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June 30, 2026 12:05 AM
Recovering workaholic
well, trying to recover at least.
What motivates you to work hard?
i was raised to believe that working and earning money is like the most important thing in life, so i've kind of always been a workaholic, and i'm actually really trying to stop being that way since it just leads me to burnout
I think the question implied that working hard is a good thing. It probably is, but that's not how my brain took it.
I had a meeting yesterday that I was absolutely dreading because I dread every meeting because meeting means talking to people about work. It ended up being perfectly fine, but I don't think I'll ever stop dreading meetings for anything really. Call it a meeting and I won't look forward it.
I was doing pretty well with working on my Teochew and focusing on myself and not doomscrolling too much, but then I went on a family vacation for a week, and I also started feeling a little anxious again about all the things I have to do, so I don't think I've really recovered from that yet.
With moving to a new apartment, and trying to register the space as a charity, and all the summer plans, and the endless amounts of things to do in WhatTCSay, well, there's just a lot of things to juggle right now. And I don't know how to juggle. I'm staring at a bunch of boxes in my living room and I really just want it to be cleared and organized and I want to have nice lamps in the room that I'm sitting in at night.
June 9, 2026 10:36 PM
Leveling Up
I did another V2!
That's exciting! You're leveling up!
Like a pokemon?
Yeah, like a pokemon
When I climb, I don't really care about trying to puzzle out the solution before I get on the wall. If I flash something, that means it was probably too easy for me. I feel the most accomplished when I finally top a climb that I was struggling on.
Like when I'm finally able to get through a climb that used to feel impossible just to do the first move
Or a climb that felt impossible to top
Or a climb that I saw so many people do with ease, but it took me many many failed tries over several weeks, until I finally found the beta that worked for me (the day before it got reset!)
June 8, 2026 9:25 PM
harry styles and chill
Ever since I made Harry Styles, I've become a big Harry Styles fan. He put out an album earlier this year, and I was SO excited for it. Like I was counting down the days to its release. I hadn't done anything like that since high school. I have thoroughly enjoyed Kiss All The Time, Disco Occasionally, but my favorite is still Harry's House. It's just such a chill vibe. And after listening to a bunch of Harry Styles music, I was inspired to make a playlist: harry styles and chill.
It started with just a few chill Harry Styles songs with pretty harmonies, little to no percussion, and a touch of sadness. Then I expanded it to include some songs from other artists. And maybe I'll still add more to this in the future, if I hear a song with the right vibe.
June 3, 2026 1:30 AM
"Being inefficient is my form of luxury"
Simone Giertz is like, my favorite famous person, and she made an instagram post that really resonated with me.
I must get it from my dad. He's always saying to take time, don't rush things. And he takes it farther than I do. If I'm dealing with a task I hate, like paperwork, I definitely want it to be over as quickly as possible. But any time he mentions more paperwork, he always says "whenever you have time." I've never filled out the paperwork too slowly for him.
Wanting the luxury of inefficiency is one of the reasons I quit my job about a year and a half ago. But then I took on two volunteer jobs and I felt the need to go go go to hit my deadlines. And I have spent much of the past year and a half kind of unhappy with that initial decision to quit my well paying job.
So, it's June now. Life is still a little overwhelming, and I have some complicated feelings towards certain aspects of my life. But I think I finally feel happy that I don't have a normal job right now. Yeah, it's taken almost a year and a half to feel this way. And while this isn't one of the reasons I quit, the number one reason why I'm glad I'm not working now is because I'm not forced to use AI.
I did quit my job to be able to work on my projects. My own projects. The Space was not one of them. What Teochew Say was not one of them. I'm still very much committed to them, but I needed to prioritize my projects over these. My own journey in learning teochew. My food blog. This blog.
Just this past week I spent 5 days working on a site revamp for flailing in my kitchen. I barely did anything for The Space or WTCS during those days. But I did practice my teochew every day and I also exercised almost every day. And that all ended up being perfectly okay. I finally got to implement an idea that I had many months ago, and it was so nice to just work on something where I didn't have to worry about what anyone else thought.
I did laundry yesterday. For most of my adult life, I actually really enjoyed doing laundry. I loved folding clothes. But in the past couple of years I grew so tired of it because of how much laundry I was doing. It felt like the hamper would get full in two days, and there would often be some sort of issue with the shared laundry in the building. But I did laundry yesterday. And it also felt okay.
Yeah, I still have bad days. But a cat on a card reminded me that that's okay too.
May 15, 2026 12:57 PM
prioritizing myself means deprioritizing everything else
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i'm still trying to find the right balance
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