Merry Christmas and Sethisfying Holidays!

I’ve always had a complicated relationship with Christmas. It could be because bad things seem to happen more around this particular holiday, at least for myself. Or it’s possibly just the natural state of things to feel a bit poignant as the year draws to a close. There will be time later to reflect on my failings of the year, but in the festive spirit I would focus on some of the things I can be thankful for.

I’m still in one piece

In my childhood years, I often found myself in all sorts of accidents, ending up with 3 different areas on my face that needed stitches. As an adult, I unfortunately got my 4th set of battle scars earlier this year:

Thankfully, it was a very superficial injury, and even the scar is easily concealed by my fringe. I thank my lucky stars that it was relatively trivial, and it still bothers me every now and then when my mind wanders into thinking about how things could have gone much worse. Perhaps if the angle of impact were a little different, or the force a tad larger, the consequences might not be something I can laugh off as easily.

Aside from ageing pains and mid-life woes, my health seems generally okay too, and I can only hope it remains as such. My parents are well in their sixties with good health and spirits, and I probably do not appreciate such things enough. “Health is wealth” is such a cliché, but often repeated only because of how true it is.

I’m doing better

The memories are a haze now, and my pet theory is that my mind tries to forget unpleasant things, but I still remember the times when I felt utterly defeated and not having the will to even get out of bed. Earning little each month and having no degree in Singapore aren’t very fun things to experience while witnessing each of your peers getting ahead in life.

On top of whatever I’ve shared in the video, I remember thinking about how unjust it was that my friends who qualified for credit cards could enjoy all the sign-up rewards and ongoing benefits, while the person earning less who truly needed the money more was excluded from such perks.

Things have improved a lot since those years of my life, and for that I am grateful. I was 29 when I finally got my first credit card, and I still remember the feeling fondly. It was the StanChart Unlimited Cashback Card with its lousy 1.5% earn rate, but all that mattered to me was that I finally qualified for a credit card. (I would thereafter put a S$11,000 transaction on it, something that still haunts me to this day. But to be fair, I didn’t have a Sethisfy.com to tell me that 1.5% was a crappy earn rate back then 😉)

I’m turning 35 in a month, and through a combination of dumb luck and hopefully smart hustling over the years, I find that at this stage of my life I feel… okay. And “okay” is a few steps up from “inadequate” – yet another thing I can be thankful for.

I’ve found an audience

This website is turning 3 soon, and it’s somehow more than a year since I started uploading to my YouTube channel. I think I’ve found an audience who would not just read and watch my content, but also leave comments, actively participate in the group chat, and supportively sign up for products and deals that I recommend.

It’s sappy, I know, but I still want to express my appreciation for people who have chanced upon my content and continue to come back for more. For something that started as an online diary, your support is what makes the deals, product reviews, claw machine shenanigans, and everything else possible.

Merry Christmas everyone… and I do mean everyone!

Even the hate comments count! I’ve always considered getting hate comments as part and parcel of a larger audience, so each new one I get makes me feel a bit more satisfied knowing how I’ve reached yet another person on the infinitely vast interwebs.

So for the person who called me cheapo:

And the one who decided to spend Christmas morning calling me out for my lack of logics:

As well as everyone reading this…

Thank you thank you thank you… and have a Merry Christmas!!

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