okay, my life isn't exactly over

ehmagerd, i can be so melodramatic sometimes.

so i thought that i'd write a little update post, not that any of you are interested in my life but i just feel like writing about it so that i am aware of the updates in my life (ha!). here's what has happened between my last post and today:

i started school
decided to pursue my masters and settled on english literature. honestly, i'm surprised that i was even given a place seeing that my american degree was in psychology and i have no official background in english literature except for an SPM subject and one elective in college.

i became a regular contributor for Career Girl Daily! 
so stoked that i've been writing empowering articles for women - mostly on personal branding, lifestyle and health. i've always been a fan of CGD and for them to take me in as a contributor was just really amaaaazing. you can find my articles here and if you do like them, please share it on your social feeds (help a starving writer!).

i lost my grandfather
honestly, i've never felt grief in my twenty five years of existence and to suddenly lose my grandfather to cancer + heart attack was really a big blow. it was very hard for me and my family and till today, i get weird flashbacks at random moments which eventually leads to crying or trying not to cry. it's worse when i'm in his car (i inherited his car) and suddenly all the childhood memories come flashing back.

i got a job! 
so yeah, after that melodramatic blog post about my life being over (lmao), i did eventually get a job as a senior social media executive with the Dentsu Aegis Network. idk why but i seem to have been given challenging accounts but i'm learning and observing along the way. the office is lovely and so international, just like how i always imagined my working life to be. it's hectic because i'm also juggling my studies but i don't regret it. i have moments of emotional breakdowns but at least i don't go to work feeling like a loser

i'm moving out! 
and finally, i'm embracing the crucial leg of adulthood by moving out of my parents' house. i still can't believe that i'm doing this but i just had to do it. i love my parents but staying so far away from office and school was just taking a toll on me. i found a simple, basic room just 6 minutes away from office and 10 minutes away from school. i can't believe that i can actually sleep in a little, walk to work and finally do all these meal prepping, morning routine stuff that i didn't get to do.


that's pretty much of what i wanted to write about. i hope i will be able to churn out some content for this blog instead of constantly churning out content for clients + school but i do believe that this transition in life might inspire some creative juices (and more time!) to create content for this blog, my social media feeds and maybe continue writing for more magazines.


and now, i shall jump into my boyfriend's arms and enjoy the long weekend.
till then!

Be yourself. Cliché but true.

"So, M. You wanna start vlogging again, right? But how on earth do you compete with all the other vloggers out there? Like for me, I want to write but there so many writers out there who's probably better or more engaging than me. How on earth do I stand out?".

It was 4.10pm. I was tired, frustrated and bored. 

We were chilling in the swing room in the office. M was already dozing off after a bunch of Trump-Clinton videos and I was at wits' end trying to figure out how to reach this eye care brand to people on the Internet. Honestly, the last place I wanted to be was here. 

M looked up, walked to the table, shrugged and said, "I guess you just have to be yourself."

Oh, like I didn't know that already.

Judging by my wry expression, he quickly added, "Well, these smart vloggers have excellent cameras and other great gears. Also, they have a persona. Like, you've heard of PewDiePie, right? That's a persona."

"A persona? What about Maxim Bady?," I started to laugh, remembering that epic 'girl speaks fluent american' video that suffered the wrath of Maxim Bady's garish opinions.

"Do you actually think Maxim Bady even speaks like that?," M shot a knowing look. "At the end of the day, it's about being yourself, your authentic self. And it's also about having great quality and being persistent."

Be yourself. Righttttt...
And then I wondered, what happened to writing for the love of writing?
Why was I so concerned about being outstanding? The writers I currently follow on Twitter have all been verified, even the ones I dislike are making it big in their relevant fields.

And then there's me. The measly social-media-turned-copywriter telling women why they need a RM2000 anti-ageing cream when I bloody well know that these women are gonna age into a wrinkly prune and die anyway.

On top of discovering my old blog from 2008 (honestly, that has been the highlight of my week), I read through my old posts - not the ones from 2009 coz those sucked, by the way - and remembered how it would take heavy medication to get me to stop writing. So, I made a choice.

I'm gonna write the way I want to write. Whether it's depressing, witty, lame or cheery, I don't really give two hoots anymore. Of course, with the exception of abiding to the style guides of the publications I contribute for. As for this blog, nothing will be barred.

So yes, M. I will take your advice and be myself. That's the only persona the world's gonna get. 

The other side of 'millennial privilege'

'before you experience success, there will be this point where you will experience a lot of shit. but that's just how life works.' 

he said it in a less eloquent and in a more...'manglish' way in the meeting room the other day but it does hit home, at least to me.

i never considered myself a 'privileged millennial' and maybe that's why i've always felt different from my peers.

while my friends went off on holidays with the money that their parents provided them, i, on the other hand, only could travel once i started a regular job. while most of my friends studied abroad on the hard-earned wages inhabited by their parents, i had to complete my American degree at a local school and go on a special scholarship. while most of my 'millennial friends' grew up with iPhones and laptops being gifted to them by their parents, i had to earn my own money through the part-time job that i had whilst at college just to get that beat up Samsung Galaxy Y that only lasted me a year.

and as i cruise through life and see more of my millennial friends get jobs and continue to be spoon fed, i realize that life is unfair. i'm pretty sure that there are people who have it worse than me. i should know, because i've gone on enough mission trips and community outreach programs to know that people are going through stuff, sometimes involving matters of life and death.

once again, during a friendly catch up with my best friends, I felt small.
small because i'm the lowest paid of the group. small because they have embarked on adventures that i could only dream of but never go because i didn't have the money. small because my job in advertising is 'pitiful', that i have to answer to my boss and clients during the weekend or that i am sometimes expected to stay past 6pm and 'not have a life',

i had two ways to go about it: 1) throw a pity party for myself or, 2) work that situation and make the best out of it.

there will be a point in life where we can't blame our circumstances or our upbringing or the past. there will be a time in our lives that we, as adults, need to make choices and take responsibility for those choices. there will be a point in life where we have to suffer because suffering teaches us to be better people. because, in the words of my boss, sometimes you just have to go through shit in order to finally reap success.

and then I ask myself, how do i define success?
is success a four-billion dollar apartment or a Porsche? is success a passport filled with stamps or a Prada-filled closet? i guess success, to me, is not about the externals.
i would define success as that feeling you get when you see a smile on someone's face after you've helped them with something. success would also be achieving my goals that i have set for myself. my goals of community building in different parts of the world and the goal of being a kick-ass writer. success, to me, would also mean a handful of quality, fulfilling relationships where you know you can always fall back on the people you love.

as i finally come to a conclusion, i guess it's pretty simple for me. i was never born with a silver spoon and i don't think my life will get any easier or more luxurious than how it is right now. and i'm okay with that. i'm okay with doing a job that sharpens my skill as a communicator. i'm okay with saving up to travel the world on my own hard-earned cash. i'm okay with helping people, with learning to be humble and giving, to look out for the ones i love.

"Finally, graduates, our greatness has never, ever come from sitting back and feeling entitled to what we have.  It’s never come from folks who climb the ladder of success, or who happen to be born near the top and then pull that ladder up after themselves.  No, our greatness has always come from people who expect nothing and take nothing for granted -- folks who work hard for what they have then reach back and help others after them...

...I encountered students who had every advantage –- their parents paid their full tuition, they lived in beautiful campus dorms.  They had every material possession a college kid could want –- cars, computers, spending money. But when some of them got their first bad grade, they just fell apart.  They lost it, because they were ill-equipped to handle their first encounter with disappointment or falling short.

But, graduates, as you all know, life will put many obstacles in your path that are far worse than a bad grade.  You’ll have unreasonable bosses and difficult clients and patients.  You’ll experience illnesses and losses, crises and setbacks that will come out of nowhere and knock you off your feet.  But unlike so many other young people, you have already developed the resilience and the maturity that you need to pick yourself up and dust yourself off and keep moving through the pain, keep moving forward.  You have developed that muscle."

- Michelle Obama, excerpt from her speech at the City College of New York, 2016. 

Read the full speech here.