Stepping Off the Escalator: Living Life on Your Own Terms
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Welcome to Cultural Coalition. I'm Victoria. And I'm EJ. Today, we want to talk about future aspirations and dreams. In our first episode, we talked about living an unconventional life. But even though it doesn't mean we want to live differently in purpose, so we want to talk about how our lifestyles inspired us to break barriers, challenge norms, and pursue our passions personally and professionally.

Yeah, it's really interesting that you say like we're not trying to live differently necessarily on purpose. I think it's really funny. The end, when we finished recording, I felt like it was almost immediately afterwards that we were like, yeah, but we still

like maybe want to get married and have kids, like, right, have the house, like all of these, right, traditional milestone things. So I thought that that was funny, even, you know, like in the midst of living, you know, these unconventional lives that we still can hold on to some of life's convention. How does that fit into your life now? When you think about what your goals and aspirations are, how do you fit some of that convention into, you know, where you are now in life and what you want?

I'm saying because I'm not yet married or have children, right? I want to embrace the freedom that comes with my chosen life. For example, I want to travel the world and have a lot of things I want to do.

But most of the things I don't have like a very strong purpose. For example, I work doesn't because I want to raise my family or raise my kid is more for me. And sometimes I don't really know what's the what's the goal behind this. I think that's also because I'm trying to enjoy the life and without like any necessary having a specific agenda or the purpose of this like experiences.

and also I don't adhere to a conventional lifestyle. My life goals are not like well defined. I know friends around me, they have like really clear, some people have really clear goals, right? I want to earn like 150,000 US dollar a year. That's my goal for 30 or like 35. And then I need to buy this house. I need to buy this car. I need to live

a life like I can enjoy my life right I don't have all that goals I'm more inclined to go with the flow and see where life leads me rather than have a having a clear-cut direction so how about you I I think I'm maybe on the other end of the spectrum I I feel like I have

a lot of goals. What I'm realizing about myself is that my goals are maybe, you know, for example, like I feel like I, growing up, I used to watch a lot of like HGTV, like home and garden television, TLC. Like there are all of these shows about like a wedding story, an adoption story, a baby story. And so I think I've like,

I don't know if the fundamental desire or like aspiration behind those goals of like wanting a family or kids has changed. I think the...

I think in my mind, I thought that it would look one way. And when I'm, I think now I still want the goal. I'm just realizing that it's probably going to look very, very different than what I thought it was going to look like maybe when I was younger or like even like maybe five years ago. And so I think because of that,

the, I don't have a clear picture in my head of what the goal will look like. I think it's more of like maybe a feeling or like a sort of re-imagination of what the sort of early life goals or sort of like early adult life goals that I have and like where I am in my life now, what they might actually look like. So like,

I said I wanted children when I was growing up. I don't have any children. It's actually hard for me right now to envision myself being fully responsible for another human life. But I have lots of siblings. Like, they're having kids now. You know, my friends are having kids. And so, like, I get to have kids in my life. My neighbors have kids. But I don't necessarily have to necessarily be a parent in, like, the sort of typical sort of mom and dad sense.

Yeah, I totally understand that. I also have a lot of friends around me like having kids and or like they're in a marriage. And

I can see their life, but I don't know how that life gonna look like for me, right? I think that's how we are like at this stage of the life and we don't have like clear goal on what our future looks like. And maybe like you said, like we have a feeling of the future, but the feeling is not like very strong goal. Like I need to achieve this at age of 35. I need to achieve this as age of 40. And that's not how we live our life.

So in what ways have you pursued your passions on a personal level and how has your lifestyle supported that pursuit? Ooh, interesting. I think that given I'm entering like a new lifestyle, I find that I'm like returning back to things that like I really loved as a kid that as an adult, like I just haven't made time for. So like reading,

I've been like reading a lot recently. I think I've probably spent, the amount doesn't matter. I have new books. I probably have in the last six months obtained books

probably anywhere to like 50 to 100 new books. I'm gonna spend a lot of time reading like so much of the point where I'm like I don't want to watch TV anymore. 100 new books so I'm gonna spend a lot of time reading like so much of the point where I'm like I don't want to watch TV anymore. Like I would rather read a book than watch TV which is I don't think something that I've said maybe since I was in like fourth or fifth grade. So I'm very excited about that. I think that

I think part of the reason why that has been so hard for me with my lifestyle before is because like work and sort of travel and so those other things sort of like really consumed my life that like I didn't really have time to read or like watch TV or be concerned with like what was charting on music and so it's nice to return to to reading and I know that sounds like maybe a bit like a

a boring passion, but it's so fun. And like, I love my imagination. And so I feel like it's, it's expanding my worldview and like, I'm not in a position where like I get to travel and some of do some of those things like I used to before. So I'm really enjoying the worlds that all of these new books are opening up for me. Yeah. Do you have any like new passions? Are you returning to any old passions nowadays? Yeah.

I can totally understand you for like, first of all, you mentioned about reading. I think that's one of the reasons our like unconventional life give us a lot of freedom and time to do the readings, right? The people getting married, the people who are having kids, it's really hard for them to have a chunk of time. You can focus on reading and also do a lot of me time.

I think that's the benefit of this lifestyle brings us. We have a lot of me time. We think a lot, we read a lot, and we sing a lot. And also we have the experience to try something different. The new passion you mentioned about, I think surfing has become a new fun passion of mine. And that's my lifestyle greatly enables me to pursue it.

I'm able to travel to destination like Bali, Hainan, or even Australia to not only learn how to surf, but also immerse myself in the like the surf community and explore the surf culture. Right. And also.

But we talk about like the benefits, right? And also I'm curious, like have you encountered any challenges or resistance while breaking barriers and pursuing your passion? And how did you overcome them? I think when you are in a place where like you're not squarely focused

focus on a particular goal or you're open to sort of, like you said, going with the flow and being spontaneous, I find that like I get bored of stuff quite fast, right? Like because I'm not necessarily always looking to like do one thing forever or to be in one place forever. Like I need some novelty. And I think that's challenging for people because

Because it doesn't include, or it's not just limited to my hobbies or my interests. It includes people as well. I think there's a part of me that I'm okay with sometimes how temporary or transient people and things in life can be. But I think that...

When you think about sort of the long-term goals or the things that I want out of life, that is sometimes it feels like it's in direct opposition to a sense of like stability, right? Like how do you find stability when you're constantly looking for novelty and like new things or adventure? So that is probably the biggest challenge that I think I'm facing.

navigating right now and like figuring out, I think sometimes I'm like, ah, I will eventually find like the one thing or the one place or the one person that will like anchor me and hold my attention. And I'm like almost ready to let go of that and just say, okay, let's see what happens. Because I think every time I try to do that, like I have to

go in a new direction or do something else. And I think that's hard. I think that's hard, especially when so many people around you are working towards stability and sort of routine and regimens. I totally agree with you. I think for me, it's the same because we have time and we eat, we have time to explore, but try different things. We read books that brings us like

So many perspectives and different ideas how we can live our life. But also because of that, it's so difficult to find our specific goal, right? I see friends around me like you said, they have really clear objectives and center around like raising their kids, achieving financial stability.

whatever stability they're looking for, right? Whether it's financially or like family or anything. But for us is, I usually feel I lost. I feel just like really lost because I try so many things and because I have time and I also don't know which is the, so what's the clear path for me to achieve like something where like have a goal. But also like you said, I also agree that

we don't have to be like, have a clear goal for now. And when we exploring, we probably gonna know that like sometime in the future, I hope. - I think it's interesting as well in that like, yeah, I don't have a second thought. I thought I had something to say that I was like, definitely don't. - Another challenge I face, I also think,

the sense of loneliness that comes with living in a new country with limited friends, right? But particularly because we don't share the same cultural background. So for example, like I'm living in Singapore right now and people around me, they are talking about the elections of next year. They're trying to change their prime minister.

Song Li, Prime Minister, right? So I don't know the background and I don't know like the parties in Singapore and I don't know how they vote for people, right? So I can't really be there to talk to them about these political things, right? And sometimes I feel like it's really hard to be in the community and with other people, like they're pursuing different things in their life, especially they have their own friends in Singapore. So for me, I'm thinking, okay,

I think 99% of my friends' families are out of Singapore. So like people like you, EJ, in the US. I have a lot of friends in Beijing. So for me, I feel like there's also those lifestyles bring me loneliness. I'm not sure about you. I definitely think it has. I honestly, ironically, more so being in the US than in China. I think that the way that

I don't know. I don't know if it was because of my job or just the way that things were set up. I feel like the expat community is one in which

it lends itself to meeting people and making new friends. I have found that being back here, something that's been interesting is that like I'm reconnecting with people who I think knew me 10 years ago, right? When I was like still living in the US full time. And it can be pretty jarring. I think especially when it's like people who you've kept in touch with, maybe you haven't seen, right? You FaceTime, social media interactions, then you get back together with them.

And it's not even just that time is different. I think realizing, you know, having, you know, had these different experiences that sometimes you change and you're like, oh, I don't know how to like continue this relationship anymore. And it's not one of the necessarily even sometimes like we've outgrown each other or that we are sort of like dislike each other or that something's happened. It's just that like,

trying to figure out, we want to socialize, or like what our values are. You mentioned politics, you know, there's an election year coming up in the US as well. And like, you know, that is a notorious time for, I think, conflict to happen. I think in terms of like looking to build community, I'm in a lot of old spaces as the new me. And it's been interesting to see like who or what has changed in some of those old spaces.

Yeah, it's difficult because I don't want to revert back to, I think, a version of myself that I think I've worked pretty hard to distance. Well, yeah, literally physically distance myself away from. But I think also like, you know, in a sense of like a maturation process, I want to be able to...

sort of show up in relationships and in work and in community, like as the person of myself now. So I think when people assume or want you to show up as who you were before, that has made it, I think, difficult for me to like build meaningful connections because people can't get over the fact that I've changed. Like maybe for some people, depending on, you know, when or how they've known me, the change I think feels quite drastic.

It feels drastic for me even sometimes. So that is difficult, right? It can definitely feel isolating. It's hard because I'm excited about the person who I am now. I remember doing the season two, the episode we had with Elaine. So she was back to the US for a couple months, or not only a couple months, a couple weeks. And I asked her, how does she feel about going back to meet your old friends?

she expressed the same thing, right? You all friends see you as who you are 10 years, like a couple of years ago, but you are now the same person. So how to build this connection, reconnect to the people you know before you leave the US and that is really hard and it's very challenging and you need to let them know you are a different person now. You're still the one they know you, but you are like more grown up right now.

Yeah, absolutely. And it's interesting because people get so scared of change, which I think for us, like, I feel like we are constantly changing new places, new things. And so that aspect of it doesn't scare me. But I find myself definitely like having to reassure people that like, I think the changes that I've undergone as a result of like living an unconventional lifestyle have been actually for the better. Yeah. Yeah.

Can you discuss how your unconventional lifestyle has influenced your professional aspirations and career choices? I think the TLDR of it all for me is that I...

thought that I wanted to be a classroom teacher, right? Like originally, like education was really important. I had done student teaching growing up and I was like, oh, I'm going to be a classroom teacher because I thought that's what you do when you're interested in education, right? Like you become a teacher. Like what other jobs are there for people who are interested in education?

And of course, like, you know, the whole international education, right? Like I never thought that I would be in a position being able to do things like education consulting at the international level. And so I think absolutely it has changed my goals, even in that, that like, I'm not, I'm not a teacher. In fact, like I don't want to be a classroom teacher in that sense anymore. So it's really broadened my,

and redefined one, like, what does it mean to be a professional? I think also, I don't know if I think about my life in terms of a career anymore. I think being around a lot of entrepreneurs have shown me that like, like, I don't know, my parents have careers. My parents have, you know, essentially done the same job for like 30 years, right? Like they have traditional careers.

I think I'll have lots of jobs. I think I will continue to have jobs. I think like, you know, I've been doing this current job probably for the longest time, 10 years. I don't know if I see myself doing these things forever. And like, that's okay. It's an exciting time to know that like, I don't have to be beholden to something like a job for the sake of career. Yeah.

Yeah, I think ultimately I want to, uh,

take education and the idea of teaching people and educating people, empowering people, and moving into ultimately social work type things. But there's time for that, and there's always going to be a need for that. So you build the skills that you need, and I apply them in other contexts, whether that's China or the US or wherever else in the world. And I think had I not

have the experiences that I had. I honestly probably would have just been a teacher and sucked it up, right? Because like you can do it and it's fine, but it's nice to like, I don't know, I have a lot of agency. I think if nothing else, I've learned that like I have agency to choose and like I can be almost whatever I want to be, right? I probably can't be an astronaut or something like that or an engineer or a doctor, but like I can be a lot of other things and that's very exciting.

Yeah, like for me, I think I appreciate this opportunity and give us time to think about it and to really develop something we want to do because we don't have a stability or a stable life. So we can try different things and we don't need to worry about like a lot of factors in other people's life. So talking about career choices, right? Mm-hmm.

Out of that, have you found any unexpected opportunities or advantages in pursuing your passions outside of societal norms?

So back in Ohio, I'm back in Ohio now, I think I never thought that I would come back here. So in terms of like an unexpected opportunity or like advantage I've taken, I think being away for so long gave me space to like reevaluate my relationship with like my hometown, the Midwest and sort of all the things that come with that.

I very much thought that I would leave and never want to come back. I mean, I was like thinking about getting a permanent residency card so I could stay in China and like, you know, like not thinking about it at all. That was like very much what I wanted. I have found that like a lot of people here like,

they don't leave, right? Or they just move from one city to another, or they're coming from, you know, a smaller city into Columbus, right? Like Columbus is sort of like one of the big apples, if you will, of the Midwest between, you know, Indianapolis, Columbus, and Chicago. So I bring that up only to say that like me, like sitting here, like in my own house is very much something that

was out of the realm of expectation for me. I thought that I would like always be, you know, someone who would like get up and go and sort of like live internationally. Actually, oh, I want to find something. Can I go grab something? Cool. Okay. I will be right back. Like this is going to blow your mind. Hold on. Okay.

This is kind of funny. I, when I was in high school, I'm trying to see the date on this. I must have been, you know, a lot of high schools in the U.S. I don't know if this is common in China. I feel like a lot of schools in the U.S., when you enter in high school, they like make you write or like a letter to yourself.

Like, I think I must have done this in eighth grade or ninth grade. And they, the goal was that like you write a letter to yourself your freshman year. And then when you graduate from high school, they like give it back to you. So you like write a postcard and you mail it to yourself. So I want to read this postcard.

This is hilarious. Okay, so a little bit of, I guess, a background. In high school, before I really knew anything about China or anything like that, I took Japanese at the local community college for a semester. So I didn't really know how to write any characters. The only kanji that I had learned

learn to write was uh which is the japanese word for so i'm gonna so i wrote this card can you see how i wrote that character i mean it's horrible so this was when i was in like ninth grade so i yeah i think in ninth grade so i wrote this note to myself mind you i'm pretending that i'm writing this from shanghai

So the address that I wrote on the card is 71 Gozen, which Gozen is like a made up Japanese word that I, but because I only knew Japanese, I didn't know anything about China. I only knew like Shanghai and Beijing. So I'm going to read it to you because I think this is like,

I think I had to date it to like 10 years. So I wrote it from my birthday. So it says May 28th, 2018, which is three years earlier than when I actually left China. So it's so funny that I said that I was going to be in China because I

I knew no Chinese. Anyway, so it says, as I celebrate my 28th birthday in China, I planned my trip back to the States. Although I've been successful here, I'm finally homesick. Like talk about foreshadow. I want you to meet someone, exclamation point. That's what I wrote here.

Did I think I was going to be dating? I don't know what I thought. Okay. I hope you enjoyed the gifts I sent. Ask Jordan, who's one of my sisters, about her ninth grade year and tell Jacob and Isaiah, who I assumed... So my stepmom was pregnant at this time. So I just always wanted to have twin siblings. So I just assumed she didn't end up having another girl. I'll bring them to Shanghai once school lets out. That's so funny. Which...

I actually did fly out most of my siblings to Beijing. So that did happen. And it's only imagine like, again, I had no idea this was happening and I completely forgot about this while I was living in China. Okay. So next it says, see you at Josh's wedding. Josh is my brother who is married now and has two kids. Okay. Jalen will make a great best man. Who's my other brother. And then it says P.S.

tell Kiana, my sister, congrats on her second baby boy. So my sister does not have kids, but she wants kids. Anyway, I signed it EJ and like, I kept onto this. It's like dirty and like, it's turning brown, but like, I don't know. It's interesting in that I, sometimes I tell myself now that I never imagined sort of this life for myself. Right. But like, then I find things like this and I'm like, oh, well, like maybe I was thinking about

being abroad or Asia or China or whatever, but I don't think I really would have been able to really predict the details of what the life would be and like how it would impact me and like

you know, I mean like here it's like, it doesn't even say that I'm necessarily moving back to Ohio. It's just back to the state. So anyways, it's an interesting full circle moment. I think to like, I've been, you know, like I'm in my house and I'm like decorating my walls and things like that. And like, I'm going through old stuff. My parents bring me like old bins from things they put in the store. So it's always fun to, to find little things, um,

like this yeah the postcard on it it says imagine the future so anyways i think back when you were like nice grade you already have this imaginary sense in your head and that you're moving to a country in asia for a long time and came back to the u.s at a certain point because they're like you're homesick that's amazing i don't i don't think like

Now, I'm not sure about like the school that the people like the how people do it in school right now. But I think that's something like very amazing. And you live in that moment and you believe it when you were young, when you were a kid. And it's more like it's not like only a dream come true. It's like something in your head and is finally came true. That's something like very amazing.

I'm now I kind of I'm going to frame it. I should like put it on my wall somewhere. I don't know. Yeah, do it. Do it. I'm wondering, curious for you, like, did you have you had like any maybe like dreams that you had as a kid that you feel like you've been able to fulfill? Yeah.

I don't really have a dream, like very clear thing I want to do or like something I think about. When I was in high school, when I was in like primary school, I didn't think about like what's going to happen 20 years ago, like 10 years ago. So I don't really know what I'm going to do.

Yeah. I hope I had the chance, but like, I hope we did the same thing, but I recommend people like our listeners do it right now. So you can write a letter to yourself 10 years later, right? It's never late to say something like that. Maybe you can, you want a life, you want a wonderful life with like husband and three kids, write it down and you imagine in your head and let's talk about it after 10 years. And we can do it now. We can do it like what's,

what's our, like, what's our imaginary life in 10 years? And then you just like write it down and keep it. I think the most important part is you keep it and you keep it. Yeah. I think that if I were to do this exercise again now, I mean, I would have completely different things to say. Right. And,

Everything that I said in here is like based off of tradition and convention, right? Like having kids, meeting someone, getting married, like having a successful job, right? Like, because those are the things that I thought would make up, you know, a happy, successful life sort of 10 years down the road from when I wrote that. I think if I wrote it now, I don't know if I would write about all of those things anymore. Mm-hmm.

Maybe I'll try it out. You've inspired me to go back and do this again. Yeah. That'll be interesting. That'll be very interesting. I think for me, it's just like, I think for this life, this lifestyle, I think it gives me time to really think about like, I read a book last year and that's the most of the reason why I do this podcast. And it gives me a lot of opportunities and advantages, but

And this provides me with the time and freedom to explore new projects. Since its inception in October of last year. So our podcast has surpassed 10,000 plays, which I think is truly remarkable. It's not something like when I start doing this, I can imagine this is happening. So I'm really glad that people are really listening to this podcast and they have the same experience.

challenge we have they have the challenge we have been through right they have all the things like they are i'm glad like it's like the content is now just like in our head we are sharing the same thought and same like lifestyle maybe for us it's unconventional but i also believe more and more people are choosing an untraditional life in

in this like 21st century or 22nd century. For some people, it's like completely, right, unconventional. But there's a lot of ways to add sort of unconvention, even in small ways, to your life. So I'm curious for you, like as you think about following this unconventional path on top of like navigating expectations that society or loved ones might have for your future, you know, aspirations or dreams, like how do you balance that?

what you want versus maybe what they want. I think it's very challenging. This is very challenging. So how you communicate with the people you love, like parents, your significant others, the people you love, right? They must, I think for them, they still hold a traditional belief

view of life. So they want you to be in a marriage where you're a successful professional, like career path. And they think that's the stability in your life can create happiness and you will be happy and they will see you happy. But I think the point is you need to talk to them, communicate with them openly and honestly with our like loved ones, sharing our desires and motivations is it doesn't mean like we discussed our

Living in this lifestyle doesn't mean we don't want to getting married and having kids.

It's just explaining the choice we made and help them to understand our perspectives better. I think for me personally, I think I made it very successful, like how I communicate with my parents. So they no longer in a position to ask me to marry someone, to having kids. They know this is my life. They know I'm happy because this is what I chose. I think everybody's going to be regretful.

in some time you're gonna regret you're living in this different life you don't have like you don't have a clear goal you're gonna be regret you you can't be like a very successful professional women and you are gonna regret if you choose a different lifestyle but whatever you choose

there are always going to be regrets. And I think it's also crucial to remember that living like us is more about finding a personal path that aligns with our values, aspirations, while also considering societal expectations because we are human natures. We live in the society. We try our best to ignore other people, how other people view on us, but we cannot completely ignore

put that apart from us, right? I think I'm not saying how other people view us is important. It's not, but you're still a human nature. You're still like, you're still a people, humankind. You live in a society. You need to know where at least you think about it. I think if I'm being completely honest with myself, I don't know if I do a great job of maintaining balance for a couple of reasons. One in which I like,

I don't know if those things should be evenly balanced. If I think about a scale, oftentimes when people think about a balance, it's supposed to be even. And like,

I don't know if I want to give even thought to how other people think about what I'm doing. I think I pretty early on stopped relying on at least my family's opinion of what I was doing to impact what I was doing. I think part of that is that because at least in my immediate family, like most of what I've done in my life has been unimaginable for them.

And so like, even if I wanted their opinion on a lot of things, I didn't always know how to factor in their consideration because like, you don't have a reference point, you know? Just going back to like getting a Chinese green card. I don't know. There's only so much input that I can get from my family or something like that because like, what is their reference point for thinking about marriage?

moving abroad long term, right? Like my family hasn't really, they don't, haven't lived outside of state for long term, right? So like, it's just a foreign concept in general. Who care though? I mean, like you said, I can't turn it off. I think

well, I care, I think, about what my friends think. I care about what my community thinks or the people who I sort of am in community with, what they think. One, because if you're in, I don't know, a community with someone, I assume it's because you have shared values. And so I would care if like,

People thought what I was doing was in line with the values that we agreed upon. But I'm a perfectionist. And I think I've learned that I'm a bit of a, I don't know, a term that I, you know, as people do nowadays see online, like a moral perfectionist. Like in my mind, there's a right way to do just about everything in life.

And I think I struggle with, I think for me, instead of trying to find balance, I am impacted by sort of judgment or opinions of others because I use that for better or worse sometimes to calibrate what I think is right. And I am sort of trying to like, I don't know, not be married to the idea that everything has to be right.

right or wrong or there's like a correct way to do things sometimes you just have to

uh, do it and like, not think about it in terms of like, is there a right or wrong way for me to go about like living my life? But it's hard. Like I I'm, even though I know that I sort of set the standard for what it is, like, I don't know if my standard is right for me. Like I go in this cycle. I'm always like, is this right? Is this, is this what I actually want? Like, how do I know what I actually want? You know? So I don't know. I'm like,

I think I'm like embracing a bit more of a healthy hedonism and just like following the things like you said that like make me happy that sort of don't harm other people. And instead of trying to, I think,

convince other people or my loved ones that like what I'm doing should be respected or appreciated. Like I'm of the mindset where like I have to surround myself with more like-minded people.

When I can, so that I don't constantly feel the need to like prove or validate how I choose to live my life. I think that's a dangerous place to get in. And I think when I try to balance it, I end up getting into a place where I have to like prove people, prove to people that what I'm doing is okay. I don't like feeling that way. I think like, even though we live in a unconventional lifestyle, like,

we still care about people around us. We still care about like our families, our friends, our like significant others. We value their opinions and their view of point. So I think maintaining open lines of communication, expressing our intentions and seeking mutual understanding can go a long way in finding a harmony between our choices and expectations of society and loved ones.

But also, I think remember, our aspirations and dreams are ours to shape. And finding a middle ground that respects people like who respects our individuality while acknowledging the concerns of others is the key. I don't think maintaining a balance really like important. I think it's more like how we want to live a life we want. Also make people around us

try to understand and try to support us is very important.

Okay, so we'll go for the recommendations for our listeners to end this episode. So I recently read a book I want to recommend to the people who are struggling to find love in their life is written by Jay Shetty in the book called Eight Rules of Love.

I think it's very interesting. Like he teach people how to love yourself, love the people around you, how to end a relationship and like how to define, I need to end this relationship. And this is a toxic one for you. I think only if you know how to love yourself first, then you need to know what you want, right? You can pursue the life of the goal of your life. And then maybe you can find

someone who share the same goal or like you can live a life together. So the first step is always to love yourself and find yourself. Mm-hmm.

um for me i'm also have been thinking about that a lot recently as well and uh there is an interview um that i watched on youtube that bell hooks did talking about her book called all about love um and it focuses on uh

Basically, I think our definition of love maybe is a little bit faulty. And thinking about what does love really mean and how do we incorporate that into our lives, not only for ourselves, but for other people. And what do you do when someone tells you that they love you, but in reality, the way that they behave and sort of act differently.

with you is very far from love. And so it talks a lot about like, you know, reconciling that and what do we do so that we can move forward? All right, everyone. So thank you for listening. Please like, share, subscribe, rate us, leave us a comment. Let us know how you're feeling on the topics that we talked about today. We'd love to hear from you all. Bye.