Seems I've reached the age where a lot of things that happen in my life tend to feel deja vu-ish. Is this normal, like a common, growing older kind of thing? "History repeats itself", as is often said, so maybe it is.
And 2024 felt a lot like history repeating itself, but with edits.
After four years, I feel like I finally got my pre-pandemic life back in 2024. I went to Kpop concerts (Bobby and iKON), travelled (a little beach road trip, Japan, Iloilo, and the Great British - and Welsh and Scottish! - trip), and most importantly, saw more of my friends. I did bits and pieces of these in that last two years or so, but they always felt uneasy and a little alien. It was only this year when they really started to feel normal again. And I loved being able to take back these aspects of my life that the pandemic kept away from me. I'm happy to report that going back to the things you love is a lot like riding a bike - you never really unlearn them, you just lack a bit of practice.
But I have to reach further back - eight years, to be specific - to talk about the other big, deja vu-ish thing that happened to me this year. In 2016, I left corporate to pursue a passion project. In 2024, I also left corporate to pursue a passion project.
Now, the edits. I left my job in 2016 voluntarily. With minimal savings and the audacity of someone in their early 30s, I thought, "if not now, when?" and just did it. I won't go into detail, because I already have in this post. Suffice to say I believed I was fully in control at the time, driven by my YOLO tendencies, corporate burnout and sellout guilt.
This year, I left corporate involuntarily...with my consent? They say be careful what you wish for, and at the end of 2023, I watched the Stories of a friend who was impacted by their company's re-organization and spent a month (or two?) travelling in Europe. We chatted about the exciting months ahead of them, and I inwardly wished it would happen to me.
Well, it happened. Haha. I spent nine months of 2024 coming to terms with the bombshell that my role at the company I worked at for 7 years was being redundated. I tried to find other roles in the same company and outside, came close to a new one but ultimately decided not to pursue it because...YOLO?
If not now, when? But I asked it with more fear than excitement this time around, in my old age of my late 30s, hehe. When I left corporate in 2016, I was confident I could go back if I wanted or needed to. I think a part of me knew I would have to. This time around, it didn't help that the idea was forced on me. I was content with my job, though I was recovering from burnout that I suffered in 2023 (again, won't go into detail because I already did here). Admittedly, it was starting to feel repetitive, but I valued the stability, and it allowed me so many benefits I never experienced in my previous companies - I was working from home practically 100% of the time, the people I worked with were great, I was happy with what I was getting.
But nothing is ever truly stable in corporate, is it? So when I realized I was losing my job, it felt a lot like I was taken out of my orbit forcefully, that the rug had been kicked under me - even when just a few months prior I was kind of wishing for it, mind you! - and it was honestly an emotionally harrowing experience.
I say "emotionally harrowing" with the awareness that it was a privilege to be all dramatic about being redundated. Some people in a similar situation would've had to just suck it up and find a job, any job again. So I know - and knew then - that this wasn't going to be the end of the world, but it was still difficult to go through and my mental health definitely took a hit. In the end, I realized I had to make sure I was owning my decisions - that I wasn't being forced to make them, but that I was making of the circumstances around me what I wanted of them, moulding them into what I needed them to be. It took a lot of months, a lot of borrowing grief from the future (which I said last year that I didn't want to do in 2024! huhu), A LOT of voice messages to friends, not to mention the long lunches. Finally, at the end of September 2024, I left corporate to pursue my passion project.
Again, the edit: this time around, it's not a passion project, but a more all-encompassing passion. The dream of building a cafe was a youthful passion project, but my writing, I now truly and wholeheartedly believe is my passion, and my life's work. There is literally nothing else I want to do as much as this. And while going through the stress of impending unemployment, there was a silver lining in my severance: for the first time ever in my adult life, I have been given the means and the time to actually pursue it, without needing to do anything else.
Isn't that such a gift? If my math is correct and my spending is managed, I have a year or so to really pour my time and effort to my writing. It won't be a side project, a weekend activity, or an after-office hours thing.
What's more, I'll be able to do it but also have time to rest, make sure I'm taking care of myself and my creative well and pursuing other hobbies for fun. At the end of 2024, as I was getting used to my new life, I had this DM exchange with a dear friend:
Me: So I'm trying to do this thing where I finish my work at 5PM every day kasi otherwise I just keep going hehe. Success today! Medyo nasobrahan pa but I clocked out at 530 and I've just been looking at stuff online hehe. I'll have dinner, watch a movie with Kyle, then go to bed!
Friend: Congratulations! You've worked hard to afford a slow Monday like this. Enjoy it my friend.
I'm eternally grateful for friends who are able to give a new perspective on things. Because it was true! Isn't it such a privilege, to be able to have time to rest? I never had 8-hour days. I had eight hours for work, and the rest for my writing and other pursuits. Rest was always few and far between and felt stolen from the things I should be or had to be doing. And to have this gift before I'm even 40? Not just making lemonade out of lemons, but lemonade with elderflower bubbly and a splash of vanilla.
At this point it's pretty clear that my 2024 can be summarized into this: same same, but different. Hehe. Here's a quick list of the "different" things that happened this year:
1. A full on, emotional meltdown. Haha. As can be insinuated from all my year-end posts, I'm not exactly the most stable person, and I'm quite emotional. But this year I really had a tipping point that would've been emotionally manageable, perhaps even trivial by itself, but after everything I was going through this year, unravelled a lot of scar tissue and emotional sinew. Again, and they probably won't read this, but I'm ever thankful to my friends, who in my meltdown I realized was the only constant in my life. In my moments of doubt this year (and I had plenty), they were always there to provide support and genuine belief. I hear so much about the difficulty of finding adult friendships, and I can't help but feel so darn lucky that I have a handful of them. Not to be Gen Z about it (because I'm not, haha), but I find it pretty cool that "Birds of a Feather" came out this year, the same year I truly realized how much I value and truly love my friends. In my emotionally fragile days this year, I was unable to listen to that song without getting teary-eyed, but just yesterday in our New Year's Eve festivities I was able to sing it through karaoke, so I think that's progress! lol
2. I got property! Another piece of land to my name, in a beautiful island, next to that of a friend! One I look forward to making a home away from home in the future.
3. I don't know how I feel about travel anymore. It's something I'm still trying to understand. Don't get me wrong, I absolutely LOVED my trip in the UK. If I had the means to do it, I would come back every year! I had the best time with friends and alone in the UK. Seoul, South Korea has been replaced - the entirety of the UK is now my favorite travel destination. But the planning can be stressful. And the world we live in is so different now, so I don't know. One thing I do know, is the kind of travel I prefer. I'm certain now I would give up going to tourist spots and "go to's" if it means I can spend more time soaking in a place by living in it for a few days. Maybe that's not travel anymore - maybe it's taking a break? A change of scenery? Not necessarily going, going, going, but staying still, somewhere else. I'm still processing this and I'll get back to you next year, when I will hopefully have more answers.
It hasn't been an easy year, but I've also been uniquely blessed in 2024, I guess. I've just had to dig deep and toughen up emotionally and mentally to get to the good parts. It broke me, too, but I healed. I don't want to make any proclamations for 2025, only that I hope for a slow and gentle year. I say that, while I try to end this post so I can move on to planning the year ahead, hehe. You can take the girl out of corporate, but sometimes you can't take the corporate out of the girl, hehe. So I'm a bundle of contradictions - and as I type this, I have a very distinct feeling I've also written that about me in an older year-end post.
Same same, but different. Happy new year!
P.S. You know what else is different? I can't be bothered to post pictures on here anymore, lol. There are plenty of those on my Instagram, and even more videos on my TikTok. We move with the times!
