Smile Like You Mean It!

If you follow me on instargram you know that I am a fan of selca’s and pulling out my sexy half smirk whenever it’s needed however it’s time to put this overused smile in the bin and time to genuinly start smiling!

I don’t like my smiling face much, I hate my teeth, I hate the lines that form around my eyes, I hate that I cannot control the way my hair falls, I hate double chins and just “not being in control”. However, I noticed that the memories going with pictures like the one above are usually better then when I sit in the bathroom for an hour taking pictures of myself.

So here is a challenge for myself and for everyone really! Take pictures and share them when you laugh, have fun, show your imperfections, your double chin but laugh about it, because in the end it doesn’t really matter!

If you post those pictures on instagram use the hashtag with #smilelikeyoumeanit and @lifelovekorea so I can find them!

It’s time to have fun guys! And it’s time to show it!

Love, Wietske

Sexy Sunday: Skin Brushing?

I have been on a health kick lately, and don’t only try to watch what I eat and monitor closely what I take in I also decided that I want to put more natural stuff on my skin and my ultimate goal is to stop wearing foundation, which I guess is something I could do right now but I don’t feel comfortable with my own skin.

I’ve started with oil cleansing and I will post an update about that in a few weeks to tell you what I think about it. But while researching that I came across something new called Skin Brushing.

It is exactly what it sounds like, you brush your skin in short strokes with a natural brisle brush or mit and you work towards your heart. It does not only claim to get rid of dead skin cells, cellulite, bloatiness, and weight but also is great for detoxifiction.

Under normal circumstances the skin eliminates more than one pound of waste products every day. If the skin becomes inactive with its pores clogged with millions of dead cells and other debris, toxins will remain in the body. This puts undue stress on the other eliminative organs, mainly the kidneys and liver, making them increase their activity. Eventually they become overworked.

However there are also a lot of sceptics like Dr. Jacob cautioned that avid dry brushers put their skin at risk for inflammation, redness and an eczema-like itchy rash. (source)

Nevertheless I am still very curious to see if this works, even if it doesn’t reduce celulite, weight or toxins if it makes my skin look and feel better that would be good enough for me.  I am going to try this for 2 weeks and I will give you update on how it turns out.

Here is an how to brush:

To brush the skin, use long gentle, but firm, strokes

• Start at the feet and legs brushing upwards to your groin.
• Then do your hands and go up your arms to the armpits.
• Then brush upwards on your buttocks.
• Brush down the neck, chest and trunk.
• Brush your lower abdomen towards the center.
• It is permissible to brush across the top of the shoulders and upper back as the best contact with the skin is made that way.
• Do not brush your face.
• Brush the breasts very lightly, avoiding the nipples. (source)

Have you ever heard or tried dry skin brushing? Or do you have other natural skin care solutions you swear by?

Love, Wietske

Sexy Sunday: Let’s Jump!

So since I now have a motivational Monday I want to put my more motivational and mind related posts to Mondays and my body, health and appearance related posts to Sundays. So here you go. I recently read an article (which I cannot find again) about a girl loosing 20 pounds by eating healthy and skipping rope! Guess what I have laying around, and guess what I want to loose. Yes that’s right, I am trying to loose weight and just live healthier.

A few month ago I was actually on quite a health kick and I lost 5 kgs by just eating healthier however lately I’ve been stressed and tired and which resulted in me eating all the chocolates, and all the cookies and basically just everything! Another reason why I want to start is because I basically ripped my pants yesterday. And they were my favorite!

 So starting from today I will eat as healthy as possible, I will keep a food diary.  And I will start skipping rope for 30 minutes a day.

And no this is not a diet, I want to live healthier I won’t say no to candies completely because it’s okay to have some bad things, as long as I don’t eat the entire bag!

Tell me, are you currently on a diet? or do you have any tips for me to stay away from the candies?

Love, Wietske

5 ways to deal with reverse homesickness

Everyone knows the feeling of being homesick, longing for home, for a place where you feel comfortable and at ease. People feel sorry for you, try to comfort you and eventually send you home.

However reserve homesickness is something that gets laughed about. People keep on telling you that you just need another holiday while in fact you feel lost, not at home in a place other people tell you is your home. That combined with an extreme longing for in my case Korea cause me a serious depression.

A depression that would only go away when I was back in Korea and would come back as soon as I came back home.

However I finally feel that I have overcome this feeling of sadness, I still know and feel that I don’t belong here in the Netherlands but I can deal with it now. And here are 5 tips how you can too.

Go sightseeing; Yes, in your own town. Go on adventures, try new bars, new restaurants, new stores see your place not as a town where you return to your same old boring life, see it as a new adventure.

Get active; By exercising your body releases pheromones which make you feel happy, even if you hate exercising, find something you like, such as walking, dancing around the house, riding your bicycle.

Meet Friends; Whenever I feel extremely homesick I just want to sleep all day and cry in a corner. This is not a solution to the problem. Go out, meet your friends, take you friends to said new bars and talk about past memories. Laugh together and make plans for new adventures.

Be Sad;  There is nothing wrong with crying your eyes out every once in a while. There is nothing wrong with wanting to go back to that time and place where you are happiest. Just make sure you don’t get stuck in the moment and if you are really slowly rolling into a depression seek help!

Go back; That doesn’t mean you have to go back tomorrow. No, just make plans. Think about it; talk about it. Tell your family how you feel about it and your absolute need to go back. Ease your family and friends back into the idea of you going back for a longer and longer.

 

 

 

What’s in my Bag – Korea Edition

I felt like stepping out of my comfort zone and just make a youtube video. Something I have wanted to do, some of the people I really look up to/ I want to be/ I want to be friends with are youtubers/ vloggers and I really enjoy watching their video. So here is one I did ages ago but never had the guts to put on public. I hope to be making more videos in the future however, something with a bit more information perhaps but well, we’ll see I guess.

I hope you enjoy watching

Love Wietske

How traveling alone changed me.

This week I have been posting a lot of pictures and music that remind me of Mongolia. Mongolia will always have a special place in my heart, since it was the first country I traveled to alone.

I stayed in a Mongolian family for 3 weeks and traveled around the country with a Mongolian family 2 Italian guys and an Irish girls for a week. This was only made possible because of the Lions organization, which is a kind of rotary club that organize camps and homestays in countries all over the world to encourage dialogue between people from different countries and to create cultural understanding.

I was a very shy girl and very attached to my “friends” who treated me very badly now I look back at it. I have never traveled without my parents, outside of Europe or flown in my life. I was scared, I was afraid I would have a hard time communicating, that I would be lonely and homesick.

Thank god I had the best time of my life, I made awesome new friends, I realized my so-called-friends were not my friends and discovered who my real friends were. I became more confident and way more talkative. If you want a relatively cheap and save way to see a new country and you are within the age range of 15 and 21 I totally would recommend you to check out the Lions organization youth exchange program!

However, it wasn’t until 2 years later, the summer after my high school graduation that I really got to know myself and became the person I wanted to be instead of being the person that people thought I was.

I finally went to the country I always wanted to go to – Korea! I made a plan, calculated how much money I would spend and then started convincing my parents. My dad was easy-peasy, he really encourages me and my sisters to follow our dreams, my mom however was a different story.

North-Korea just sunk a South-Korean warship, my mom was scared and just rather had me stay at home. Luckily I was able to convince her and could start booking tickets and hostels. And then finally I spend an amazing 3 weeks in Korea.

I would be lying if I said I wasn’t scared. I was shitting bricks however from the moment I stepped out of the airplane I fell absolutely in love with the country and it’s amazing people.

But most important I learned a lot about myself. I learned that it is okay to make my own decisions, that it is okay to have fun, that it is okay to be myself and people would still like me.

I became a happier, more confident version of myself. Korea still has this effect on me and that is probably one of the reasons why I like to be there so much even though I am in general a very happy and confident person nowadays.

After traveling alone I finally realized I shouldn’t take shit from people and stand my ground, that I have the right be happy and should be, because I am amazing and wonderful.

And so are you! and if you haven’t realized that yet I recommend you to travel alone, meet new people and do all the things you want to do and be happy, because you deserve it!

So I challenge you, within a year from now, travel somewhere, it can be far away, or really close by. Go alone, stay alone and enjoy and be amazed about all the things you can do!

Tell me, where would you go and what crazy things would you do if you were travelling alone?

Love, Wietske 

20 things I want to accomplish this year.

I do have a bucket list of 50 things I want to do before I die. And although I’ve accomplished quite a lot of things already some of them are defiantly goals I don’t even want to accomplish just yet (get married, have a baby).

However I feel like I need to push myself more to accomplish something this year. So here I present you with a list of things of 20 things I want to accomplish before this year ends.

1. Get accepted into Hanyang University
2. Loose 10 KG
3. Get one of my posts to Freshly Pressed page
4. Sell a painting.
5. Get some of my photography published.
6. be able to run 5K
7. Get  to Topik level 6
8. Save 10,000 Euro
9. Get straight A’s in my classes.
10. Be able to do 20 push-ups
11. Go camping with my friends in the backyard
12. Create a monthly budget and stick with it.
13. Keep writing daily post
14. Throw an epic party, with no reason and invite everyone I want and don’t worry about how they mingle.
15. Make a weekly schedule and stick with it!
16. Get something to remind me of birthdays and ALWAYS send a card
17. Make my own birthday cards
18. Take a day every week where I am not connected.
19. Talk more with my mom.
20. Be a better sister.

I am going to work hard to accomplish those goals, although some are probably a bitter harder then others.

What are the things you want to accomplish before 2014?

Love, Wietske

 

Spring Clean for your Body

Spring is just around the corner, time to throw of the oversized sweaters and drop the chocolate bar that kept us company during cold winter nights. It’s time to stop with our extended no-shave-November and have a good pampering session before we dash out the door in our frilly skirts.

I recommend you do this on a Sunday night, perhaps tonight! Take your time, relax. Pamper yourself and you will feel amazing, now, tomorrow and for the rest of the year!

Put on some nice music perhaps burn some candles and make yourself comfortable. I’d like to start of with a hair mask, or just plain extra virgin olive oil. You can leave it in as long as you like while you sit back and listen to your music. If you are wearing make-up right now would be a good moment to take it all of, I once again like to use olive oil (I am a big fan guys!) to take my make-up off.

Then get yourself some fluffy towels and get ready for a bath (or shower). I usually start of with a complete body scrub, my favorite is something you will probably already have in your kitchen cabinet. Just mix some olive oil and regular sugar and you are set! After this amazing scrub session get rid of that winter coat of yours, I know you have one, I know I certainly do…

Talking about a winter coat, wash your hair very thoroughly, especially if you used oil in your hair. You could also wash it twice, just to make sure you get everything out. I still like to use a conditioner afterwards since my hair is really dry, but you don’t really have too.

Then do whatever you want to do in the shower and then end with a cold rinse! keep my blood flowing and close the follicols on my hair to make it nice and shiny I always end my showers with a cold rinse. As cold as possible, it feels horrible but afterwards I always feel Amazing!

Then I smother myself in my favorite bodylotion and put some clothes and put a leave in conditioner in my hair (like I said I have very dry skin and hair) on and we are done with the first part.

Then I like to use a nice aloe facemask to realy moisturize my skin, after which I massage my skin with the leftover residue of the mask. The next step you can do while you wear your facemask or after, it’s up to you. Give yourself a manicure, not just get my nails back in shape but get rid of dead and dry skin and then put on some hand cream, after you are done with your hands, don’t forget your feet, these babies carry you around everywhere you go so then really need a bit of extra love!

Feel better? ready for spring? Now dont’ forget spring clean to declutere your house really helps with keeping up with it for the rest of the year, this is pretty much the same. Pamper yourself every once in a while but for the remaining weeks just do a little bit of each every day.

For example, scrub and shave on Sunday, Hair Mask on Teusday, Face Mask on Thursday and a Manicure on Friday.  Helps you to stay pretty and feel amazing all year round!

Love, Wietske

Four Tips to Make Getting Up Early Easier.

Last week I wrote a post about Four Things I Should Stop Doing In My 20s and one of them is sleeping all day. I usually stay up all nights and it’s a real struggle to get out of my bed at a reasonable time in the morning. Here are a few tips that make getting up early easier.

1. Go to bed earlier: These days instead of going to bed at 1 or 2 A.M. or sometimes even later I go to bed at 11 P.M. at the latest. That way I get enough sleep and it makes getting up a whole lot easier.
2. Put your alarm on the other side of the room: I am one of those persons that hits the stop button instead of snooze, rolls over and sleeps for another 4 hours before realizing I am horribly late. Even though having to jump out of bed to turn the damn thing off, it was one of the best decisions I made.
3. Implement a 30 buffer: I usually set my alarm on 7.30 but while the music is playing I usually roll around in my bed for about 30 minutes before actually getting up. And even though I did this I am still up early.
4. And last but not least, once you are awake and got out of your bed make yourself a majestic breakfast, my current favorite is French Toast topped with banana and syrup. But even a simple slice of bread with nutella could be a real treat.

What methods do you use to get out of bed? and what time do you get up?

Love, Wietske.

Sexy Sunday – it is me.

After reading the chapter Learning to Love Yourself of  Gala Darlings book  -which was truly inspiring for me – I decided I needed to start loving myself because In the 22 years that I lived my life I still feel that I cannot really say that for even one year I fully loved myself.

There were times when I was super happy and I felt awesome but there were always moments where I felt that I couldn’t be me.

Now I feel that I still cannot completely be me. There are just two places where I feel I can be myself. Korea and the Internet. Now unfortunately I am not in Korea at the moment. Which means the Internet is a place where I spend most of my times.

Now I still want to feel good outside of the internet. Which is hard sometimes especially since I recently got back from Korea. The place where I am happiest to a place where I feel that my life is on hold.

To defeat this upcoming depression I want to make a new segment on here called Sexy Sunday – getting sexy inside and out. Meaning that I want to flood your dashes with happier thoughts, things that make me happy and tips of getting a generally healthier and happier lifestyle.

I want to start this new segment of with something that has been bothering me lately.

I have basically been on the internet for my entire conscious life and when I was younger I used my full name for everything from my bebo account to myspace and I just added every –creepy old – person one that wanted to be my friend.  I quickly learned my lesson,  deleted what I could and started using fake names ever since.

You might know me just as Katie, or maybe as Seungmi or maybe even just as that girl from that website, but as I wrote a while back on my tumblr. I want to interact with people on the internet. I don’t want to be just a nameless face. I want to be me.

So here it goes, for the first time in maybe 10 years I will use my real name again.

My name is Wietske. 

It’s a name I love, I love it’s uniqueness, I love the litteraly meaning and the thought by which my parents gave it to me.

It’s also a name I hate. Especially since I started traveling – constantly getting weird faces or people mispronouncing my name.

I am used to it now and I won’t ever for the life of me change this name. It is mine and it’s a part of me. Now I revealed this piece of important information about myself. I feel that I can be more myself on the internet. Now just find a way to feel more comfortable at the place where I am actually at.

Love Wietske