Hold On To These Memories, They Will Hold On To You

 New Year's Day by Taylor Swift keeps playing in my head. 

Don't read, the last page, 

I stay, when it's hard, when it's wrong, when we're making mistakes

I want your midnights

But I'll be cleaning bottles with you on New Year's Day

Hold on~

To these memories, they will hold on to you~


After that prelude, it's time to tell you how I've been feeling, not just what I've been doing. Recently, at a pickleball session, my friend Rose asked me, whether I love my job, because (from the outside), she said, it's looks like a dream job. It quickly forced me to think, as I have adopted a less-than-enthusiastic attitude and mild mannerism towards this job now. I replied noncommittally and illustrated a incident where a colleague couldn't take the heat from the boss and lost her mind for a little bit. And just a day later in another pickleball session (lol), my husband told a 25 year old boy who works corporate events that I am dealing with Pokemon, sparking a frenzy of questions and continuous conversation. 

If I had to rate my skills and capabilities, it's a perfect match. It's PR at its most basic and its core (researching, writing, and analyzing results/information gathering). Selecting journalists, sending their invitations, and following up, and them meeting them on the event day. Writing PRs, (rare) interview pitches, coverage reports, and emceeing occasionally, all those are skills that 25 year old me easily covered. Throw in influencers in the mix of attendees, and we're done. It's actually nothing that I can't do, except for being mindful of how big the scale of an event is, since I am not well versed in operations and logistics. If I had to sum it up in a poem:

Steady pay,
Trips... (whether I get picked), I don't get a say,
So let's not get carried away,
Lest I have my emotions swayed.
Bless it, I can do it!
If it's writing or speaking, I excel,
Planning, we go into details, 
Anyway, it's just research, no sales,   
At the end of the day,
It's kinda easy, hurray!

After two back-to-back classes tonight, I finally had an answer. The first class - a yoga session, started off deeply relaxing (and slowly built up to be challenging) and it ended so meaningfully with a quote "Don't let life slip away" (A reminder to stay present), and the second class- a mat pilates class, was so tough that it immediately put me in a flow state, trying to keep up, and at the end, feeling a little sore but refreshed, uplifted. 

The answer is, to create my own joy (when a situation or person isn't giving it to me). In this instance, I had been passed over for travel opportunities until I've lost count. However, in that "loss", I had to reconcile with what is real and present in my reality. And what I can plan and manifest in my reality. There was also a time that I was very hopeful and open-minded, reading into past life regressions and future life progressions, but seemingly not able to access the visions yet. (That's So Raven anyone?) And it was untrue, the one time, a year of the far future popped into my head, it was because of the hotel room number (lol!), 2050, or something like that. Therefore, I do believe in the power of the subconscious mind, because it pulls any images or ideas, that are not in the conscious mind, and make them appear in one way or another. 

It's like how when me and Liam decided we want to go to the U.S., we saw a bunch of American people showing up for a game at the pickleball court that we frequent every week. And when the paddles arrived at the office (for an event), I saw the words U.S. Pro first before anything else. But besides manifesting, what I concluded that could help create my own joy, was to have something to do that put me in a flow state. Like the way I am penning down my thoughts now, an hour has passed, and it felt rather quick.

Something not too hard that makes me not want to do it (or feel anxious), something not too easy that makes me feel bored and not as enjoyable, a just in-between state. So, here is my list: 

-Duolingo chess

-Scrabble

-Japanese conversations (learning the phrases first, and then voice act)

-Hiragana (first)

-Learn the complete sequence of classical pilates by Joseph Pilates

-Meditation

-Inner child colouring

-Psychology or philosophy on Coursera (or any course of interest)

-Read short pieces of news in Mandarin to test my linguistic ability

To counter the effect of subpar day, laugh with Liam and pet Belly. Kiss and cuddle even if we don't make love. And then do all the things that can take me into flow state. Even if it's just reading on my Kindle, it's better than aimlessly scrolling.