It's been a long time, hasn't it?
Let;s get down to bidness right now. New year came and went like that. I took the day off and just stayed at home with my family.
New year came and for some reason I felt like this is THE year to make resolutions and changes to my life.
First of all, I have started to go to church regularly. Instead of attending the Mandarin version of church which I find so difficult to focus on because 1) i only partially understand what they are trying to say 2) i think the people who attend mandarin services are quite boring :(( i am so getting hell for saying this. I KNOW I KNOW. it's not the person but the way the services are conducted in. the mandarin ones I attended were too proper and traditional for my liking.
I am attending City Harvest Church now. The singing gets to me sometimes I find it too loud and I get frustrated that I can't see the lyrics in front coz I'm too short WTF. But I truly enjoy the service because the pastor is also young like the rest of the attendees and the way he preaches resonate with your style or rather the young people's style.
I want to open my heart to fully accept Christianity, to accept God, Jesus and the Holy Spirit. This doesn't happen overnight. I want to attend the Sunday service regularly until I am sure that I can leave my past behind and start anew. Whoever hurt me in the past shall be forgiven, all mistakes and sins I have done will be left behind. This is the hardest thing for me to do as I CAN"T just forget like that. It still haunts me to this day and until the day I learn to forget and let go, I cannot fully accept Christianity. I am also learning to have more faith in something that can;t be seen with the naked eye and have faith that an entity is able to help solve my problem instead of me carrying the entire burden. Like that is not what I was brought up to believe you know.
I'm still starting but I want to make serious progress with this.
Secondly, a new job. I guess I have my friend to thank for this. Thank God your father has a really huge company and is so kind to hire me. Haha. No seriously. I am starting my new job in march and it will be normal working hours plus Sat/Sun off which allows me to regularly go to church without feeling guilty that my staffs are slaving off in the restaurant while I'm sitting in air-con room listening to a preach.
I want to stick to this job and perform so well that my boss thinks 'I did not make a mistake hiring her' :) and get promoted too *positive.
Thirdly, this year will be my last attempt to lose weight and maintain a healthy lifestyle. After all those talks abt living healthy, I think it's nigh time to walk the talk. Without busting my bank account, I have found easy ways to incorporate simple exercises to my daily routine.
One way is to use my dogs and the thing called a road that has been paved outside my house >.>
One of my friends once said, 'you want to lose weight? look outside. there's the road. walk it. ' WTF.
So now I would take any chance I have to come home early and bring my dogs out for a jog early in the morning before I head off to work. Usually it's a 30-40 mins walk/jog. Which is better than nothing.
In addition to that, I have a staff who's like a little birdie. Constantly reminding me not to eat rice/noodle and not to eat after 9pm. She even text me early in the morning to remind me to go jogging at the tasek Lama.
She wants me skinny before CNY which is a miracle if that happens but I guess it's the thought that counts *winks.
Fourthly, to be financially smarter. I told myself I will start saving ideally $1000 every month starting from this month and put the down payment for my first house on the day of my 26th birthday. Coming from this generation, we are all smarter than the previous one - financially. We know the exact way to secure our future finance wise however because we are so consumed with the material things around the us, we tend to ignore it. The latest phone is a must today. I guess when you earn 5K a month, you have no problem with that but because I earn less than 3K, I have to plan ahead.
Taking the fact that I'm still young, I need to start investing into something more concrete such as real estate. I will only see the return maybe 15 yrs later but it's a start.
However, now I will try to clear the problem in front of me which is my credit card debt >.>
I have 500 bucks on it and should be able to clear it by the next paycheck yay!
BUT! There always is a BUT. I am going to KK next week for CNY shopping and Bali next month. Considering that I have gotten most of my CNY loot from ASOS, I think I won't spend too much in KK except for shoes. I need shoes....I nearly bought a pair of Tory Burch flats online the other day. Then I was like 'No Lesley! You're supposed to be buying a house when you're 26 remember!'. So maybe I won't get new shoes then :(( *sad life of a poor girl ...
As for Bali, oh well, that will be my last extravagant holiday for the year. Just kidding..I mean it's Indonesia. How much can you spend there? US$500 should be more than enough to cover 5 days over there. Sightseeing, activities are all relatively cheap. Not much shopping tho..maybe a couple of souvenirs here and there. Reminder to self: You are there to enjoy yourself, not pretend to be millionaire!
Finally, be less of a burden to the Mother Nature! I sound like Captain Planet back there. Recently my house encountered a problem with the piping and we couldn't have water for a few days. Hence we had to fill up pails of water and you know the old style of taking a bath.
I found that I actually enjoy it and that I was able to save so much water using the pail. Usually when I use the shower head, I tend to let it on while I was brushing my teeth/taking a dump/piss whatever waiting for the warm water. Then I'll read my Archie Comics and get so engrossed that I don't want to get up from the toilet WTF!
All these while, the clean water are all wasted and going down the drain. So this year, I will pledge to save water. Last but not least, I want to volunteer and donate to charity causes. Mine is is the CAS - Care and Actions for Strays in Brunei.
With more time on my side to actually get involved with these activities, I know this year will be the year to realise these resolutions and to maintain them.
Whatever your hopes and dreams are for the year 2013, I hope you have thought it through and may you be blessed with the willpower to keep them up :)
TO 2013!
