nat-xo.blogspot.com 🖤

Hello! I hope you're doing well and feeling happy today!

I woke up feeling great, and managed to drag myself into a 20 minute morning workout to get my systems up and running. For some reason, morning workouts always seem to make my days start better, even if it means I have to wash and dry my hair in the mornings haha. Drying long hair takes up so much time you know???

Anyways the journaling prompt for today makes me reminiscence so many wonderful things that have happened over the week. Shall we get started with my list of joy this week? Hehe!

When I get to watch anime and movies with moomoo

ROX gaming (brings back those Ragnarok days hahaha)

Talking to my WOTV community peeps on discord

Seeing thatlittlepuff's reels on Instagram (highly recommend the best cat chef!)

Anyone sending me cute funny reels or memes (yes thanks besties)

Getting my Shopee parcels ufufufu

Reviving my blog to blog again + updating my blog template! It's just the right balance of pretty, minimalist and simple!

When TingTing made me a cake

Finishing volumes of 86 light novel (currently at vol7 now!)

Catching up with the latest animes (so many shows to watch!!)

Reading Tokyo Revengers till the latest chapter (and now I'm sad that I gotta wait for more chapters)

Watching random Youtube videos that I subscribe to (I laugh a lot and just genuinely enjoy content from worldofxtra worldofmama heyitsfeiii peach amberscholl itsjinakim oanh wassupman shorteview miamaples and more) Sorry if it suddenly turned into a YouTube recommendation list lol!!

Doing daily workout videos! (thanks OppServe and GrowWithJo)

Getting collagen drinks and more from Rixile.co

When moomoo bought hot chocolate powder for me :D 

When Cuddles accidently fell off the bed while asleep 

Honestly right now I can't even tell if this is last week's or 2 week's worth of joy that's condensing into a single week. Pandemic lockdowns have really blurred the lines between days and weeks... I was even writing entries in July but I wrote the date as JUNE??? Yup... so many good things to look back on for this week. I'm pretty sure there's more joyful events and happenings that might have slipped my mind, but I like these kinds of journaling prompts that just make you see the good in the daily happenings!

I'm so sorry if my picture qualities are still quite bad... I'm gonna try to invest in a proper tripod so I don't have to rely on front camera quality HAHAHA. Here's a mlem Cuddles picture to end this post with. She's been in heat for awhile now... I hope it ends soon...

Take care! See you tmr :)

 Hello Day 5 of the Journaling Prompts series!

I'm liking this habit of journaling online daily. Gets some of the negative feelings out of my system! It feels like a habit I would want to instill into my daily life. Honestly I would like to do some of those actual journaling in journals with stickers and washi and all those journal decorations but I know myself, I'd get too lazy, and it brings out the perfectionist on how everything has to be "perfect" in that journal. At least blogging about it won't get me irritated by my own handwriting hahaha. Sometimes I wonder how much practice people put into achieving that aesthetic handwriting... *shrugs*

Now to get to the 10 things I'm grateful for... (which to me might seem repetitive because I've been mentioning it in the past few journaling posts as well!)

    1. I'm grateful for good health and a healthy body.

    2. I'm grateful for loving, healthy relationships in my life.

    3. I'm grateful to have a wonderful paying career with supportive colleagues.

    4. I'm grateful to have a place to call home with food on the table.

    5. I'm grateful to have zero financial worries, with spare to invest with.

    6. I'm grateful to have a wonderful online community to connect with during the pandemic.

    7. I'm grateful for the many books and podcasts that I can feed my soul with.

    8. I'm grateful for the workout programmes to keep my body moving daily.

    9. I'm grateful for the technology and social media and apps that allow communications daily!

    10. I'm grateful for choosing to revive my blog, even if no one reads it (hehe)

Now... that was a little harder than I expected it to be. Since I end up combining a few related things together, I actually froze at 7 things... had to crack my head for the last 3 things hehe. What about you? Did you take time to think what you're grateful for today? I usually have a gratitude app on my phone to remind myself to list down at least 3 things I'm grateful for on that specific day. I even have the reminder notification set daily so that I won't miss a day. I find a great way to end the day before sleeping. You should try it too! I highly recommend it :)

#10 might seem a little weird to you guys but... blogging was once my pride HAHAHA. It was the medium that secured me a trip to Korea for free, that got me invitations to events, that led me to met other people, and even today I wondered why I stopped...

I was super excited back then, I'd bug my mom to get a camera for me (twice!), and happily take pictures of almost everything everyday. I probably annoyed a lot of people, but at the same time I'm glad that I have a lot of pictures to look back on during those times... I stopped using the cameras once phone cameras became the "new camera" and well... that's what I'm using today haha!

Blogs aren't mainstream now but I did enjoy reading many people's contents back in the old days. Where people used to blog freely about their emotions without a care in the world. Being emo or happy or sad or just anything - putting in down in black and white made it all easier. Publish the post and that's that! Was so much better than Twitter. I quit twitter when I realized I was only using it to vent feelings and frustrations... it turned into an app I'd reach for only when I'm down and under, and I never want to always feel like that. So I got rid of Twitter from my phone hahaha.

Welp I'll stop here for today. Thank you for reading and I hope you get to list down things that you're grateful for today :)

 Hello again!

I'm full of energy now thanks to a productive morning! I missed my workout session yesterday evening, so for today I decided to go all out and did my workout first thing in the morning. Morning sweat sessions are always a great energy booster for the rest of my day hehe.

Then I had a cake pick up to do at Sunway! Thank you Ting Ting for the cake!! It's so pretty right? Here's a delicious picture for you to feast your eyes on.

So back to the journaling prompt today. What is going right in my life? 

I am quite happy with my life right now. I don't know what is going "right" or "wrong" as I can never tell what the future will bring but I'm positively happy!

I have a room to live in.

I have a car to drive

I am debt free.

I have a job and was promoted last year.

I am still getting paid despite the pandemic.

My loved ones are alive and well.

I have time to read, paint, workout, aka time for self love.

I have enough money to save and invest.

I have a positive mindset to face life head on.

I could list so many more things that I think is going right in my life... and yet at the same time all that I have could be a luxury for many others. I am just beyond grateful for everything I'm blessed with. The only thing that isn't going right would be my social life and the lack of proper "work" I have to do to keep my job. But I'm more than grateful. Life has to be balanced after all.

And I am just so so so grateful to be in a better position that many others. I do try to buy from small businesses every month. And I do try to share about them on my social media as well, but I'm not all that active on social media these days. Endless scrolling doesn't make me feel like I'm using my time right. If you are running a small business and I haven't reached out to support you yet... I am probably waiting for the time or reason to buy (or just selflessly promote yourself in my DMs hehe).

 Hello again! Today is Day 2 of the journaling prompts! What do I need more of in my life? The answer changes depending on who I am the current moment I guess.

If I was still in a busy state of work (like before lockdown), I'd want more time and energy.

If I was constantly worried over finances, I'd want more money.

If I was always in a bad mood, I'd want more relaxation and rest days.

The list goes on.

But right now? I'm in a state of languish. Languish is the lack of motivation, aim and happiness. I was constantly feeling this way since the lockdowns started, never knew the right term or word for it until Mossery posted about it yesterday on Instagram. Absence of purpose. That really sums up my lockdown. My work requires full time field work for me to be effective spending time. Sales work... is so much more productive with face to face meetings and body language ques, and being there to understand my clients better. It's just so different.

And so I've been spending more time playing games, reading books, watching YouTube videos, scrolling social media, occasionally painting or completing dot-to-dot pages, etc. I feel like I'm constantly in a state of flow without purpose.

I need purpose in my life for me. I wake up not knowing what I want to be doing. And it feels so empty. Some days I try to set goals for myself. Paint a page. Read a chapter. Complete the quests on the game. But it still feels like it's not a proper purpose in my life. It's not the steps to the big picture that I want. Being at home all time is nice and relaxing at first but once you're forced to stay at home? That's a different story alltogether.

I feel like I finally have time to do things that I've forgotten I love. Like painting. I still don't do it as often as I'd like because... well.. technology and being surrounded by screens... But I am thankful for time to enjoy my hobbies again. I wish I had more motivation to do this on a constant basis. Maybe then my skills would actually improve instead of being roughly the same...? Also my supplies are getting old... 

Maybe that's why I'm doing this 30 day journaling prompt challenge. To give some purpose into my daily life. Waking up knowing "I have to blog about this topic today!", sorta gives me something to look forward to later in the day. Even while typing this, I'm taking mini breaks in between. I'm even on a 4 weeks workout challenge at the moment! So far I'm on Day 25 and I'm loving the results I'm seeing despite not being on a proper diet or eating clean. I just needed a plan or schedule to follow to keep my body active during the lockdowns. Know what I mean?

I find these challenges much easier to do if I have a partner or friend doing it with me. But right now I'm doing it all alone hahaha. At the end of the day, I'm alone but not lonely. 

I want more social connections too. Staying at home all the time... I feel like I've forgotten how to speak to people. How to naturally be friends with people. How to start conversations to learn more about people. Please teach me how to be friends with people again... I feel so awkward talking to people now. As in physically talking. It's like my throat has forgotten how to speak.

I was walking Cuddles the other day, and I tried to greet the other people on their walks or exercise. I literally said "Morning!" when it's evening... and the uncle just smiled and nodded back at me. That was embarassing, not knowing what time of the day it is. Most other times all I do is smile and wave to the other folks. It's nice when they do the same nod and wave back. I haven't managed to go past that though. Occasionally it's just a few words of exchange, but I still don't know their names hahaha. Then again I only talk with like 2-3 people on a daily basis (le boyfie included) so I guess having a small circle is ok too. I'm sorry if I'm such a bad friend hahaha.

Well.. I guess I'm ending this blog post here.

Right now I need more aim and goals in my life, more social connections, and more purpose! Currently doing 2 types of challenges to keep myself in sync with life, maybe I'll pick another challenge up for my own wellbeing. Feel free to suggest any challenges that are good to do! :)