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jessa

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Everyday Stories, Lived

Work

  • Beyond quiet quitting and bai lan: finding a third way to work

    I’ve been unsettled these past few months about my changing attitude towards work. I can’t help but see myself resonating with my generation’s disillusionment, and it’s escalating my anxiety about the future. I feel like I’ve been cheated right after university—”too educated” for humble jobs, yet somehow I’ve forgotten that our kind of work today… Read more

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  • Cutting the clutter in nth drafts

    While I was working on my draft for the nth iteration—because I couldn’t remember how many times I had reorganized and refined it—I felt a sudden resistance to deleting some information I found valuable, even when they do not really add more value to the narrative. Perhaps I just wanted to sound knowledgeable, having to… Read more

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  • Cluttered mind

    I can sense how my cluttered mind is affecting my ability to organize all my daily tasks—the tasks I have started but haven’t finished, tasks that are still waiting for closure. And so they overflow and get carried over to the next day, and the next, and the next. I think this is the cost… Read more

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  • On to the next

    So many things have happened in the past few days that I can’t help but think how long the months have been! Like a fish gasping for air while flipping and tumbling on dry land, the reality is starting to sink in, slapping me in the face: one month more and I’ll be out of… Read more

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  • Hard work doesn’t look the same for everyone

    I was taught that if I just worked hard, I’d have the opportunity to escape poverty. The formulaic approach seemed straightforward and doable from my perspective. Work hard, get ahead—a simple equation I believed in without question. Until I didn’t. Upon deeper reflection on this approach and after watching hours of documentaries about the cyclical… Read more

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  • Committing to a path forward

    For a year now, I have been thrashing out ideas—imagined futures—once I arrive at the inevitable termination of my job contract. I feel like I’m suffocating from a lack of imagination. When did this happen? I remember the nights I spent outside the veranda, looking at the stars sprawled on the night sky, dreaming about… Read more

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  • The cycle we can’t seem to break

    Tax after tax without tangible benefits is squeezing the life out of ordinary people like me. And like the people from 20 years ago, we still struggle to break free. Read more

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