Category: Thoughts & Inspiration

Eid Mubarak and Ramadan Reflections

Published on by Eve Crabapple1 Comment

We just finished fasting our last day of Ramadan and I wanted to wish those who were fasting a congratulatory “Eid Mubarak” to you all!

This Ramadan was especially trying for me and my husband since during this time we bought a house and moved into the house and experienced all of the uncertainty and stresses that go with that. At an especially challenging point of the process my husband and I just had to let go of all of the worry, frustration and anxiety and enter into space of surrender to Allah. Also, during this same time I was promoted to a my dream position with the company I work for. While this was happy news for me, it was still a change from what I was used to and between moving at home and moving into a new role at work, I was feeling very disoriented and not my usual self. We completed our istikhara and wished for Allah to facilitate this home-buying experience for us if it was for the best or to end it if it was not. We’ve always known that nothing is in our control and as much as we try to plan and prepare for things, in the end, Allah’s will supersedes all. We did end up by getting the house — alhamdulillah — and now that I am sitting here in my new home and prepared to start my new position next week, I see that nothing was ever truly in my control so there was no need to worry.

I hope that I am able to keep this lesson within me and refer to it whenever I find myself falling into a endless pit of fear and distress because everything always works out — sometimes in ways that you planned, often times in ways that you didn’t even imagine.

Once again, Eid Mubarak everybody and may Allah accept all of our fasts and efforts during this blessed month!

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On Learning Languages

Published on by Eve Crabapple2 Comments

I have a lot of trouble seeing things through with the exception of about 3 things: my work, reading, and learning languages. So while my interests may come and go, ever since I was around 11 years old when I first started learning French in middle school, acquiring languages has been a relatively long-standing interest of mine. As such, I have collected a lot of methods for keeping that interest alive (even through the grammar bits!) that I would like to share with you today.

     1. Listen to music and memorize the lyrics to some of your favorite songs in the language you are learning.

I’ve found that this helps me learn and mimic the pronunciation and cadence of a language without sounding like a machine as most of those language learning programs do. Plus, you will be able to memorize the vocabulary much easily when its in a song.

2. Listen to language learning podcasts, watch youtube videos and movies with subtitles in the language.

I work and have many obligations outside of work that don’t provide me with much free time to sit and memorize vocabulary and grammar from a book (not that I’d want to even if I did) so I make language learning as enjoyable and interesting as possible. Granted, at the beginning stages of learning a language, you will need a book to learn from, however if you’re past that stage and have a grasp of the grammar and some vocabulary under your belt, start listening to the language in contexts that interest you. This makes the whole process much easier and fun, plus it’s cool see how much of the youtube comments you can understand!

3. Purchase and read from a dual language book.

These are great for visual learners. They are complete books or short stories with the foreign language on one side of the page and the English translation on the other side of the page. You are basically reading the book in the foreign language but have the English translation to help you out if you get stuck. This makes it easier to enjoy engaging in the language without having to search for the definitions!

4. Start to journal in the language.

I keep a (almost) daily journal and I alternate between different languages throughout the days of the week. This is great because you can start to acquire the vocabulary that allows you to express yourself in the language without feeling embarrassed if you make a mistake. You can start very basic (Today, I was happy.) and eventually through continued learning you’ll find yourself being able to write a pretty respectable journal entry.

5. Stay exposed to the language everyday — even if its for a few minutes.

Trying to keep all that goes into acquiring a new language in your head can be a tricky endeavor, especially when you don’t have anyone to speak with or are residing in your native country. It is crucial for me to spend some time everyday interacting with the language I am either learning or retaining.

So there are my 5 tips for learning and retaining languages. If any of you are learning a language or keeping up with one, please do let me know what works for you. I’m always interested to find new ways to interact with foreign languages!

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Beauty Review: YSL Black Opium Perfume

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If you follow my Instagram you will have noticed that I posted a picture showing that I used up all of my YSL Black Opium. I purchased the smaller 1.6 ounce size since I wasn’t sure if it would suit me despite its rave reviews from everyone in the world. I bought this at Sephora in early October to use during my trip to Tunisia and I used it on average 3 times a week (mostly because I would forget in the morning) since October. For a daily user of this perfume I can image it lasting at least 3 months based on how long it took to spritz my way through this bottle.

Let’s start with the bad and end with the good because it’s Friday and I want to end on a happy note.

The Bad

When I used this at around 7AM by around 12PM the scent was gone. Since this lasted me only halfway through my day I invested in a portable perfume atomizer so that I could top up during lunch. Perhaps this is an average number of hours for a perfume to last but I’ve used perfumes that would last me the whole day from 7AM to 7PM that weren’t as expensive as this one. The lasting power for Black Opium just wasn’t there for me.

Secondly, while strangers and friends would compliment me on the scent, I wasn’t that partial to it. This is definitely an intense, darkly sweet scent that I didn’t enjoy on myself even though others liked it on me. I did start to like it once it had been on my skin for a couple of hours and the top and middle notes had evaporated, but by that time I would have only had about 3 hours of a scent that I actually did like. It isn’t smart for me to purchase a perfume for just its base notes.

The Good

While the actual product didn’t please me, I’d like to give YSL recognition for the packaging. It is beautiful. Consisting of a shiny black bottle shot through with subtle pink glitter with a glass peephole in the center that reveals the light pink liquid — it perfectly reflects the whole feel of the perfume. It tells you that it’s sweet, feminine tones are surrounded by a dark, heavy domination but still shine through at just the right angles that surprise and delight you.

The Verdict

It isn’t for me. However, I can see why it would be popular because of its packaging and mysteriously almost sickly sweet scent. It’s funny that other people liked it on me but I only like the perfume once it has sat on my skin for a couple of hours, but nobody has time for that. So now I am back to my signature Bvlgari White Tea scent until something else comes my way. Let me know if you guys have any recommendations for me for a spring or summer perfume for the upcoming season!

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“Never Lose Your Childish Enthusiasm…”

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…It’s the most important thing.”

This is a quote from one of my absolute favorite movies, “Under the Tuscan Sun”. While there are so many lessons in that movie that I like to remember over and over again, the phrase above spoken by Katherine is the most memorable to me.

I find myself more often lately trying to think back to when I was a child about what I liked to do, how I used to spend my days, and how what I remember is so different from my life now. But I suppose that it’s a natural part of becoming an adult. We can’t spend whole days playing outside. The rent would never get paid, bills would pile up, and I’d probably starve to death. But less about the actual differences in what I spend my days doing, it’s the difference in how I feel about my life that the quote above reminds to reflect on. One of the differences I remember about my life as a child compared to my life now is the feeling about my day as I used to wake up. Before I felt happy and alive. I loved school. I loved living. Now, not so much. I wouldn’t say I’m completely depressed and hating life, but it’s a different feeling. A duller, sedated feeling.

I’ve got to get that feeling back. I’ve got to get back my childish enthusiasm.

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Climbing out of “Idea Debt”

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Do you know what idea debt is?

If you’ve started different blogs, spent several days to get them to look exactly how you want them and then after a post or two, inexplicably seen the initial enthusiasm for your grand new idea wane away — then you have experienced idea debt first hand.

If you’ve become so enthralled about a new subject and decided from then on to invest all of your energies to learning about it and becoming the leading expert in that area and perhaps publish a few books, only to see your devotion disappear the next weekend — then you know what I am talking about.

The examples above are personal to me but idea debt is summed up as the accumulation of ideas that have seen this progression from ignited enthusiasm to sputtering ember until you are surrounded by all of the cold lumps of ashes that lay around reminding you of your inability to see a project through.

I’ve been struggling with this for years now and I don’t think I’ve completely climbed my way out of my idea debt, but I have a much better awareness of why I fall into it and I know where to start.

The first thing to realize about any project is that not all of it is going to be enjoyable, all of the time. Even if the main work is something you have a passion for, you are going to need to develop new skills and challenge yourself in ways that you didn’t realize going into it. I don’t care if your goal is to become a professional cake taster and all you want to do is get invited to judge cake baking competitions and travel around the world eating the best cake there is — there are going to be days when you are sick of cake, days when you have to judge and taste a cake where the baker felt that the broccoli and asparagus based frosting really elevated the filet mignon infused cake to a whole new level, days when you are asked to be the keynote speaker at the International Convention of Cupcakes when you are terrified of public speaking. You see where I’m going with this? Even if you find the “perfect” passion that encapsulates all of your strengths and combines all of your interests (which is impossible) you will need to do things that you had not planned on. Now, if it gets to the point that all you are doing is tasting disgusting cake, you need to start being more selective about which competitions you agree to judge. However, don’t expect your life to be a daily parade of joyful and inspiring experiences — because that is not life, that is no one’s life.

It has helped me to understand that nothing I choose to do will be easy. It is normal to experience fear, boredom, hesitation, and stagnation, but as long as I choose to do something that I like and something I am good at, it is impossible to go wrong.

P.S. For more (and better) writing on idea debt, take a look at this post at jessicaabel.com (http://jessicaabel.com/2016/01/27/idea-debt/)

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