My mini autobiography

Several days ago, I turned 32 and I feel like it’s time for another reflective post.

I have the tendency to think a lot; about my past, present and future. I think about my past mistakes, the choices I’ve made, and what I look forward to. I think about my dreams, goals, and purpose.

I think about why I do what I do, and why I am the way I am.

I think about how I can achieve what I want, faster.

I think about how I can make a lasting, positive impact.

I want to do so much.

It may sound crazy, but I want to be a legacy.

You may ask, how? By doing what?

I think, by using my words to impact others.

I want you to feel better, happier, more empowered after reading my blog posts and translations.

I want to share my experience and advice, and you to benefit from it. Knowing that I have the power to change someone’s behaviour makes me feel good.

I’ve come to realize that I need to live a life with meaning to be happy. For the first 23 years of my life, I basically followed exactly what my father had wanted me to do.

As a child, my only goal was to get good grades so I could get into university and then get a good, stable job.

I needed good grades. I was a “good” student, but at the same time, I wasn’t. I mean, I showed up to class and did all my homework. I tried to study and do well, but half the time I was daydreaming because it was so damn boring.

I tried to retain as much as I could, but I’m just not very academic. At least, it’s not easy for me. I have a slow brain, so it takes me a long time to understand something.

I had friends who could seamlessly get 90s without trying, while here I was, working hard and struggling to get an 80. So sad.

I knew school wasn’t really for me, but I still tried. In fact, I even got an award for perfect attendance. LOL, so lame. Who gives an award for that???

Anyway, after high school, I went to study Early Childhood Education. After the first year, I wanted to drop out. I didn’t even like kids! Why was I studying a program that I didn’t even care about? (The answer is because of my parents)

Despite how much I despise school, I finished it because I didn’t want to waste the time that I had already spent and disappoint my parents. After graduating, I managed to get into OISE for Teachers’ college. My dad was soooooooo happy. (It’s probably the only thing that has ever made him proud)

Because it was only a year, I sucked it up and did it. It was ok, I did learn, but I have absolutely no passion for teaching. I’m just not interested.

I didn’t want to become a teacher nor become a librarian. They were the only two options my father was ok with. He just wanted me to get a unionized job with good benefits. He wanted to plan my future and know exactly where I was be in X amount of years.

But I really didn’t want to do it. I needed something that I found meaningful. While teaching allows me to impact hundreds of children, just thinking of being in a room with them everyday gives me a headache. It only works if I want to be there in the first place.

Becoming a librarian is even worse. It’s soooo boring (no offence to my librarian friends). While I love the library, it’s not the same working in one.

Later on, I realized I wanted to help people with their finances. So I looked up what I had to do, and studied Financial Planning at a post-graduate program at George Brown. It was extremely intensive and stressful, but I enjoyed it and learned a lot.

But around this time, my autoimmune condition went nuts, and I was very ill. I ended up losing 30lbs and almost died. Afterwards, I spent the next few years trying to heal and get better. My view on life also changed drastically at this point.

I realized I could die at any moment and I wanted to live for myself. I didn’t want to die and regret not making my own decisions because of fear.

I asked myself, “What would I do if I only had X amount of time left?”

I feel like most people don’t really think about that, because they’re so busy trying earn money and survive.

Anyway, my condition has been up and down. Some days are so tough. I have no motivation to work or do anything. Some days are better, and I’m in less pain.

Eventually, I started blogging because I wanted to inspire others, and to share my experience. I just wanted people to read what I have to say. My friend suggested that I go translate Chinese novels so I could gain more readers, so I did.

So basically, I entered the field of novel translation because I wanted to grow my blog. LOL. At first, it was really hard because Chinese and English is so different. The tenses kept screwing me up, since we don’t really have tenses in Chinese. Ex. Drink tea. Does that mean he’s drinking? Or he’s about to drink? Or he drank already? Or he will drink?

It took me years of translating and hundreds of chapters to get to where I am today.

Years later, I’m now managing a bunch of translators, editors and artists. I never thought I would end up doing this. Life has been very unpredictable.

One of my fan translations, “The Eunuch is Pregnant”, became really popular and recently broke over 5 million views.

The novel is very niche, and is not for everyone. But I have gotten some incredible fans and supporters from it. Some people have been with me since the very beginning, and it means so much to me.

I try my best to produce quality work because, again, I want my readers to feel something from it. I want them to feel joy and despair, love and fury. I want to see their passion, frustration, and dedication. LOL

Anyhow, as you can imagine, my father is not pleased by my life choices and decisions. He doesn’t like how I have chosen such an unpredictable path. It’s filled with uncertainty and you never know what’s going to happen.

But I am confident I’ll be fine. I honestly think no matter what I do, I’ll be ok.

Some may say I’m overconfident, but I feel like it’s all about the mindset. For those who wish to follow their own path, here’s what I want to say:

1. Choose something that you want to achieve and stick to it. Consistency is one of the most important factors to success.
2. Don’t give up! Do something today that will get you closer to where you want to be.
3. Track what you’re doing, so you know exactly what is going on.
4. Focus on hitting the little wins, and eventually, they will become huge milestones.
5. You may not get the results that you want even if you spend hundreds of hours on something, but you will develop some skills and learn from your journey.
6. Even if you do not get to where you want to be, everything you do will help you grow as a person.
7. Don’t give yourself excuses for why you can’t achieve something.
8. You have to believe before you can achieve.
9. Don’t compare your chapter 2 to someone else’s chapter 20.
10. Practice and practice until you become so good that you’re irreplaceable.

Thanks for reading! I hope you enjoyed this mini autobiography. I didn’t go too much in depth or you’d be reading a 10k paper. 😛