May is here, its absolutely crazy and I don't understand how its the 5th month of the year already when New Year literally feels like the other day. But it is here none the less, and I've decided to set myself some targets for this month, and share them on here, and reflect on April a little bit too.

I've spent much of April at home, only actually being in Edinburgh for the first couple of days at the end of term, and a one night trip back for a friend's birthday (which I blogged about here). I'm not ashamed to admit that I've suffered from quite bad home sickness being away from home for university, and I actually still do. I plan to do a blog post about my first year experience, in which I'll write about it a little, but I've found that being home this month has really helped me. I needed this month to look forward to, being at home just relaxes me a lot more, and I feel comfortable and happy surrounded by my family. As I am about to do my exams, I've been doing a whole lot of revision while I've been home, and I've found that being in the environment that I revised for my Highers has set me at ease, and made me feel a lot more relaxed than last term. It's also helped that I've been able to revise a little each day over the course of the holidays, revision week, and this last week when I didn't have exams. Last term I had a week to cram in revision for my three subjects and all it did was stress me out and almost made me sick. So being back home has helped my stress levels.
I've also got into a new study routine over the past few weeks, which I've found has been really productive as well as allowing me time to relax and enjoy the day. I get up for breakfast with my family at 7, and get ready and am at the central library for a 9am start with my sister. At the library, I'm able to focus much more as there is absolutely no internet. And I've been staying there for a good few hours- some days till 1- and then go home for lunch and then I have the afternoon to do some light revision or relax. Its been much more beneficial for me, as I've been able to get through a lot of work and stayed focused when I'm there, because I know I'll be able to have a fun afternoon. It has also made the day feel a lot longer, which I love.
This past month I've had time to reflect on what I actually want to do with my life- it seems a pretty hard going thought to have and I'm only 18, but realistically- first year has passed so fast, that its going to be next to no time until I'm graduating a faced with the reality of finding a job or whatever. Over this last year, I've discovered that I am most interested in the classical period, and in particular Classical Archaeology. So I've decided that next year, instead of Scottish Archaeology I'm going to study Classical Archaeology, and for my History subject, I'll do Ancient History. As my outside subject, I've decided that I'm going to take up beginners Greek, I loved Latin at school, but can't do the course at uni, so I think I'll enjoy Greek. With all this "looking ahead", I've been considering what to do after uni. I've always thought that I'd go straight on a gap year- travelling the Southern coast of Turkey (which is still a dream of mine), but I've decided that its not something I need to go on to do straight after graduation.  I was lucky enough to be asked in to do a talk on Roman Archaeology in Britain in my sister's primary 4 class, just the other day, and I absolutely loved it. I've always loved being with kids and working along side them, and being in my sister's class, who were all lovely, has brought that back. So I've been looking into doing a PGDE (post graduate diploma in education). Its only a year long course, then a probation year afterwards, but I genuinely think I would really enjoy it, and I can see a future being involved with kids. So this has brought me onto looking at different ways I can become involved in leadership roles, and that's something that I want to do a lot of over the next few years at university. So we'll see how that goes!

My May Goals:

• Church: After being home for the last few weeks, I've been able to go back to my church and see everyone again, which I have loved. So I've decided that after my exams are finished, I want to try and find a church that I can go along to when I move into my new flat for next year. 
• Volunteer: As I've said about the PGDE, I have to start volunteering and getting experience with kids, so I want to have sent a few emails around trying to arrange volunteering opportunities for next year.  
• Run: I said in a previous post that I wanted to try and start up running. Its not a surprise that I haven't done that yet- but I thought if this month, I set myself a goal of going for at least a couple of runs, then I might actually do it.
• Exams: This month is pretty much stress month, and I have my first exam tomorrow. So this month my goal is to complete the three exams with as little stress and panicking as possible. 
• Explore: With two weeks in Edinburgh at the end of May and absolutely no uni work to do, I want to go around the city and explore it a little more. 
• Blog: My main goal is to build up my blog a lot more over the next few weeks, since I'll be finishing exams and exploring the city and able to spend time writing things. 

I didn't want to set lots of goals, that I wouldn't be able to do. I thought these ones are realistic and achievable, and since I've written it here it means I have to give it my best attempt.

Thanks for reading!
Love,
Emily
xxx