never comes true.

Last days of 2020…

A couple of days before the end of the year I got food poisoning. It only happened to me once before a few years ago but it wasn’t nearly as bad as this time. I threw up all night and the following day I just couldn’t move because even the tiniest movement made me nauseous.

On Day 2, New Year’s eve the nausea went but my stomach still hurt and I had almost no energy left in me, just enough to move from the bed to the sofa. It took me 10 mins to go for a pee and make it back to the sofa. During these difficult times, Oscar, the family’s guardian angel just laid on my feet, looking after me.

It was still a fun day, the whole family together (most of us struggling to stay awake after the tiresome couple of days each of us had) watching Christmas films, playing board games and having a laugh together. We made it to 12am and cut our vasilopita (New Year’s cake traditionally made in Greece and Cyprus, which contains a hidden lucky coin. Whoever finds it would be lucky all year, apparently.) but none of us found the lucky coin yet.

First day of 2021

On New Year’s Day I felt better and my stomach only hurt a little but I was still weak to move further than the living room. I just watched Yoga with Adriene’s first day of the 30 Day January Yoga Revolution, watched a few more films and had a little bit more food than the day before (dad turned on the foukou/Cypriot BBQ).

Yesterday I finally felt I could move and get out of the house, but after my morning walk with Oscar, I realised I wasn’t well enough to venture further than that.

I did however the Day One 48 min yoga session and it just felt amazing. Honestly, it’s humbling and moving to know that thousands of people across the world devote the time to themselves to do the session and at the same time I’m doing it, the chance is my friends as well as strangers are doing the same. I’ve written about Yoga with Adriene, a lot, if you want to find out more, you can do so here.

My 2021 New Year’s Wish

I decided a few years ago that making resolutions for the new year doesn’t and has never really worked for me. It only leads to unnecessary disappointment, plus I firmly believe you can make a new start at any time in the year. So since then I just make a wish for the New Year. (2019 Wish, 2020 Wish).

2020 has been challenging (to say the least) for the whole planet. Never have I ever in a millions years thought that the entire world would be locked inside for months, queuing at the supermarkets wearing masks, people dying off a global pandemic and all that during my first year of teaching English and living abroad.

After a pretty tough couple of months, teaching full time and a short break visiting my best friend in Barcelona, I had to (as well as thousands of other teachers across the world) learn how to teach online in three days and continued to teach online for months. For a first year, newly qualified teacher, it was a hell of a task, but I managed. I made a series of vlogs on how I dealt with the pandemic, I read, I drew, I even spoke to BBC World and BBC Solent about it. Being in Italy in March 2020 was just surreal.

After a heavenly few days exploring the South of Italy and two horrible days of travel amidst the pandemic I made it back home to Cyprus and enjoyed the summer, for a while, travelled across the island, started my Kopiaste vlog and blog until the nightmare of having to find a job and survive for now until the bloody virus goes away kicked in.

All that happened whilst I was and I am still trying to adapt to living in Cyprus for the foreseeable future, dearly missing life in the UK, travelling and trying new things.

I’m lucky though I have great friends and family who have always supported me either nearby or from a distance and I’m sure it will all work out in the end, it has to.

So my wish for 2021? Beside health, physical and mental, which for all of us has been a great challenge in 2020 in one way or another, I hope you feel and give love, do what you love and love what you do (being stuck in a horrible job is miserable enough as it is, let alone during a pandemic, but if you can’t quit for financial reasons, I hope you find ways to survive it, that’s what I did a few years back), I hope you don’t compromise and fight for what’s right and noble (that’s often the hardest road to take), let your creativity juices flow and above all enjoy life, enjoy the little things, that’s what life is after all, little moments.

PS I also hope we soon get to travel again. Life is just not the same without it.

Namaste

Eleni

My first In Balance Hot Yoga experience

About a month ago at the Networking and Breakfast event organised by Women Who Do I met Benedita, who recently moved to Southampton and gave up her career in hotel management to start In Balance Hot Yoga.

Since I discovered and fell in love with Yoga, I can’t stop talking about it so I was instantly drawn to Bene and we started chatting.

A couple of weeks ago I met Bene and her partner Ian for a coffee to learn more about them and what they do and I absolutely loved them.

Bene is originally from Portugal and she worked in London for years. She fell in love with yoga after going to a hot yoga class and she loved it so much she trained, as well as her partner Ian, under Dylan Ayaloo, the Founder of Hot Power Yoga in London, who I really want to meet after everything Bene and Ian told me about him. Yoga and her teacher training guided Bene through self-discovery and reaching a higher level of self-awareness, exactly what she needed at that point in her life. It seems that’s how most people fall in love with yoga, it comes in their life when they need it the most.

She started teaching yoga part-time alongside her full-time job and she realised that’s what she wanted to do for a living. After she moved to Southampton to work as a general manager at a local hotel, she decided it was time to chase her dream. She quit her job and herself and Ian started In Balance Hot Yoga. They run classes every day and regular workshops at the top floor of one of my favourite places in Southampton, Harbour Lights, overlooking the marina.

My bestie, Sheba went to a session a while ago and she messaged me afterwards saying ‘Just finished the hot yoga class, it was incredible!’, so after meeting Bene and Ian, who asked me to try it and blog about it in exchange for free classes, of course I said yes. I really wanted to try it anyway and I would have blogged about it even if they hadn’t offer me free classes.

I only blog about things I’m passionate about and I really want to and yoga is now part of my life and one of the very few things I do daily.

So last Saturday Sheba and I booked ourselves at the 11am beginners class. We decided to walk there as the route to Harbour Lights is beautiful, through the city centre parks, Oxford street and Ocean Village. I forgot how beautiful, charming and peaceful this part of the town is.

As soon I walked in the room, I felt the heat in every part of my body and memories flooded in. It reminded me of home on a hot summer day, during a power cut, sitting in the living room sweating, waiting for the power to come back on so we can turn the air-con on but in the meantime using whatever we can as a fan.

I just loved the heat. I’ve been living in the UK for 9 years now and I still miss the sun and the heat.

It also smelled amazing thanks to the burning incense sticks, which makes a huge difference, if like me, scents make you fall in love with a place and enhance your experiences.

The actual class was amazing. Bene is a hands-on instructor, helping you correct the poses if you don’t get them right and her voice is calming and smooth. For me the yoga instructor is the most important, essential element of a yoga practice, they are the ones guiding the session and to enjoy and fully embrace yoga, you need to find a teacher who inspires you and Bene is a truly inspirational human.

We started and ended the session with three oms which I found deeply spiritual and beautiful and we went through most of the main yoga poses through a vinyasa flow, fast-paced and empowering.

I smiled when Bene mentioned how our balance on the mat reflects what’s going in our lives. It is 100% absolutely true. When my balance is off is because my mind is troubled and I worry or I’m sad about things. Give it a go. Stand on one foot and check your balance and take a minute to look inwards and acknowledge your feelings in that moment.

The last pose before Shavasana was the fish pose which is becoming one of my favourite. It reminded me of when I was a child lying on the sofa upside down, feet up, my head touching the floor, feeling the blood flow through my head. I still sometimes do it…

Throughout the class random memories kept coming up, the heat reminded me of home so much my mind immediately went there, hot summer days, at home, at the beach, with family, with my friends. I felt relaxed, calm, happy, during and after the session.

I’m definitely going back again. Who knows what will happen next time?

One the reasons I love yoga, other than the physical benefits is how it helps me discover myself in ways I’d never imagine, and I learn something new every time. I’m still on the early days of my self-exploration journey and so far it’s been amazing.

After our yoga class, we passed by No4 cafe and wine bar on Canute Road. Shebz always wanted to try it so we decided to be spontaneous and treat ourselves to brunch. Delicious!

We then wandered into town, popping into one of my favourite shops, Rice-up, a local wholefood independent grocery shop in the city centre. I love their choice of tea, herbs, spices and nuts, my favourite isles to browse!

What a beautiful day it was. Thank you Bene for making it incredible. I can’t wait for my next session! If you decide to give it a go, come and say hi, I’d love to meet you 🙂

I’m always fascinated by how others get into yoga, you can read my story here, share yours in the comments below if you want to!

Namaste

Eleni

My little poem for World Poetry Day

They say we only live once,

and that should be enough.

Be happy, life goes on.

Keep moving on.

It’s OK to struggle every now and then.

‘Cause we are only humans and we try our best.

Love with all your heart and live life to the full

You never know when it’s your time to go too.

Always remember to trust and

love yourself.

Do what makes you happy

and forget the rest.

Eleni

3 months ago…when I learned I should listen to myself more often and confirmed once more there is no such thing as fate…

DISCLAIMER. It’s not my intention to insult or disrespect anyone, the purpose of this blog is for me to express my thoughts and feelings, and share what I learned with others which I find very therapeutic, and helped me immensely during this transitional period I’m going through. And by sharing what I’ve learned, I hope to help others, that’s the reason I decided to start a blog instead of keeping a diary (and I’ve received amazing feedback so far, thank you everyone).

I don’t think this post shows any disrespect to anyone or exposes anyone’s personal life (except some aspects of mine of course). If some people think that this makes me look selfish, although I don’t agree, I accept that.

I learned a lot from this experience and I think it’s worth sharing (as much as I can without drawing any conclusions and my thoughts on other people) so here it goes…

A month after I broke up life started to get better… I went out often, I had fun, I started planning things I wanted to do, getting Christmassy (I love Christmas!) checking flats to move in after Christmas… I still had bad days but I kept going…

I still believed if my ex and I spent time apart, recuperate and get back to our old selves that we could get back together and live happily ever after… but we agreed it was better to think we’d never get back together … so I made a decision to stay on my own for some time, get back on my own feet and stay away from heart troubles… I was definitely not ready to get into another relationship for a while, I needed time on my own.

But never say never!

I was asked out by this guy, a friend of a friend.

I was flattered but I couldn’t imagine myself falling in love with anyone, so I explained that I only broke up a month ago and I wasn’t ready to get into anything serious. LESSON 15. Listen to your inner voice, it’s usually right! If you feel you are not ready, then it means you are not (This reminded me of something I read in a little gem of a book about mindfulness ”Listen to your inner voice. Remember to trust yourself”)

But after chatting and seeing him a couple of times, I realised we had a lot in common and we got along incredibly well.

Now, I’m not going to go into details on how everything happened… but it’s rare to find someone you have similar interests, enjoy doing the same things, have the same weird sense of humour AND have good chemistry. And I met such a person a month after I broke up. I was made to feel special and everything felt different than anything else I experienced before.

I don’t believe there is such thing as fate, life is random and it’s all down to chance...but I started to doubt my own beliefs, all this swept me off my feet.

Maybe timing wasn’t the best but maybe it was meant to be??

So what do I do?? I was not ready for a relationship but staying away from him proved difficult.

Everything happened very fast…too fast for me.. Was I in a relationship again within weeks???? LESSON 16. NEVER rush into anything…

I was absolutely petrified. I didn’t want to get hurt or hurt him… I found it hard to accept someone I only knew for a couple of weeks was so sure about this so soon…I kept having doubts about our feelings for each other. I kept trying to put him off because I wanted to make sure his feelings were real…

During all this I was going through grief (which I never really had time to process and still haven’t fully recovered from that horrible week although writing about it and getting amazing messages helped A LOT), getting over a 7 year relationship (which left me with LOTS of issues), moving on my own for the first time in my life (which was not easy) and dealing with my ex’s pain (which was painful for me too). And I’ve told this new guy, Craig all I was going through…

I am truly sorry for hurting my ex… and I sincerely apologise for this. I never intended too. I did what I thought was best for me. Although our 7 year relationship didn’t work out, I love and care about him, he is an amazing person and he deserves to be happy…

So I had a lot of emotional, dark moments, doubts, outbursts, overreacting… And there were moments I didn’t like myself… And there were moments that I was sad and I cried… I was going through so much, so there were days I broke down. I wasn’t myself all of the time, sometimes I was the shadow of myself…

And although I am not perfect, –no one is!- I do love myself and the person I am because (ET) yourself is all you got and you should be comfortable in your own skin. If you don’t love and accept yourself as you are no one else will! And if you love yourself, you don’t need anyone else to be happy (most of the time, we are social creatures afterall!)…

Fast forward to a week ago…

After a difficult, emotional week (during which I had to go to my old place for the last time to pick up the last few things, overreacting to situations, crying, started smoking again-and quit after a week, yes I’m that strong! back to smelling amazing again) I decided to put aside my worries and do something I haven’t done for a long time…

And, although afterwards I felt like a fool, I don’t regret it, because I pushed myself out of my comfort zone, I overcame my fear of bearing my feelings and putting myself out there with the risk of getting hurt. Not sure I am willing to do that again anytime soon…

But it was already over for him… And when he ended it… I overreacted, which is never good! All the pain, grief and anger I had inside building up for the last 6 months, burst out. I felt deeply disappointed, hurt and sick! I wanted to forget all this ever happened.

During my outburst I might have hurt him, unintentionally… And I sincerely apologise for that but I was hurt…

That’s why I didn’t want to get hurt again, not that it would have been too difficult to get over someone I only knew for a couple of months but I knew that another heartbreak will bring out all the pain and issues I’ve been trying to deal with the last couple of months. And it did. Now I have to deal with what I haven’t dealt with because I got into another relationship straight away.

But I don’t regret this, because (ET) all the experiences in my life taught me something valuable and made me who I am today and I can’t and wouldn’t change that so I don’t want to regret anything that happened. And I don’t regret meeting this person. We had amazing time together, we enjoyed being with each other, we had fun and lots of laughs, we made each other happy… for a while…

Maybe it wasn’t special and different after all (we didn’t even get to know each other that well), but that’s how it felt at the time and that’s why I went for it.

Would it have made any difference if we waited 6 months ? Maybe…or maybe not.

Should have I hidden my pain, doubts and worries and pretend I was OK? No, because I wanted to be honest and I needed to find myself and deal with my issues, not avoid them. If I had done that, they would all have come out later on.

Was he the right person? I don’t know, I am not even sure if there is such thing as right person. Was it the right time? Definitely not.

When 2 people break up, they are both at fault, they both made mistakes. I am not going to get into what I think his mistakes were. But my mistake was that I wasn’t ready for a relationship and I should have been more cautious and take time out for myself before I got involved into anything.

LESSON 17. I learned that I need to listen to myself more and not believe everything I’m told … And I again reminded myself ‘Never say never’!

So now what? It’s been a week but I still feel numb. What happened doesn’t make complete sense to me but it doesn’t matter. It wouldn’t made a difference, it’s over. LESSON 18. Not everything in life makes sense, just let it go!

But it definitely put me off any quests for love. No more Ex’s and Oh’s!

What matters is that life goes on. I don’t want to waste any more time being sad. And I try my best not to…I am not going to pretend that I’m OK now, because I’m not all the time, there are times I can’t help it, there is a lot to process and get over (the last 6 months haven’t been easy for me) and it can be overwhelming sometimes (remember the Kubler-Ross stages of grief? I think I am now at the depression stage… but acceptance comes next!) but there are days that I laugh and I’m happy.

And today, I feel happy!

I need to get over my grief and pain I avoided for months, learn how to control my feelings again (which I’am already better at, yeay me!), find myself, heal, have a place I can call home and… just have fun, wander around in cities and countries with no worry in the world, try new things, spend time with friends, make new friends, enjoy every moment! And stay away from men!

Lesson 19. Every day is a new day, and your past doesn’t determine you (but remember what has taught you!). From this moment, right now, you can be whoever you want to be.

But it’s OK not to be OK all the time, on those days, take it a day at a time and remember all the lovely people who love you for what you are, that’s what helps me 🙂

Next post…. THE PRESENT- GETTING READY TO GO HOME- HERE COMES THE SUN TURURURU!!!

How life can change in 6 months…

I’ve been meaning to start this blog a while ago but never found the time or the courage. But there is no better time than now!

My life changed dramatically in the last 6 months and by sharing my experiences and what I’ve learned, I hope I’ll learn more about myself and hopefully some of the lessons I’ve learned can be useful to others.

So join me in this journey, if you want to! I welcome any comments 🙂

Have a lovely day everyone!