Erin Kelly

A few months ago, my friends and I were decorating our...

Tue, 18 Sep 2012 22:30:00 -0400

A few months ago, my friends and I were decorating our graduation caps for Northeastern’s Class of 2012 Commencement. Natalia wrote “Life is good.” Michele wrote out a meaningful quote (fitting for her) that said “It’s About the Journey, Not the Destination.” After a particularly rough semester, I tried to be hopeful, spelling out, “The Best is Yet to Come.” And Jaclyn just covered her entire cap with glitter.

We each expressed ourselves, displayed our personalities and hinted at our dreams with our personal decorations and words. But collectively, we wanted the same things: To be happy, to appreciate and enjoy our lives, to be hopeful for the future and to shine (and be our own, unique selves) at all we do, in our careers and beyond.

I think that while the road is bumpy and excruciatingly difficult at times, together, we are achieving our goals and dreams. Maybe not all at once, maybe not at the same time… and maybe one or two of us will take a longer road — but we are getting there.

Keeping up

Mon, 10 Sep 2012 12:58:00 -0400

Why do other peoples’ successes, accomplishments or mere life happenings make us suddenly question our position in life? You can be perfectly happy one day, and then all of the sudden, a friend, or someone you went to high school with decides to move clear across the county to take a new job. And just like that, you’re wondering: am I happy? Should I move? Why don’t I take chances like that?

Someone you grew up with gets engaged and suddenly you feel like you will be alone forever and really think about whether or not you will EVER get married.

Maybe all of your friends from school have moved out of their parents’ houses, and you feel as though you’re doomed to be supported (financially) by your family, always.

We can try to focus on ourselves, but that doesn’t mean that other peoples’ progress does not have an effect. And yes, we can be perfectly happy for them — all while questioning our own existence.

Blast from the Past

Thu, 30 Aug 2012 13:37:00 -0400

My friend Lauryn and I spend a good amount of time trading articles and blog posts with each other during the day — from Thought Catalog and buzzfeed articles, to pictures and YouTube videos of funny animals, to these hilarious reviews of the BIC For Her pen, we really enjoy everything from hard news stories to deep thoughts to incessant ramblings.

Though we were both journalism majors at Northeastern University, were a part of the same student groups and shared an experience traveling through the Middle East together last summer, we became EXTRA close just this past spring when we both found ourselves ending long-term relationships. It’s been great to have such a strong support from her over the past couples of months, and in attempts to try to return the favor yesterday when she was going through an especially hard time, I remembered this (laughable) article I wrote for a teen website years ago and shared it with her. The website has since been shut down, but I found it in my inbox and thought it’d be fun to take a look into my mind during my earlier years of college—naive, naive, naive.

Like the Backstreet Boys could ever cure a break-up.

…….

So, you got dumped. Or maybe you did the dumping. Perhaps you cited “irreconcilable differences” and mutually broke it off. However it happened, you’re heartbroken. You’re feeling alone, angry, maybe even depressed—and you truly believe you’ll never love anyone else again. EVER.

Stop wallowing. We’ve all been there—that part after the break-up where you sit alone in your room in the dark listening to music that makes you cry, pining over ‘the one that got away’….er, at least I’ve been there.

While I hope I don’t have to use this anytime in the near future, this ultimate break-up play list (paired with the five steps to acceptance) will help you get over any Ex (even if you REALLY thought he—or she—was the ONE). There’s a song for every step of the healing process, and here it is:

Step 1: DENIAL (This isn’t really happening…)
Thought: “Over you… I’m never really over you.” – Back to You, John Mayer
Thought: “It’s ridiculous, it’s been months, but for some reason I just can’t get over us,” – So Sick, Ne-Yo

Step 2: ANGER (I HATE you!)
Thought: “Truth be told I miss you…truth be told, I’m lying…When you see my face, I hope it gives you hell.” – Gives You Hell, All American Rejects
Thought: “Watch me strike a match on all my wasted time, as far as I’m concerned you’re just another picture to burn,”– Picture to Burn, Taylor Swift

Step 3: BARGAINING (PLEASE don’t leave me)
Thought: “You’re all I ever wanted, you’re all I ever needed,” – I Want You Back,
Backstreet Boys

Thought: “What am I supposed to do, when the best part of me was always you?”– Break Even, The Script

Step 4: DEPRESSION (My life is nothing without you in it…)
Thought: “How’s it gonna be when you don’t know me anymore??” – How’s it Gunna Be, Third Eye Blind
Thought: “Broken this fragile thing, now…and I can’t pick up the pieces” – Only One,Yellowcard

Step 5: ACCEPTANCE (I guess it’s really over.)
Thought: “I gotta let it go, ‘cause the party ain’t jumpin’ like it used to’,” – Burn, Usher
Thought: “Finally doin’ me and it feels so right” – Ridin’ Solo

Are you feeling better yet? Over your ex? If not, hit replay. The road to acceptance isn’t an easy one.

"“If you don’t go after what you want, you’ll never have it. If you don’t ask, the..."

Mon, 27 Aug 2012 12:14:00 -0400

“

“If you don’t go after what you want, you’ll never have it. If you don’t ask, the answer is always no. If you don’t step forward, you’re always in the same place.” -Nora Roberts

“Success is not final, failure is not fatal: it is the courage to continue that counts.” -Winston Churchill

“Twenty years from now you will be more disappointed by the things you didn’t do than by the ones you did do.” -Mark Twain

”

tumblrgym: live—love—fitness: ~Eager To Improve~

Sun, 26 Aug 2012 21:40:03 -0400

tumblrgym:

live—love—fitness:

~Eager To Improve~

WHEN I TRY TO WAKE UP EARLY

Thu, 26 Jul 2012 11:38:43 -0400

howdoiputthisgently:

IT’S LIKE:

Let’s Remember What’s Really Important | Thought Catalog

Wed, 25 Jul 2012 10:45:06 -0400

Let’s Remember What’s Really Important | Thought Catalog

Struggle City

Wed, 11 Jul 2012 10:34:00 -0400

Yesterday, a fellow Northeastern grad had an article posted on Huffington Post that has generated a lot of buzz, and a tidal wave of angry comments.

A Struggle of Not Struggling, by Taylor Cotter, is a recent grad’s explanation of how having a steady job, car and apartment is robbing her of the 22-year-old, Ramen-noodle eating, $3 bottles of wine-drinking, struggling-to-make-ends-meet kind of life that is expected of recent college grads.

And while the entirety of her article comes off self-righteous and unappreciative, I can identify with her “struggle” of being so young and immediately choosing a career over something else — like traveling and/or seeing the world, or just for a lack of a better term, dicking around for awhile.

I am 22 myself, and I recently started working at a full-time job in New York City. I feel like nearly all Northeastern grads (at least, the ones I know) have been able to secure a job since graduation. Northeastern’s co op program, and the institution that it is, really helps with employment.

But unlike Taylor, I don’t have a car, nor my own apartment. I commute over an hour to work everyday and still sleep in my lofted bed in the teeniest tiniest room in a suburb of New Jersey. When I miss my train, you can usually find me crying at the park in Hoboken while staring at the NYC skyline and wondering what the hell I am doing with my life. I get a steady paycheck, but it’s nowhere the amount of money I’d need to be financially secure at this time, and half the time, my dinner is a bag of trail mix from the News Counter at the train station. I’m seesaw-ing between The Real World and High School Life, and as much as I complain about my life sometimes, I’m trying to be grateful for what I have. I even wrote a blog post about how living at home wasn’t as bad as I thought it would be.

My friend Jenny, who is the biggest appreciator of life I’ve ever met (she is currently road tripping through the USA in a Zipcar and is an exchange student at Northeastern University, from Ireland), asked me once why I would immediately start a job after graduation rather than travel, or go do something crazy. I told her, honestly, that it was because I needed money. I have loans to pay off, and eventually I want to be able to afford my own apartment and be financially secure by age 26 (I’ll talk more about that later). I’ll never forget Jenny’s response to that—she simply asked, “Why don’t you get a loan?”

In the weeks/months that followed I seriously considered her idea. Why was I in such a hurry to grow up, or start a career?

Now that I’m settled into a routine that may seem mundane to some, I often wonder if I made the right choice — should I have dropped everything, taken a loan, and gone somewhere? But after reading Marina Keegan’s editorial that was published in the Yale Newspaper distributed during the class of 2012’s commencement (Keegan died shortly after in a car accident), I realized, there is time for everything I want, or don’t even know I want yet. This particular passage really resonated with me:

We’re so young. We’re so young. We’re twenty-two years old. We have so much time. There’s this sentiment I sometimes sense, creeping in our collective conscious as we lay alone after a party, or pack up our books when we give in and go out – that it is somehow too late. That others are somehow ahead. More accomplished, more specialized. More on the path to somehow saving the world, somehow creating or inventing or improving. That it’s too late now to BEGIN a beginning and we must settle for continuance, for commencement.

……

What we have to remember is that we can still do anything. We can change our minds. We can start over. Get a post-bac or try writing for the first time. The notion that it’s too late to do anything is comical. It’s hilarious. We’re graduating college. We’re so young. We can’t, we MUST not lose this sense of possibility because in the end, it’s all we have.

Another friend of mine, and fellow Northeastern grad, Rachel, worked for a year, then quit her job and went on a three-week trip to South America. My best friend’s sister, Katie, worked for the government for several years before backpacking through Asia.

I still have time to be young, to be drastic, to travel — and in the meantime, I can do some work, make some money, and hang out with my family and friends from home.

I keep reminding myself: I am extremely lucky to have a family that allows me to live at home, and am extremely lucky to have a job. It’s not unusual to question if what you are doing in life is right, as Taylor has — perhaps she just should have thought more about whether or not publishing it online was the right thing to do, or added several more disclaimers within the essay. Maybe she just needed to vent.

Either way, Taylor’s shared experience has helped reinstate (for me) that nearly all recent post-grads are struggling with their life choices, their current living situations, and their career paths. It’s not easy to transition from a life of dorm living to a full-time job that isn’t just a co op.

But what you really need to remember is to count your blessings. You can have it all and choose to complain, or you can be grateful for what you do have, when you have it.

Why I'm Happy I Still Live at Home.. Kind of

Mon, 25 Jun 2012 22:50:39 -0400

This morning, my alarm went off at the normal time (6:30am) and I woke up at the normal time. Except this morning, abnormally, I went back to sleep and ignored my second alarm (which goes off promptly at 6:35am).

I’m not sure why I was especially tired this morning — I slept in on both Saturday and Sunday and went to sleep at a reasonable hour Sunday night — but for some reason, I just couldn’t get it together.

I finally woke up (for real, this time) to my mom in my doorway talking to me … much like I woke up during high school.

She told me it was 7:09am. Since I normally leave my house at 7:20am on the dot, I was a little alarmed. I did my best to get it together, throw on an outfit and not look like a zombie (I’m 60% sure I succeeded) and when I got downstairs, just a few minutes past my normal departure time, my mom handed me a lunch and told me I could be surprised later to see what I had. She then drove me to the train — and I made it, with two minutes to spare.

So, while I bitch and moan about my current situation, and wistfully think about moving out, today was a perfect reminder of why, sometimes, living at home is not such a bad thing after all.

Words of Wisdom

Mon, 25 Jun 2012 14:50:14 -0400

Source: pinterest.com via Jennifer on Pinterest

23 Reasons Why Today will be the Best Day Ever via BuzzFeed

Fri, 22 Jun 2012 14:07:54 -0400

23 Reasons Why Today will be the Best Day Ever via BuzzFeed

To Tivity & Beyond...: What Tivity are YOU doing this summer?

Wed, 20 Jun 2012 11:25:25 -0400

To Tivity & Beyond...: What Tivity are YOU doing this summer?:

teamtivity:

With summer comes a lot of great things…like barbeques, beach trips and a more socially accepting outlook towards day drinking (at least, we think—and hope!—so).

Warmer temperatures and extra hours of daylight also promise more opportunities for outdoorsy events like road races, mud runs and…

So we graduated. More than a month ago. I’m not sure...

Mon, 18 Jun 2012 23:00:23 -0400

So we graduated. More than a month ago. I’m not sure exactly how it happened, or how five years went by so fast. But a woman I’d never seen before handed me my diploma—miraculously, the right one—and I’m destined to never set foot in a Northeastern classroom again (if I do go to grad school someday, it won’t be in Boston).

I’ve been meaning to blog about everything that’s been happening, but I honestly haven’t found the time. Since I graduated, I moved home, went on multiple interviews, secured a job, and am now working 45 hour weeks in a small office in Manhattan near Madison Square Park. I freelance at nights and during any spare moments I can find, and on the weekends, I pretend I am still in college, taking trips with my high school friends and going to visit my college ones. A heap of my college things are still in the basement, and my parents shout “be careful” at my back whenever I take the car out or go for a night run.

Things have certainly changed from last summer—at this time, I’d just been returning from my trip to the Middle East. I was starting a new internship, figuring out my relationship and excited for my senior year.

This year, there was no exciting journey to look forward to, only Boston to travel home from, a relationship that was extinguished along with a part of myself, and the job I started? It’s not just a job. It’s my career now.

I’m supposed to be grown up, but sleeping in the room I’ve lived in since I was a baby doesn’t really help me feel that way. I’m supposed to be smarter now and make better decisions than I have in the past, but when it comes to a toss up between hanging out with a friend and going to bed earlier, I still choose the first option. I’ve been having trouble adjusting to my hour-long commute, and I still feel defeated when I miss my train on the way home, delaying my nightly plans (even if it’s just to go for a run) another 40 minutes.

Maybe I sound pouty… and maybe I am, but I’m adjusting. I’m surviving, and I’m moving on.

On April 28, I completed my first FULL marathon in Nashville,...

Thu, 10 May 2012 10:37:40 -0400

On April 28, I completed my first FULL marathon in Nashville, Tennessee at a time of 4:17:02!

Things Change

Tue, 17 Apr 2012 10:18:33 -0400

Around this time last year, I was preparing to end the spring semester of my junior year. After nearly a semester of wondering, I finally knew that I would be going to the Middle East to act as a foreign correspondent with a group of journalism students led by several notable professors at Northeastern. We weren’t going to Egypt, as we had originally planned, but we were planning to head to Amman, Jordan for a little over two weeks and then to Istanbul, Turkey, for the remainder of the five-week long period.

After my dialogue was over, I had other solid plans- to go home to New Jersey and work as a reporter at the Ridgewood Patch in Ridgewood, New Jersey. And after that, I would go back to Boston to start my senior year. Cookie cutter pans, all laid out and chronologically perfect.

This year, everything is different. I have no idea what comes next—and I’m not sure if I love it or hate it.

Part of me is excited—the possibilities are endless, right? But what about the potential of having no possibilities?

I’m not the type of person who can sit still. I get bored easily, and always want to be doing something—whether it’s working, being with other people or going on a run. I hate doing nothing. So the idea of moving home right now with nothing in front of me not only scary, but a little overwhelming.

Here’s to hoping I can embrace the endless possibilities that I pray are coming my way.

50 Life Secrets and Tips | High Existence - StumbleUpon

Tue, 03 Apr 2012 13:12:27 -0400

50 Life Secrets and Tips | High Existence - StumbleUpon:

I’ve started to become really sappy with quotes and long lists like these, but sometimes you need some extra help to get by. Here are 50 life secrets & tips, that aren’t really “secret” but may lead to a happier, more content life. Easier said than done… but it’s worth a try!

I stumbled across this photo/quote on my Facebook feed today and...

Sun, 01 Apr 2012 23:39:04 -0400

I stumbled across this photo/quote on my Facebook feed today and I wanted to share it. I’ve been going through a very difficult time lately and it gives me hope that better things are on their way. I hope it can give the same hope to others :)

Train like a Tribute at this new fitness class...

Wed, 28 Mar 2012 23:37:57 -0400

Train like a Tribute at this new fitness class #HungerGames: http://www.bloodsweatandcheers.com/new-york-sweat/1092-hunger-games-workout-nysc

On Saturday I ran the New York 13.1 series half marathon. I was...

Sun, 25 Mar 2012 13:27:35 -0400

On Saturday I ran the New York 13.1 series half marathon. I was in the middle of cursing myself for putting my body through this particular endeavor when I noticed a woman ahead of me in the race. This woman had a prosthetic leg and was running faster than me. It reminded me that no matter what challenges you are facing or what you may be up against, someone else is doing that very same thing- with a much larger disadvantage than you have- and are probably doing it with a smile, or at the very least, positive energy. So next time you complain about something, remember that.

18 Mile Tuesday

Wed, 21 Mar 2012 14:49:27 -0400

Yesterday I ran 18 miles as part of my training for the Nashville Country Music Marathon in April. I was hurting by the end, but felt much better than I did during my run last week. I paced myself much better, starting slower at the beginning and working my way up to a comfortable pace. Also, I had a Powerade station this time, which also helped a LOT.

Check out the route I took via MapMyRun: http://www.mapmyrun.com/routes/view/76770858