Joey Bee

When I turned 16 some ten years ago, I promised myself that by the time that I turned 26, I'd be in the comfort of my own home as a teacher with a loving wife and a child. By then, I'd thought that I'd be in my sixth year of teaching English to high school students, and most probably be inspiring them to another part of their lives.

Now as I sit here, typing this all down, wondering if anyone would ever even read this post (or other posts even), I'm wondering how my friends in Manila are.

Currently, I'm a 26-year-old into my ninth month in the journalism field at Daily Guardian, one of the known local newspapers in Iloilo City and in the region. 

Nothing I imagined ten years ago came true.

I graduated in 2017 with a journalism degree at the age of 23, I'm in my third job after graduating, and worse--I'm stuck in the middle of a global pandemic along with everyone else.

Just like everybody this year, I did not see anything coming.

Before seeing myself in this current position, the last time I saw myself in the media profession was probably when I was in college. It was hard to get a job in the profession after graduating, knowing that I've been wanting to become a journalist since elementary school.

In my younger years, I did want to become a journalist (after settling that I didn't have what it took to become an architect), and I vaguely remembered saying in sixth grade that the only places I saw myself were the big leagues, CNN and The New York Times. 

At that point, I'd been told to stop daydreaming and start working towards it. I didn't listen, and I would only learn about the need for hard work in college, which, I think we can all agree on, would probably be too late already.

But alas, here I am, at 26, still learning a lot more about life which I should've learned more than a decade ago.

I've never even seen myself in law school--and two law schools at that. I knew when I was young that being a lawyer would be too strenuous, but in some years growing older I forgot about that and thought that I could go on with it.

But then again, I was in a place that I never even thought I could see myself in.

There are some areas, though, which I saw myself in the past that I didn't think I'd see myself in now, but they're not the good ones.

For one, I knew I'd be glued to my screens--I just didn't know that it would be two--my laptop and my phone.

I'd have to be honest about that fact, I don't even like being glued to these screens, but I don't know why some years ago I've developed a serious case of FOMO (Fear Of Missing Out, if you still don't know what that meant).

I've also developed more morbid thoughts, which I've been contemplating as early as fourth grade. But I'll talk about this in some other post, and when I'm ready to.

Looking back on all of these, I honestly hate myself for not working as well as I should've in the past. 

But I still like it, nevertheless.

Why?

Because I learned.

I guess one of the things I like most about my slow growth is that I learned about learning, and how it's a beautiful process.

Some people say that others stay the same, but I guess my experiences from then until now have taught me that it's okay to trip on your own ankles, fall down, get back up, and regret, no matter how many times, because I get to learn lessons that I've never learned inside the classroom and I only learn by being with other people and learning from their experience as well.

This may not be applicable to other people, but it's helped me grasp a better understanding of the world around me, so I could become a better person and see less from my own lens, and see more from others'.

And I'm thankful for that, because it's also helped me to think less of how I would want to see myself, and to venture into greater unknowns--or as it's put in John Green's Looking for Alaska--a great perhaps.

Now, I see myself as how I like--an adventurer who joins the world to make it better. I'm not good as I would want to be yet, but at least I know I'm getting there.

Perhaps.