My Life's Ticker

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So here I am, crying, afraid and vulnerable. How should I even deal with this debilitating feeling? Ah, I know, befriend these emotions!!

Me.

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An Open Letter to my Future Self.

Dear Future Raymond Led,

Hi there, I am your old self(maybe) and I wrote this so that you’ll have something to refer to in times of confusion or if you feel like you’re going off the grid.

I know you must now be someone who is successful and happy and have probably gone far in your career, your dreams. Great then!! I am happy for that. All my ambitiousness and aspirations and persistence today should now be reflective on your situation.

I am not sure though if you stayed in the IT industry or have gone astray and went for the “scientific journey” I used to have when watching Sineskwela as a kid. I am sure that the Led in between us will probably know, and he’ll probably have a letter for you too. 

You are not always that way, Led. 

And sometimes, you should look back and realize the improvements that happened within you and hopefully around you as well. Sometimes you must know your roots to realize if something that should be there, something you must always have, is missing and finally, sometimes you can look back for answers. 

Problems will arise and will get recycled always, so know the tools at your disposal and make good use of them. Just like when I used to code in front of a computer. Instead of memorizing the codes, I memorize the processes, concepts and ways to use the codes. I hope you are better now at this. I hope you’ll remember these times 

(NOTE: you should not be cheating on your codes by now). 

As I am writing this, I am 22 years old, approaching 23. I have failed a few times in my endeavor(I haven’t tried many yet though). I hopped to two jobs as of now. One from Accenture as an associate software engineer. Fate didn’t say yes, so I was not promoted into the next level(long story written in the brown journal with tag 1) It’s okay. I learned a lot, don’t feel mad. 

I am now an iOS developer. Never did I thought I would look at a MacBook angrily when the program is compiling like a turtle. As of now, I am not an expert in iOS. 

The company didn’t give me many tasks that I could learn from and I didn’t find any inspiration to do my own project. I don’t know why I always have to be in a situation like this, but I am not giving up. No. Though partly, I am to be blamed for this.

And yeah, you were once putting excuses for your laziness and I hope by now, you’ve changed for the better. I am slowly trying to build that path that would lead to you, I am starting to have a clearer picture of you by now and thanks be to the Lord for this self-awareness thing.

These are the times I think you should be prepared for. Maybe you are more knowledgeable by now, but in case you find yourself in any of these times, I wrote a message for you, this is how your young self will react to these times:

***In times of confusion. ***

Seek for a guidance. Either seek for that divine enlightenment I’ve read about in the book Eat Pray Love, write a petition to God as your usual ritual when wishing for something big or go sit with Mama, she is wise and probably wiser than you will ever be. 

Ask for her guidance, tell her the story, admit your sins, guilt, grievances, regrets and even cry in front of her, just like I did when I broke up with my first lover. Mama will understand you and support you as long as you’re not doing anything bad. 

Remember I used to meditate during 4am when I am confused or sad. Sit somewhere now, be in silence, deal with yourself, I’m certain you’ll find the stillness I once owned inside that vast void which is your mind. 

***In times of happiness. ***

Wow. You now know what “happiness” is huh. That’s not always the case though. But, remember to be thankful to the people around you, those who supported you, those who did not turn their backs and offered you any kind of assistance or kindness alone during your needy time.

Thank the Lord because He blessed you again, as He has always done so in the past. 

But remember to be humble always. No matter who you are talking to.

Don’t scold the cashier when she puts the coins in the counter instead in your palm. I did it once and I regretted it. Don’t shout at the cats, because like your favorite dog PotPot, they too can feel frightened and need your love. 

Remember, I am an animal lover and you will always be one.(always share PETA’s post if you found it really helpful). 

***In times of new challenges***.

I used to be creative, resourceful, a fighter and resilient Led. .  and so should you.  

This one should be easy for you. I am sure by the time you read this. You’ve already followed the plan I have laid out since 2015 and you have now been exposed to many methods of how to conquer big problems. Probably you’re no longer scared of diving into the unknown unless of course fatal.

Yeah! Divide and conquer. Break it down to smaller ones, know the root cause, look at the pyramid from the top and celebrate each small successes(remember this is what I learned in Business Analysis Fundamentals of Lynda.com). 

And like how I used to draw flow charts for the clients in upWork, you too, should apply the same mentality - I’m sure it’s within you. Look for it. There is always a way out. 

***In times of sadness, depression, frustration. ***

Meditate. Just like how I use to deal with these negative emotions nowadays.

Remember? Everything goes away. When you are sad, remember to not react. Just acknowledge the pain and let it flow, be passive Led, that’s how I used to deal with it. IT WILL BE GONE.

Go at the memorial park where Amang was buried, find the old big tree and under its shade, sit, enjoy the wind and just be with yourself, Led, I’ve been there and you’ll love the place (not in the evening though). 

Or, talk to the people you value the most. Mama, your friends, to the Zen gurus in UP Diliman, or like what I usually do, post a question in Quora and ask for an advice to the witty community. 

Or , listen to the old beautiful and inspirational Mariah Carey songs, just like how I used to these days. They are great Led. 

Make it happen, cant take that away, your favorite Hero, Fly like a bird, through the rain. Remember how in many times of your life, they uplifted your spirit from being down. I’m sure these songs still have that power. 

***When you feel envy, jealous, insecure. ***

It’s fine. Remember how I used these emotions to be a better version of myself, leading to you of course. 

But don’t consume too much. Any of these emotions, it ransacks your confidence and renders you unable to focus on your own journey. 

Remember how unique of a person you are and the strengths you posses. Use them at your advantage. Don’t consume too much envy. You don’t have to compete with anyone else. Where you are right now, is exactly where you need to be. Hold on to that one.

***When you are sick. ***

Just go home. Don’t be alone. Let Mama cook a soup for you, massage your head with Katinko menthol, let Papa do you hand reflexology that he claims effective during sick times. If you have a work schedule, fuck it, then file a sick leave and go. 

***In times of a broken heart. ***

Oh. This one. I thought you’ll never experience this because I said so, but you will, and it’s inevitable as a real human to fall in love and get hurt. 

I have affixed to myself as of now that once is enough. I am immune to it. Just like how you vaccinate a child to poliovirus. The vaccine itself is actually a weak version of polio virus, not the destructive one, but because the body learns how to fight it when the real destructive polio comes in, it no longer brings havoc. 

Oh yeah!! That’s it!! That’s how I dealt with heart break, Led. Look at the picture of that person who is making you cry, look at his picture with his new lover, yeah, immune yourself. Let it be. Let it flow and you’ll get used to it. 

Talk to Mama, that’s what I did when I cried because of my first breakup. Weird? It is, because it is not my nature to let my walls down for someone, but once, I did and you should recall the feeling after I have moved on. It feels victory.

Call your friends, eat at Malolos Crossing at midnight with them, just find people who will listen.

Time will heal it. You are allowed to be weak sometimes Led, so it’s okay. 

***In times of dating someone. ***

Haha. You should be an expert to this by now. Remember how communicative I am? I love talking to people, I love connecting with them and you should too. Just remember Led, if your gut feels not good towards a person, the by all means follow it. Your gut is good at telling you NO and it usually is right. That’s its job, to keep you safe. 

Don’t settle for anything less than what you really want. 

Know your value Led. Not just in terms of dating someone, but for almost all aspects of life. When a company tries to offer you a salary you’re not comfortable in, try negotiation. It’s not what you are currently doing, but what you are capable of doing. And I know you are capable of a lot.

Remember how I ended up with a low salary job once because I really wanted to get out of a company? No way by now, you should not settle. Period.  

Going back to dating.. BUT DONT FORGET, to open your heart and mind for someone who you think is right for you. I have done a lot of research about it Led, but no scientific paper has answered my questions so far. You can do it.  

***If you find yourself alone in life.***

I hope not Led. But remember, I am used to it. I used to eat alone at the restaurants in the mall and the waitress would look at me baffled and I would look back with an annoyed face. Haha. Everyone else was was with somebody else. Except me. Well, that was different, though.

Alone and lonely are never the same thing. Perhaps if you are on, this time, you’ll feel that you’ve spent too much time being alone and you deserve a companion. You do Led, I believe that you do, but we can never know for certain. 

You can always socialize and find friends, though. Call your brother, if he has children by now, play with them, you are, by the way, their family. Yes. A family. So you never have to live life alone. 

Don’t waste time in your room, go out!! – =========================================================

Remember Led, life goes on and just as a child we once were, you should always walk out of your comfort zone not knowing if you’ll fall or not but always filled with wonder and curiosity. The only difference by now is that you must be capable of taking calculated risks, of course, don’t go for something fatal…or has the probability of being one…not worth it.

If ever you want to recall a day, go look for the journals I kept, the old ones and I hope you are still writing your own now. I hope we can meet one day and talk about our failure and successes, but that’s one big impossibility. This letter will be one of your connections with me.

You are loved, well fed, sent to a good school, surrounded by a great family, have better jobs. I hope you are better now. Life is good. Smile. 

I love you, Your Old Self,Raymond Led E. Carasco

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Perhaps you will never look into the same eyes I laid on you when we first met. You've changed me. You've altered the way I view others and myself as well. In a positive note though, I learned how to love myself even more and to really build that layers of protection that I can use the next time I fall inlove. But as of now. still. It's you that I long for.

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Coffee @McKinley Hill

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My new office Location. I will surely miss those mornings when I had breakfast at McKinley Hills with my friends, looking down at the beautiful scenery, enjoying the quiet location, the feeling of non-crowdedness, the school of Enderun (haha). All of those, including the fine people I met.. Will be missed. Well at least this new Bootcamp will last for just a month. Hopefully thereafter, i'll be back at McKinley Hill office hahaha

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Kuyaaaa! Pwede po mag tanong? :)) ano po position nyong inapplyan sa accenture and howlong before kau nakapag start? Im about to start on august 12 po :))

Hello, I am assuming that you have read my post , if not the whole of it, maybe just a part of it. Anyway, thanks, 

The starting date, I believe, would depend on what is stated on the contract. If your starting date be delayed, probably, mga one month maximum delay. And may contract addendum naman na pipirmahan ka if it happens.

For now, August 12 na starting date mo. Don’t worry too much. Just get excited! HAHA :)

by the way, I applied for an Associate Software Engineer position.,

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Me, myself and I

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One busy class.. These are all my “bootcamp-mates" now my colleagues busy doing our case study in part of the overall criteria required for us to pass the bootcamp(training) in Accenture. Hey blog! Here’s the continuation. My start date slowly came and as it went closer, I, too, got excited and quite nervous. So my phone rang, an HR from Accenture!!! I was advised that my starting date would be moved by a week. So I agreed(I had no choice to begin with, hahah). The day of my original starting date came, I was supposed to take my orientation that day but I didn’t for mine had been moved. Then late that day(around 5pm) my Phone rang again.. An HR from Accenture!! The guys in the other line asked me if I would be willing to start the next day, yes, the next day(Tuesday). I was frozen(of course not literally), not knowing what to do nor say, I accepted the offer. And so another unusual occurrence took place. I did not attend the orientation and there I was to attend the first day of bootcamp(training), and take note, it was at McKinley Hill at Taguig. The destination I was hoping not to be assigned to because it is too far from home.

Challenge Accepted!

I was assigned to be trained in SAP SD (Sales and Distribution) capability. Which was a total shocker for me. Haha. I was expecting some programming class , hours of debugging codes, countless semi-colons,.. Etc.. But then again fate must have some other plan. It was not about programming which, not something to be boastful of, I am admittedly much inclined with. Anyway, it is all part of growing. To be able to adapt with new learnings. Because learning is fun in the first place.

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Hey blog, it’s been quite long since I last updated you. It’s been quite long since I told you events in my life I used to be thankful of, some had been great experiences , some were not, though some didn’t come up as I expected them to, I always see to it that I seek positivity in each of those “not-so-good" experiences.

As my mother says, “charge it to experience". And so I did. Optimism is like happiness, you choose it. Okay, so where should I start my update? Hmmm.. Accenture… Yep, blog, after many rejected applications and days of effort sending online resumes and scourging the jobstreet site for job vacancies, I was finally hired. So heres what happened:

I applied there! But, no, I wasn’t able to make it

I tried to apply to many companies prior to my hiring at Accenture, one company told me that I was too inexperienced for the position of a C# developer but they may consider me after a year of experience said the interviewer.

Another that I was so confident I would be hired in also rejected me because of the result of the interview said the HR manager who interviewed me. In this second company, One Of the questions was “Why did you choose IT as a course".

I answered a bit long but to summarize, my answer mainly focused on “money", because IT jobs are in demand, because IT guys are cool and get to own cool gadgets, because The future is set to be dependent on computers. Etc. but the HR seemed not impressed and told me not to look at the salary at first, because if I do good, then high salary would soon follow. She was a bit pissed with some of my answers, and for that I wasn’t hired at their company.

  The third one was a Japanese company catering social media services, I was able to pass the examination and the interview, then along with my schoolmate and former co-intern at Tsukiden. Gelo, we underwent a two day “internship" at the company as part of the hiring process, the company uses the much hyped Apple Macbooks, which really impressed me a lot. Haha. Although my performance might not have impressed them as well, and along with Gelo, we were rejected. 

I felt down, I felt unaccepted, I felt weak

Then came the nights of frustration, I told myself to be strong enough and face the challenges with hope and faith. I was depressed to all the rejections I had encountered and feared that no longer I would be hired. I was wrong My family kept on supporting my job-search-plans, specially my mother. They motivated me a lot and reminded me the importance of patience, faith and of course dedication. I recalled “Accenture". The company I was able to pass an exam at last December 6, 2012(before I graduated).

And take note of the date because it is a significant part of this story :)) as advised by my friends Gene and Gian, and Armed with a lot of prayers, hope and faith, I went at their recruitment hub for following up my application.

Then the HR called my name after awaiting for an hour and a half. The HR advised me to re-take an exam for my application was about to lapse (the policy is that after 6 months, all pending applications must not be entertained anymore). It was June 5 and I only had 1 day before my application “really" lapse. I begged(but not so obvious) the HR if they could still consider my application. The HR took my resume. After half an hour..I was advised to take a lunch and return at 3pm. And so I did..

That moment when they guided me to a room with folders organized in a table, I felt..gladness, relied..I felt so much excited what was about to happen. Those were CONTRACTS! And yes, that day, I was hired. June 5, 2013! Considering that I was only a day earlier(June 6 was supposed to be the expiration of my application).

But I made it. Thank God! Praise Him! :) I immediately texted my mother during the time I was signing the contract. It was the beginning of my new journey.

The student became officially an employee. Full of determination, full of hopes, and armed with little experience, I would face the next weeks with enthusiasm and excitement to start the work. And so as they say, the rest is history. The next post Would be about the training I had with Accenture… Stat tuned blog :))

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Ibagay ang pag uugali sa edad..

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We (I and my fellow 'batchmates' who graduated last April 2013) are now in a new arena, where we seize endless opportunities and where we are the ones who will set our limits..a step closer to our dreams , a step closer to pursuit of happiness, 

Stay strong my batch mates, we'll soon rule the silicon valley! hahaha ;) 

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I was on the brink of being emotional, as the rain poured this afternoon. I was trying my best to stay calm and ignore the gloomy weather. I was trying my best not to recall the memories I had with him, those little memories which I have been keeping for years now..

Instead, I rejoiced by recalling our childhood associated with the weather, as my friends and I used to take a bath and play in the rain.. Those days Of innocence, those days when being a “taya” on a game was our only problem.. Happy. :))

When suddenly Larnie chatted me, yes, he did, :( he was apologizing for the last time I phoned him, he did not answer the phone and he even turned it off as if I am a stranger or a bad guy trying to harass him. Nothing is wrong with that, I would love to chat with him, my concern is that...let's say, the wound hasn't stopped bleeding yet, but it was hit again , causing the pain to subside faster...get it? HAHAHA forgive me if you didn't! ^_^

Too sad I was trying my best to move on but he has given me another dilemma . I just find it hard to forget him, though we never became lovers in the first place. As I described on my very first post in tumblr, which you can find by exploring "older posts" at the bottom of this web page Huhuhu :(

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Meet the newest member of our family, a dog, yep, his name is POT-POT.

Born: September 19, 2012

He used to be a bit obese..isn;t it obvious? 

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I held on to my faith, I struggled and I prayed, and now, I finally found my way

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Add Me up! ^_^

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Class Picture: Something that I will never get involved on

Have you ever taken a close look at this photo? What have you observed? Oh that may be right, or wrong, 'm not Dora who always knew the audience says RIGHT answer.. Did you notice it? Let me unveil it for those who didn’t see what is wrong with the photo., or perhaps WHO ARE MISSING.

It might be weird and ridiculous, saying that I am a proud graduate of Bulacan State University , taken up BSIT yet upon observing this photo..you would have noticed that I am not included there! Yes that is right, a class picture with the class being photographed incomplete.

It was very unfortunate that I and some of my classmates were not able to pose with the Dean Hilario and our teachers for the last time. The reason: tan-ta-ra-rann—>TARDINESS , the only people who were not able to pose with the class picture are those who came late during the shoot, count us in. Because this is a very important photo for college graduates, we should have asked for consideration and for a little delay on the shoot until we were all complete, but we didn't coz' we got no chance in the first place, we weren't there to tell them "wait, this is our souls, our physical body is fucking hurrying up just to catch up with you hurrying people, so please wait! ", right? 

They were all in hurry that day that the traditional "start-30-minutes-late" tradition was bypassed and they really started at the scheduled time, or perhaps SOME. I know it was our fault, but it could have been forgiven that time because this is an important photo...but yeah..80% was our fault.. the remaining 20%? Well..

HAHA..

As I can remember, I and my classmates Jan Aldrich Tandang and Lorenz Amiel Gonzales were the only persons not included in this class photo in the gender of male. The others, maybe I couldn’t recall.

History will now grow old with us as we cherish those college days I am very nostalgic these last few days with, this photo will serve as an incomplete remembrance for my classmates, and I do apologize for that. I do apologize to my parents who were as dissapointed to learn that I am not in the photo as they were excited on the day I told them we were  about to shoot for the class picture, oh well, the traffic hindered the jeepney I was riding on whilst on the way..wew..excuses..sorry Mom, Dad,.Myself.

Lesson , indeed was learnt. NEVER COME LATE. As old as it sounds. Regrets, they come late.