Hectic week: happy things

This was a super busy week at work. I was leading a 4 days workshop, with international speakers in town, and a broad set of stakeholders. Fortunately we had a holiday to breathe and rest a bit, before the last push on Friday. Overall, it went very well. As my work buddy said: we are making wave! 🙂

Yet, we had so many good things that happened that kept me grounded and balanced.

#1. Having my work buddy in town. He left Jakarta few months ago. While we kept in touch with text and daily calls, it’s a different dynamic having him here. Work is so much fun when you have someone who gets you and cracks jokes.

#2. I invited my favorite person (from work) in Manila to come over as speaker. It is so nice to have an old friend in town. So many good memories. We met at work setting and became life friends. Next weekend that we are going to Manila, we will stay over at his house and meet his new baby.

#3. I realized that I didn’t need to prepare for my presentation because I know the materials by heart now. I can speak through the ppt without HR to go up because I am so confident of what I am presenting. I presented the same ppt five times this week and didn’t get bored of it. That’s a good sign of working something interesting.

#4. After a full day of meetings, I came home to be with my family. They center me, they ground me, they relax me, they bring me ordinary joys that I need after a day of intellectual excitement.

#5 On the non-work day, Sofia spent the morning organizing her book shelf while I read in her bed. We put on Taylor swift music as background, so chill and relaxing.

#6. Lizzy enjoyed seeing my work buddy, his cartoon buddy. Lizzy is very picky with my friends, she often ignores them but she’s super friendly with this guy. I love seeing them together.

#7 I took the girls out for lunch that non-working day. Lizzy told me phone is off limit during lunch time 😉 So cute.

#8 Kids are so on point sometimes. When I got super excited by a text, someone who was in one of the meetings wanted to meet me in private to discuss my work, Sofia asked me: so this guy wants to meet you, he’s super important, what does it mean? does it do something for real? or does it just make you feel good about your self? I was happily surprised, how she innocently caught what ego can do to us.

#9. I booked our summer vacation!!! Despite busy work this week, when stressed, I booked our vacation. One week in Sumba, and one week in Bali. YAY!!! Super excited for the nature centered holiday. I need some chill time after busy work schedule until July. I have two more work trips coming in May, and 2 weeks trip to DC. All exciting but could be mentally and physically taxing.

#10. Lizzy learned to bike, in like 10 min. It was a spontaneous decision to go out to bike on a Friday afternoon. I had to borrow the pump from a neighbor, we had to clean the bicycles, and head out in the middle of Friday evening traffic. It was so fun! Lizzy started peddling after 10 min of trial and error with Sofia’s assistance (because I tried for 2 min and my back hurt!). Now, Lizzy has declared that’s her favorite exercise. A lot of biking to come this weekend. A super chill and low key weekend.