"What a shame": is that your life? Why you need to adopt a "change-or-die" mentality

I woke up on a Sunday in early August 2013 and laid in bed for two hours, tangled in the sheets, staring at the ceiling while the fog of San Francisco rolled by my bay window, asking myself for the millionth time, "can I really do it?"  That's how life felt at the time, actually: I felt my life was just steadily passing by and all my goals in life were becoming clouded.  I was drifting away from my authentic self and saw that person -- soon to be a ghost -- peering at the real me through that window, shaking her head, shaking her head.

What a shame.

Throughout the next few weeks, I felt the presence of that person in every situation of my, truth-be-told, charmed life: steady and challenging corporate job, awesome apartment in San Francisco, an abundance of the best friends anyone could ask for, good health.

But as I moved through the motions of everyday life -- getting coffee to 'break up my day' in that cubicle life, happy hour, exercising -- I knew I was feigning happiness and well, running from the gnawing feeling inside me.

That person kept whispering to me as I conversed with coworkers, with friends: "This isn't you.  Not yet.  You haven't lived out the next chapter of your story yet."


Maya Angelou once said, "there is no greater agony than bearing an untold story inside of you", and that untold story in my life was a burning desire to travel long-term to South America and to work in a cause-related field.  I'd wanted to do this for six years (six years!) -- I can even go back to journals in college where I documented this -- but had chosen to suppress them as I chose to live out a more conventional, safe life (which I am not not-grateful for!).  I still took what others might see as risks, but looking back, I realized I had settled to make decisions that were, to me, 'the next best compromise.'

All of those compromises finally caught up to me: little fragments that had accumulated and snowballed into a cancer I could no longer ignore.  That hypothetical person's voice grew from a whisper to a shout; she dominated my conversations with others and overpowered the old thoughts in my head.  I became obsessed, really obsessed, with the idea of quitting my job to travel and to make the plunge to another field.

I talked about it so much that it became real.   "I want to go to South America" became "I need to go to South America" became "I am going to South America."

There was no other option but to make it happen.

I became sick of hearing myself talk through this hypothetical person than be the person.  This reminds me of when people say, "I am living vicariously through you."  Yay, but no.  We need to live vicariously through ourselves.  

I knew I had to start being about it rather than just talking about it.  Seriously, the feeling was so strong that I was positive I had never been more sure of anything in my entire life.

I had a moment where I snapped, and in a span of a very quick few weeks, I quit my job, soon moved out, and used the money that I had been saving -- yes, I had been saving for years for this -- to embark on a three month solo journey in South America.  No job secured after, but I didn't care. 

To not fulfill this dream of mine was the equivalent of shutting the door in the face of a loved one who came to me, asking for help.  The dream was a part of me.  I had poured my heart's blood, nights waking up in a sweat, and tears into it.  If I denied it, I would have killed a part of my soul.

"Killed your soul."  Cut the drama, right?  Whatever.  Life, for people who are passionate to live it, is "either a daring adventure or nothing at all", as Helen Keller put it.  Life IS a drama.  Our lives are stories that we have to write ourselves.


So I went on my solo trip.  December 2013 - March 2014.  It was the trip of a lifetime, and I have always hesitated to use such a grandiose statement.  Bolivia, Brazil, Argentina.  Memories, people, places that will forever be woven into every ounce of the soul that was once at danger of being lost.  It really changed my life.

Do you know what happened when I came back?

I was rejuvenated, enamored with humanity, and curious yet again, yes, but amazingly, everything else lined up in perfect, perfect timing.  Job offers in the field I wanted all along, within days of each other.  I promise, when you decide on something, the universe WILL conspire to make it happen.  It has happened to me.

Change is no longer on the horizon; it has passed and it is here to stay.

"Embrace the Fall."  Me at Iguassu Falls (Brazil), January 2014.

******

"Change-or-die" is the mentality I had to pull myself out of a situation that I was content with, but not full-on enamored with.  And you should be enamored with the life you're living, because why not?  You deserve to live out your dreams.  Fear is what holds us back -- I had a fear of this unknown for six years -- but once you break through it, confront it, and let the door hit it on its way out, I am telling you, you will open up so much more room for confidence and ideas and excitement to manifest within you.

Is there something you've always wanted to do?  Take the step now, even if it's just a small one, to do it.  Heck, the last thing I wanted to do was to look back on my past and label it a wasted youth: "what a shame" that I didn't live up to my potential.  Hell no.  Too many people let life happen to them; you have to take control and make things happen for yourself.

Who wants to just exist?  If you want to truly live but feel like you're just floating, waiting for the next best compromise, snap out of it.

Change or let your soul die.  It's your choice.  When all your cards are on the table like that, you best bet you will light the fire and make it happen.

How Quitting my Job and Chronic Dissatisfaction Helped me Find Happiness

One of my most favorite scenes in a movie is from 'Vicky Cristina Barcelona', when Penelope Cruz, with her perfectly disheveled hair, passionately accuses Scarlett Johansson of having “chronic dissatisfaction”: “Chronic dissatisfaction, that’s what you have. Chronic dissatisfaction.”

I like that scene because she's talking to me, figuratively. I also imagine that if Penelope Cruz were talking to me, literally, I would be pretty pleased with that.

All jokes aside, I just turned 25 and I quit my job about a month ago. This was my third job in a reputable sector, where I had spent a few years in tech marketing, then half a year in automotive marketing in LA then SF. I got to host shwanky parties at Coachella and run the show at SuperBowl and shake Joe Montana's hand – but quickly, because of course I had to run off to meet 'the people' at The Rolling Stone magazine for some meeting. It sounds so, terribly LA cool.

The truth of the matter was that all of this wasn't for me, so much so that I lost 10 lbs during one stint and even considered work-related counseling. If you know me, breaking down like this is the antithesis of me: I can handle a lot, learn quickly, perform well, shoulder others' burdens, and run my life a million-miles-a-minute. My packed calendars from high school and the University of Southern California are so colorful that I get cross-eyed looking at them now. My roommate during this particular dark period called me “the iBanker boyfriend that she never had” because I was gone all the time and had a devoid look in my eyes. I honestly even considered trying smoking to ease my stress. Please keep in mind that I can barely handle second-hand smoke in Vegas.

All of this is funny now.

The reason for the stress was more than the hours and what I often deemed unimportant stress; it was as simple as the fact that I was not listening to my heart and yet, kept making career decisions that were totally against my “calling” in life. As an extremely cause-driven, bleeding-heart type-of-girl who posts inspiration quotes on her mirror, I was disgusted with myself for spending 80-94% of my day exerting energy and brainpower on things that didn't matter to me. But I masochistically kept at it because the path was safe, familiar. I also am not the type of person who knew at a young age that I wanted to “be” a designated profession, so I couldn't quite pinpoint what that exact next step would be. However, I kept thinking that I could grow to like something, or that moving to a new city and having new adventures, could help me cope. It didn't.

For three years, I lived in a parallel mindset: I lived a “real self” but had an “ideal self” whose paths I thought could never intersect. Despite the confidence I exuded, I felt completely inauthentic. If my heart was the penny in the pool, I wasn't even swimming in the water to try to find it; I was standing at the edge of the pool, staring at my reflection and feeling trepidation about how cold the water would feel.

One foggy Sunday in SF, about eight months after I had moved there, I woke up at 8am on a Sunday and just stared at my ceiling for two hours. It was a moment I will never forget because this was the moment that I became sick of myself. I was sick of hearing myself complain and for making decisions without truly assessing their implications. I was sick of feeling unhappy. I wanted myself to shut up, to start “being about it” rather than “talking about it.” If I was going to be away from my family but not fervently chasing a dream or listening to my heart or whatever, then I saw no point in me doing what I was doing just because “I need to.”

A word about risk: moving to a new city is, to many, a big risk, but I found this to be 'the next big compromise' for me. After sharing my journey with many, I'm finding that not many people think like this; especially at my age, they want to start establishing roots and building a comfortable life. I, on the other hand, start feeling extremely suffocated once I feel myself settling somewhere. Visualizing a future in the corporate world with fun romps around SF, which is an insane and insanely fun city, suffocated me. Depending on your outlook on life, I either have commitment issues or I am just a free spirit. Your call. Either way, I would not have traded my experience in SF for anything. That city changed my life by providing mental clarity through the fog.

From that moment on, I embraced risk and became my own personal coach. It took months for me to gather the courage to tell myself that I could leave my job and take a leap into the unknown. Various blogs and aphorisms helped me tremendously with this period of transition:

• Brazen Careerist's article, “How to Succeed as a Multi-Passionate Careerist” 
• The quote by Maya Angelou, “There is no greater agony than the untold story inside of you.”
• The blog, “Live in the Grey”
• The quote, “If you don't like where you are, change it. You are not a tree.”
• My friend Ellen Huerta's article, “Why I Left Google"

I was on a path to reclaiming my life, and when I finally pulled the trigger on my job and set dates for moving out, I cannot begin to tell you the physical and emotional changes my body underwent. I literally started dreaming again because the imagination part of my brain was unlocked. I actually had fewer urges to write because my journal had always been a source for me to paint my “ideal self”. I had finally taken the step to bring those pages to life. A coworker approached me once and said I was looking radiant. Other than the fact that I had just highlighted my hair, I do think it's because I was smiling more.

My plan now is to go abroad, volunteer, and perhaps find full-time work in a sector that captures my heart. I have saved up my own money to support these endeavors but also know I am fortunate to have an incredible family and friend support network who have housed and supported me through this process. I completely get that I am extremely fortunate to even have this opportunity to have a chance to re-align my career and not have to worry about health or financial issues – the thing is with life though, is that you never know what's going to happen, hence why I am seizing the day. Carpe Diem. My mindset has done a complete 180; rather than being fearful and asking “what if”, I feel more fearless and see this world as a place of endless opportunities that are at the fingertips of so many people who have the tools to better the world and better themselves.

It feels so, so good to be lost in the right direction. More importantly, it feels good to embrace this ideology and not force myself into the wrong direction. The concept of choice is not often taken seriously, but we must prepare ourselves for our choices and dig deep to know why we're doing what we're doing. I'm enjoying the journey, the present moment, and not caring what others think because we are all on our own paths. I have faith that all the dots will connect and that my choices will surmount to something great. Fears and success are nothing but a state of mind. I may be called crazy or naïve, but I would rather embrace the unknown and give my heart a go rather than constantly living in a stagnant, half-dead state of mind. Too many people let life just happen to them and I refuse to be like that. Life is fun. Life is an adventure. Life is a wild ride. Start driving.

As for “Chronic Dissatisfaction”, Karl Lagerfield once put it this way: “I live in a state of permanent dissatisfaction. I think it's the key to doing things well.”

2012 in Review

It was a year of change - the most I had ever had in my life thus far.  It was a year that, down the road, I'll be able to pin-point as the beginning of something new; of my quest to become, well, me.  It was 2012, and it's ending in a day.

Holidays this year seemed to have a greater impact on me this year.  I'm sure the increase in gratitude toward my family, friends, and current situation, as well as my acknowledgement of the amazing pouring of blessings that rain down on me every day by me simply living, is due to the amount of changes I went through this year and also the recent Sandy Hook tragedy.  May those angels rest in peace.

It's funny how tragedy and death always put life into perspective; how the leaving of another's soul causes us to make the selfish - but necessary due to its reflective nature - examinations of our own souls.  Though I underwent many life changes this year, Sandy Hook will always be a 2012 marker for me; the lessons I took away from the anguishing story are so on par with everything else I learned this year from all my changes.

IMPORTANCE OF FAMILY.  This was my biggest lesson this year.  You never know when life will be taken from you.  I went through "hard times" this year, emotionally, due to some career stress (truly #firstworldproblems, if I am being honest, for having woes within a job is a "good problem" to have), and I leaned on my parents so, so hard.  I think the job stress I went through was for me to emerge on the other side with a greater appreciation for them.  I've always loved them, of course, but going through what was one of my more difficult periods, with them by my side, meant the world to me.  I'm so insanely fortunate to have two parents who, despite our quirks and quips, love me unconditionally.  This lesson has made me re-examine how I approach companionship in my life.
 
CARE WHEN IT MATTERS.  Don't sweat the small stuff, or don't sweat when you don't actually care.  Does that make sense?  Again, life is too short to dwell.  We'll make mistakes, we'll have to deal with the consequences.  I did a lot of things this year that, in my heart, I didn't think through 1000%.  I didn't know what the end goal or outcome would be, but I did it, expounded probably too much of my own energy, got worn down, bounced back up.  January to May of this year were the most hellish of my life; now, I'm happier than ever.  I've learned that we can't control or know everything now, so when faced with decision-making time, make one, don't turn back, and deal with it if and when any issues arise.  No use wasting energy on things that don't happen.

GET ONE GEAR TURNING.  My friend told me her Mom's anecdote on life: we have many gears that we need to turn: a career gear, a romantic relationship gear, a family gear, a friend gear, a personal gear, etc. etc.  It's not just hard -- it's nearly impossible -- to get more than one or two gears turning at the same pace at once.  If you can get one gear turning, consider yourself blessed.  Work hard to get that gear turning as quickly as possible, and appreciate that gear as being the positive force in your life.


PATIENCE FOR THE PEOPLE WHO MATTER.  Going back to the lesson on family, I learned patience.  It's easiest to get upset with the people who are closest to you, and ironically, these people matter most.  So I learned to be patient.  Similarly, I learned to be patience with the person who matters most to me: myself.  As a member of Gen Y, I expect success instantaneously.  I work very hard, sure, but beat myself up over where I was going in life, what I had or had not accomplished, etc.  But maybe that's the beauty of my story: my journey is one of self-creation; there's not a Point A, Point B to my beginning and end of success.  When consoling me one day through my quarter-life crisis, my Dad used Daw Aung Saan Suu Kyi as an example: she had to be under house arrest for 12 years before really getting recognized acclaim from Burma.  Now, how should I expect success tomorrow if she, one of my heroes, clearly had to wait?

HAVE SOME FUN EVERY DAY.  Sometimes I can be very serious and pensive.  When I'm in a moment of introspection, or when I'm focused at a task at work especially, or home, I get very serious, seemingly tune others out, and put a game face on.  I'm learning to see the humor in these situations now, and am trying to laugh more at the little things.  It helps that my roommate is probably one of the wittiest (and sweetest, kindest, most wonderful person) women I know, so it's rubbing off one me!

"MY ONE FOR TODAY".  This was a brief project of mine this year, to tumblr one thing I learned or was gracious for that day.  I was so easily getting sucked into negative thought as I wallowed about how lost I seemingly was - but I pulled myself out by remembering that there's always beauty in the day.  There's always a lesson.  Plus, my "problems" are very, very insignificant compared to other real problems in the world.  I'm very blessed.

When looking back at 2012, I see a year where I took a job half-heartedly, got my energy zapped, changed my persona in a negative and toxic way, made a quick decision to move cities with a half-secured plan, and bounced back to enjoy life again.  To live out my goal to visit one new place a year, I visited many US cities for work: worked Superbowl in Indianapolis, IN, saw Detroit, visited Kansas and Missouri; then toured Eugene and Portland, OR and Seattle, WA with college friends.  Pretty good, for also exploring my new home city! 

I learned that you can fall in love with a city, and the feeling can be as real as falling in love with a person.  I sincerely love San Francisco.  It's magical, and the friends I've made up here, the memories I'll forever keep, are for the books.  

It was a year when I - the girl who was always seen as independent by others - finally felt independent for myself.  2012 marked the beginning of me becoming a true me.  I had no idea I'd be where I am now, but I'm so grateful for my life and everyone in it.  2013 will be great. 

Blessings to all.

50 Quotes on San Francisco

Taken from someone else.

1. One day if I go to heaven…I’ll look around and say “It ain’t bad, but it ain’t San Francisco”. (Herb Caen)
2. San Francisco has only one drawback - ’tis hard to leave. (Rudyard Kipling)
3. You know what it is? (It) is a golden handcuff with the key thrown away. (John Steinbeck)
4. San Franciscans are very proud of their city, and they should be.  It’s the most beautiful place in the world.  (Robert Redford)
5. If you’re alive, you can’t be bored in San Francisco.  If you’re not alive, San Francisco will bring you to life.  (William Saroyan)
6. Of all cities in the United States I have seen, San Francisco is the most beautiful.  (Nikita Kruschev)
7. I prefer a wet San Francisco to a dry Manhattan. (Larry Geraldi)
8. The cool, grey city of love. (George Sterling)
9. I never dreamed I’d like any city as well as London.  San Francisco is exciting, moody, exhilarating.  I even love the muted fogs.  (Julie Christie)
10. I don’t know of any other city where you can walk through so many culturally diverse neighbourhoods, and you’re never out of sight of the wild hills.  Nature is very close here.  (Gary Snyder)
11. San Francisco is 49 square miles surrounded by reality.  (Paul Kantner)
12. The ultimate (travel destination) for me would be one perfect day in San Francisco.  It’s a perfect 72 degrees, clear, the sky bright blue.  I’d start down at Fisherman’s Wharf with someone I really like and end with a romantic dinner and a ride over the Golden Gate Bridge.  There’s no city like it anywhere.  And, if I could be there with the girl of my dreams, that would be the ultimate.  (Larry King)
13. Leaving San Francisco is like saying goodbye to an old sweetheart.  You want to linger as long as possible.  (Walter Kronkite)
14. There’s no question this is where I want to live.  Never has been.  (Robin Williams)
15. San Francisco is one of my favourite cities in the world…I would probably rank it at the top or near the top.  It’s small but photogenic and has layers…You never have problems finding great angles that people have never done.  (Ang Lee)
16. When you get tired of walking around in San Francisco, you can always lean against it.  (unknown)
17. You wouldn’t think such a place as San Francisco could exist.  The wonderful sunlight here, the hills, the great bridges, the Pacific at your shoes.  Beautiful Chinatown.  Every race in the world.  The sardine fleets sailing out.  The little cable-cars whizzing down The City hills….And all the people are open and friendly.  (Dylan Thomas)
18. In all my travels I have never seen the hospitality of San Francisco equalled anywhere in the world.  (Conrad Hilton)
19. Your city is remarkable not only for its beauty.  It is also, of all the cities in the United States, the one whose name, the world over, conjures up the most visions and more than any other city incites one to dream.  (Georges Pompidou)
20. It is a good thing the early settlers landed on the East Coast; if they’d landed in San Francisco first, the rest of the country would still be uninhabited.  (Herbert Mye)
21. What fetched me instantly (and thousands of other newcomers with me) was the subtle but unmistakeable sense of escape from the United States.  (H.L. Mencken)
22. The City of San Francisco (the metropolis of the State) considering its age, is by long odds the most wonderful city on the face of the earth.  (G.W. Sullivan)
23. You have in San Francisco this magnificent Civic Center crowned by a City Hall which I have never seen anywhere equalled.  (Joseph Strauss)
24. Every man should be allowed to love two cities, his own and San Francisco.  (Gene Fowler)
25. Of all American cities of whatever size the most friendly on preliminary inspection, and on further acquaintance the most likable. The happiest-hearted, the gayest, the most care-free city on this continent.  (Irwin S. Cobb)
26. No city invites the heart to come to life as San Francisco does.  Arrival in San Francisco is an experience in living.  (William Saroyan)
27. God took the beauty of the Bay of Naples, the Valley of the Nile, the Swiss Alps, the Hudson River Valley, rolled them into one and made San Francisco Bay.  (Fiorello La Guardia)
28. I always see about six scuffles a night when I come to San Francisco.  That’s one of the town’s charms.  (Erroll Flynn)
29. San Francisco! – one of my two favorite cities.  There is more grace per square foot in San Francisco than any place on earth!  (Bishop Fulton J. Sheen)
30. I don’t think San Francisco needs defending.  I never meet anyone who doesn’t love the place, Americans or others.  (Doris Lessing)
31. San Francisco is Beautiful People wearing a bracelet of bridges.  (Hal Lipset)
32. San Francisco is the greatest…the hills…fabulous food…most beautiful and civilised people.  (Duke and Duchess of Bedford)
33. I love San Francisco.  It would be a perfect place for a honeymoon.  (Kim Novak)
34. Now there’s a grown-up swinging town.  (Frank Sinatra)
35. I don’t like San Francisco.  I love it!  (Dorothy Lamour)
36. Two days in this city is worth two months in New York.  (Robert Menzies)
37. I’m just mad for San Francisco.  It is like London and Paris stacked on top of each other.  (Twiggy)
38. San Francisco is poetry.  Even the hills rhyme.  (Pat Montandon)
39. I love this city.  If I am elected, I’ll move the White House to San Francisco. Everybody’s so friendly.  (Robert Kennedy)
40. I like the fog that creeps over the whole city every night about five, and the warm protective feeling it gives…and lights of San Francisco at night, the fog horn, the bay at dusk and the little flower stands where spring flowers appear before anywhere else in the country…But, most of all, I like the view of the ocean from the Cliff House.  (Irene Dunne)
41.  We’re crazy about this city.  First time we came here, we walked the streets all day – all over town – and nobody hassled us.  People smiled, friendly-like, and we knew we could live here……Los Angeles? That’s just a big parking lot where you buy a hamburger for a trip to San Francisco……And the beautiful old houses and the strange light.  We’ve never been in a city with light like this.  We sit in our hotel room for hours, watching the fog come in, the light change.  (John Lennon and Yoko Ono)
42.  San Francisco is a city with the assets of a metropolis without the disadvantages of size and industry.  (Jack Kenny)
43. San Francisco is one of the great cultural plateaus in the world….one of the really urbane communities in the United States…one of the truly cosmopolitan places – and for many, many years, it has always had a warm welcome for human beings from all over the world.  (Duke Ellington)
44. No visit to the United States would be complete without San Francisco – this beautiful city, center of the West, very well known for its beauty and the place where the United Nations was born.  (Queen Sirikit of Thailand)
45. To a traveler paying his first visit, it has the interest of a new planet.  It ignores the meteorological laws which govern the rest of the world.  (Fitz Hugh Ludlow)
46. Cities are like gentlemen, they are born, not made.  You are either a city, or you are not, size has nothing to do with it.  I bet San Francisco was a city from the very first time it had a dozen settlers.  New York is “Yokel”, but San Francisco is “City at Heart”.  (Will Rogers)
47. This is the first place in the United States where I sang, and I like San Francisco better than any other city in the world.  I love no city more than this one.  Where else could I sing outdoors on Christmas Eve?  (Luisa Tetrazzini)
48. San Francisco is  a city where people are never more abroad than when they are at home.  (Benjamin F. Taylor)
49. It’s the grandest city I saw in America.  If everyone acted as the San Franciscans did, there would be hope for settlement of the world’s difficulties.  (Frol Zozlov)
50. To this day the city of San Francisco remains to the Chinese the Great City of the Golden Mountains.  (Kai Fu Shah)