I’ve been blogging since 2015 but I realized I haven’t posted any about birthday life lessons yet (just turned 34 a few days ago). I did post though about things I’m thankful for when I turned 32. Reading it again, I somehow think I already discussed there some of the life lessons I learned.
But with this quarantine happening due to Covid-19, I learned more lessons and realizations of what I can do more.
- Being healthy is a GREAT blessing.
We don’t like being sick, none of us I think, but during this pandemic, it’s indeed the worst time to get sick. Gone are the days when it’s easy for us to go to clinics for check-ups and medications every time we’re not feeling well. I remember before feeling relieved when a sick loved one was already settled and being treated in a hospital. Yes, the expenses were no joke and the situations were tough but EVERYTHING’s different at present. To get sick right now, worst being hospitalized, is way more expensive, more stressful and SCARIER. - Having one or two friends whom I can rely on is ENOUGH.
Being a work-at-home mom for 4 years now, I lost contact with some of my close workmates. Almost all friends from high school and college got married so like me, they’re very busy with parenting. They’re still my friends, we sometimes chat on Facebook, like and comment each other’s posts but that’s what all we can do for now.
But I’m thankful that while everyone’s very busy, I have one friend who still visits me and chats me frequently on FB, asks me what I need that he can buy himself and even surprised me on my birthday. His presence and efforts are enough to make me feel OK aside from my family. - Living below our means is doable.
Saving money when you’re married with kids is a challenge. I shared our joys and sorrows here during the first 5 years of getting married and the moments where I can say we hit rock bottom. We’re a couple with average income. We earn just enough to provide for our kids’ basic needs and higher quality of education. We’re able to get insurance for me and hubby, bought a brand new car (mortgage will be finished next month!!) and started paying for an investment. There were some extra money but we used all of it in paying our credit card debts which were used during our travels. One advantage of the pandemic though, for us it made us to spend only on what we really need. We stopped using our credit cards during the last quarter of 2019 and since the start of quarantine, we got serious in paying those debts and live below our means. And it really surprised me that we’re able to do it – ‘living below our means’ and that we’re on our way now to building our EMERGENCY fund. Some would say we’re TOO LATE for it but I didn’t have regrets. We were able to travel as a family to different destinations, experienced many things that we can’t easily do anymore at present.
Our future is a lot more uncertain now, we don’t know how safe and secure we are from the virus, we don’t know how long our jobs will stay, the thought that everything is not permanent is making us more anxious. actually. We can’t control those things but with enough savings, at least there’s an amount we can use instead of going into bigger or another debt. - I am enough to be my kids’ TEACHER.
Yes, I am now a homeschooling mom! I shared all the reasons here. It’s only been a few weeks since we started but I realized how natural and fulfilling it is – to be my kids’ own teacher. I still have a lot to learn but I’m thankful that we’re doing OK so far, my kids are learning from me and we’re not very stressed. I admit I am a ‘monster mom’ sometimes but I believe my kids need to see the ‘angry me’ for them to understand that what they’re doing is not good, that I want them to always try to do better than their ‘younger self’. - It’s NEVER TOO LATE to learn a new skill.
I’m not good in cooking but here I am, happy to be my family’s cook from breakfast to dinner (sometimes including snacks) 7 days in a week! And to improve more the taste, I always rely on asking my sister or father for their recipe and also watching YouTube videos. I might be too shallow for telling you that my new skill is cooking but for someone who doesn’t cook a lot before 2020, this is already an achievement.
Update: October 2020 we shot our first ever cooking video for a brand. Have you watched it already? We had so much fun, hopefully we can create another video soon.
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