Learning to Grow
2020 has been an interesting year for everyone. With travel being suspended, it meant I had to come back home to Australia and will be staying here until things overseas start to improve.
I think a lot of us had found ourselves at an extremely low point at some time during the year. This was a bit of a wakeup call for me. I decided while I was home I would work towards creating a better life for myself, mentally and physically. Without focusing on material things, I worked towards improving my overall health, getting myself out of my comfort zone and learning to be grateful for what we have instead of wanting more.
This lead to me deciding to invest in education. There is so much information we have access to now days and it seems silly not to take advantage of the opportunities we have and expand our knowledge on certain topics that we’re interested in.
I’m sure many of us have had interests that we’d love to start or topics we’ve wanted to learn more about, but haven’t done so because we don’t know how or simply because it’s out of our comfort zone. This was definitely the case for me. When I got home last year and couldn’t continue working overseas I decided to start a Bachelor of Applied Science online as genetics is a passion of mine that I’d like to pursue a career in one day down the track.
At this point you’re probably thinking “Oh so you’re trying to encourage us to go to University”. The answer is no, I do not believe you have to go to University to learn new things and become good at something. When we talk about learning, I think it’s important to never settle with where you are today but strive to continually learn more and grow as a person. Even if this means watching videos on YouTube of your favourite topic, or doing research on something you’re interested in. You don’t need to spend money to invest in learning and education.
However, if you do want to spend some money there are plenty of legitimate courses that are available for a very little cost, and of course you can find some available on sale too! Whether these courses are through TAFE or an online website they are still able to help you grow and learn new things.
Finding the Right Course
I know a lot of people think that to gain more knowledge you have to be completing an actual course for university or TAFE. However gaining knowledge about certain topics can be as simple as watching something on YouTube. For example I watch a lot of videos about cars and photography on youtube and have learnt so much through that platform. For those topics this benefits me more as this is not something I want to pursue as a career but just learn more about so there’s no need for me to get a certificate of any sort.
If you’re interested in learning new things I think it’s important to consider the following:
What are my interests?
What do I want to do with this interest? Is it a career aspiration or just a hobbie?
How deep do I want to get into this topic?
How much financially (if any) am I willing to invest into this topic? No, you do not have to spend money if you don’t want to.
If you need a certificate, do some research on what places offer a certificate for this topic.
If you’re not looking at getting a certificate, do a lot of searching for different people or companies in the industry that share free information on this topic.
MAKE SURE THESE ARE RELIABLE SOURCES OR HAVE EXPERIENCE IN THE TOPIC.
Chose the option that suits you best
Start learning and growing!
Courses I’ve Completed
I thought I’d include some of the short courses I’ve completed over the last 12 months incase someone has a similar interest.
Photography and Content
Sorelle Amore’s Advanced Selfie University
I have followed Sorelle Amore on instagram for a couple of years and knew she had a course called the Advance Selfie University. This course was all about how to take good photos of yourself in a more artistic and beautiful way that also creates confidence in yourself and how your photos look. She talks a lot about posing, finding the right angles, looking for beautiful locations to shoot, how to use props, taking beautiful photos on your phone and a lot more!
This was an absolutely amazing course to do and would definitely recommend for anyone wanting to improve their self portrait photography or just improve their instagram photos. I have just recently finished the course and am very keen to start creating some of my own content. I will definitely be sharing some of the photos I take that are inspired by Sorelle Amore on my Instagram.
Health
14 Day Better Hair and Better Health Challenge
On boxing day I found Sarah Tran’s 14 day Better Hair and Better Health Challenge. I’ve always found that I was never doing the right thing with my hair and thought this short course would be interesting to do as one of my goals at the start of the year was to work on my mental and physical health.
She goes into a lot of detail about certain ingredients that are bad for your hair, what benefits your hair can have from particular foods, how to create a hair care routine, and lots more. She also offers a 5 week program called Hair Growth Lab where she works along side you to find your hair profile and helps you to create a better routine more suited to you based on a lot of different things such as your hair type, where you live, you’re daily routine, ect.
I learnt so much more than I thought I would when doing this 14 day course. It was definitely something I’m very happy I did as it’s really helped me understand my hair.
John Benton - Model Fitness Consultation
Another amazing course I have invested in was John Benton Model Fitness. He has some of the best workout’s I’ve ever done which helped me not only get my measurements down by a few centimeters but also improved my mental health. This included no strict dieting but just doing amazing work outs and watching when I eat certain types of food.
If you’re not wanting to pay any money he has a YouTube channel where he posts some workout tips. If you’re interested in purchasing a workout you’re able to do so separately, or there is an option to buy a workout package which includes 6 workouts and the Model Yoga Flow. If you get his full consultation this also includes a 30 minute phone call to discuss current diet and nutrition routines and his method on how to incorporate this into your normal routine as well as 10 free virtual class passes to use for their live Zoom workouts.
I have learnt so much through John Benton that I never thought would make that much of a difference but since doing his workouts I have seen tremendous results!
I hope you chose to invest in yourself and continue to grow and learn new things!
Kind Regards,
Madison Weik
If you want to keep up to date with what I’m up to or you want to get in touch feel free to do so through Instagram at @madiweik
