Forgetting how to be grateful

This morning I woke up in a hotel room in LA, getting ready for my flight to Denver for a conference (slash) vacation. I haven't been back to Colorado since I graduated from my Masters (back in December 2017). So it's about a little bit more than a year.
All of sudden I was thinking, gosh... how come I forgot how grateful I should be for the life I have right now? I do remember very clearly how struggled I was when I was working on my Masters in Colorado... How I didn't have many friends, didn't have money, couldn't go out have fun cos.. again.. I don't have money or friends to enjoy my life. YET at that time I should've felt grateful. So many people want to be in my shoes at that time, going to grad school for free in a really really good school in the States.

Anyways... I'm writing this because I feel the need to constantly remind myself to focus on what I HAVE than what I don't have in my life. Cos what? Cos I will really remember all of these things once I lost it. And God forbid I'll lose this in my life. I really don't want to go back to the struggling life without certainties and securities.

Now I can travel whenever I want to... where ever I wanna go to... I can buy whatever I feel like buying (in moderation of course). I sleep on a very comfortable bed and do not need to share my space with anyone for the sake of cutting expense. I have many friends (tho I also lost some) that are very good friends and we share a lot of enjoyable memories and stories together. I still have family who love me back in Indonesia (tho, yes, I'm a pretty cold daughter *still*).

This cycle always happened, tho. I get comfortable. I have everything I need (more or less), and I start questioning if I'm happy enough. If I have accomplished enough. If there'a anything else I'm missing and if I'm gonna be miserable without that thing to complete my life.
I need to remember not to be too hard on my own self. I have achieved a lot. God has been very very very kind to me. I have to be very grateful for all the things I have right now.

And the quote that just reminded me of that too: "remember the days you prayed for the things you have now".

Yes. Indeed.

Relationship Insecurity

So like I posted on here couple of months ago I broke up with my BF... which apparently he sorta cheated on me... Well I like to insist that it's cheating although he never really agreed to commit to me.. But yea he cheated, cos he hid it from me.. Anyways... he got into a relationship with this girl very quickly (they are BF-GF immediately) and it made me really frickin mad and crazy for a while.. maybe about 1-2 months.

Well thanks to my current love interest, I moved on from my Ex and we are actually friends now. We still talk pretty frequently and I have almost zero negative emotions about it. And guess what? The GF is now sooooo damn insecure about me. And I'm just lalalalalala and act very chill about the whole thing (as long as my Ex still talks to me every now and then, as a friend).

Honestly if this girl wasn't a catalyst to our break-up, I would totally back off more than I do now, to respect their relationship. Cos I understand how intimidating it would be if I was with someone that still talks very frequently to their ex. And my ex is always very bad in giving an assurance in any romantic relationship he is in, BTW, so that is his fault. And yea frankly I enjoy this time, when I'm pretty much chill about our friendship (my ex and I) and he kept telling me about how stressful it is that they always argue about me. Girl, isn't karma a bitch?

Honestly again, if they ended up together for a long term relationship, that's fine too. At this point I don't want to go back with my ex anymore (he doesn't have anything to offer but love. Literally). I just feel kinda bad that he again ends up in that kind of dynamic. An insecure gf. I was one. But at least we were in a long distance relationship. This girl is actually there, living pretty close to him. Oh well... who cares now?

In the end of the day I learn more and more that insecurity in a relationship is inevitable. But there's nothing really you can do to make it better, other than to be chill and accept the reality, or leave. The more you nag about things that make you insecure, the more they (the guys) are turned off by it. If you're not okay with many things in the relationship and continuously feeling insecure, leave. Of course it's easier said than done... I'd know that better than anyone lol....

Dating... (have I had a post with this title before..?)

Ever since I broke up with Eric about 3 months ago, I've been involved in a dating saga.. Met 3 people and had a great time with the first two. The third one was a funny story but not sure if I wanna talk about that...

First guy I met was great on a paper. He's an engineer, 29 y.o., looks like he's pretty settled financially, oh... very good looking and great body, he is a surfer too - so you can imagine. Hmmm what else, oh he's a Catholic (wow!) and seems to have a nice family. Buttt... it failed lol. We had a great time the first time and then we were gonna meet up the 2nd time which he bailed on me twice! So the conclusion is, he might have a GF and a total douchebag...

Second guy is great... He's very good looking, tall (I only date guys 6' and taller lol), very sweet, very successful in his career, very attentive, and... very good at.... dudududuu.... so many things ;)
In fact I'm still seeing him.. But this wouldn't go anywhere, which I don't really wanna elaborate why.. In the end of the day he's really something and I'd probably remember our time together forever in my heart..

Third guy I met was a musician, played 6 instruments. Pretty good looking, pretty short to my liking (5'7") and very pretentious. Oh and he's a 90% vegan. Big no.... I loveeee food too much to date you dude. And so many other things I don't like about him...

We'll see how all of this dating saga go... ;)

Break-Ups

I may have had a post in the past with this title.. Oh well, whatever 😃. Soo... I may not have updated in here, but I finally broke up with Eric. We have been together (long distance) for 2 years and 8 months, roughly. We would have broken up last year during the Summer when our relationship really hit a painful wall. But because I can never break up with anybody I love, we kept our relationship until recently. There's so many obvious reasons for us to break up, from his side and my side. Actually, my side is more obvious (maybe there has been about 10 or more people wondered WHY I still stayed in the relationship) compared to his side. YET he's the one that insisted to break-up. Not because we don't love each other or not enjoying each other's company; but because if we had stayed together longer, we knew it would turn ugly. So, now, when we're still in a loving state, it sounds better to break up and stay friends.

Man it's never easy to break up, altho with this one probably I got it much easier than anyone else. At least for now. Sometimes when the withdrawal kicked in, I got super sad. But I can always call him and give him a hard time. LOL. In general, I like being in a relationship. I don't like dating around. It's like trying to find a diamond in the middle of desert full of haystack. I just made up that analogy. But yea I'm too lazy to be adventurous in a dating game. Too many frogs out there and the prince is hidden somewhere. Even the ones that thought they have found their prince, will later realized their prince are just a disguised frog. How sad is that?

One thing I learned from past break-ups, though, is that I can always fall in love just as hard as I can, with someone. Whenever I broke up I would think I may never fall in love again, and guess what? I fell HARD all over again. So.. that's a good sign and a good promise for the future. Will see what's waiting for me ahead...🤞.

Some thoughts..

It is truly easier to consider everything in life has it's period. Or expired dates, something like that. Nothing will truly last forever. That's why it's sometimes sad but relieving to see news about somebody's misfortunes : divorce, death, lost of job, etc. And.. it creeps you with some disbelief and jealousy when someone is having a stable relationship, very successful life. You wonder, "when will it all come down to the fall?".

It sounds mean, but I believe many people feel the same way. I feel the same way about myself too. When I'm in the peak of my success, I get scared.. a little bit. Like... is it gonna last for a long time? 

But why do we worry about that at all? Sometimes all the worrisome don't mean anything. You worry about what people may think about you when they don't add value to your existence, anyway. 

Anyways.. on the other note, I currently have some many girlfriends.. I think this is the first time in a long time. I'm surrounded by girls. Girl squad or some sort. Which is interesting... It is fun but also can raise an eyebrow most of the times. I'm still glad, though, because hanging out with boys can be fun but also they don't get us (girls) that much. But with girls, I realize that the friendship has a lot of complimenting each other (oh you look so pretty, I like your dress, I love your hair...blablabla), a lot of talk about guys/marriage/kids, a lot of gossiping about other people (oh yes my favorite too), and I'm pretty sure.. a lot of jealousy behind all of it as well. One of my friends is in love at the moment and all of sudden she now talks like a love/relationship expert. LOL. Maybe I think like that because I'm jealous. But it's just pretty annoying. Honestly when I'm in a happy relationship I was just silent and not bragging about it. Cos I know it would suck when it fell apart. And heck how can you be so certain about your significant other? Nobody can predict anything..

Oh well... just some thoughts.. But all in all, I'm still pretty happy to experience these new kind of friendships

Passion

There is a girl that just got interviewed by the company I'm working with. She is about 6 years older than me I think. She is single too. Anyways, so apparently she is very passionate about social work kinda thing. Like she would volunteer at the 3rd world country, etc. Or just do something for the community. That's what her passion is. And then that leads me to ask myself a question.. "what's your passion, Sheila?".

It's pretty hard to think about it. I wish I had something great that I'm passionate about. I'm not passionate about my job. I'm good at it, though. But then I think again, what is it that I always see myself excited about?

- Food (I can find myself browsing about food for hours)
- Beauty (I keep on looking for self enhancement. Nails, hair, skin, make-up, all the fricking time)
- Traveling (duh, who doesn't?)
- Nature (now I get myself into more and more hiking and camping activities and I'm so happy about it).

Well, there you go! That's my passion. Although it's all for me, me and me. It doesn't really relate to making the world a better place, lol. Or maybe it's not true. I like to introduce good food to people. I like to make good food to share. I also am excited in letting my friends know about a good fashion or beauty trend. I always told my friends where to go to get their nails done, etc. I love traveling with friends, or planning a trip together. I love going on adventures with my friends and experience it together.

There you go! That's my passion :)

And oh, happy 30th birthday to myself. I love me! :D

Life has been good.. Turning 30 soon.

I realized I haven't posted anything here for a while, but I'd like to remember this time. The time when my life has been good.. great, even.. I have an awesome job with really good coworkers, awesome group of friends here in Bako (who could have thought?), a pretty good relationship stability at the moment with Eric. Who knows til when it would last?

In 2 weeks I will turn 30. It's so crazy. When I look back, I remember this is the kind of life I always had wanted it to be. Career woman, always dreamed to be one. For some reason, tho, I thought I would have had a family by this age. Altho that might be affecting the career side (which means I might not have been at this level in my career, had I gotten married and have kids). But yea, it's amazing how going from 20 to 30, I have gone through so many unpredictable things. I remember when I just turned 20, I was in bad relationship (about to break up), still in college, didn't know what the future may bring. And during my 20s, these happened:
- Graduated pretty early and got a job with Chevron
- Been through several little relationships here and there (before my 20, I barely had any experience with any guys, lol). Had memorable vacations with some of them.
- Did a really horrible thing for once, well, at 20 something you must have been dumb at least for once. Learned a lot from it, tho.
- Partied hard. Which I'm glad I did after I started my job, not when I was in school. So I actually was able to do it and had money to do it.
- Started traveling abroad and to many countries: Singapore, Hongkong, Macau, China, Japan, Turkey, South Korea, UAE, Vietnam, Thailand, Egypt, Palestine, Israel, Jordan, Australia, New Zealand, Malaysia, and.. the mighty USA of course in the end.
- Quit my steady job, admitted to my dream school in the US for Masters, oil crash, struggled, bounced back, got a job in the US, experience a whole new life over here, in another country very far away from Indonesia.
- Got my first tattoo and "piercing" lol. What an accomplishment.

I'm happy with what I have achieved in my 20s. There are some things that I wish I had done more, but in the end of the day, everything is just a lot more than I expected. Thanks God for everything...