It’s the most wonderful time of the year

Christmas has always been my favourite holiday since I was a little girl. I loved the idea of receiving gifts from Santa, watching the hustle and bustle of people doing their Christmas shopping. There was always a special feeling in the air at this time of year. So Christmas has always been a magical experience for me.

As I got older I started to understand the true meaning of Christmas, why we actually celebrate it to begin with. When I was able to completely understand this, Christmas became all that more important to me. Although everyone has their own believes and some don’t believe in or celebrate Christmas. Being brought up in a Christian family Christmas has become more of time about thinking the lessons of the bible and giving thanks to God. Instead of thinking more about Santa and the gifts, although there still is all the traditional activities I enjoy related top Christmas time.

There are many different family activities I enjoy at this time of the year. Each different one has its own special meaning for me related to Christmas. So I thought it would be a nice idea to share some of them with you.

1.       My first favourite activity to do is sit on the sofa and watch all different films. This film may not be very Christmassy; it is always on television this time of year. So my favourite film to watch since I was little is The Secret Garden. If you haven’t seen it already, I definitely suggest you rent it out to watch.

2.       Christmas isn’t Christmas if you don’t decorate your house and put up the Christmas tree. Ever since I was little we had the tradition of always putting up the tree on the second Saturday in December. This is always an eventful experience, as I years doesn’t go by that we argue about how the lights or meant to go or if there be a star or an angel on the top of the Christmas. Once everything is said and done, it does give the house a Christmassy feel to it.

3.       At Christmas there is always great music played with wonderful songs showing the true meaning of Christmas. Recently I have been really into playing the Everly Fireside Christmas album, so if you haven’t got it already it is a must order. Mostly I love going to my local church and going to the Carols by Candle light service.

4.       The most important part for Christmas day for me, is going to Church on Christmas morning. Spending the rest of my day surrounding by family, giving and receiving gifts from one and other. Getting the time to reflect on the true meaning of Christmas with the people I love the most in my life.

Those are just a few of the experiences that make Christmas so special for me. If you celebrate it or not I hope its still a special time of year for you to spend with your family, before we are bringing in the next year together. Whatever you are doing this Christmas time, I hope you all have a great Holiday Season.

Merry Christmas

The World is full of magic

Over the past nine years I have grown up watching One Tree Hill, since it started it was always my dream to go to Wilmington and meet the cast. For a lot of them years I felt like this was a totally impossible dream and with all the magic in the world it was never going to happen. So in some ways over the years that dream started to die out. I still watched the show and started to see the cast as my role model.

One of the characters in the show Haley, played by Bethany Joy Galeotti seemed to always stand out for me. As the years went on she very quickly became my role model, it was more than how she played Haley in the show that made me like her as an inspiring role model for myself. I started to take an interest in her and wanted to see what she was like as a person outside of her character. I started to follow her music and follow other projects she was doing outside of one tree hill.

Just from listening to her music and seeing the different projects Joy was involved in, I knew that I had picked a great role model to inspire me. When listening to her music I love how you can feel the message she is trying to put across and making the connecting of helping us all to look at the bigger picture in life. For me I loved that her music was channelling made me think about the deeper message. The music for me was a way to relax and get away from the outside pressure of life and just have some fun.

More recently Joy started up a blog and her own band Everly with one of her great friends Amber Sweeney who is another great role model for people. Together these ladies created great music that I have developed a great connection to and help me at different time in overcoming different experiencing in my life. When it came to Joy’s blog, I loved getting an insight into her world and seeing how she liked to view. For a while I was having a lot of bad experiences with friends and getting the feeling like they never really wanted to accept me as there friend. I knew that joy blog was always something that I could turn to and make me feel better in the darker days.

Last month my world changed and I got the chance to go to Wilmington and meet the cast and crew of one tree hill. It was the best experience of my life. All the people were so kind and welcoming, just for a week I felt like I was part of their big family. Getting the chance to meet my role model Bethany Joy Lenz was an unforgettable experience in itself. Joy is an amazing person. It was a pleasure to meet her and spend time with her on a personal level. She made my trip so special for me, showed me how to feel normal even with my disability.

I feel so honoured to have such an amazing role model, to be inspired and encouraged by every day in life. She is the most down to earth and caring person I have ever. Her attitude and outlook on life our amazing, I have seen first-hand how great a mom and friend she is surrounded by family and friends. I hope she knows just how great of a person she is to inspiring so many young people like me. Through sharing her own life experiences she has definitely changed my life, made me understand with the right attitude and the right amount of faith the world is full of magic.

The disability is the easy part

All my life I have had my disability, so it something I have grown up with. In having my disability it doesn’t stop from doing the things I want to do in my life. There are times when it does get in the way, I like to try and find a way around these barriers. I still like to try and do the same things, as a person who doesn’t have a disability.

Since I was young people have always asked me “Is your disability not hard to deal with?” When I was young I did feel as I got older the disability was going to be the hard part. Actually going through the experience and living with it all my life, the disability is the easy part. Don’t get me wrong there is time when I wished I didn’t have it. I have learnt that having my disability is part of who I am and I’m okay with that.

As I have grown up I have found from having my disability, it all the other stuff that is hard to deal with in life. I definitely feel there is a lot of pressure put on disabled people to try and fit in with abled bodied people. This isn’t always easy, sometimes other people don’t want to be bothered and have that responsible put on that to make sure you fit in. Going to main stream school, I have found people only want to be your friend when they want to look good, in front of the right people. This really annoyed me; I wanted to be friends with people because they wanted it too. Not just because they were doing it to please the right people, giving me a false sense of hope.

Now that I’m a teenager, I have found this is the most difficult time to deal with not being accepted or fitting in. As a lot of the abled bodied friends I had inside and outside school don’t really want to bother with me on week night and weekends. They find it easier not to invite me out with them, so they can still do things without having to change plans to take my disability into account. A lot of the time I’m left to spend the weekend with family, which I do love. When it’s happening every weekend, you do get to a point where you just want to have fun with people your own age.

From having the disability, I have spent a lot of time in and out hospital. I have noticed that older people are a lot more accepting of my disability. This can be a little awkward at times; I don’t want to grow up before my time. I want to be able to take the time and enjoy my life and do it with friends my own age. I know it’s not easy when you have an on-going battle of trying to fit in and be accepted as someone with a disability, when people look at you differently for who you really are.

Zara :)

Blogging Again!

So I have had a blog for a good while now, never really wrote anything in it that is of importance to me. The entries I did share all came from different website and blogs I had read online. Sometimes, I wrote what each of the different entries meant for me in my life. That was in a way giving people a little insight into my world. I guess the reason why I displayed my blog in this way, is that I didn’t feel I had the ability to be able to write my own thoughts and opinions and share them with the world. To be honest the idea of having people I know read my entries, scared the life out of me completely.

I think Blogging at times scared me because of different situation I was facing in my life. I knew at time it wasn’t the right for to blog and easier to keep things to myself. As I still seen it as something I enjoyed and wanted to keep it as a good memory, not something I looked back on that would upset. Really this is the main reason as to why I felt blogging wasn’t for me. It was anything that other people had convinced me not to do, it was something I felt I didn’t have the strength to know how to do and make it good.

Recently I meet two amazingly ladies and we got talking about blogging. They both felt I had great ability to be able to have my own blog. One of the ladies felt that from the comments I wrote on her blog I had a good outlook on life and perspective to see the world from my own thoughts. She also said some great things, which I consider to be great advice for myself. Since I have been home, started to blog again has been on my mind a lot. Definitely think that it’s something I ready to try again.

Zara :)

Are disabled people integrated effectively in society?

In society there are a lot of different people. The first thing we see is the outside appearance. We need to learn that "you never judge a book by its cover”. You should look beyond a person’s appearance to see what is on the inside of the person. What is on the inside is the important.

Society is a place where everybody is allowed equal rights and access. Especially if you are disable and looking for a job. You shouldn’t be declined on account of being different. Nowadays if you do get a job, its legislation that the establishment you are employed by is accessible for people in wheelchairs. Disabled workers who are in full time employment earn approximately 20% less than their non-disabled peers.

Do you think a disabled person’s life is easy?. Well it might seem that way to some people. If you a parent or career who lives with someone that has a disability, you will hear a totally different opinion. When we think of some having a disability we automatically assume its a physical disability. There is also people who can have a mental disability I guess you never really understand “until you live with a disabled person.” Even if you talk to a person with a disability, I am sure they will tell you that “the world isn’t set up to include disabled people.” You may well think why do think that. Really all you have to do is go to the nearest shopping centre and there point is made. I assure you that there will be about four different shops, that a person in a wheelchair can not go into because it is small or there is steps up into the shop. Are disabled people integrated effectively in society?

What is Normal?. The word normal is very strange, it can often be used on the wrong way. Everyone calls themselves normal, are we right to put a disabled person down if they call them self normal?. Everyone is allowed to be different in there own way. So society therefore can not say the person with a disability is not normal. Just because they may be in a wheelchair and not be able to walk like everyone else. Also when people talk to someone in a wheelchair they tend to think they can not answer for them self. They talk to there parent or carer like the person is not really there. What really is Normal?. I would like to think to being different in your own little ways wouldn’t you?

In the media and newspaper we hear a lot about different celebrates and sport heroes. Have you noticed?, none of them seem to have a disability. The TV is a place where young children and teenage look up to role models. So should the programmers not give everyone a chance in putting disabled actor in there shows as well? That what life is about life making sure everyone has an equal chance. Even during programmers like the Olympics, you hardly ever got any coverage of the Paralympics. When was the last time you seem a disabled person on TV getting a sport or TV award?. So how is a disabled child meant to get a role model if the media or newspapers will not promote it to the world? Are disabled people integrated effective in society?

I believe “you should never judge a book by its cover”. In society everyone is allowed there own opinion. Disabled people are as normal as everyone else , they have there own feelings. In the further disabled people should get the same chance as other like being on TV or even on the Paralympics. I also think you shouldn’t judge a parent of a disabled person because you do not know what there life is like until you live it for yourself Remember before you say something about I disabled person, just think would you like it to do you ? and “don’t judge someone until you walk in there shoes”.