When I was in university, I told myself  telling myself countless times, I can’t wait till I’m out of here! Then I can devote ALL my time to growing this blog!  Of course, now that I’m done uni, I realize that it’s not that simple.  It’s been hard to manage my schedule and learn to prioritize while I am creating a never-ending list of things to do.  

For the last several weeks, I couldn’t seem to get much done, no matter how hard I beat my keyboard.  I tried different time management tactics - Pomodoro, scheduling software, changing my environment - but nothing stuck. 

Even with calming meditation music on, I couldn’t focus.  I would start one thing and get sidetracked again and again, until next thing you know, I go from writing a blog to editing my LinkedIn Profile to cutting the grass!

After several weeks of spiralling in and out, I’ve finally got some answers.  

If only summer lasted forever, the world would be a happier place.  

I, for one, would wake up more excited and reinvigorated with sunlight. I'd be more productive with more daylight hours. I'd be lighter without the sweatpants and hoodies. 

So when I was planning my student exchange back in 2012, I was determined to go for the winter semester and skip winter altogether.  I finessed course load intoshape and spent January to April this year living on a tropical island in constant 30+ degrees celsius and 80% humidity weather.

Take it from me, warmer climates do not equate perpetual happiness. Now that I've definitively dispelled the myth that I would be happier in warmer climates, I've moved on to try other things. 

I'm conflicted. My problem is that I'm trying to create my own dream career and live my passionate life while telling you how to live yours.  

So I'm making a declaration today that I will not try to tell you how to live your life.  I'll just tell you what's working for me.  (Honestly, this is what I've been doing all along, but I feel better making it clear to you :) I only ever share things that have personally worked for me.)

Here goes: I have seriously down days.  At various points in my life I thought I must have bipolar disorder, PMDD (aka. severe PMS), SAD ( aka. severe winter blues) or depression.

In my efforts to alleviate my moodiness, I went on birth control pills, cleaned up my diet, became vegetarian and even escaped last winter by jetting off to Singapore. Some things worked, but nothing for very long. 

Now I just face it, the ups and downs are part of the human condition. (Not to mention, starting a business makes highs higher and the lows lower.)  The point of life though is to ride the waves, not to numb it all out. 

Everything takes time.  Lots of time. More than I know how to
fathom at my age.

I'm 23.  When I read about the careers of people who are doing what
I would love to do one day, I can feel the whole ship sinking.

AAAH, there's so much to do. How am I supposed to do all of that?!
I don't know how to do 99% of the things they talk about and the 1%
things that I can do, I suck at.  

I often have this nag­ging feel­ing that I’m wast­ing my time in school.  I read sto­ries about young entre­pre­neurs who started and grew their own busi­nesses while in uni­ver­sity, or even high­school and I feel like I am falling behind with each pass­ing day.

The prob­lem with try­ing to carve my own path is that my work­load never ends.  Every­thing that I dis­cover becomes one more task I could do grow my busi­ness or improve my life.  I’ve learned that I can’t just work, work, work or I’ll burn ou