Pride vs Peace of Mind

One indicator of our maturity level is when we apologize to the other party even though it's not our fault because finally, we've come to the point where our peace of mind is more important than our pride.

One Year Since Graduation: Then and Now

Exactly one year ago, June 7, was the day I graduated from college. Since I consider that day as an important milestone in my life, I would like to ponder over the changes I've experienced since that day. 

June 7, 2014 - It was the day I felt this huge relief, excitement, and a tinge of nervousness. I was excited because finally, I was about to enter the real world. I remember telling myself that day that I would start looking for a job right away, since I didn't want to waste time bumming around. But there's this tiny feeling of doubt and nervousness. A small voice was asking me, "What if you couldn't find a job? Let alone soon?" But since it was a happy day, I just shrugged it off.

The graduation photo I chose for our yearbook

Unfortunately, I did have a hard time landing a job. At the first few rejections, I was still fine. I was still feeling kind of optimistic and just convinced myself to just push, push, and push. But around mid-November, I finally broke down. I was already getting seriously frustrated and scared to the point that I actually wanted to give up and take a break from job hunting. But honestly, I felt that the cry I had at that moment was a huge help. After crying my frustrations out, I felt a LOT better and  had a new perspective of my situation. I was like, "Okay, I'm having a hard time right now, but if I stop looking for a job and give up, then I really won't find a job at all. There's no other way but forward." Having that short pep talk with myself really pumped me up! It's like I gained back all the excitement, optimism, and determination I had during my graduation day. 

After that, I was called for a couple more interviews. I got accepted at both but I chose the second interview I attended. And now, I'm working for the first bank in the Philippines and one of the leaders in our banking industry: Bank of the Philippine Islands (BPI) as a Client Service Associate under the Corporate Banking Department. It really feels good earning and using your own money! I also give a portion of my salary to my mom to help with the family/house expenses, which is a big fulfillment for me. In the workplace, I'm also moved and inspired by how my superiors believe in me. They've said it several times and it's a huge boost to my confidence.

My first ever company ID!♥

Besides getting hired, another change I've seen in the 'me' now compared to the 'me' last year is in my maturity level. I'm the type of person who reflects every single day about what happened on that day and about myself as a whole. It's actually hard to put into words why but I honestly feel that I've become more mature. Maybe the whole happening helped: graduating, looking for a job, landing a job, dealing with work and colleagues. But besides those things, I would like to add one more event that happened to me (and my family) in the past year that helped me gain a higher level of maturity: dealing with my grandma's death. She died weeks before my graduation and I've been trying to move on since.

It was difficult getting over a loved one's death, finding a job, and getting rejected all at the same time. But it made me stronger. And here I am: a 22-year-old girl having her first job ever and just trying to lead the best life she could have. 

I think that gratitude played a huge part in this period in my life. I had my ups and downs but even in the downs, I was still grateful. And when one is grateful, the emotional baggage lessens and a new and better perspective is gained.

The #1 Benefit of Deactivating your Facebook account. And it’s more than just having less hours on your devices.

Around October last year, I decided to deactivate my Facebook account. I wanted to take a break. A break from the news feed I kept seeing whenever I log on to Facebook. I wasn’t really sure why but it felt like everything was too much. It was noisy and everything looked cluttered. Friends posting every minute, showing off, ranting, etc.

I needed a break.

I started to feel better the moment I clicked “Deactivate”. I swear, it was one of the right choices I’ve ever made. And the #1 benefit I was talking about in the title is this: deactivating your Facebook account actually helps you focus on yourself. Below are a couple of observations I got from my deactivation experience.

Firstly, deactivating your FB account eliminates the need or desire to log on it every time. No distractions. I observed that after leaving Facebook, I was able to do the things I needed and wanted to do. I was more productive.

Another observation is that my tendencies to compare myself and my situation with that of my friends greatly lessened. I’m not an envious person but when 90% of what you see on your news feed are posts and photos of your friends showing off the places they've been or the food they've tried, then sometimes it’s really inevitable to compare and get a little envious.

Now, I’m active on Facebook again. But I still deactivate from time to time. I noticed that I no longer feel the tendency to get a bit envious or irritated when my friends show off. Maybe it's just really nice to take some time off social media. For me, it gave me time to breathe and re-focus.

Thank You 2014, Let's Do This 2015!

What happened in my life in 2014:

• My grandmother passed away and I felt extreme guilt for not spending enough time with her during the past few years
• My older sister, whom I was closest to in this house/family, migrated to Canada and I've been feeling so lonely
• Tirelessly looked for a job for several months
• Cried when i was already scared and almost hopeless about my future

But the following also happened:

• I found a job (but I will only get to officially start next week) after pushing myself relentlessly all the time
• I became more mature
• I'm back to my strong and resilient self whom I somehow lost during the past few years
• I've learned to stop being so angry about almost everything
• and instead, I started reminding myself that there's a good purpose behind every happening
• I'm now more optimistic
• and happier
• My relationship with my mother is getting better too!
• My relationship with my whole family, actually
• Overall, I now see myself changing for the better :)

What I want to say is that there is HOPE. I'm not really proud to say this but I've had suicidal thoughts everyday for the past few years and was in a really dark place in my life. But I helped myself and accepted the help other people gave me, and here I am. I'm not saying that I'm 100% great and happy already, but I'm on my way there.

Let's never give up! :)

9 Rules that Guide My Decision-making. What's Yours?

As I've already mentioned in some of my previous posts, I'm currently reading The Happiness Project by Gretchen Rubin. There was a chapter that discussed how to improve one's Mindfulness, which according to the book is "the cultivation of conscious, nonjudgmental awareness"

Rubin shared her True Rules, a set of principles and beliefs that guides her whenever she has to make a decision and set priorities. After reading it, I was inspired to make my own list and this is what I came up with!

How about you? Do you have your own True Rules?

The Happiness Project Quote #2

3 Virtues You Need To Get Through A Slump

I was reading an article about traveling when this suddenly hit me: I want to move to another country where no one knows me, meet new people, and begin a new life. Unfortunately, that's not exactly possible right now due to personal reasons. Then I asked myself, "Why do I want this? Why do I want to start a new life in a place with unfamiliar faces?'. There was only one answer: I'm starting to get tired of my current situation. 

I won't say that I'm becoming totally hopeless because I think I'm still pretty optimistic and hopeful right now ;) However, I'm beginning to question myself, everything that has been happening to me, and why in the world they're happening to me. But thanks to the power of all the inspirational and self-help articles and books I've been reading since the past year, I've successfully pushed myself to become more resilient and positive. Yes I won't deny that I'm starting to feel down again, but compared to how I was before, I guess I'm able to pick myself up and move on more quickly now.

In addition to Resilience, this slump I'm experiencing reminded me to practice another virtue: Gratitude. Why do I want a new life in a new place with new people when I already got a life here and now? With people who both challenge me and help me? I just really have to be grateful with everything and everyone I have right now and make the most out of them! I know this is not easy to do, that's why we have to cultivate Gratitude daily in our own little ways. Making a collage or a list of the things you're grateful for are some ways to do this!

Also, I cannot let myself forget that there's a good reason for all this. As the famous saying goes, "Everything happens for a reason". Instead of questioning and doubting myself and everything else, I simply have to work hard despite the odds.

To sum everything up, my advice is to practice:

1. Resilience - be strong, push yourself

2. Gratitude - be grateful with who and what you have and make the most out of them

3. Optimism - always remember that there's a good reason for everything

I hope these virtues would help you when you feel like giving up or escaping from a problem :) 

How about you? Do you have any advice that you want to share? :)

5 Steps to Restore the Faith

Some of us may have come to the point where too many misfortunes were happening in our lives that we just decided to stop believing in God. In my case, my religiousness have started to waver when I was around third year college. All the aspects of my life just kept getting worse and I started to feel animosity towards God. I questioned Him about all the misfortunes I had and eventually, I began to doubt if there really was a God out there. So you see, it didn't just waver, my religiousness went down to 0. I stopped believing in God. I declared myself an Atheist and even had q&a sessions with my Atheist online friend to learn more about Atheism.

My religious past self used to believe that God won't give me problems that I can't bear and that He would always help me. I also believed that everything happens for a reason and behind every reason was Him. But the time came when all of these beliefs didn't make sense to me anymore. My thinking became more worldly.

But fortunately, I woke up from that state and decided that I'm going to believe again. I realized that not believing in God didn't improve my life and make me any happier. So how did I do it? First off let me tell you at this point that it's a long process, of course. Even up to now, I'm still not done. I'm still working on restoring my relationship with God. The following are the steps I came up with:

1. Decide whether you're really going to stop believing in Him OR you are just mad at Him.
   
2. If you feel that you're not happy with whatever your decision is, take a step back and look at everything, the whole situation. Then ask yourself, "Why am I not happy?". I
   n my case, I realized that I made the wrong move when I decided to quit Catholicism. I thought that doing that would finally help me feel better and happier. But dude was I wrong. Weeks turned into months and eventually, the truth came to me: I was just mad at Him. I was so mad that I convinced myself that He's not real, I denied His existence. I forced myself into Atheism thinking that that was the right thing for me to do given my circumstances. In answering the question above, you should be totally honest with yourself. It's better and more helpful than denying your feelings, questions, and thoughts. Once you find the answer, this question should come next, "What should I do to be happy?".
   
3. Realizing my big mistake, I started praying to Him right away. I asked for forgiveness and explained to Him everything: all my thoughts, feelings, and worries (though He knows all of them already). I also suggest to try to always talk to Him even if it's not exactly a prayer, you can talk to Him even in random moments throughout the day; express your thoughts and concerns and ask for help. To be honest, I think it's just like trying to reconcile with a close friend you had a fight with.

   
   
4. Go to Confession. I haven't done this yet because I'm still in the part where I'm trying to be comfortable with God again. But I will do it soon. This is advisable because once you do this, you would feel like you're a new person. This would help you leave your sins, guilt, and mistakes behind and start anew.
   
   
5. Go to Mass. I believe that this should be done ONLY after going to confession, because that's the right way, isn't it?

So those are the steps that I took, have been taking, and will take as someone who wants to go back to God after spending a part of her life as a non-believer. Though I want to restore my faith as soon as possible, I believe that this kind of thing should not be rushed. If you try to rush it, you would feel that it's wrong and it would just make you feel worse. I hope those steps would be helpful to a Catholic who's having doubts about staying in the religion or not.

The most striking thing I've learned from the 1-day Sales training I had last Saturday. Damn.

Curious and Concerned: Why Knowing the Difference Could Save You

I'm sure all of us have experienced someone asking us, 'Are you okay?'. However, we should be cautious whenever others ask us that, or any question along that line. Because not everyone who asks that is concerned, some are just curious.

There’s a thin line between those two. Concerned people really worry about you and your circumstances. They want to help you get out of your bad situation, they want you to do better, they want you to be well. While curious people on the other hand just ask you the question so that they would know more about you, but not exactly in a good way. They want to know how you are doing and what kind of situation you’re in so that they would have one more person to gossip about, so that they could talk about you behind your back. 

In life, it’s very important to know which ones are concerned and which ones are just curious. This is a very vital step in having a good life filled with good relationships. We have to be careful or else we would really have major trust issues and get hurt in return. And of course we don't want that.

One way to evade mistrusting is to get to know everyone around you.  Talk to them, know their reputation, observe them from a far. Once you think you're done, choose which ones to keep and which ones to avoid. Still having a hard time differentiating? Just trust your gut, your intuition. It won't fail you. There are things that cannot be guaranteed just by seeing and hearing, you also have to feel the things and people around you. 

The Happiness Project Quote #1

I recently posted a review about Gretchen Rubin's The Happiness Project here and I realized that a single review isn't enough to share with everyone how great this book really is. That's why from now on, I'm going to share my favorite quotes from the book in the form of photos. The book is really filled with inspirational quotes and I can't wait to share them with you. I hope you're looking forward to it! ♥

Surefire Way to Get Past the Moping Mode

I'm a very emotional person and though I have embraced this part of myself, I'll still admit that it is really exhausting at times. I easily get affected by negative words and happenings. Because of this, I often find myself moping. Or even worse, crying. A few months ago, I had a fight with my mom and I ended up locking myself in my room. I cried my eyes out for quite a long time, and then it hit me: I was actually wasting my time right at that moment. I was crying about the same damn thing and I realized that, "Hey, there are more important things to do!" I stopped crying, got out of my bed, and read a book. It made me feel a lot better.

Instead of crying or getting mad at the world, remind yourself about your goals. Do this repeatedly until you feel like they're already tattooed on your mind. This totally works for me. Whenever I feel the sting in my nose, I either start listing my goals again to motivate myself, or exercise because I want to lose weight, or  continue with the self-help book that I’m reading so I could learn a lot of things, or just continue looking for jobs so that I can start working immediately and earn my own money. Or maybe I could just finish a series I've been watching. No matter how shallow you think your goal is, it's still way more important than sulking. Remember that.

Life is too short to feel down and keep yourself that way. Pick yourself up and seize the day! 

Passion vs Practicality

People in general want to earn money by doing what they love. So usually, they pick a course in college that really interests them and would pave a good career path for them. But what if you chose the wrong course? Well that's what happened to me. So now I'm in a grueling situation.

I'm a fresh graduate who took up Marketing as her course and now currently looking for work. But actually, I already knew it wasn't for me when I had one of my first major subjects. I talked to my family about it and asked if I could shift to another course (Humanities) but I don't think they took me seriously. They laughed it off and just told me to suck it up since I'm already there. Oh well. So I did. Studying Marketing was enjoyable in a way but I now know in my heart that writing is what I really want to do. It's my passion. I want to be a magazine contributor or a good blogger. That's the future I want for myself. I also want to excel in marketing but I really don't think it's for me.

What I call this predicament I'm currently going through is Passion vs Practicality. Let's be real here, people would most likely choose marketing over writing as the more sustainable career path because it's a common belief that there's no guaranteed future for every one who wants to make writing their full-time career. But this stereotype wouldn't hold me back. As of now, my plan is to keep looking for a marketing job because I don't want to waste the past four years I spent studying it. But at the same time, I will also start working on my writing seriously so once I have good enough abilities and portfolio, I can start applying as a magazine contributor. This plan somehow makes me feel at ease. Yes I have conflicting  circumstances, having writing as my passion yet having Marketing as my degree; but that doesn't mean that I have to overthink and just make myself trapped in this current point in my life. We just got to move forward.