One day at a time.

Warning: Long Read, but worth it

It’s 11:38 AM at work and I have an urge to write. It is my second day back from Hawaii and my biological clock is still a little messed up.

Lately I have been speaking with my friends from high school and college, comparing our post graduate life. Now before you think that this is a way for me to brag, it’s not. Read the entire post as I will shed some light.

I was asked by a college friend to write about my life as I have graduated last year and I’m doing the work force thing. For those of you that do not follow my life like how you follow some random white people’s life on The Hills or a black person’s life on Baldwin Hills, let me fill you in on what your’s truly has been up to. First let me rewind my life to the start of college and then proceed with what’s been going on:

Late 2004-early 2006: I spent my days at Moorpark Community College. I was never really interested in going straight into a UC, well I was lazy. In result, I ended up going to the local community college. While busting my butt being a lazy community college student, I also worked at numerous retail jobs, some ended with me becoming a manager. Life was great. I continued my passion with dancing, art, finding music, my normal routines in life.

Mid 2006-mid 2008: I spent my days in San Diego, hustling and trying to graduate with a Bachelors in Economics at UCSD (which I did attain). I continued dancing and my normal hobbies, but I had a mission in mind and it was to finish school. While in San Diego, I got my foot in deeper into marketing. I was doing promotions and advertising (marketing) for local clothing brands.

July 1st-July 12th, 2008: I moved back to my hometown in search for a job. I started interning at a company for the finance and accounting department. I only worked for a day and then I moved over to the marketing department to go balls deep into something I actually liked.

July 13th-July 18th, 2008: In Hawaii for 5 days. I spent my time in Hawaii with my sister and mother as a graduation gift for doing my thing in San Diego.

July 19th,2008: I went straight to work after landing in LAX from Hawaii. To my surprise the marketing director offered me a position the day that I came back. She was impressed with my finished project the day before I left to Hawaii and she decided to use my help. I was given the title of Marketing Specialist for Marketing Programs.

August 5th, 2008: The first day I got to travel for work. They flew me up to San Francisco for a day so that I could help support the other Marketing Specialists at a tradeshow.

Late October, 2008: I was moved from Marketing Programs to Marketing Communications. My title: Marketing Special Ops. This definitely was a better change for me!

First week of November, 2008: The job flew me out to Canada for two days to suppot a seminar. After flying back to LAX, I had to fly out to the Bay for two days to support a tradeshow again. This time I got to display everything that I learned about the company for the past few months. I blew my managers away with all the information I knew. Trust me, I never knew I would know so much about Wi-Fi.

December 11th-December 15th, 2008: My family took a trip to Hawaii again. I paid for my own ticket, hotel room, and my mother’s ticket. I locked down a relationship with Roro on Dec 12th…yeah pono!

January 22nd-January 26th, 2008: I flew my girlfriend out to my hometown and we had an adventure with our friends and each other. Disneyland, movies, family, breakfast at Eggs N Things, qt with Roro, what more can I ask for?! Fuckin Splendid

February 12th-February 17th, 2008: I flew myself out to Hawaii to spend time with Roro on our anniversary and valentine’s day. We went to see Boyz II Men. Saw my all time favorite group. Met her family and more of her friends. Celebrated and ate massive dinners and lunches with her, followed with amazing shaved ice. More time spent with Roro. Verdict? Fucking amazing.

Return to Newbury Park. How does life compare here with what I’m doing? It doesn’t really.  

Now lets get to the important message. The part that drives my life as of late.

I wake up in Honolulu next to RoRo. I close my eyes and I’m in Newbury Park. I wipe my butt and I’m in Canada. I land and I’m off to San Francisco. This is my life. I’m in love with it. Not in the retarded, perveted way. I’m in love with it because I made it happen, no luck, no hand outs, just pure hard work. I owned up to my passion, drove as close to the edge as I could and took it to life with no intention of doing anything less of going deep into life.

My passion and strive for life has always been to become successful. I don’t care about fame or getting my name out. I just want to be good at what I do and be successful. My success isn’t measured in my monetary value, but it’s measured in what I do. In the span of 7 months, I have travelled more than 5 times. Besides the work related travels where everything is paid for, I’ve paid for my leisure travels. I’ve continued with my hobbies of dancing, painting, martial arts, and more. Sure enough I did excel in each hobby, but I never had the focus of becoming famous from them. I just wanted to be me, but always be successful.

For those of you that don’t know my fixation with success. Everything that I ever did in my life, was defined by success. I had to master what ever it is that I was doing. I eat, sleep, and shit a lifestyle that is worthy of the word success. I was that child that people looked down upon thinking that I wouldn’t amount to anything. Long behold I kept a secret inside of me and showed everyone that I am successful. The true essence of my success is my lifestyle. What do these past months mean to me? Means that I’ve made it. After numerous years, all my hard work, blood, sweat, and tears finally paid off. I’ve taken jobs that made me the little bitch at the bottom of the totem pole to jobs where I had to hustle using my talents. I’ve worked hard enough for success to the point where it was a miserable and mundane cycle that some call “life” and transformed me into a lifetime addict, quenching for success every moment of my life.

I got a white paper in the mail stating “Congratulations Dan Pham.” Cue the sense of accomplishment. “Danny, I want to offer you a position.” Ring the bells, turn on the sirens, scream at the top of your lungs. I fucken made it.

The biggest respect I will ever have is for the people who have the desire and the will to seek and follow their passion. Find your passion in life. Whether it is making money, dancing, drawing, writing, teaching. You should live it, breathe it, eat it, sleep it. Follow it. Pave your own way to accomplish it. Open your mind and continue to push your limits. Keep following and don’t fall behind. This is honor…this is the essence of life.