When I was 9, I told myself I was a model. Not because I found myself particularly pretty, but because I loved clothes and the way I felt when I posed in my favorite outfits.
When I was 12, I told myself I was a singer. Not because I thought I sang particularly well, but because I loved music and felt like it was the only option for someone who had taken voice lessons on and off for months.
When I was 14, I told myself I was an actress. Not because I felt like I was particularly good at performing, but because I loved standing in front of a crowd, knowing the audience was watching me, but not quite seeing anything since I could hide behind the facade of the character I was playing.
When I was 16, I told myself I was a writer. But at this point, it seemed that this time, I was actually right. Despite this, I felt trapped: it terrified me to imagine that for all the years of loving so many other things, each one of them would eventually go to waste all because I had found the label everyone could agree on.
But over the last two months, I've made a very important realization: I don't have to be to what people think I should, I just need to be who I am.
With that, I've decided to start an "A Day In My Life" segment, wherein I take one of my "titles" and discuss my lifestyle in that field. So for this week, I've chosen to talk about what I do as a writer, then next time, as an actress, and so on.
We must all embrace what life molds us to become, so if God wants me to be a jack of certain trades, then I'd like to show you all what I do with the cards that I've been dealt.
Blogger
So let's start it off easy; nowadays, my most dominant role in this career falls under blogging. Since the beginning of summer, I've spent hours on end working on creating content for my site, as well as promoting the material across different social media platforms, editing the coding of my theme, and contacting partners for collaborations. It's definitely the most time consuming, but personally, the most fulfilling as well. As a blogger, I get to write in a space where no rules exist. You see the full sketch of my personality though my posts here, and I get to interact with a warm and supportive community of like-minded individuals.
Every Friday, I put up a new piece under either the fashion, lifestyle, or DIY category. But long before the end of the week comes, I'm already working on something for alphabelles.com. My days become void of time, because I'll often wake up early, work the whole day and completely forget to sleep by the time I realize it's already the morning of tomorrow. In the week, I allot my mornings for general check-ups on the site, cross-marketing, and replying and sending out emails. I'll also reserve one day purely for writing, another day for photography, and another day for creating promotional graphics. By the time I get to the last step, it's usually already Friday, so all I have to do is upload it then let the cycle restart for the next week.
Exhausting? Yes. But I wouldn't have it any other way.
Contributor
This is actually how I started my writing journey: I'd read all the stuff on my favorite websites, then when I found myself creating content that would possibly match the branding of the site, I'd reach out through their email and pitch my article to them. With this route, there's no assurance of any reciprocation, but this is one of the few risks you can take that won't lead to any deeply-rooted, life-shattering pain if things don't go as planned. Honestly, the most any company can do is reject your pitch-- no more, no less.
Personally, I've written as a contributor for 2 publications: Scout Magazine and Thought Catalog.
For Scout, I was pretty up to date with their features for a while, so I knew they were into the urban lifestyle and anything related to it. They're a local indie magazine that's been blowing up on Instagram for their unique style editorials. I created a lookbook where I took a bunch of famous album covers in 2015 and designed outfits to match them. I pitched it to their editor, and within a week, they had it published on the website.
In the case of Thought Catalog, the waiting game was significantly longer. It's an online collection of listicles, essays, and poetry with the "milennial voice", so I loved binge reading the articles from the site that my Facebook friends would share. I took it upon myself to have something of my own published there too, but I knew this dream was a little bit of a stretch since it was an international publication that usually only adults got into. But lo and behold, by 2018, I've had 2 pieces successfully featured on their website. It would have been 3, but the first time I got accepted, I let it slip that I was under 18 (which their writing policy was against), so they had to have my work removed. #rookiemistake
Intern After my year-long contract as a correspondent for Candy Magazine's website in 2015, I refused to come down from the high of working for such a big and prominent company.
So this summer, I sent an application to the digital youth culture magazine, STATUS, and managed to score a spot in their internship. Initially, the conditions of my role required me to report to the office every week for a set amount of hours, but thankfully, my editor was very accomodating and allowed me to work from home. Since then, I've written 2 articles for them, and have learned advanced and commercial grammatical rules to apply to my future projects. Twice a month, they reach out to me via email and give me a topic to expound on, then by the end of the day, I submit my piece.
Her Campus Ambassador
In case you aren't familiar with this company, Her Campus is a Boston-based online magazine for college females all over the world. In 2017, they opened applications for the Her Campus Ambassadors, a program wherein a select group of international high schools students would work with fellow members globally through email correspondence to complete writing tasks as preparation for the professional industry. When I first discovered I was accepted, I took my position for granted as soon as the weekly workload started filling up my inbox. I didn't submit any of my "assignments", and thus missed out on a whole year's worth of learning. But recently, I've decided to involve myself in the program again, and start accomplishing our tasks. We're given one thing to do every two week, so I set aside one day to work on it.
Remember, kids, never reject an opportunity to learn!
As for now, this is where my writing journey stands. I've got a whole list of projects planned ahead, and I can't wait for you guys to experience each and every one of them with me.