weekend in my life | snowing in nyc, catching up, reset & reflect vlog

Auto-captioned from the film, lightly cleaned. Elena's words, not edited prose.

on my way to 45 i'm gonna die and i know it breaks your heart when we end up when we started not too shabby hi how are you doing good i'm just doing a little morning journal i'm trying to learn a lot more this year while i journaled four years i'm not great about being consistent with it but i'm trying to do a little bit more self-reflection this year so as i'm moving into february i'm trying to like be specific about reviewing each month so doing like a january review i'd rather know about like the major themes of the month as well as wins and challenges as well as in february intentions as well a whole deal and i am moving this month which is crazy and i am my course is supposed to be releasing this month which i'm so freaking excited for if you watch my vlogs i talked about it back in june june was when i was like i think i'm going to make a course and so i've been working on it for a minute it's going to be living on bright trip which is an incredible platform that was created by johnny and is harris and johnny's been helping me along with my journey for creating this course and i cannot wait to share it i'm so excited it's basically like an all-encompassing how to vlog course really going into the very nitty gritty details of like how i started how to find your niche all the equipment i use i take you guys outside and i have a second cameraman following me around wally vlog to show every single shot i get and then i like bring you to my computer and i show my entire timeline as i add in a whole vlog and i think it's going to be really helpful if you want to try out vlogging for yourself so stay tuned for that i'm really trying to focus more on my mental health this year obviously last year was challenging for everybody under the sun i think a lot of people's mental health definitely took a toll myself included and i actually started doing better help probably mid 2020 and then a few weeks ago i just finished up a session with my therapist on there and my counselor and i was like checking my emails out and i got an email from my manager being like better hope wants to make a video in collaboration with you and i was like you can't even i just got off the best session with my counselor like that'd be amazing so this video is sponsored by betterhelp which i'm so excited to share betterhelp is basically an online platform that connects you with an online therapist betterhelp will help assess your needs and then match you with a therapist that will be like the best fit for you and you get to choose from a bunch of different therapists based on like some of the key issues you think you want to talk about and work through it really comes in clutch and on better help there's such a huge network of really incredible therapists who might have different expertise in certain areas that are best food for you that might not be like locally available in your area especially right now when you can't really meet in person what i like too is that through the platform when you're connected to your therapist you do weekly calls or video sessions so i like doing video sessions um but it's nice that you don't have to like wait in a waiting room uncomfortably and you can send them messages where you'll get thoughtful responses when you want it's available worldwide which is super exciting and i make it really easy to change counselors if you want which i've definitely done what's also incredible about betterhelp is that it's more affordable than traditional you know in-person counseling and there's financial aid available as well so if you want to check it out for yourself you can get 10 off your first month using betterhelp.com elena that's better help so he lp and you can join over a million people online taking charge of their mental health with an experienced professional so if that sounds like it's something good for you check the link in the description below i'm gonna get a little bit more ready for the day go get some food and chat with you guys more soon oh my goodness hello i haven't filmed the vlog since mid-december and now it's early to mid february so i'm excited to chat and catch up and i feel like there's so much to talk about it's a new year it's 2021 how futuristic does that sound i got some new cameras finally got a super 8 camera i've been talking about getting one for years i mean obviously a lot of times all like fake edit things to look super great but i'm very excited to finally have one of my own and then i finally got a manual film camera i got the canon ae1 i have this which is an automatic film camera it's the olympus stylus zoom 105 but she's kind of broken right now so this is nice because it has flash so if you want those like fun action shots out on the town when that was a thing this is great for that but then this is a little bit more like stylistic even though it's you know we're already in february i figured i'd talk a little bit about like resetting for the new year reflecting some fun goals of mine moving forward i'm trying to learn like two new songs a month let me show you i love this song peer pressure by james bay it's just like feel good song january i kind of learned it it's hard it's not easy to learn a new instrument i've been journaling a lot more which has been a lifesaver one of my big goals is to just be more personally reflective but in the past i've been such a future-oriented person so structure my life and my schedule and probably a good chunk of my identity on being busy honestly or i wouldn't sit with my emotions and if i felt bad i would just add something new to my social schedule which obviously i can't do anymore so this year i'm trying to work really hard at just inner work and just being more intentional with the things i put my time into the things i look at the things i listen to journaling is a big one i'm trying to find little moments of gratitude every day and really sit in them and i think it helps me see the bright side of every day you know writing down at the end of the day like i loved that cup of matcha it was so good or like that sunset walk the colors the way the light hit the buildings all those little things add up i realized that finding time to be intentional and appreciate all those little things makes such a difference for just mental health and happiness and the ability to find joy in days that otherwise might feel like there's not a lot of joy to be found oh another thing is i'm trying to be more confident and embrace my own authority and stop like second guessing myself past year i lost a lot of confidence i think i gained more from external validation than i had realized i think i felt like i was becoming more of a shell of myself and didn't really know like who i fully was or what my identity was i was wearing sweats all day like i didn't feel physically confident a lot of it is just faking it to make it and if you like decide like today i'm going to be confident i'm going to feel proud of who i am and throw my shoulders back and like change the way you go through your day by such a big degree again it's obvious but it's one of those things where i'm like oh and i actually put into practice it makes such a difference i'm trying to embody that femme fatale energy i want to be my own muse past year i just kind of felt like i was fully lacking inspiration i want to in take less inspiration from just like online mediums like social media like so much of the time it is just me scrolling on instagram but anytime i intake art from other things from books from paintings from beautiful movies from music i find so much more inspiration and i feel like i can explore more parts of myself when i'm actively seeking out art in different forms like it's always going to teach you something new what attracts you and what you feel pulled towards and by that i feel like kind of figure out more of who do i want to be who am i what do i actually enjoy for myself in ways that i haven't in the past i want to provide as much value to you guys as possible whether that's like education or entertainment or just something calming that you can enjoy i'm working to be a lot more present also because the future seemed so out of my hands i had all these ideas of doing different things and now i'm like i just gotta take a one day at a time but those are some updates from me also i really want to learn this song on the guitar i really love this black sabbath song because i feel like it's not what you'd expect when you hear black sabbath it has this beautiful strumming pattern this oh so stay tuned hopefully by the next vlog i'll make some progress on that song it's the trash for me this is how pandemic saturday nights look and you know i'm not mad about it we've got a good little cozy vibe going on i got my katie pilate wine glass gonna get some work done and i feel good about it happy saturday what is this stuff falling from the sky i don't understand the winter don't have any coffee which is an emergency so i'm gonna go try to trek through all of this i look so squishy marshmallow right now this coffee is delightful i feel like a human again my fingers are freezing off and i just spent way too much money on a breakfast bowl but i probably should have just saved money on a cook to home you know what it's a sunday we're treating ourselves on a snowy day and while it's cold it's actually kind refreshing to be outside like it's definitely waking me up that's for sure so happy sunday hello good morning a little crooked but we'll go with it hi good morning um super snowy outside but the sun has come out so i texted gaby i was like we gotta go see it so i think we're gonna go to central park to try to see like the snow trees covered in snow they even make a little snowman i don't even know if i've ever made a snowman in my life because i didn't grab around snow before we go see new york in the snow we just got a little delivery from the migrant kitchen which i'm so excited about i'm a huge fan of them they're like a social good food company that's on a mission help feed the less fortunate in new york city so they have like a buy a meal give a meal campaign and they're doing a lot of really cool work some days we need help we have an aussie and a californian we both never built a snowman that's the best times but also we don't know how to do it i feel like we gotta like look see like behind you they have something going on together but we don't oh look at them down there look at a huge one how do they do that that's like bigger than a human okay that's that's what i mean all right i believe in us kind of hopefully a little bit i don't know how well a little check in me and gabby she's built this lovely lump on the ground here you can see we've got some interesting dimensions here's my little ball i'm really proud of her this has been like 20 minutes of work i can't wait for the comments of people being like that's not how you build a stool yeah i'm from orange county look at what we did i'm really proud wow true winter legend you'll stay in your new place start