How I Went from Feeling Stuck to Finding My Own Path in the Startup World
TL;DR - I’m not normal. I thrive on weird things that oddly make me feel better, be it in my personal life, or my career. And eventually, this is how I picked myself up from realising that it’s better to accept who you are, then to try and adapt into something that doesn’t do you justice.
Because at the end of it all, no one’s going to help you, but you. And something we ought to realise is that the faster you realise and accept that, the faster you will burst the bubble that you’ve been conditioned to live in. Listening to podcasts like The Mindset Mentor, has really helped me realised that there are so many things about your life that you can control, once you’re made conscious of it.
As for me, for the longest time in my career, I thought I had to conform to what the ‘corporate’ world needed me to be. Which I did, for a long time. And then I realised, I don’t want to do that anymore. And here’s why.
Curiosity doesn’t kill the cat.
I started as a pure designer at work, with a communications degree from university. And yes, I loved my design work. Graphic passion iz indeed my passion. And UIUX (or Product Design as the terminology now) made me feel whole. I love solving problems for people. In general. And yes, I still love it now. BUT. I started to want more. Take up more. Do more. Spending 12 hours at work? No problem if I’m solving a new problem. People thought I was crazy. Thats when I realised. I still need more.
And I did. I asked for more. I started to learn. Business. Management. Leading teams. Operations. Customer Experience. Public Speaking. Marketing. Content. SEO. Customer relations. Public relations. Brand building. I can literally go on, and on. And I’m not stopping, I love this cycle of learning, knowing more, being educated & relearning skills over and over again.
Now, alot of people have commented that because of my innate nature of always being curious, I ‘lack attention span’, or I’m ‘not open enough to focus’. To each their own, really, but I know what I thrive in and what I don’t. And this process of being able to learn holistically can and will aid in my future endeavours as well of becoming a solopreneur.
Pressure cooker strategy works on me.
Having many things to do is one way I’ve realised that could push me to perform. The needed pressure to multitask even though its not recommended, helps me thrive. This is not something anyone would recommend doing or taking up because studies have indeed shown that multi-tasking on a timeline will not help an individual thrive. But, I do.
Another interesting thing that I’ve learnt is that I work well with timeline pressure. If there’s too much time to do it, I won’t start it until the very last minute and get it done almost instantly. Which can sometimes lead to procrastination to complete certain tasks as well, which I’ve slowly curbed over the years by planning and prioritising on a weekly and daily basis now. It is important to note that when you spend 10-20 min everyday to just check in with yourself, your tasks, your priorities, it helps you set your internal direction for the day and I can’t emphasize how much that has helped me align myself to my goals.
So, now I still keep a routine, but a routine that works for me, where I do the following:
Creative outlet Fridays, where I spend an hour just getting inspired by everything around and to create and experiment
Focus AM mornings, where I do not have any meetings to be able to plan, think and execute my priorities before getting into the meeting frenzy in the PM.
Calendar code blocking, where I create deliberate space to actually do the work versus being distracted by a million things around
5 min rest time, where I simply do not think about anything else. It can be a walk, getting coffee, or simply taking the time to reset before moving on to another task/priority
I literally can’t be put in a mold. Call it jack of all trades, or whatever it is.
Lastly, I found it really hard to focus on just one thing and solely one thing alone. I’ve been struggling with this since I was a child, where I would take on too many sports, too many activities, and yet I still wanted to do more. I was netball captain, and squash captain, and head prefect, etc. I didn’t realise this back then, but that, in fact, is my true personality. And how I’ve realised that growing up, is that the pattern doesn’t change.
Whether is it in work, in my passions, in any interests that I have, I need to be able to do more than just one thing. And that fuels me. Similar to the first point above, it gives me energy to continue to power through. While I may not be perfect in every single thing, I’ve conditioned myself to know enough of it to be able to thrive. And this skillset is something that I’ve now slowly honed & appreciate versus putting it away and saying that it’s not who I am. It’s honestly a recent realisation that I like being able to do multiple things & to juggle them, even though I may not be the best in it.
Another thing that made me go ‘aha’, is that when they started to clamp down hard on structures, processes, and adding multiple red tapes in the teams, my internal alarms shot through the roof. I realised that I really do not fit in well with bureaucracy. In fact, it’s not in my nature to adhere to being a ‘yes man’, or to fit in a puzzle of ‘big brain people’ (iykyk).
Summary
And there you have it, my own little story about overcoming my innate nature, to truly be okay with who I am, grow and learn in multiple ways, and not to force myself into fitting into something that doesn’t suit me. And I’m okay with that. Because it gives me a sense of freedom and clarity into my next step in the career I’ll ultimately want, as well.