Our Greatest Strengths are Our Greatest Weaknesses

So what are your greatest strengths and weaknesses?

The dreaded interview question.

If you speak before your brain has a chance to engage you risk admitting your deepest darkest weaknesses and leaving your self exposed to the potential employer’s scrutiny.

You can always repackage a strength, as a weakness, “I work to hard” or “I am such a perfectionist”, but you risk sounding a bit full of your self or like you just got your answer from a ‘hints for interviews’ book.

The other option is stating a real weakness, one that isn’t going to stop you getting the job and then go on to say how you are working on improving it.

What ever happens don’t say that your strengths are your greatest weaknesses!

Its so close I can almost touch it!

The count down has begun to a little bit of me time, with only two assignments left from the mountain work, the end is in sight. I can start looking forward to my annual trip home to see my friends and family, nothing beats London in the summer!

Free music concerts in the London parks, sipping Pimms on the long summer nights and of course the shopping. I wait all year to stock up my wardrobe. I can not wait, Just less than a month to go.

Try a cliché

‘It isn’t rocket science’

Now this is one of my favorite and most used clichés.

There are jobs in life that really aren’t that difficult but some people have a way of making what should be a simple job, a painful experience.

Those that inflict this agony on me when I am trying to get tasks ticked of my to-do list, most defiantly should not be rocket scientists.

Lost and found

Wizard has gone wandering! It is heartbreaking waking up every morning having a quick look around, only to see that she still hasn’t returned.

I feel like a true crazy cat women, we have searched the neighborhood, put up posters, visited the vets, called the animal shelters and even tried the armed response in case they had seen a cat knocked over on the side of the road!

We have looked high and low, and after four days still nothing!

One of the first vets I called, had a little grey stray cat, so I went to see if it was wizard. I tried not to get my hopes up to much and sadly it wasn’t her, but later in the week when I put up a poster in a pet shop. I noticed someone else’s plea to help find their missing cat. I recognized the cat from the vets, so I took down the number and phoned them right away.

Turns out it was their cat, felt so good to re-unite someone with their kitty after the nightmare of the last few days. I am hoping that karma does a full circle and wizard find her way back to us L

Other wise there is always the animal communicator!

The great house hunt

This week as stressful as it has been with the huge pile of university work looming over my head, has also been one of the most exciting weeks of the year so far.

We have finally found a flat that ticks all the boxes AND our offer has been accepted!

House hunting has been a serious learning curve that at times has felt as though we were feeling your way in the dark.

It has been a task riddled with emotion, finding places that you love but cant afford or putting in an offer only for it to be rejected.

It was exciting searching the Saturday papers for flats that would be on show the following day, and getting to take a peak into other peoples homes.

I just can't wait to make and my first house a home. I have already been cutting clippings out of decor magazines, I shouldn't admit that kind of thing should I!

Feelings follow behavior

Don’t you hate those mornings when you wake up cringing about what you got up to the night before!

Initially it’s a hazy blur, but as the haze lifts the vivid and extremely embarrassing memory of what you did or said starts coming back to you. Generally the hugest cringes come from the people you were trying to make the biggest impression on.

My wild days are long gone, but there are still the odd occasions when this familiar feeling creeps up on me.


I am quite self conscious person and a night’s mischief can leave me cringing for a life time. I can still recall the silly things I have said to people years later!

Gosh just the thought of it is making me cringe.

Time management

We have about 3 weeks of the 1^st term of university left and a huge pile of work to get through before we can enjoy the break.

I seem to be very good at procrastinating, even though I have drawn up a timetable that needs to be stuck to, in order to get all the work done!

Our one lecturer keeps going on about managing our time more effectively, so I thought it might be helpful to look up some time management tips for my fellow students.

Hahahaha this is the first thing I came across my sentiments exactly!

No: 1 “Realize that time management is a myth.

No matter how organized we are, there are always only 24 hours in a day. Time doesn't change. All we can actually manage is ourselves and what we do with the time that we have.”|

OK other more helpful tips!

- Find out where you're wasting time

- Create time management goals.

- Plan your actions to achieve your goals

- Implement a time management plan and create a ‘to do’ list

- Prioritise ruthlessly

- Allocate time to each task and stick to it

- Don’t waste time waiting move on to the next task

Tips from http://sbinfocanada.about.com/cs/timemanagement/a/timemgttips_2.htm

It’s better to practice a little than talk a lot

This makes me think back to the days when I used to work at the stables.

You could see these people coming a mile away, we used to say they had all the gear and no idea.

They would swagger into the stables telling you elaborate stories about how they tamed wild stallions in outer Mongolia and that they have been riding for 30 years.

As soon as they got on the horse you could see they didn’t have a clue.

These people the ‘know it alls’ would normally be the ones catapulted from the horse at great speeds.

I always think it is better to be modest about your skills and then pleasantly surprise people, rather than talk your self up and disappointed them!