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We want what we don’t have. I was thinking a lot about this lately.
My parents were government servants. Their first job was also their last job. They retired and are now enjoying the fruits of their labour — comfortable pensions and a debt-free life. They wanted the same for me.
They heaved a sigh of relief when I broke a rolling stone streak in my teen years to settle in a respectable company for nearly 15 years.
But then, I turned 30 and phew, change became a thing with me.
Once, a friend of my Mum asked her about my current job and what my plans for the future were, my Mum replied after a long pause, “I seriously have no idea what’s she is doing now or what she plans to do. I have no idea where she’ll be year by year!”
My friends would usually greet me with, “Eh, so where are you now ah? I can’t keep track of what you’re doing!”
This “go with the flow” style of living extends even to my blog. While I may be blogging a lot about personal finance these days, I am feeling the itch to expand the scope of the blog to include more diverse topics:
Career topics — I’m seriously thinking about writing articles about content strategy, fiction writing, technical writing, B2B writing and more. I have plans to interview people in the field. This is driven by my
exasperationobservation that many people don’t realise that there are different content careers.Entertainment — I do miss creating random thoughts about movies and shows. I mean, I was an entertainment journalist for a national daily once upon a time!
Productivity — such as how to use Obsidian and more.
The more logical, Google-pleasing way is to create separate blogs for these, but honestly, my friends — keeping up with one blog is hard enough, I can’t imagine maintaining four.
Yes, I worry a smidge that I’ll lose traffic and incur the wrath of the Google god, but I’m more concerned whether it’ll confuse you, dear readers.
I understand some of you may have been drawn to my personal finance essays. I do enjoy writing them and will continue writing them, but there will be periods where a random non-PF essay will pop up, and I wonder if you’ll be okay receiving that in your inbox.
Serious question: Would it be better to:
a) continue emailing you entire post, regardless of the topic, a week ahead like I do now?
b) switch to a monthly digest version where I list what I’ve written for the month, so that you can choose what to read.
c) create a completely separate blog related to a content career. Posts on this blog will not be sent to you via email. Instead, I’ll just place the links in my monthly Journal Page email.
PS: Witha all these options, you will still receive personal letters from me that will not be published on the blog.
Please let me know in the poll below.
Alternatively, you can leave a comment and tell me what you think:
What I wrote
A list of personal finance Youtube channels in Malaysia on my blog. Rather than inundate you with a bazillion links to a dozen Youtube channels via email, I thought an email is just friendly and less overwhelming.
What I’m reading
Confession — I haven’t been able to read much. This is mostly because work has become so hectic lately that that’s all I can think about. However, I’m snail-paced reading these right now:
The Innocent by David Baldacci — assassin rescues teen runaway from other assassins. My kinda book.
Happy at any cost: The Revolutionary Vision and Fatal Quest of Zappos CEO Tony Hsieh by Kirsten Grind and Katherine Sayre — what’s behind the tragic death of one of Silicon Valley’s most celebrated entrepreneurs?
What I’m watching
I’m always reluctant to take on a new Chinese drama because a) they usually have around 40 episodes or more b) Chinese viewers do love their tragic endings.
But this one, well, I couldn’t resist! After checking that it does have a happy-ish ending, I dove right in. It’s available on Netflix, and it revolves around the adventures of two heroes in the martial arts world and how they, of course, fall in love. It’s a dash of political/palace intrigue and wuxia battles. I’m taking my own sweet time savouring this drama, and I can safely say that it’s as good as my no.1 favourite Chinese drama of all time: Ten Miles of Peach Blossoms.
Journal prompt
What kind of change do you want to implement in your life? What’s holding you back from doing it?