07 Aug
I am not a vegetarian or vegan, nor do I abstain from alcohol, coffee or sugar. I am most likely gluten-full, am able to consume peanuts and eat all kinds of seafood including the occasional shellfish. Dairy products will remain being part of my diet so long as I desire to stay connected with my mid-western American relatives from a few generations ago: my only known roots. I got rid of asthma as I child during the year I spent in Ireland so you see, I am a very adaptable human being.
My only intolerance does not stem from mere physical substances, but rather from the mental strain of a dear old friend of mine, called stress. Stress is a funny little thing to which at first glance can be discarded as bad. For example, if we were playing a card game, then I would have the urge to place in the discard pile, in hopes for a better, more reassuring hand. Yes, and I have done this many times before- rid my hands of all stress but to no avail as a life without stress is a life without care. I could passionately love something, utterly loathe something, or become fantastically stressed out about something but it ultimately means all the same thing: I care. When stress leaves the equation- I lose the ability to take action. So you’re in love? Do something about it. So you hate your situation? Change it. So you’re stressed out? Invite action. You can’t play the game without any cards.
Of course the idea that stress is bad didn’t just come out of nowhere. Stress can be very bad if you don’t use it properly. For instance, sometimes I find myself caring way too much, to the point of paralysis. That’s where procrastination comes in. The thing I fear most, I cannot look in the face. I avoid it as much as possible and end up all alone in my bed. But does this help? No, because the stress will persist. Until you run away completely or deal with it, the stress will persist, getting stronger with each step. Running away is just a temporary means of escape because soon I’ll run into another stressful situation. Let’s not become Western doctors prescribing medication to alleviate symptoms. Let’s treat the cause.
Look the thing you fear in the face and start laughing extremely hard at this ridiculous “threat.” Then begin dancing around it like this is your favorite thing to do in the world. Lose all seriousness and watch it succumb to your seductive eyes. Most importantly, do SOMETHING and don’t care too much about the final outcome. You’ll win every time.
29 Jul
I know I haven’t written in a long time. Maybe because I’ve had nothing to say, or that I didn’t want to end up staring at a screen longer then I had to after a long day of work. Probably the main reason is because at night I just really don’t want to think anymore. With my brain spinning around at work, busily making decisions, seeking out strategies, cautiously contemplating over how to do something that I’ve never done before, really well. It’s a constant struggle to try and I yet I find myself keep coming back the next morning.
Why though- what is my motivation, to be great? I guess I want to know I’ve made an impact. I want to see some kind of results. But life becomes a constant white noise with everyone doing his own thing. Everyone is on Twitter tweeting, who’s reading? Well I am. Kind of. I’m actually reading an entire book about this social media “phenomenon.” How pathetic is that? And yet J.P Morgan was the company distributing the book. Who’s to say they are wrong? It’s all a bunch of white noise if everyone keeps talking and no one starts listening. To make an impact- can you really do it alone? An acquaintance of mine asked if I was still writing, and I apologetically had to say no. It’s like a guilty little secret, a task I did not do. I made my bed when my mom was in town but she doesn’t see it messy.
I am looking for my top value- a personal mission in life. I want to do something great but don’t know what it will be. That’s the sad tale of the privileged. There are too many damn opportunities in America. Life was easier before QFC’s (supermarkets with 7 brands of canned chili). It’s a lot more fun to write in “free style.” They say you really found a great career when you hit the “flow” and forget about time. How much time before we get there? I want to find a way to stop being so stressed, while still living in the real world (monks and gurus not included). I want to discover an industry where it’s not all about who you know, but what you can do. I want to share my secrets with others.
18 Jun
I like the idea of being a concierge, because their value is in their word. Being a concierge is about maintaining credibility, and I can’t think of another industry where truth holds more of an importance. I’m sure public relations professionals, sales execs or even consultants don’t flat out lie (or they might be out of job) but they do represent the truth in a way that makes them look good. I think of my high school statistics class- where I was able to get data to look any sort of way: skewed to the left, moved to the right, inverse proportions, obtuse angles, stars and jellyfish if you wanted. In other words, truth is my face without make-up. I’m not lying with make-up on, but it can certainly hide all the shadows.
The look of honesty.
The difference between a concierge and a sales rep is the way they are measured for success. A concierge is successful if recommendations match up to experience. A sales rep is successful by the number of accounts sold. Of course with a good leader- good values are emphasized. Before the economical recession, I was told that anything was possible.
06 May
I used to be nostalgic, but now I can’t remember. What to miss? There was the time I felt embarrassed coming to the wrong mother in a straw hat, reading by the pool. She probably doesn’t even remember me, the accidental mother. Wondering about the moments I forgot which affected strangers for life. Hoping they will write it down, someday. I was told not worry if this is boring you, because it’s for me to pass the time on.
20 Mar
My sophomore year of college I was anemic, which led me to get chronic strep throat. I am pretty tolerable of my conditions so I was sick for over 3 months before going to the doctor. I noticed my glands were always tender and swollen and that I had a terribly low amount of energy- to the point where socializing with friends was hard work. It had changed my personality, the person I had become I didn’t know. A conservationist for energy, a hibernating bear. The defining moment when I knew I had to do something was after an hour-long lecture when I had to sit down and rest in the school’s coffee shop to muster up enough energy and walk home. I couldn’t even scrounge up enough energy to walk a ten-minute distance! The kinds of people who can relate are either old and dying or about the hit the 300 pound mark. I didn’t fit into either one of these categories! I knew I had to get help.
My first doctor checked for strep throat, but I came up negative because apparently she only checked for a strain that is the most common and least bearable. My second attempt, I turned to a homeopathic doctor, who I highly respected and feared because he was the kind of person who would just look at me and tears would swell up in my eyes. It was like he could see everything about me, he could see what was going on inside. It was uncomfortable but necessary. He gave me an analogy that I will never forget: if you put a toad in boiling hot water, he will jump right out. But if you put a frog in lukewarm water, raising the temperature ever so slightly until it starts to boil, that frog will fail to notice and die. I hadn’t noticed my gradual rising temperatures. It takes months for iron reserves to get back into the body and when I was finally feeling more energized I couldn’t believe how long I lived like that, without energy.
The thing is though, I had to first recognize the problem, and then I had to decide to get better. I had to decide to get better, and sick or not, that’s what I try to do every single day.
16 Mar
I have this memory from my freshmen year of college where I’m sitting on the steps of my dorm on the 6th floor. It was the kind of stairwell that was connected to the inside but felt like it was on the outside- like how they are in a parking garage. I was alone listening to Elliot Smith on my MP3 player and jotting down random thoughts in my head. This memory is so vivid, yet nothing really monumental happened. Perhaps it was the feeling I had that causes me to remember it so well. I liked the industrial feeling of those stairs. It’s funny because nowadays I would probably just call it dirty. I had a phobia of elevators up until that year I lived on the 6th floor. It was so bad I cried all the way up the Eiffel Tower in my father’s arms. I conquered my fear out of sheer laziness. I’m ok with elevators now, but my policy is, the cleaner the better.
Being an indecisive person in high school, multiple-choice tests always threw me off. I did however find it to be quite amusing once I had completed them because the varying shades of gray attested to my levels of certainty. For example, the questions I wasn’t so sure on, I would fill out the bubble with hesitancy, making a light grayish dot. But when I was certain that number 13 was C, I pressed that pencil down so damn hard my fingers became sore. I would turn the following answers in once the bell rang: Light gray, black, medium gray, light gray, black, black, blank. I suppose if teachers really wanted to fine tune their teaching skills, they should study the ranges of gray on their multiple choice tests.
I’m trying out this new thing where I’m supposed to be focusing on the bigger picture. Keep your eye on the goal- you know that sort of thing. I needn’t tie myself up with mere trivial things. People have way more control over themselves than they think. I’d like to turn in a test with all black dots one day.
02 Mar
Advice to the unemployed: act like you already have a job. Get out of bed at a decent hour. Don’t watch TV during the day. Proceed as if you were working for yourself. Perform as if you already have the thing you want, and you will reap the benefits. Think in terms of progress and goals. You may just realize that you like being productive. My 87 year-old grandpa just had a hip replacement and two days later he was walking with a cane. Now that’s incredible. If he can make real progress, so can you.
Olympic gold medalist Kim Yu-Na is 19. Last year Forbes Korea named her the No. 1 celebrity in South Korea based on professionalism, popularity, income and influence. One week after having won a gold medal, Yu-Na plans on returning back to practice to prepare for the upcoming World Championships in Turin, Italy. Now that’s devotion. An elderly man walked while a teenager won an Olympic gold medal. Think about what people in their 20’s could do.
Part of my job in being unemployed is holding informational interviews with as many successful people as I can. I’ve learned that successful people share a lot of similar qualities, like optimism, persistence and thinking outside of themselves. Today I spoke with my grandpa on the phone and you know what he said? He was thinking about me. While adjusting to a new body part and attending rigorous physical therapy classes he is thinking about somebody other than himself.
I have a new theme for Rice On the Hill called “Telling it like it is.” Hope you enjoy.
28 Feb
The bars are getting old and I’m in need of a new hobby. Preferably sober. It’s disturbing that I can’t think of a single thing to do on a Friday or Saturday night other than going out to bars. It’s because all my friends will be doing the same thing. As long as we’re in our mid-twenties going out is pretty much socially accepted.
The one thing you can count on when unemployed during a rehabilitating economy are sales recruiters contacting you to become one of their sales representatives. I am not interested in selling. Anyone looking for marketing jobs on Craigslist, CareerBuilder or Monster should be critical of what the company actually wants. That goes for all internships too because you may just end up stuffing envelopes. That doesn’t mean you shouldn’t do more. Another option would be to transform the position you’ve been handed and do more than what’s expected.
26 Feb
People like to split the world into halves. We are good or bad, wrong or right, employed or unemployed. When we put things in categories it simplifies things. It sums up our complicated universe into tight little Ziploc bags. I like categorizing because I get a good feeling when things are tucked neatly into their place. Like when I tie my shoes before a run and yank the two bows apart, real tight- it’s that pleasurable feeling I get right after they are firmly set into place. I get to look down and say, “Hey shoes, you are on my feet extremely well today.”
I walked into the newly remodeled Starbucks in University Village and immediately found myself amongst total chaos. It just so happens that a few minutes before I arrived, a Coach USA bus pulled up letting out a considerable number of architects to observe the Starbucks new design. It was a scene taken right out of Disneyland, with tourists taking pictures, walking excitedly through the store and smiling for just about anyone within sight. I could tell the architects from the customers by their bright green lanyards worn loosely around their necks. After ordering a coffee, I squeezed into the only open table, which was right smack in the middle of the overly crowded store. Usually I would have been quite annoyed from being immersed in this zoo-like environment, but today I felt something different. I missed having a job. I missed the fast paced environment because it woke up all of my senses from the outside in.
Categorizing is essential to make sense of the world, but what we need sometimes is a little bit of chaos to keep us alive.
10 Feb
Sitting on my small, IKEA desk I have an overgrown Golden Pothos plant with long tendrils cascading down the sides of my black MacBook. I like this juxtaposition because it reminds me that nature can neutralize technology’s negative effects. When I think of technology I think of Seattleites who code all day long and describe basic social etiquette as re-tweeting a colleagues point-of-view. I think of cubicles, fluorescent lighting and accepting schedule +’s on Microsoft Outlook. Other times I simply think in binary terms, “010101110001.”
When I was a bit younger I was more like a Golden Pothos, carefree and fun. I was approachable and refreshing, allowing people to breathe. I barely needed tending to because I was so outrageously self-reliant and alive. I was sensitive and would react to external stimuli, such as extending my leaves to face the sun. It slowly happened, my transformation from a free-spirited soul to an uptight bitch. How though, had it happened and what could I possibly do to return to my natural state? I had become the computer, a tool that lacked self-awareness and focused purely on pleasing its users. I was strictly an input-output system that neglected any sort of emotion, fearing it would only get in the way of progress. I thought showing sensitivity was weak and instead imitated machinery for recognition and approval.
But when you try so hard, it just doesn’t work. My scheme to be amazing had fundamentally failed. Instead, I had lost myself. Relying on recognition or approval from others turned out to be a pretty unsustainable source of energy because I could not always count on it. In fact, I could rarely ever count on it. I would even suspect the more you need approval, the less others are willing to give it to you. I would rather do the best I can do, accept it, and move on. Like a Golden Pothos, I am sensitive to my environment. As a human, I value my emotions and trust that they, similar to the sun, will provide some kind of light.
