Year Ender 2022: When Dark Clouds Rolled By

Since early 2000s, it has been my tradition to reflect on the events of the year that was about to pass; to thank God for the graces bestowed and the learnings that made me wiser, made us stronger as a family.

 If 2020 and 2021 was tough enough for all of us, I did not expect 2022 to be one of the most difficult and gut-wrenching year ever. I knew there will always be a balance between light and darkness. The good and of the bad. 

But then, most of the year felt as if I was under an eternal dark cloud due to poignant events. We lost our brother Aris in an untimely manner and Tatay spent nearly half of the year in ICU and eventually, passing away. 

For the first time in my life, I felt the stirrings of anxiety. I consider myself lucky that I am still able to get through the day, functioning on auto-mode – work, home life, ending the day with my family beside me. We went back to face-to-face hybrid work set up some time in March and I was glad for the company of work-friends in Avon PH whom I can open up with. They made those days bearable.

Here are the 22 high and low lights of our 2022 -- 

• The 1st day of the year began with me getting the Covid19 virus. The symptoms were mild-to-moderate but took me ~10 days to get my voice back. Thankful that the rest of the family did not get the virus.

·      Alvin and I celebrated our birthday on our Year of the Tiger. 

·      Death of Aris on March 13th. Took us more than a month to process the repatriation of his remains from KSA where has been working and living for the past 23 years. I felt the blow of grief only after we were able to bring him to his final resting place. It took a while to comprehend that our last time together in the Philippines was 8 years ago. I am glad we had some time to talk during those last few days and months before he passed away.

·      The Presidential elections. It was not the result I expected, and I recall listening to the news around 8PM that evening as if the world has fallen apart.

·      Kyla making it to straight Second Honors in Grade 12. I am proud of how far she has gone through her journey and overcoming her challenges.

·      Kyla’s Senior High Graduation and Loyalty Award

·      Kevin at 22 and Kyla at 19; I still have to come to terms that both of them are adults now

·      Alvin and I celebrated our 23rd Wedding Anniversary. Each year is a milestone to be celebrated, and we are blessed to have been given the life we prayed for.

·      My parents’ 50th Wedding Anniversary. We are thankful that despite their aging and ailing body, we are still together and survived this pandemic.

·      Turnover of our new condominium unit in Manila. We have a new (alternate) home in the city.

·      Tatay in ICU for ~ 6 months until his final breath on August 6th. My husband Alvin had to spend nearly 24/7 at the hospital during the entire period. I am fortunate to be working from home while Kyla is also on online schooling, all of us managed to make it work. 

·      Became an adoptive cat parent for the village mom-cat strays; having the kittens around helped me through the ‘dark cloud days’

·      Started taking minimalism and decluttering seriously, and discovered community bartering; we amass so much stuff through our lifetime and one day I asked myself, what I am going to do with all these when I die? Ask someone else to clear it and dispose it for me when I could have done it myself when I was stronger? Should I expect someone to keep all of it for sentimentality's sake? That was when I decided to do the Döstädning (Swedish word for death cleaning). It sounded morbid, but truly practical.

·      Kyla’s illnesses and hypoallergenic challenges. It was not a good time to be going to ERs during pandemic.

·      Had our wisdom tooth surgery; served me right for procrastinating this!

·      Cat pestilence in the village- we lost Bacon and Ginger, and few other stray kittens; we moved Patch to my mother’s home, and he is the only survivor in the litter batch.

·      Kyla’s college life began, and I am over the moon that she is having the time of her life; we moved to the condo and started our ‘tiny home adventure’

·      Said goodbye to Avon PH and the Supply Chain teams after 2 years. I wrote an earlier blog post in honor of the men and women behind the Avon PH Integrated Supply Chain. It was a salutary experience and one that I will always be proud of.

·      Started joining the K-drama band wagon

·      Welcomed a new job, moved back to the south, new set of challenges but remaining loyal to my personal purpose

·      Back to face-to-face reunion with friends

·      Finally, picking up where we left off and going back to the road to run! To be able to run is freedom.

So that was 2022 in a nutshell. Closing the year with a grateful heart that despite the sadness and grief, there is always a fragment of hope waiting. I continue to trust that while the days that await us will not always be better than yesterday, I can hold on to my faith that God will help see us through it.

Praying for better times ahead in 2023. As always, we are ready for you but please be gentle this time. 

Here is a photo-collage to the high and low lights of 2022

Thank You, Avon Philippines!

 Today will be my last working day and I want to take this opportunity to thank all of you.

 To the Integrated Planning teams - Beauty/APMI MMT, Beauty+ teams, thank you for giving your best for the team, most especially on those times when it seems so hard to keep going.  I am proud of what we have achieved together to bring service, inventory, FCST accuracy, agility and capability to the next level. Keep pushing forward! There is a path forward to winning, being better than yesterday. To the Beauty and Beauty+ Leaders, thank you for getting my back during the turbulent periods of my life.

It was a pleasure to have been able to work with you and serve our Representatives, albeit mostly virtual.  It may have been a short ride but I will always reminisce my time with Avon as one of the most meaningful period in my career journey.  In the last two years, I had the privilege of flexible work that allowed me to continue being my best self, carry on my personal purpose which is to give back and build capability for my team so that they can continue to be better than yesterday and find a path forward to winning.  I always say that the capability we built is the only legacy we leave behind. To see the SC team grow, become more confident through the new skill sets they have learned and embrace the right culture that spurs sustainable successes will always be my source of pride. As a coach, we live for those moments.

I am a believer that Things Happen for a Reason – that I am meant to carry on my personal purpose, but now in another place.

 It was a pleasure to have been able to work with all of you, and know that I greatly appreciate and value each and every one of you. Thank you for the trust, friendship and camaraderie.

May you always find happiness and fulfillment in what you do, as I have with mine. 

Thank you all for the heartwarming farewells and the memories.   

Rest in Peace, Aris.

 Aristotle B. Molina

February 3, 1977 – March 13, 2022

 Early this year, our family dealt with a huge blow. We lost our brother Aris due to cardiac failure. Few months prior, he had a battle with acute leukemia and went through chemotherapy sessions in Riyadh. These chemo sessions happened at the time of pandemic where travel restrictions are still in effect and he had to stay in the Riyadh hospital alone.

 I accepted the reality that we will have to face dealing with old age, sickness and death, primarily with our parents getting older and weaker. I did not expect that we will lose my younger brother so soon.

 As a brother, we fondly remember Aris growing up as soft-spoken and even-tempered man. He was the gentle soul of our family, with a cheerful disposition in life, growing up as the only boy in a home surrounded by strong-willed girls. He is a man of few words, very private in his thoughts and goes on life with a very optimistic outlook. When we moved to Rizal, he helped me in taking care of our younger sisters, running our country side home when modern amenities did not yet exist. He was in charge of fetching water from the deep well, and eventually doing the cooking chores because he was the better cook after all. He likes cooking soup-y tinola and adobo. Life was hard when we were growing up and having chicken or pork for our dishes was a luxury often reserved for special occasions. In order to stretch dishes, he would cook them with loads of soup and sauces to make up for lack of meat. He is very fond of basketball and music from DZMB radio station.

 Aris had been living and working in Saudi Arabia for 23 years already. He left when I was still pregnant with my firstborn. I remember that he visited me in my workplace in Makati before his flight and I gave him a going away gift. We were relieved that he is able to settle well in the foreign country and that the employer gave them good accommodations. The advent of social media and messaging apps made communication easier. At least he is able to catch up with the goings on in our lives and vice versa. He got married in 2009 but their relationship did not last very long and he was never really able to have a family of his own. I guess his community of Filipino colleagues overseas had become his second family over the years. I can also imagine that in the latter years, when Aris is already getting older and some of his comrades already went back home to Philippines, solitude, loneliness and the longing to have meaningful connections caught up with him. I am grateful that in the last few months of his life, he was not alone for a time when he had to face health challenges, although it did make his life complicated.

 He was supposed to finish his contract by September and go home for good. We were planning for a family reunion in Manila by December where my younger sisters and their family will come home too and that we can be complete once again after more than 10 years. But sadly, it was not to be.

 The repatriation of his remains was very challenging. He was finally laid to rest last April 21, 2022 at Mount Zion Memorial Park, on the 40^th day after this death.

 This was the first time we had to face the death of a loved one, within the immediate family. The most difficult moment during the final interment rites was when the casket is being lowered six feet below ground level – the final separation between the living and the dead. When I learned of Aris’ death, there was shock and disbelief but then again, there was little time to grieve because there were so many logistical challenges that had to be managed. The time for grief only truly began for me after his burial and reality hit that he is now gone from us forever.

 Rest in peace, Aris.

We comfort ourselves with all the good memories with you, and the knowledge that you are now at peace with our Creator, free from pain and suffering. Our reunion will have to wait.

 

No Rice Dinner Suggestions

 It has been a few years since we adopted a no rice dinner strategy. Dropping rice in the menu does not mean that you have to starve or compromise healthy eating. There are many options to choose from and still enjoy a healthy and tasty meal.

My better half prepares ahead the food menu for the week. Light breakfast, regular lunch and no-rice for dinner. The advantage of preparing a menu is that there is a deliberate effort to balance the food components (eg. fish, pork/beef, chicken, variety of vegetables and fruits) and the cooking method (we usually opt for stewed, steamed or air-fried). Fortunately, there are no picky-eaters in our family. Everybody eats whatever is served on the table. The food quantity is also regulated to discourage over-eating esp. during dinner.

When buying food items during grocery day, the menu serves as the reference for the grocery list. This prevents buying stuff that we don't need. We do stock up on items that are often used (like feta cheese, olives, vegetables for salads, dressings, etc).

This is an example of our week-long dinner menu . Alvin and I usually cap off dinner with a hot calamansi-ginger/turmeric tea, or other herbal tea.

Bon Appetit!

Paying It Forward: Learnings from the Last Twenty-Five Years

 January 2022 marks my twenty fifth year anniversary in the corporate world. I was regularized by January 1^st after six months of probationary period at the R&D department of Procter & Gamble Philippines. Over the years, my career took me to many different avenues beyond my comfort zone, gave me technical and leadership skills for life, and an expatriate assignment opportunity at the Singapore regional headquarters.  I am currently only in my second company, where I moved at the peak of pandemic period more than a year ago.

When I was just starting out in my career, twenty-five years sounded like an eternity! Looking back I can tell you that the years went by very fast and now, in-the-blink-of-an-eye it has been twenty five wonderful years.

During my stint at the P&G Cabuyao Plant, our HR leader would organize lunch sessions with the leadership team called “Meet and Greet with New Hires.” In my department, I also lead the introductory on-boarding to welcome our new hires. I often get the question, “What keeps you motivated?” “What advise can you share to us new hires?”

To celebrate my silver anniversary with the corporate world, I want to share key lessons from the last twenty-five years. While work is not the end all and be all of our life, and does not define our entire humanity – the fact is we spend 33-40% (or more) of our day at work; one would might as well strive to make it a meaningful endeavor for the rest of your working lifetime.

• Cultivate the right attitude towards work - your work ethics will stay with you for the rest of your life. This is always the first and most important advise I give. I have closely observed new hires from their joining year and seen how they grew with the company over the years. In most cases, those who started out as proactive learners, self-motivated/driven and highly accountable retained excellent work ethics over the years and their careers grew faster ahead of peers. Many of them became the next generation leaders. Whereas those who are eternally complaining about anything under the sun, turning in low quality of work, dodging opportunities for bigger responsibilities and focusing what they think they did not get -  remained stuck in a rut. Unfortunately, their downwards spiral attitude negatively impacts the rest of their teams as well.  Choose to learn from people who are positive influencers. 

• Find your WHY. Find your personal purpose in life.  Life at work is not always going to be a sunny day. There will be highs and lows, we need to manage energy and work the way through crisis and difficult seasons. Having a sense of purpose gave me an anchor to hold on to and keep me motivated during trying times. In one of the training sessions I gave last year, I shared my life purpose to my team. This life purpose gave me a sense of fulfillment and satisfaction.

• Similarly, find a source of motivation. Let me tell you this: skills can be taught and learned. One can always seek to know what you don’t know. Some values cannot be taught, this has to come from within the individual -  grit, drive for success, others call it motivation. Sources of motivation can mean different things for people of different walks of life, experiences and perhaps across different generations. Find out what success means for you and your drivers of motivation. When I was just starting out in my career, my goal was to be promoted to manager level and get promoted faster than average. This goal required commitment to consistently over-deliver vs my workplan, be visible to leaders, contribute to both business and building the organization capability and move to bigger roles even if they are beyond my comfort zone. My motivation was borne out of the conviction of embracing the mentality of passion to excel, and that the rewards and recognition will follow (it did). Over the years, my motivations have evolved to more noble and selfless reasons such as wanting to give back and pay it forward through my mentees and the organizations I serve.

• Learning is a continuous journey. Stay humble and hungry. Use your learnings to improve your craft. Learning and development is a life-long journey. If you have already mastered a skill, find another. Share and teach your skills to others. Read a good book or an article from LinkedIn learning. Participate actively in focused improvement / lean six sigma projects. Much of what I learned when I was just starting out in the very dynamic world of manufacturing operations management, I am still able to use and reapply those skills until today. It would not be possible had I decided to simply forget those skills the moment my assignment in manufacturing was over. Skills are like tools up your sleeves. You never know if somewhere along your journey, you will encounter a crisis, a problem to be solved that will warrant you to tap from the well of knowledge you have mastered over the years.

• Bring the passion to excel in what you do. In one of the lunch and learn sessions I attended as a new manager in the plant, the speaker said something that resonated with me. He said, "Whatever you do, be the best." Whether you will spend most of your career under the corporate umbrella, or seek to venture out your own start-up business someday, the passion to excel coupled with grit sets apart the winners vs those who simply give up at once when adversities sets in. Embrace the attitude of winning (which can mean, being better today than yesterday, making small baby steps to progress). Find solutions. Do your task well. Strive to be the best via continuous learning. Hold yourself and your heroes to a high standard. If like me you are destined to a corporate path, strive for a balanced contribution (build the business and build capability), lead something, participate actively in continuous improvement projects, drive a system improvement that benefits your team’s productivity, teach and share your expertise. There is a whole universe out there of what can be done with gusto if you set your mind to it!

• Seek out good mentors. Mentors are great sources of wisdom and guidance when learning the ropes. I would not have become the leader which I humbly hoped, people deserved, if not for the coaches, mentors, career sponsors over the years who believed in me and held my hand along the  journey. Long after most of us parted ways from P&G, they continue to be my trusted friends and confidante, my source of wisdom and advise when it mattered most. I have different mentors for different aspects of life and career (like financial management, managing the boss, managing life and career changes, even hard core technical topics that are not part of my core competencies).

There you have it! I hope this will be useful to you as it has served me well for the last twenty-five fulfilling years of my career!