My Ordinary Life

Hi (little wave), my name is Hannah and I feel depressed - often. Mental health is surrounded by stigmas, stereotypes, and fears which swarm the air like annoying little bugs. None of these help us out when we're feeling down. Today's discussion is jumping off-track from high school stories to share pieces of my mental health with you. My goal is to help you know WHY the mental health stigma exists, WHERE we are headed with it, and HOW it has been a part of my life. Then I want to share with you one big victory I had last week that is helping me press forward. Everybody's got mental health to care about. Let's talk about it.

How many times have we been counseled to be intentional with our efforts? With our work? Several years ago, I sustained a serious sports injury that forced me to be intentional with the healing process, and with my academic involvement. Today, I've learned to be intentional about defining my own goals enough for me to figure out my next steps and make active progress towards achieving what I set out to do. I'm challenging you this week to look at your own life and identify one loose intention (something you just want to do 'eventually,' like painting a wall, starting a business, etc.) and set deadlines to work towards making it happen. 

When 12-year-old Hannah sat down on the bench alongside the Troy High School volleyball team in the first week of moving north, she had no idea what she was in for! The compassion shown to me by those girls (to whom I was only a stranger) would later give me the drive to seek involvement in my high school activities so that I, too, could show compassion and warmth. It is an experience that I don't even know if they remember, but the ways in which they made me feel welcome when the hard move was still fresh in my mind continues to impact me today. As we talk about involvement tonight, I'm also sharing some thoughts on serving and being served.

I'm kick-starting this new year with a resolve to find and maintain BALANCE across multiple areas of my life: school, work, social life, health, finances, and the ever-underestimated elements of creativity and comfort zones! Listen in as I share some thoughts for making the whole YEAR awesome, without the inevitable burnout of New Year's Resolutions. Tune in next week to hear about my experiences as a benchwarmer for my high school volleyball team!

Today I'm ending 2020 by reflecting on some hard goodbyes I've said throughout my life, both temporary and permanent, and I'm asking myself what it is these experiences have taught me. Episode 13 is also wrapping up Season 1 of my life stories this week, and next episode will be the first of Season 2! As always, thank you for listening in and I hope you'll stick around! May God bless each and every one of you as this chaotic year draws to a close.

During the week of Christmas, I'm reflecting on one experience many years ago which has blessed my family and brought them closer together. It has taught me greater appreciation for the people I love and it has shown me how lucky I am to have been raised by such good people. This week, I'd like to share some of that goodness with you.

Is the word "boundary" triggering for you? To me, boundaries counteract the potential pitfalls of risk in any context. Life is inherently riddled with risk - but to set boundaries is to invest in a little bit of preservation for your well-being. I'm personally setting boundaries every day as I attend college. I'm trying to govern my social life, academic commitments and financial situation all at once. It takes patience, discipline, and the implementation of boundaries. Today I'm talking all about how boundaries can help preserve your well-being as you approach risks in life.

Preparation is SUPER important for any sort of goal you have in life, whether it's coming up tomorrow or several years down the road. Training for a marathon, studying for a test, or even buying groceries for dinner tonight - all of this is preparation for things to come. In today's episode, I'm sharing two stories from our barnyard in southern Idaho that illustrate how I was taught to be prepared for both expected and unexpected challenges. Listen in as my family first faces off with an aggressive rooster in the barnyard, and later jumps away from a surprise visitor out by the horse barn.

Hey there! I’m your host, Hannah Christensen, welcoming you to My Ordinary Life. This is a podcast sharing short stories about family, adventure, friendship, memories, and the extraordinary experiences that come from a seemingly-ordinary life. Episodes go live every Tuesday at 8AM Mountain Standard Time; thanks for listening!

Consistency shows results! Have you ever had a long-term project that you chipped away at, a little at a time, until it was finished? Instead of procrastinating everything until the last moment? Today's episode is all about those long-term commitments and how consistently working towards your goals will bring about amazing results. I share my experiences from showing goats in the fair, and at the same time, introduce you to my little world of southern Idaho, where I lived in McCammon for about two years. We will spend a handful of episodes talking about some of my most impactful experiences I had while living in southern Idaho. Thanks for listening in!

What good comes from COMPROMISE? There are so, so many circumstances in our lives (no matter what our lives may look like) that can benefit from healthy compromise. It's a magical principle that just fosters relationships so much, while simultaneously helping us learn humility, patience, and sacrifice. In Episode 8 (cheers for halfway through Season 1!), I talk about how meeting my childhood friend halfway when we walked to each others' play dates benefitted both of us, and I connect the idea of compromise to my current daily student housing experience.

What do you hold onto when things get really hard? What do you put your hope in? What goals do you appoint as your compass, or what habits help you pull yourself forward? In this episode, I'm sharing the story of how a stubborn little 9-year-old Hannah refused to play the violin so that she could learn the cello instead - and how it was a commitment that came with hard elements! I'm also sharing a little about some of the "tough" things I've been facing recently and what I hold onto when I face them; namely, mental health challenges and the symptoms of COVID-19.

I am definitely one to put a lot of weight and value in material things! From the decorations in my living room to the books on my shelves, clothes and shoes I wear, my photography equipment, etc. - I spend a lot of resources investing in things that are really only temporary.  In this episode, you'll hear a story about how I lost something material as a child, and I share some abstract thoughts about the value I place on things. 

Is there something in your life that stresses you out more than usual? Do you assign high value to something that might not actually be worth that much worry? In My Ordinary Life today, I'm sharing a story about feeling small next to a towering ice cave, and I compare it to feeling small when pursuing the goal of a Bachelor's Degree! By stepping back and looking at it with a critical eye, I can understand its importance and work hard to make progress without worrying myself to the point where I can't function. Hope you like today's episode!

Independence. Is it good? Is it bad? What happens when we're TOO independent? Today I'm sharing a couple of short stories from my tiny-person days where I exercised stubborn independence and it came back to bite me. I also offer some thoughts on what a good, trusted source is and why it's okay to take advice from others! (Especially my parents...) Hope you guys like today's episode! Working on more material for next week - we will see if I actually publish on time!

Hi friends! I'm starting to structure my episodes a little more each round. In this episode, I describe a childhood memory about my mother's flower beds, hint at my obsession with rocks, and preach a little about a certain virus and how it's been causing stress for me as someone who is not part of the high-risk population. I ALSO share with you some of the background story of my podcast project and let you know about new details which you can use to help support me if you'd like! Thanks for stopping by again, and I hope to see you back. Expect to start seeing two podcasts a week (if all goes well!) The link I share in the podcast is here: https://anchor.fm/hannah-christensen/support

In this episode, I'm giving podcasts another go as I learn how to use my new Blue Yeti microphone. This episode was recorded in one take from my front room. As well as discussing limitations and the good/bad associated with them, you'll get to meet my boyfriend Caleb and listen to some of our more obscure interactions. He offers an insight or two on the idea behind limitation. Thanks for listening in to our discussion and my reflection on another short story from my childhood; now that I have my own microphone, be on the look out for more regular podcasts!

My name's Hannah, and in this first episode of my podcast I'll tell you about the members of my family and the foundation my parents established to help us learn to love each other and become best friends. This episode helps introduce you to the majority of the people that I'll talk about in the following episodes as I share unique stories from my seemingly-ordinary life growing up on a goat farm in Northern Idaho.