Showing posts with label Personal blog. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Personal blog. Show all posts

Part 3: Going on a Roller-coaster Ride

Posted on Wednesday, July 01, 2015 by
If you've just stumbled upon this post, get an understanding of what this is about by visiting my journey to developing a career with food.
It’s been a while since unleashing the master plan, but between writing two weekly posts on Gastro World and the assignments from a food writing course at George Brown, it’s been difficult to find time for the personal blog.

Over the last three months, I’ve gone through a roller coaster ride of emotions. Not the swirly nauseating ride like the tea cups; rather the up and downs of something like Behemoth.


The Behemoth. Photo courtesy of Canada's Wonderland
Starting on a High

Like the beginning of Behemoth, as every day passed and changes started adding up, I became progressively excited about the future. Signing up for a food writing course, joining affiliate programs to try to monetize the blog, coming to the realization that money can’t buy happiness … each step raised me higher on the happiness meter and I couldn’t wait to see what was at the crest of the hill.

Starting anything is a wonderful time: I’m energized and as every step passes my goal seems that much more attainable.

Reaching the Crest

Then somewhere in the early spring I reached the top. For a brief moment I was proud of everything I’ve done. For friends who read these personal posts, we’d talk about the achievements and challenges over meals and wine.

However, reaching the crest also means plateauing. I really didn’t know what more I could do and honestly, whether there was time to do more – like cold calling restaurants and people in the food consulting industry to develop a network.

Going Through the Stomach Churning Decline

It’s the part that Behemoth riders know is coming: at any moment you plunge from the high into a deep low valley. Although it wasn’t a quick decline for me, it seemed that as things compounded I eventually hit the bottom of my enthusiasm scale:
  • Through the George Brown course, I learnt how hard it is to make a living off food writing. Unless you’re the hand full of publication writers, you’ll likely need to supplement your income with other things like editing, fact checking or writing non-food related article. 
  • Plus, I’m not a great writer – most assignments only broke the 80% mark (which is good enough to write for small publications but not the really professional ones as my teacher describes).  Certainly, it’s a mark my parents wouldn’t be proud of.
  • Realizing food consultants have some sort of culinary background. Most were executive chefs or restaurant owners. Simply having a developed palette and eating a lot doesn’t qualify me. Sure, I could use my financial background to help restaurants with budgeting and costing. But, I’d rather stick with a big corporation if I’m working with spreadsheets.
  • Even all the alternative sources of income I tried developing has failed. Sheblogs, an ad service, is “continuing to monitor” Gastro World as it doesn’t have enough monthly Canadian viewers. I’ve yet to make one sale through Amazon’s affiliate program. None of the secret diner services I’ve applied for has sent over a job – imagine what a detailed write-up I could give them!

Riding Through the Ups and Downs

Since the low, occurring somewhere in May, there’s been smaller joyful and disappointing moments. Through it all, I’m thankful for the podcasts that have helped change my perspective on the journey (Dr. Robert Puff of the Happiness Podcast is the most useful).

“Dreams are beautiful, they’re wonderful. But, they can cause suffering when you cling too tightly to them.” he suggests.

It was then I realized I was becoming too attached to the idea of developing a career in the food industry. When I first set out to do this, what enticed me was the possibility of living a happier and more fulfilling life. But, as I started working towards it, every step started adding on pressure to generate success. Simply put, the journey was doing the opposite: it was weighing me down and stressing me out.

So, I’ve started changing my attitude: I’m going to let things happen and go along for the ride. Yes, sometimes there will be a success (like being invited to try out restaurants and attend media events) but even if there are set-backs to be grateful for the opportunity and learn from it.

I refuse to let the behemoth journey of developing a fulfilling working career bring me down. This is one ride I’m going to enjoy, no matter what turn the track takes. 


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Part 2: The "Master" Plan

Posted on Sunday, April 05, 2015 by

If you’ve just stumbled upon this post. Get the background of what this is about by visiting the main page of my journey in developing a career with food.
Now that I’ve decided my career should revolve around the food industry, things will just fall into place right? After all, it’s something I’ve thought through and so passionate about it. But, being a taste advisor and food writer isn’t just a walk in the park. There is tons of competition out there and frankly what I feel is little demand for paid services.

Nonetheless, for achieving a life of contentment and happiness you have to give it a try. So, to begin, I start with what I do best – develop a plan. At the beginning, you may feel like you don’t know where to start, planning helps calm me and focus efforts to specific purposes. Unlike my past efforts of planning a wedding or vacation, this one will be more fluid and I’m certainly willing to branch out and do more as I become immersed in learning about the industry.

Generally, the “master plan” is made up of the following rough steps:

Develop credibility. Just like attending a well-known University and earning a designation developed my current career, I have to distinguish myself in the world of food. Unfortunately, I don’t have the resources to return to school to study journalism, but some continuing education courses wouldn’t hurt. Luckily, George Brown offers a food writing course, and starting mid-April the weekly evening classes begin. I can’t wait to learn from someone who does this professionally!

Connect with the industry and develop the necessary connections. Admittedly, this is the area where I’m stumped. Attending more media events and speaking to more food bloggers certainly has helped. But, I’ve yet to meet individuals who actually do this for a living. If you’re a food writer or menu consultant and are feeling generous with your time, please connect with me, I’d be so grateful.


Gain and build experience to prove my work abilities. At Gastro World, I’m able to do plenty of posts on restaurant reviews. But, for food writing the articles need to be more diverse. So, expanding into more interviews (I did one with Kanpai Snack Bar) and product placement are a few areas I need to work on. If you’re a company with a food product please reach out. If it’s something I enjoy and can stand behind we can do some interesting things together.

 On the taste advisory front, restaurants need to learn about the value of having someone who’s not their chef or employee trying their products. Likely, I’ll need to reach out to a few places to offer these services on a complementary basis first – if you’re a Toronto restaurant that want to try out my services please contact me.

Have the necessary resources to pursue the dream. By resources, it means both time and money. Certainly, at this point, leaving my job is not an option as there are still annoying financial obligations to maintain. But, I also can’t work in a role that expects a lot of my time beyond the 9 to 5 as between classes, writing, connecting and researching a lot of time will need to be spent on the dream. 

 Eventually, I’m likely going to have to take the plunge and focus my efforts full-time to make this work. Before this can happen, it's important to build a nest egg to get me through the “tough” times. Also, starting to develop some sources of income (even if sporadic) is needed to let me know that this could work. Simply developing a “Work With Me” section and adding an Amazon store are first steps at attempting to monetize the efforts.  

Thinking through everything and taking first steps towards some of the above goals has really gotten me excited! You hear time and time again that people now have numerous careers in their lifetime – some very different from each other.

Frankly, I never expected to branch out of the corporate world. But, with every year that passes, it’s becoming clearer that although it’s comfortable and safe, it’s not for me. Who knows, perhaps, I have a bit of my father’s entrepreneurial spirit in me after all… something I was so adamant to deny. 

 Next: Going on a roller-coaster ride

Doing the thing that gets me excited!

Posted on Wednesday, March 25, 2015 by


Let’s lay it out there now … I am not unhappy. There are many things in my life that I’ve been blessed with and wouldn’t want to change. And it’s because I already have so much that I’ve always felt greedy for wanting more. So, for several years sayings such as “work shouldn’t be fun … after all, if it was they wouldn’t be paying you to do it” were always top of mind. To me, what mattered most in a career was ease of getting a job, of course the compensation, ability for progression and job security.

As I’ve grown older, this no longer seems enough. Sure, I change roles every 2-3 years to keep things new but inevitably it’s still working in a large corporation and going through the motions. Don’t get me wrong, the companies are great and offer everything I had wanted in a career. My managers are supportive and provide the right amount of recognition. And I’m good at what I do; I know the work is appreciated and “matters”.  

But, what about that intrinsic satisfaction, passion, simply put doing that thing that gets me excited? Sunday evenings shouldn’t be a drag and Friday afternoons the best thing in the world. Surely, there must be some of you out there who are nodding your heads right now.

Over the last few months, as a means of staying encouraged, I’ve started meditating (currently loving Tracks to Relax and My Meditation Station) and listening to motivational podcasts (try Happiness Five a Day and the Daily Boost). In the end, I’ve realized that to achieve contentment you have to do something that makes you want to move.

Writing at Gastro World is exactly that thing that makes me move. Despite a 45-50 hour work week, I want to spend more time writing at least two posts a week, connecting with others through social media daily and attending as many media events as my schedule allows. I’m energized by all these things and look forward to every moment of it!

Sure, I know this is just a hobby… but why does it have to be? Plenty of people work in the food industry as food writers, social media consultants and public relations professionals. Then why can’t I find my niche? 

Quite frankly, it all comes down to finances which has made me stop myself. The industry is competitive and not exactly as lucrative as corporate Canada. So, it’s taken a while, but the realization is I can’t have it all – is money or happiness more important?

 As much as I’d like to announce I’ve handed in my resignation and started working for Blog.TO, lets be realistic - living your dreams isn’t an easy affair. Nonetheless, I’m willing to give it a try. 

 But, it’ll have to be done in a systematic way, so financial obligations can be met and I won’t have to live on Kraft Dinner. Sorry, I’m too much of a planner and frankly not brave enough to just take the plunge. Continue reading to find out more about the “Master Plan”.

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