Hey guys it's Sophie. So I wanted to
talk to you about readathon I’m gonna do I’ve never made a readathon before like I don't
think I’ve ever made like a proper readathon like with challenges and stuff I’ve done lots of like
read this thing with me but this is my first one and before I go into all of the detail firstly
I started this because this is something I really wanted to do and I’ve made it all for me
a bit like the spreadsheet stuff and I was like I should share it let's do it as a readathon. So before I start I do want to mention that
another content creator has also made a readathon around the same subject matter they made it about
three months ago their name is Neffa Entertainment but I have watched their video and looked at their
prompts looked at the way they put it together and this is a substantially different thing as
I said this is something I was going to do for me but what I want to do is just acknowledge
that they had made a readathon with the same name and they're a much smaller content creator
so if you would like to go and check out their video and see what they put together see how their
readathon went absolutely do I don't want to be taking space from other people but I think the
things I want to do with this are different enough that I still feel fine to go forward with it.
So this readathon is focused around self-care so the reason I was talking about
wanting to do something for myself is you guys know I’ve been doing a lot of study
and my study will finish at the very end of May and I want to spend a month looking after
myself and like getting my sh*t sorted is kind of how I do it like my emotional sh*t
my practical sh*t all of the stuff I put off and I’ve done a readathon to go with some prompts
about how to use month to kind of sort your sh*t out that's the idea behind it so we'll run through
the book prompts which is like the main readathon you can do one or the other doesn't matter to kind
of explore what it is so for those of you who are like not super like into the self-care space
it self-care is very much not just bubble baths not just like relaxing spa day stuff self-care
can be quite challenging and quite difficult because it requires you to do stuff that
sometimes I’m comfy or you don't do very well or else you can't be doing it already and I think
the wellness industry and self-care are two very different things but there are kind of eight
recognized areas of self-care which are different areas where you can look after yourself to try and
keep yourself resilient and balanced in your life. So the reading prompts are based around
each of the eight areas of self-care so the first area is physical and the challenge
for this is to read a book which has movement on the cover so that could be people movement water
flowing something in motion on the cover the next area of self-care is psychological and for
this prompt you can read whatever book you want but at the end you need to take 10
minutes to reflect on what you've read that could be in the form of like a YouTube
video like a review or it could be like a goodreads review it could be just you jotting
down some notes it could just be you sitting there thinking about what it is you've read so like
a bit more engagement and for this one I chose it because psychological well-being is quite often
like related to reflecting on how things have gone in your life or things practices like meditation
that kind of activity or gratitude journals and for reading I thought let's reflect on what we've
read let's see what we've learned or haven't see what we've liked or haven't then the next area is
emotional so for this prompt the ask is to choose a book from your tbr or from your like to read
list that you have a feeling about so it doesn't necessarily have to be a good feeling it could be
like read the book that intimidates you the most read the book that you find most challenging or
it could be read the book you think will bring you most joy or a book you've got lots of excitement
about but I want you to choose a book that sparks something that you can notice that's an emotion
that comes up when you think about that book rather than just like yeah that one will
do I want you to find whatever that spark is and read that book the next area is social
and I think this is going to be a hard prompt for me but social is read a book which features
a healthy relationship so I read a lot of books that feature unhealthy relationships and the
whole book doesn't need to be like soft and squishy but somewhere in the book there needs to
be a relationship that you think at least if you haven't read it yet already but you think is a
healthy relationship you're not going in reading about a relationship that you know is abusive
before you even start the book the next area is professional so for this one the challenge is to
read any non-fiction book that you like then the next area of self-care is environmental and that
means like your physical surroundings so for this one the book on the cover or in the title needs to
have like a home a space or something from outside like trees plants mountains whatever but it has to
be an environment whether that's inside or outside the next area is spiritual so all of the religions
spiritual well-being comes into this camp this isn't one I engage in very often I don't
think of myself as a very spiritual person but for this one I want you to choose a book which
explores an idea in a way that you wouldn't agree with so like as an example you might read someone
else's perspective you might choose a non-fiction book that you don't automatically agree with
the premise of you might choose a book with an unreliable narrator and I’m kind of asking for
like an extension of empathy I guess in this one you could also take it as reading someone has
a different religion than you're a different spiritual practice but the idea is to kind of
look at what other people might believe and why and then the last area of self-care is financial
and for this one I’m going to caveat it don't do anything illegal but I want you to read
a book without spending any money on that book so I’m thinking like libraries borrowing it from a
friend a reread a tbr read but this one can't be a new by book you can't spend money to acquire
this book but please do not also steal books. Okay so that is the prompts there's only eight
reading prompts obviously you can do whatever you want with them combine them make them up I don't
mind I’ve tried to leave them like fairly open but give some examples of the types of things
I’m thinking through but they are totally up for interpretation and because I’m pairing this
with some checklists of like self-care activities I want to run this over a month so I’m going to
run this from the 1st of June to the 30th of June and I’m going to be sharing the checklists for
both the readathon prompts and also the daily prompts that I’ve made that you can do in your
real life to look after some of your own self-care but I will go through what's in each week
so I’ve put them into the seven per week but you don't have to do one a day you could do
two in one day none of another it doesn't matter and it also really doesn't matter if you
don't do all of them but the idea is to give you some ideas about some things you can do
and maybe you do more than you would have done if you weren't participating in the readathon.
So the checklist for week one is to clean a space in your home, to do a favour for someone, to
find a new recipe, make yourself a cold drink, think of that because it's June, plant
something and go for a walk and then for every week there's a stackable aim so you can
do this just the once or if you want to stack it you can put it on for the whole week so
do it every single day or you can carry it forward so you might do it for the next week
every single day but the final and stackable one should you choose is eat one more fruit or
vegetable than you normally would in that day. Then the week two checklist is do a task that
you've been putting off, buy yourself a small food treat, something that just tastes good, text
a friend to say that you're thinking of them, donate some clothes you no
longer wear, draw something, have an hour where you have no obligations you
have nothing to do within that hour that's a task and then the stackable aim is move
your body in a way that feels good. Then the week three checklist this top
one is going to do me in but it's check you've booked any dentist or optician's
appointments that you need to book, say thank you to someone, find a new podcast to
listen to, say no to something, wear something that makes you feel confident and finish your
work day on time and then the stackable aim for that week is make enough time oh nearly dropped
my laptop make enough time to get enough sleep. Then for week four we have set a boundary,
change your bed sheets or your pajamas, no screen time 30 minutes before bed, connect with
someone new like reach out to someone you're not already friends with, put on something that
smells good hand green perfume whatever, unfollow someone on social media who doesn't
make you feel good and then the stackable aim for that week is to spend half an hour outside.
Then week five cause it's a 30-day week is only just two and so let's pay someone a genuine
compliment and buy yourself a new pair of socks because I think everybody loves socks and
it's inexpensive I’ve tried to make it so there's not a lot of buying on here to try and make it
as accessible for as many people as possible but yeah that's the challenge I’m gonna be
doing it in June and challenging myself to read a few of these challenges and just do
something a bit of fun with my reading and also look after myself yeah that's the video I
will leave links to where you can find all of the like downloadable bits that you might need
you can print them out done them as pdfs that you might want and all the details
of the readathon will be down below let me know what you think and yeah I'll make
a video at some point I’m sure sharing my tbr and what I’m going to be reading and I may well
vlog it like the reading part of it throughout the time period maybe I'll tell you about whether
or not I finally broke my dentist appointment but I’m gonna just like at least update you on how
it goes and I’m really excited I think I needed to like schedule myself some time to sort my
own self-care out all right I hope you guys are doing good and I'll see you in my next
video look after yourselves until then. Bye.
