Habits Become Your Lifestyle

Today I realized that if I keep doing what I’m doing, I’m not going to end up where I want to be in life.

And that's disappointing. 

I keep thinking, even though I don't love my job, it'll be the platform that I can leverage to get where I want to be. But I have to work on figuring out my end point--as in, where do I want to be 10 years from now? Even if I could just decide where I want to be 5 years from now, that would be enough to keep me focused. This is something I should think about often (which I do...it actually consumes my mind), but not only simply think about it, but actually take action. If I want to be an expert on Brazil and U.S. bilateral relations, it's not going to happen overnight, I must read the news and articles daily. It's a habit I must develop. It's a lifestyle I have to adopt. The question is, what are the habits that I want to incorporate into my life? Which are the ones I am committed to practicing daily?  

For me, these are hard things to pinpoint because I'm in this stage of my life where I feel like I'm getting to know myself for the very first time. I've been working on being assertive and figuring out what it is I like and don't like. What do I think about certain social and political issues? What really steams my buns? And what really makes me smile and happy. I'm like a baby discovering her own body for the first time. 

I'm the kind of person that allows life to take its course. If it's meant to be, it'll happen. And sometimes, I do feel behind in my peers who may have already received their Master's degrees or have taken their GMATs or GREs. But I'm going down my own route...and I'm really excited to see where it takes me. Of course, I still work actively to make things happen, but not everything goes accordingly 100 percent of the time (re: State Department job, Maine job, PiLA and a whole slew of other opportunities that I didn't get). I get rejected. I don't get job offers. And it's not the end of the world. There are days where I feel extreme pressure to achieve--whether it be get a well-paying job and earn that fancy title or doing service work in developing countries to service marginalized communities. I need to appreciate my time now. It's like I'm my own personal detective and the world is my investigation site; follow the signs, stay strong and carry on. 

The thing to remember is, as a wise friend told me (L Redfield!), in life, you can't stay complacent. Once you're complacent, you're settling and no longer striving for more. You know that song that goes, "I'm sexy and I know it," this is how I change the lyrics in my head, "I'm ambitious and I know it." I'm not a sexy person, but I'm indeed ambitious as hell, just like my dad. 

This is my "take action" quotation: 

Small changes repeated often become habits. Change your habits, change your life. Start small, don’t give up, & be the difference.

4 teeth lighter and a whole lotta pain later

Day 2: Very Swollen 

I got all four of my wisdom teeth extracted this Tuesday. My cocky surgeon kept reiterating, "oh you'll thank me for this in the long run" and "It'll be painful in the next few days, but in the long run, you'll appreciate this advice." Then he'd flash his Mr. Know-it-all smirk. Can you tell I'm not a big fan of him? But I hope his confident self is right.

Honestly, I was experiencing no pain from my wisdom teeth. My original dentist suggested that I get them extracted because they were growing in (I didn't even feel any pain but 3 of them had already been impacted and I only had the upper right wisdom tooth to grow out). The next thing I know, I'm laying down with this surgeon's hands in my mouth, plucking out my wisdom teeth and sewing in stitches that will dissolve in approximately a month . I really only needed to get 2 extracted (they were growing in sideways), but according to the oral surgeon, I should just get it over with now and extract them all. So I did. And now I'm in the land of the pain and hungry. Last night, I sneezed, very unexpectedly (I mean, all sneezing happens spontaneously, but I hadn't sneezed in like 2 days) and experienced the worst and most painful sneeze of my life. My salvia flew everywhere and my mouth was throbbing. Things we take for granted. So in that breath, I'd like to write a short list of things I've taken for granted when I experienced no oral pains and lessons I've learned since my surgery.

1) As I mentioned earlier, sneezing. Sneezing is such a natural and uncontrollable action that I had never thought twice about. It sure is mighty painful when you are recovering from oral surgery. So try to avoid sneezing.

2) You feel tension in your jaws. I find myself wiggling my jaws around to loosen the tension but it's pretty tight in that area.

3) Drool with a hint of blood. The first two days, I had a hard time keeping my mouth closed so when I woke up, I had drool mixed in with blood smeared on my face--yes very unpleasant, especially when you look in the mirror first thing in the morning. I looked like a vampire.

4) I was eating congee one night and couldn't chew this fleshy thing in my mouth so I took it out--I thought it was a piece of meat my mom put in the congee...but it wasn't. It was my gum flesh. I definitely freaked out.

5) I am so hungry. All the time. Randy talks about food. Constantly. How he's eating Korean food tomorrow, all the snacks he's had between lunch and dinner...then his post-dinner meals. Then he proceeds to talk about the next 15 meals he'll have over the weekend. It makes me so hungry. When I see people chewing and eating...my mouth is salivating. I have taken my lovely teeth for granted for so long. Which brings me to...

6) I miss chewing, biting, crunching--anything that works that grinding sensation in your mouth. My teeth are itching to chew and bite. It could be from the pain or general numbness of my mouth, but they're really itching to bite. And every time I try to bite into something--bananas, dragon fruits or any fruit, my teeth cannot sustain that pressure. So I've given up trying to chew. Plus, the front teeth are not good grinders! Also, since my cheeks are swollen, I can only open my mouth half the original size, which is frustrating since I'm not used to eating like a goldfish.


Because of these new (temporary) restrictions, I have such a newfound respect and gratitude for what my mouth and teeth can do.

I'm so excited to be able to eat solid foods again. I've been eating yogurt for breakfast, smoothies, congee and soup. I feel like an infant with no teeth...wait, we're pretty much on par.

It's time to disconnect. Just for a month...

I've been a Facebook user since 2007. That means I've been using Facebook daily, for the past five years. And for the first time ever, I'm going on a Facebook hiatus. I'm disconnecting. I realized that Facebook has become such a routine in my life...like going out for a jog, brushing my teeth and then checking Facebook, as if it were a necessity. I won't say that I was addicted to using Facebook...but my...habit became especially apparent ever since I've started my social media job. I realized how important and powerful social media is and became so preoccupied with how my Facebook represented me and who I am. So I blocked my tagged photos to gain a higher level of privacy and only gave access to my closest friends. Then I stopped uploading photos because I just didn't want people to know what I was up to. I even thought of completely blocking my albums, but decided that was too brash for my friends who wanted to take a trip down memory lane via my photos.


Because of my job, I am always on social media, thus constantly checking my notifications or private messages. Ok, now I'll admit... I was addicted. Those red notification boxes became a hit of high...private messages were double hits. And ever since my trip to Tucson, my social life has become very active. It was just what I wanted and in retrospect, it was what I needed to pull me out of my slump. But it became too active. I would say that from January to March, I was a bit of a recluse and spent a lot of time alone. And from April till now, I've been a social butterfly. After my trip to Maine, I realized I needed to do more solo trips. I missed my alone time. I was so obsessed with my summer of fun and socializing that I had completely shafted my alone time. I need time to write (like now) and do things I want to do. I've been putting a higher value on social interactions and leveraging these social engagements as opportunities to learn from others and build relationships. But in doing so, I lost myself. I'm exhausted from putting others first. I would go out and party even though all I really wanted to do is go and write or read in the comfort of my room. Or just hang out with my family. Just because I'm young and live in the city that never sleeps doesn't mean I need to live such a wild- child-NYC-adult-life and have a million friends. In fact, I have enough amazing and wonderful friends. The real question is: do I need excess people in my life who may or may not add value?

So as I was looking through photos from my weekend, I looked at myself in these photos and couldn't even recognize myself. Who was this girl that looked like me and smiled like me? I felt so disingenuous and couldn't stand it. That's when I decided to deactivate. I know my month-long Facebook hiatus probably won't mean much in the bigger scheme of things...but so far, it's been a relief to not check Facebook daily. Maybe this will even extend beyond this arbitrary month-long time period.