Brain Dump | Morning Musings

It's that time of the year, when college starts and some people starting to experience college life for the first time including my cousin. My family is a tight-knit family & I am very close to all of my cousins and consider them my own brother and sister. My youngest cousin recently started college and we're all proud of her mainly because she got accepted to the same place I went to and it's one of top 3 in the country. Through her experience, I can't help to reminisce the first time I lived on my own.

Welcome to my brain dump, it’s morning and when I am able to sit down, sipping a cup of coffee while contemplating about life and emptying it out a little.

She asked me about places, what was it like and all that jazz. I was happy to share as big sister and told her to just enjoy the process and while being ambitious, she should "act" her age. As that is one thing that I truly realize now that I am older is that I didn't get to properly "act" my age.

By that I meant, I was too mature and I should have enjoyed it more. I got sucked into the hustle culture early on and while the wisdom are good, I felt like it I worried about things that I shouldn't be worrying about. For example, I wanted to retire early while I had a rough idea what retirement means. These days, I found out retirement isn't for me and I love to constantly do something because retirement around me means doing nothing. For me, that isn't something to be proud about.

I also told her not to worry about what's come in the future and most importantly, if the world is gonna be doomed in 10 years. Even if that would happen, that's just another obstacle to overcome when it truly comes. It's not something that should be too thought out now. I told her to block all the noise, cut the toxic people early on and be very pick about who she's associating with. In the end, they can make or break our college life experience and our life in general.

Most importantly, I told her to study well and block out the noise. It's what I felt back in my college days that there were noises. I trust my cousin enough she's not going rogue or anything like that. She has more discipline and willpower more than I do. So, I am trusting her enough that she'll be okay.

Let's go back to the idea of acting our age. I am at the age now where sometimes I feel like I am still a child but also adult enough to know some of the things in life. I know what my values are, what I am living for and no longer afraid of living up to my values even it might have some negative/unfavorable outcomes. I am undergoing crazy changes in life and soon will even be crazier, strangely all feels comforting and I am just ready to have all those come to me. It's like, whatever the outcome is, give me more!

Parts of me that back in the day holds so much idealism is now a little gone partly because money doesn't grow on tress and it never will. I also used to be pretty charitable sometimes ignoring my own needs but I stepped back and realized, I would rather be spending it on my own self and the people that truly and extremely care about me. I still love helping people but just not in monetary means anymore.

The views I have towards money changed too and while I believe in abundance, I am not going to be wishy washy about it anymore. I grew respect for people that are truly money-driven and everything they do is straight up for profits.

Trust me, I used to sneer at these kind of people but these days, I've grown so much respect to them especially those that knows how to coat their money-driven mindset into something that seemingly is an altruist act. They don't really care if they're being called out because they've grown a lot more powerful to buy their way in and out too. The same goes with sleazy marketers, now that I am older, I grow respect to them a lot more. It's something that changed with me because I am not shying away of making money and think of it as something that's being greedy anymore.

It took me a week of reflection to come on clean with the new me, my newly found beliefs and appreciation towards something that I used to disdain. It was more so also about doing life in the new ways because clearly, my old way of life isn't really working. Anyway, my coffee is finished and my mind drifted off somewhere.

See you around!