I kept on saying I’m not gonna watch Seventeen’s concert. But on the eve of the first day, I accepted the offer of a friend to buy for me and immediately got myself a VIP Standing ticket. Marupok na kung marupok pero I spent sleepless nights thinking about it and I knew it’s no longer just FOMO. It was about my mental health and how I will be for the rest of the year.

Hindi naman ako agad-agad bumigay, shempre. The reason why I had to wait until Friday was because I prayed. I asked for a sign from St. Therese of Child Jesus and St. Andrew Kim Taegon. I told them that if I will see a bouquet of roses before the concert, it means I can go to the concert with peace of mind - at pagbalik ko sa bahay, my parents will be fine and there’ll be not even an ounce of regret na I’ll have additional debt (no pressure though, no interests, pay when able).

I was so careful about mentioning this to others kasi baka madinig ni Meta at magpakita ng kung ano-ano. I refuse to look around din whenever I go somewhere outside the office kasi ayokong isipin ko later on na I forced it.

The whole Thursday, there was nothing. But on Friday, nagparamdam na bigla yung mga rosas. The first one was when I saw the profile picture of an “influencer” holding a rose. I don’t like the girl but I paid attention to the fact na isa lang ang hawak niya. I told myself na hindi yun counted. I asked for a bouquet, or atleast madami. I kept on browsing through Facebook and came across this ad of an online flower store. Puro bouquets pero walang roses, when normally meron sila.

Nung mga oras na yon, akala ko wala na talagang pag-asa. Unti-unti ko na tinatanggap yun eh. I don’t want to go against the prayer and decide on my own kasi parents ko yung sinangkalan ko.

But suddenly, I came across this tweet about Hanahaki disease when I was checking out MinWon’s White Midnight teasers. It was a scene from a manga where a guy was coughing while there’s a set of xray images of his brain on the side of his hospital room. And sa next picture, there’s a closeup shot of the xray images, and boom… roses. 

Hanahaki disease, after all, is a fictional disease wherein a person coughs roses with thorns if his love isn’t reciprocated. Yun yung madalas na nagiging cause of death because tumutubo yung halaman sa loob niya.

Now, if that isn’t a sign, then I don’t know what is. So I went back home early and bought the ticket. 

Cut to the concert day.

Before I left the house, nag-away pa kami ni Mama at Daddy because it felt like they don’t want me to go. Pero kailangan ko kasi kaya nga siguro ko pinapanood ng concert para makapagpahinga from all the unplanned responsibilities eh, pero parang ambigat sa loob nila na paalisin ako. Parang kailangan may isipin ako sa concert at hindi ako magsaya - kase nasa bahay sila at walang kasama, dahil hirap na hirap na daw sila, dahil “ano ba naman yang concert na yan? Dapat nagdadasal ka lang! Kaya sumasama ang mundo eh!”

Eventually, daddy apologized and mama never did. Pero tumuloy pa rin ako. And while waiting for the concert, pinalabas yung MV ng Love, Money, Fame. And yes, may scenes dun na may hawak na bouquet of roses si Mingyu.

That moment, I was alone, pero nangilabot talaga ko. Like is this a reminder na pwede ako magpahinga? Na once again, God used Seventeen to convince me na okay lang ako tumakas saglit. Okay lang na piliin ko muna sarili ko. Okay lang na kahitt minsan, ako yung masunod. Ang galing ng instruments ni God. From my friend to Seventeen, and to another friend na willing sunduin ako after the concert para madali ako makauwi.

I want to think na deserve ko pala. 

Saka na ko magkukwento ng concert stuff. Sa ngayon, gusto ko lang maging thankful. Nagnunurse ako ng PCD ngayon pero mas mabuti na yung pakiramdam ko. Iba kase talaga yung saya pag may Seventeen ka. :’)

Seventeen Heals.

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• by Angel Aguilar
  Angel Aguilar

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 We’re 11 days into 2025 and to be honest, it’s going better than I’m used to. I think the main game changer was my decision to forego the chance to watch Seventeen’s concert next week here in Bulacan. So that basically saved me 40k in an instant, less all other miscellaneous expenses because that’s just the tickets. Gahd, the moment I typed the last sentence, I suddenly wondered how was I able to get through the past concerts with NOTHING at all? I mean, all expenses back then were abrupt, unplanned, and not in the budget. HOW TF WAS I ABLE TO MANAGE?

I realized in an instant that it’s through debts. And to be honest, I’m starting to learn how to manage my finances. And I guess that the first step was sticking to my priorities. Seventeen is VITAL to my mental health, but so is my desire to step foot in South Korea on November. (Although I’m still praying that Kuya Mike and Kuya Don will surprise us with free tickets, I’m gonna need my showmoney for the visa application so, yep, hello, we need to save!)

So basically, that’s my priority. Plus the medical expenses of my parents and the household stuff I need to pay for… 

The first thing I did was debt consolidation. Driven by the dire need, I decided to avail of Eastwest’s InstaCash promo and loaned a total of 185k before the year ended. As I didn’t have a choice, I chose a 5-year installment plan. The interest’s higher when you compute, but atleast the monthly amount is manageable. 

From that money, I decided to pay off my Unionbank credit card debt and Ate Julie. I was also able to update my payments in Eastwest as well so it doesn’t incur penalties and interests. And I have money to use during emergencies. I have so much debt left though but I’m working on it. I’m making sure I’ll triumph over these debts this year. 

To be honest, this is not easy. It takes lots of sacrifices - the Seventeen concert topping the list of course. I have to let go of a lot of things and stay away from my comfort zone most of the time. What helps me to stick to this resolve is tracking my finances. I was doing it so wrong in the past that I couldn’t stick to it. So thank God, I’ve finally learned the strategy that works best with me.

What I did was just to record my income and expenses and decided not to worry about how much I have. Because it is way easier to check if I’m spending more than what I’m earning/receiving, than keeping track of how much is in my wallet everyday. I realized I’m not a bank. I’m a person who’s trying to handle my finances properly. I don’t need to do accounting entries everyday - because besides the fact that I don’t know how to do it, I’m really often lazy to do it.

Now, here’s the catch: my salary is never enough. So to help at least with my daily expenses or my parents’ medicines, I decided to sell paruso and other bread products of Emong’s and Alicia’s Bakeries. Many people from my town missed it so much so I took advantage of it, highlighted the provenance of these delicious breads, and sold it to everyone. I’m not earning so much but at least, it gives me a few hundreds every week. My capital peaked at almost 6k last holiday season so I guess it’s really making a comeback now. 

Honestly, I am planning to revive the bakery in Meycauayan after the house has been renovated. I shifted to Kuya Rico as my architect (with Chris’ permission!) and we’re planning to start the construction at least by mid-February. This is another challenge, of course, because it was totally difficult to stick to your budget once the work begins. But I know God will provide. I know God will finally allow this for us.

This little bit of freedom for financial worries somehow lessens my stress, to be honest. There are lots of times when I thought that money is really my number one stressor, mainly because my parents are both senior citizens and their insurance is nearing its expiration. And that’s basically my biggest motivation to stick to this. I need to have enough money to support their finances when I’m practically on my own in two years. I need a fallback and the bakery is my plan A.

Right now, I’m feeling positive on what this year’s gonna give us all. Maybe this is what happens when you stopped stressing yourself about what’s the future instead of focusing on the present. Whew. I guess I finally learned my lesson. Thank God.

What’s next? I have to learn how to prioritize finishing my deadlines. I have a lot of things to do for Leo and Quico Vecin so I might as well focus on that too.

But one step at a time… one step at a time. :)

Exciting Year Ahead

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A few weeks ago, we were told that there is a possibility that our unit will be merged with another dahil as the boss apparently said, “wala namang ginagawa `yang mga `yan.” And did it hurt? No. But did it annoy us? Terribly.

Of course, I can always choose to let it go. But I decided to take it personally because it challenges one major principle which I’ve long been holding onto: Productivity does not always equate to being seen as busy.

Okay, just a short story: People, in real life, knows how my leadership style is. While I am a professional yapper most times, I have often received feedback about how I just let my colleagues do their own thing to achieve the goals we set together. My style is I just lay out the plans, tell everyone what I want to happen, and then let them all take the wheel. And then, I’ll just be out there monitoring from time to time, making sure no one’s going astray and then throw out advices here and there.

You see, we were not given the most intelligent brains out of all creations for nothing. Human beings are born to think; and for us, who chose to stand as leaders, we are given the responsibility to hone and allow our fellow thinkers to be able to do so. This way, we can eradicate laziness and slacking - because trust me, in my years of leading volunteers, this is how I managed to encourage them to perform and commit even without getting paid.

Now, do I set a timeline? Yes! We all have deadlines. The pressure will always be there. But as I’ve said, if you allow people to think and do things the way they do; as long as they get things done, how they are seen during work hours should not matter. If my teammates prefer to act on the tasks at once and complete it earlier than expected, thank you! But if they prefer to cram and work on things last minute, as long as the deadline’s met, then so be it!

Many traditional leaders would think that this could encourage laziness, but honestly, this works well because I understand that it’s not all the time that people’s mind work at its best. We all have moments. We all have our downtime - and as a leader, I know fully well that I have to respect that. 

If the teammate eventually turns lazy and a task gets compromised, then that’s the time that I have to step up. After all, I’m the leader. I should know what to do in case things go south, and in fact, I should know even before things fall apart.

Going back… I’m not saying I am better than the boss who apparently accused us for doing nothing. It’s just that I cannot help but establish a point of comparison because I don’t feel like we were given a fair assessment, especially that for the past months, we had to settle things for the company on our own because we were left to fend for ourselves alone. 

As indignant as I felt, I still tried to look back to somehow try to understand where that kind of feedback came from. And looking at us from a bird’s eye view, yes, we can easily be misconstrued as slacking. We often go out for lunch, never had a dull moment, and are performing on other co-curricular activities for the company. So yes, it’s easy to judge and assume that we’re really not doing anythingwhen at work.

The thing is… it only means one thing to me: The boss (and all the other people who think the same) just does not understand the nature of our job. And as someone who should be on top of everything, that is saying something. 

This is not about defending our unit. This is more like expressing my realizations that there are still a lot of supposed leaders in the corporate world who think that productivity always equates to being seen as busy. To be honest, I don’t see them a leaders at all. They’re just that - bosses. 

It’s not our fault that we were a bunch of efficient office workers. It’s not our fault that we were trained well to complete tasks within the day. And it’s completely and downright unfair when we are judged of not doing anything when our jobs are totally dependent on our counterparts.

But are we slacking? No. We have side tasks, of course. In fact, we’re using this downtime to iron a lot of things out for the company. So to say we’re doing nothing basically raises a bigger question: Why doesn’t he know what his team’s up to? A leader should be on top of everything, right? Why isn’t he?

It’s 2025 soon and maybe I’ll carry this annoyance to the next year as a motivation to maybe, be a little louder with what we do. Maybe that’s the problem from our side - we tend to work things on our own and just keep people updated via emails and meetings. So I realized that maybe it’s time to put myself more out there and you know, present bigger evidences that we are indeed working. 

This is me being petty, I think, but I consider it necessary already. After all, a leader should know how to adjust - and yes, this is me promising to do just that.

How Do You Define Productivity?

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• by Angel Aguilar
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Kung may award ang pagiging reklamador, siguradong may Latin honor ako. Siguro dahil meron akong chronic fatigue (salamat, PCOS!) o baka dahil talagang mentally exhausted na ko, ayoko nang sumubok ng bago. Ayaw ko nang lumabas sa comfort zone ko at magsimula from scratch. Nakakatakot eh. What if hindi mag-work?

Ito yung mga tanong ko kung bakit hindi ako makapag-resign. Actually, nakakatawa nga, kasi when I revived this blog, I came across old posts wherein sobrang attached ako sa company ko. Well, in a way, attached pa rin naman ako ngayon. It’s just that recently, I realized that if I can find a stable and sure way out? I’ll do it in a heartbeat.

Why? That’s for another post.

Because for this entry, I want to talk about the fear of starting again.

Being someone who is never fond of surprises and generally, the unknown, mentally and emotionally taxing sa akin yung iisipin ko pa lang na magsisimula ako ulit. Kung aalis ako sa trabaho ko, I’ll have to go back to zero, build new relationships, and adjust to new sets of custom which may or may not be different from what I’m used to. Siguro ganon ako katamad? Pero I take it like it’s exhausting to, you know, invest again on new things kasi andon yung takot na pano kung hindi mag-work? Pano kung hindi ko magustuhan? Pano kung hindi AKO magustuhan? 

For someone who couldn’t even envision her future, ang galing ko mag-assume. Sobrang pessimism, actually, pero ayoko kasing isugal ang peace of mind ko.

But the thing is… if I continue to stay, am I assured of the peace of mind I long for? Kung manatili ba ako, makukuha ko ba eventually yung mga pinapangarap kong makuha dito? At this point, all answers are leaning more to “No” kaya nga buhay na buhay yung mga inhibitions ko. Masyado na kaseng nangyayaring hindi aligned sa mga napakatayog kong prinsipyo sa buhay, and it affects my performance and overall mental health if I continue to tolerate things that are against whatever I believe in.

Pero sabi nga, hindi naman ganon kadali na pakawalan ang mga bagay-bagay. I’ve been with the company for ten years in February and I’m left with two years worth of health insurance for my mom and dad. Sila lang kasi ang nagbibigay ng hanggang 75 years old and both my parents are 74 this year. So may konting benefits pa na need kong i-maximize.

But time flies. Kaya as early as now, sine-set ko na yung isip ko na in two years, I’m 37 y/o, I’ve got to go back to the wild and venture out on a different, and hopefully, a better adventure. Matinding mind conditioning kasi ang kailangan para hindi ako matakot. And maraming prayers and preparations para if I decided to put myself out there, may mga gusto pa ring kumuha sa akin.

Sabi nga sa picture na nakita ko, “It’s not hard, it’s just new”. Two years kong itatanim sa utak ko ‘yan na mapag-aaralan ko naman lahat. Ito ngang sa bangko, natutunan ko kahit wala akong kahit anong background sa numbers eh. Ngayon pa kaya na may 10-yr worth of experience na ko sa banking field?

It’s Not Hard, It’s Just New

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• by Angel Aguilar
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