Things Successful People Do on a Weekend

Success is determined by one's self. It could be satisfaction with your wealth, milestones achieved at a young age, or solid relationships with loved ones. However, more often than not, the world equates success to a high ranking position in your career at a young age.

I have not thought of myself as successful, but as age and experience creeps on, i became gradually proud of my life journey.

My conservative Asian parents reckons i play too much and sometimes nag at me. Their belief is "slog when young and reap the fruits at retirement".

Other than the fact that, you could possibly not live Forbes recently published an article of the 14 Things Successful People Do on a Weekend, and it further affirms my belief that my playfulness is what gives me my edge professionally.

After all, the whole point of the week is the weekend.

It is what you do on the weekend, that fuels you during the week. I never found the first five days after a weekend hard. Well, other than the fact that i have been very blessed with jobs that i love going to.

Partying or drinking excessively is something i do not do on a weekend. Getting wasted is wasting the weekend, even if socializing is listed as one of the 14 things.

I have a weekend routine. I start off my weekend with exercise. Even if it means waking up at 7am to catch the 8.30am yoga class. The best Tweets come to my head when i'm in the cobra or one legged standing pose.

On certain weekends, i do something a little more special like doing an adventure course, going out on a boat or visiting somewhere special. Being active and outdoors is an opportunity to disconnect, to pry myself away from the addictive finger swiping.

There are also days when i just want to stay home because i had been out socializing on the weekdays. On such weekends, i indulge in my passion. Blogging. This is also the reason why i didn't want to go into hardcore monetizing my blog or blog full-time. This is a hobby i keep, for me to do whenever i want and however i want. Some of my best blog posts are written on a Friday! While cinemas are a bad weekend idea because you're losing precious outdoor time, there are Saturdays where i like to veg out in front of a big screen with a movie that doesn't require much thinking. Now that I've relocated temporary to Europe, weekends staying in mean trying out new recipes.

I do plenty of weekend getaways as well. While many of my colleagues complain about the office being far from the city center back in Singapore, i took advantage of it being near the airport. Bangkok, Bali, Ho Chi Minh and even Malaysia are the usual suspects. That attitude didn't change, in fact increased its frequency now that i'm in Europe. I wasted no time in spending my weekends in Budapest, Florence and just last weekend Lake Como.

In fact, making future plans on a weekend is also an effective way of preparing for the work week. Being able to plan ahead makes me focused in achieving goals. It also makes me a more responsible worker. I am now planning for my next weekend getaway in Milan :)

My other ritual on a weekend is attending church. The 2 hours spent allows me to reflect, appreciate and be more introspective about larger issues.

How are your weekends like?

WEEKENDS....

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Blog for Money

For the people who came last week to the auditorium of SPH, i felt i may have short changed you. Many bloggers came wanting to know how to make money from blogging, but 3 out of the 4 panelists are not self-employed. In unison, we insist (or maybe we are not brave enough to admit) that we blog for leisure than for profit.

Wasn't talking about making money, so i fell asleep on stage (2nd from the right)

Blogging started as a hobby and still is but I DO love the freebies, the occasional extra cash AND THE FREE HOLIDAYS! However, i also prefer to eat my food hot than to be preoccupied with photography. If it is indeed (food) porn, shouldn't you shut your eyes, savor and smile with satisfaction in private?

In Singapore, reading blogs is popular. Myself found ideas of things to do, products to use, places to go via blogs. Also, i think we read famous bloggers' blogs because we secretly envy them. Gossip is addictive.

Thus, bloggers serve a purpose for brands. They create awareness and they influence readers.When do you start charging then? When you become a CURATOR OF AWESOMENESS.

How to become a curator of awesomeness?

Be Curious
Be the first to try out new social media platforms, keep on top of trends and read a lot. Reading not only improves your writing skills, it also inspires you with blogging topics. Being an early adopter of social media platforms also gives you a head start in amassing followers, figures that gives you the negotiating power later.

I spend many dateless nights just surfing the internet. Most of the time, i end up in the weird sections of Youtube that inspires me to write what-the-hell topics.

Movies inspire me too, i wrote my own rendition after watching Apple of my Eye. Reviewing unique experiences also make good content, like visiting a strip club.

When you have awesomeness in your life, you start accumulating followers. There's this blog, as well as

• Twitter — 1,093 followers
• Facebook — 1, 184 friends(join 224 followers if i do not know you personally, you will still be able to view my updates)
• Instagram — 695 followers

Highlights:

• Brand ambassador for Porcelain Face Spa
• Social media consultant for an MNC
• Speaker at PANASONIC "how to be a great blogger"
• Speaker at CNA BlogTV
• Panel speaker at OMY networking session
• Co-host on CH 8's Share Something with Bryan Wong
• Media trip to Gold Coast with Scoot
• Media trip to Hong Kong with Canon
• Media trip to climbing Kota Kinabalu
• Winning Super Blogger 2012

I'm not a well-known blogger like Straits Times wrote me as, but still, i am blessed to have these opportunities. However, if you want to be a blogger, you need to handle the heat. Had a mini seizure when i heard from a friend i am being talked about on EDMW, a very popular site with Singaporeans. Not the most positive comments were already made in the forums, but now, on a Facebook page?!? I then read what the hype was about. While taking a sarcastic dig at me, i do found the article well written and pretty damn funny that i'm actually proud to be mentioned.

In an ending note, the real secret to my little success? It is the OMG effect.

You can find the videos from the panel session on Youtube.

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Things that irks me about Bloggers

Just this afternoon, i overheard a lady in her late 30s telling her friends "there're soooo many bloggers these days..."

Back in those Orchard Road days where anyone who took some studio shots, never mind if they never made it to cover page or a runway, they call themselves a model.

Today, everyone is a blogger. Well, almost. Worldwide, there is an estimated 10 million blogs, growing at a rate of 38,000 a day with a new one reportedly created every 2.2 seconds.

In Singapore, Technorati estimates 15,000 blogs with 220,000 blog entries mentioning Singapore. These are figures from 2005 so we can bet the numbers have grown.

Back in those days where bad customer service is faced with a "I'll write to the media!" create trembling fear, today it's social media brands fear.

Bloggers are celebrities, and like celebrities, there are the A-listers, B-listers and so on. The A-listers win the popularity contest, the B-listers work hard trying to climb the ladder, the rest exist as a speck in the blogosphere (the wannabes). It is very much like high school.

The huge difference between blogging for leisure VS blogging for profit is that the latter makes you an ugly person.

I understand we're all in Sales. Each day millions of people earn their keep by convincing someone else to make a purchase. There's car insurance, life insurance, newborn insurance, yet-to-be-born insurance and also pet insurance! In fact, each and every one of us spends time trying to persuade others to part with resources - money, time, attention - though most of the time we don't realise we're doing it. Like parents selling their kids to bed, us selling ourselves to bosses for a promotion. In astonishing numbers, today we go online to sell ourselves on Facebook, Twitter and in Instagram.

So yes, i can understand. Still, the Type of Bloggers i Detest are:

1. The Self Centered
There are bloggers who do anything and everything to be famous. That includes making use of "friends" to get invitations, being chummy but never returning favours and/or participating in dating activities that has media coverage despite being attached or engaged.

2. The Narcisstic
To the Instagram pictures announcing said self have no make-up; Nude is used by the cosmetics industry USING make-up to create the barely-there look. If you want to be au naturel, it really means naked. So, strip!

3. The Name Dropper
There're bloggers who are overly eager to befriend the A-listers, hoping some of their stardust will fall. Stop trying so hard.

4. The Shameless
I've heard conversations between bloggers like "you should start a blog so you can get advertisers," "let's go email xxx, i'm sure we can get free holidays," "they're bound to sponsor us because we're bloggers."

Kudos to those who at least try to be discreet, "oh you know, if you want me to heeeeelp you advertise, JUST let meeee know."

5. The Diva
Then, there are those who asks to be paid to go on a sponsored holiday. ER, HELLO ARE YOU BEYONCE?

Controversial post but before you post a judgmental comment, I'll say it myself first. Maybe i am a pot calling the kettle black.

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Doing Social Good

Enough with the keyboard warriors and their hate comments, enough with the EDMWers sharing gossip. Be creative, be innovative, use the Internet for something beautiful.

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2012

Year in Review

I noticed that Facebook has a feature that helps you review your year based on your most liked upload or highlights.

While it is a pretty useful tool to reflect back on the year, there's more to my year which deserves a post. For myself. Not you, not anyone else.

I look through my archives and am glad it's not chock-block of advertorials, events i attended or product reviews *inserts finger and gag*

Despite, yes i am sponsored last year by True Fitness, Porcelain Face Spa as well as Hair Sciences to preserve my body, face and hair like it hasn't aged.

In January last year, i shared an article i thought was inspiring about a nurse's revelation of the 5 regrets her dying patients often have. I wasn't consciously living by those rules but i'd use that as a basis of reflection.

I bought a house this year but only to be lived in 2015. By making that decision, it brought me one step closer to living for myself and not of what's expected of others. I've always felt a slight pressure to marry because all my friends are marrying and my parents can be stifling some times. I believe most people still do propose/ marry because they have found the mate they want to grow old with but there are still some who propose/ marry just because it's "time".

Surely i fantasize of my fairytale wedding (since i am 13 and it changes with the trends of season) but with the purchase decision of the house, that pressure is gone.  I do not have an expiry date and i can take my time in enjoying a relationship without being kiasu about a HDB. However, i have also come to learn with experience that if a man doesn't want to marry you (after enough time of a relationship), he just isn't into you. It takes a lot of guts to end something before its time and its a courage i need to muster.

I've never really fit. When every girl's uniform skirts were shorter than their knees in school, mine was way below my knees. They got their mums to sew up their hems while i couldn't be bothered to. I felt a little out of place being the ugly duckling, bespectacled and not hip. Then in my tertiary education, everyone was "glamourous" and hung out on Orchard Road. I felt a little out of place going home after school. Mass Communications is the most pretentious course at that time, it churned out many stars.

My fame came, alright. It was in 2012 where I was discussed in forums by merciless keyboard warriors,

auctioned off for a charity Valentine's date, was a calendar girl ( or at least my picture was)

went on CNA, discussing intellectual issues (haha),

awarded Supper Blogger which was a real honour,

and also had a TV episode to my name.

So narcissistic was I that i made About Me in a powerpoint

                         

But the job promotion was the most rewarding (no, i'm not a full-time blogger *inserts finger and gag* ) because it is in the office where you are judged the most harshly with your speech, dressing and behaviour. I was quite an oddball, especially when my conversation starters can be something like

An adulterous Greek male was sometimes punished by the removal of his pubic hair and the insertion of a large radish into his rectum.

In 2012, i had qarah. The Hebrew word that is translated as time and chance, to encounter and to meet without pre-arrangement.

It was a good thing i've always felt out of place, because I was being prepared for what was already prepared for me. 7 years in the workforce, i am now at a place where my gift is appreciated and my character was built while getting there.

Work, however, have never consumed me. The 2nd regret that many dying patients (especially male) had was that they wished they hadn't worked so much. Seeing things keeps me inspired to be a better worker. My favourite exhibitions of 2012 were the Titanic in Singapore, Barcelona's Museum of Ideas and London's Harry Potter studio. Actually they were the ONLY exhibitions i went, haha.

In 2012, I had many solo travels. I went to Club Med and tried out the trapeze troupe, I was the Flying Pony for a day.

I made a descend into Cheddar Gorge,

and snuck into a school group at La Rambla.

I was a jewel thief in London,

and i went to discover Sala Bai on my own, a non-profit organisation in Cambodia that prevents sex trafficking. Despite having a bit of fear that i was going to be trafficked, I went to understand how young Cambodians can smile so genuinely despite the extraordinary challenges they face.

I was a dolphin trainer in Gold Coast,

molested by a koala

and pooped on by lorikeets.

While all these experiences were enriching and perhaps essential for soul searching, i would have prefer to share it with a special someone.

After all, it sucks using a tripod.

In 2012, i found the courage to express my feelings. It was only at the end of the year that i experienced a roller coaster of emotions and epiphanies were revealed. I could express my feelings to my parents, releasing resentment. I could express my feelings to my friends, finding peace. I could express feelings to people i date, which either raises the relationship to a healthier level or releases the unhealthy relationship from my life.

That courage to express my feelings came from travelling alone and learning to be alone throughout the year.

Still, there're moments of weakness and vulnerability that i want to hole up and just weep.

Facebook notes that i've added 119 new friends in 2012. However, I only meet 5 regularly. When I am younger, I would be caught up with a boyfriend or a busy schedule that I hardly caught up with friends. Throughout 2012, I had friends who were tireless in comforting me. A listening ear is the best gift and in the last few months, I found a few gems in the unlikeliest of friends.

My dad just passed me the photo album of my aunt who passed away last July from cancer. They were photos from her final moments in life. She went shopping for a camera and took pictures of what mattered. I flipped through it and saw it was filled with pictures of her with her husband, her children, and her few friends. Oh, and they were many pictures of her eating ice-cream.

In the final weeks of life, it is relationships that holds the true importance. There were a lot of meaningful conversations shared over good food, injected with some adventures in Golden Mile, Geylang and Little India. I've always preferred creating deeper connections with people than meaningless small talk.

I seemed to have gone to land's end, searched my soul and returned with new meaning.

Oh wait, i did go to land's end.

That

All the world's a stage. And all the men and women merely players. They have their exits and their entrances. And one man in his time plays many parts, his acts being seven ages.

And because life has its entries and exits, the purpose of life is to live it, to taste experience and to enjoy every human relationship that comes along it.

Climbing Mt Kinabalu was one of the best experiences in 2012 for all that I've seen teaches me to trust the Creator for all that i've not seen.

Even so, i've kinda forgot what it had felt like, which makes me reach out eagerly and without fear for newer and richer experiences for 2013.

The last epiphany for the year was me digging deep into my past, my childhood and the hurt from relationships. I'm at peace, letting go the mindset that my parents loved my brothers more than me, letting go the mindset that i'm ill-fated with men. For a while, i wondered if i had loved, and i emerged knowing i had. My friends since 15 have always warned me that my strict code of conduct/ moral that i impose on myself will make me very unhappy in future. Seeing how qarah happened in my work life, i know i just need to be myself and qarah will happen in my love life.

About this blog, i hope i've inspired with some of my best posts in 2012.

Like my experience standing in the red light district of Amsterdam.

Or my lessons learnt from a Russian strip club, or how eating blind gave much life insight.

Even superficial events count for experience and i reveal the secret weapons of a beauty queen.

I write a blog because writing is therapeutic and sometimes, it could just lift someone up like how Max Tucker's sex ray blog post lifted me out of flu "depression".

2012, i have lived.

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Month in Snap Shots

If you want to know how your date looks like without make-up? Take her to Pulau Ubin.

Pass! This means she'll be good to wake up beside. LOL

Oh, how nice it is to be out in the nature. We were stranded in the rain, survivor me found pen and paper to make playing cards! Heart Attack!! Coincidentally, one game and the rain stopped.

They tried to cheat the ang moh by quoting him $20!

Alas, that paper we used, was THE MAP!

Piecing it together to find our way back.

The perfect pint of Heineken is to have 2 fingers of foam.

Frank Yu, Singapore's one and only appointed draught master who has gone all the way to Amsterdam, the birthplace of Heineken to train came to teach us the Heineken Star Serve!

Everyone's talking and blogging about Hermes Gift of Time at the old Tanjong Railway. I hope you visited it! Today was the last day.

 Pop up shops were there, including nostalgic items!

The pop up cafe was abit of a rip-off though. $8 for a hot dog without bun! The exhibit was beautifully executed and venue was awesome.

 Plenty of block busters to catch, but otherwise mucking around outside toilets!

 and showing overseas friends a good Singapore time.

 A good Singapore time includes a the Heineken Green Room Experience.

She leaves a ear uncovered!

The best media press kits are Magnum where there's a soap shaped like a Magnum ice cream!

and the Heineken Star Serve which have MANY items perfect for my upcoming Mt Kinabalu trip. A haversack, a rain coat, headphone and portable speakers shaped like a Heineken can! Very cool.

 We visited a friend's gallery located at 28 Jalan Kilang. It is open to the public.

Selling for 28K.

 That's the Guinness record holder artist who did the astounding 3D art pieces above.

Follow me on Instagram and Twitter @chrispytine for more real time updates! Instagram just deleted my photo that showed one of Tokyo's fetish club :(

They said i violated the terms and conditions of Instagram, no nudity! Haha.

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