The past few days have been interesting for me. It’s the last long weekend we’ll get here in Vietnam until Tết, which is not until February. Side note: I think I need to do a life-update in this site since it has been a while. A lot has happened. Notably, I’m now based in Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam.

Over this National Day weekend of Vietnam, I have taken the time to do quite a rather deep introspection. This year, 2023, marks the 10th year mark of the roadmap I outlined for myself back in 2012. Some time around the semestral break of my Senior year in undergrad, I have plotted milestones of what I would have wanted to achieve from 2013 to 2023. Every year, I tracked my progress. Every milestone, I found a way to celebrate. Every step I have taken contributed to my goals. There were missteps along the way, but I found a way to pivot and thrive everytime.

I’m proud to share that I was successful in hitting my 6 major goals over the past 10 years. Honestly, looking back, I may have underestimated myself and I could have charted more challenging seas, Then again, I didn’t know what the world was like that much outside University.

This weekend, however, got me planning my life from now until 2033. Yes, I’m actually counting the remainder of 2023 as still year 1. Challenging myself this time around. This time, more than just writing it on my journal, decided to put it on Notion, which has just grown on me to be more organized and lay everything out.

While I am not keen to share what goals I have set for myself for the next 10 years, above is a quick snapshot of some routines I am committing to. Some of these I have been doing already, but it helps to just put in place to serve as a reminder, especially how these contribute to who I want to be in the next 10 years.

I’m quite happy that I have finally been given time by the Universe to do this much delayed necessary planning. The past few months have just been me going through life, trying to see where the winds would blow me. While this approach has allowed me to slowdown and enjoy life as it unfolds itself, I realized that I have just gotten used to a life of having goals and milestones.

Yes, there’s a lot of pressure in living such a life because it seems as if I’m always chasing after something. However, I think of it differently. Having these milestones allow me to measure how I’m able to live my life authentically and meaningfully. I’d like to believe even that the past ten years of making an impact in everything I have been a part of, wouldn’t have been possible if I didn’t set targets for myself. If I didn’t have a clear vision of who I wanted to be and what I wanted to do.

It’s exciting, yet terrifying, especially in the coming years since I’ll soon be hitting 40. I’m demanding more from myself and I’m hoping that I will be even more disciplined this time around to achieve these ambitious goals. Frankly, as much as I am competitive against myself, I’m approaching this 10-year roadmap quite lacking in confidence. A lot of self-doubt. A lot of roadblocks I am already seeing early on. Anxiety-inducing, daunting goals.

I do remain hopeful. I am staying optimistic, despite the odds seeming to be against me. I do love myself a challenge, after all. It’s always fun proving myself right, and surprising myself when I do thrive. So, we’ll just see if I’ll be as successful as I was ticking the boxes the past 10 years. If anything, for those challenging moments, I have Taylor Swift’s “Daylight” to remind me the mark I eventually want to leave the world. She puts it well, “I wanna be defined by the things that I love; not the things I hate, not the things that I’m afraid of, ot the things that haunt me in the middle of the night. I just think that you are what you love.”