Liebster Award + Coping With Tough Times

I’ve been nominated for the Liebster Award! Thanks, Bill!

Bill writes reflective blog posts on A Silly Place and has a way of making me feel that things aren’t all that bad in the world even when times are tough. I think it’s his tone of writing.

So, if you need something to ease your mood after reading some of my heavy posts, Bill’s Silly Place is the place to go!

I wasn’t going to respond to this award so quickly. I’m notorious for waiting months before fulfilling my nominee duties, for this I’m sorry but this brain has a mind of its own. His question was about coping with tough times, and I’ll answer that after this rant.

A rant on branding, not on-branding

Bill was talking about brands and being “on-brand”. How humans can be on-brand but aren’t brands. Since the opening of my little Etsy shop, I’ve been giving brands a lot of thoughts.

Believe it or not, I studied marketing for my Bachelor and graduated with a distinction. Sadly, all that’s water under the bridge – “achievements” that didn’t serve me because I didn’t know what I could and couldn’t do.

I knew my personality (and social anxiety) wasn’t suitable for the marketing industry, but I thought that could change. Besides, I wasn’t accepted where I wanted to be and marketing was an old crush. So I studied marketing and proved myself to not be marketing material. Ha!

Ironically, years after graduating, I find myself needing the skills I learned in my marketing days. The stuff about 4P’s, target audience, consumer behavior, branding, and etc is now just a distant memory. You know, water long since passed the bridge. Probably irrelevant in this day and age anyway. They’ve now moved on to 4R’s and who knows what.

I’ll never be able to become a brand myself. I feel too self-conscious to ever do that. That said, I’ll try to be on-brand.

Before Bill’s post, I didn’t even think about the phrase “on-brand”. His rant became my timely reminder. I guess I’m annoying him right now. Haha.

Blame it on life!

Life has taken me on a journey of entrepreneurship (who knows where it’ll lead to), and I’ll have to be on-brand if I want a shot at a semblance of success. After all, branding is at the core of every successful product and… brand.

It really doesn’t come naturally to me. I’ll learn, though.

And now to answer Bill’s question!

Qn: When times are tough, how do you cope?

Before I answer the question, let me clarify that I’ve never been in truly tough times where I find myself not having food and shelter. That’s tough.

Lucky for me, I have solid family ties to tide me through those times – like that time I found myself with S$30 in my bank and weeks away from my paycheck.

I’m having a tough time now, but I still have food and shelter thanks to my generous mother-in-law and loving husband. Physically, it’s easy. It’s tough because I’m unemployed, constantly guilt-ridden, and have no idea what’s going to happen next with my trickling income streams.

When times are tough…

Typically, I cope by pretending everything is okay, and simply responding to my environment. Situations invariably pass, though something invariably comes up again. Because… life.

I’ll also get very upset because I blame myself for my predicament. Why can’t I do this? Why didn’t I do that better? Am I not doing enough? I’m not doing enough!

And then I feel parasitic and helpless. So I’ve been using the following coping “techniques” to cope with these feelings.

Coping with tough times

I have three ways to cope internally:

1. Be okay receiving help from people. We can give back when we’re able to.
2. Know that we’re always doing our best in every situation, even if it doesn’t seem that way. I do a lot of self-blaming in my free time and that’s nasty and useless. If you’re in a tough time, I suspect you may do this too. Well, don’t!
3. Remember: this too shall pass. I have this tattooed on my wrist.

Three ways I’m coping with tough times externally:

1. Contribute in ways you can, to whatever you can. Giving is like a balm for the soul, even if it’s just supportive words.
2. Keep your needs few and your wants even fewer. We don’t need a lot to live comfortably. If you know this, you may realize you’re richer than you thought you were. Then tough times won’t be as tough.
3. Continue putting in actions to improve the situation and eventually something will work.

I hope this would help someone who’s coping with tough times!

My questions

1. What’s your most philosophical take on life? Go crazy with it.
2. What’s one good thing about the pandemic in your opinion?
3. If you can go anywhere right now, where will it be? Why?
4. If I tell you that you’re perfect the way you are and you should accept yourself, warts and all. What will you say to me?

My nominees

Alison

Crystal

Emily

Laura

Lisa

Lucy

Melissa

Ray

Sophie

Vanessa