Virtually Nurul – { Research | Fitness | Designs } by Nurul

Author: Nurul

  • August is here!

    It’s past half a year now. Interesting past few weeks. The highlight of last week was I felt that I felt so aligned with everything, the crowd I’m with, my activities. Though there were things that were upsetting but they were okay.

    What’s good last week – my trainings were on point. My fitness had tremendously improved, I loved how I looked. I love how the people around me were so supportive with my journey – basically had been receiving kindness from other people. That meant a lot to me. I felt that I was in the right time all in my alignment. Everything that I had worked for had finally came into fruition. But of course, stability is still far from my reach – again, someone said security is an illusion – however, I am still looking for that peace that could potentially come from stability and doing what I like in life.

    This week started out okay. Still feeling a lot of clouds – maybe it’s the extremely hot weather that sets me off. Gotta do a bit of tweaking for my DRP presentation and proposal. I just find it really hard to focus in this weather. Something needs to be done about it! A lot of exciting things are happening this week. I am living my life – it’s not as extravagant but this is my story and I love it!

  • DRP Preparation

    So, my DRP is finally happening and will be conducted on 4th August 2023. I am so excited, but also now really need to focus on touching up my proposal and presentation plan to be in sync with my supervisors. List of things to do from here on:

    • Finish adding citations and check references
    • Formatting
    • Check my grammar
    • Presentation slides adjustments
    • Mock DRP presentation with my supervisors
    • My own timeline prior to make the above list happens

    This week, laser focus on this one and assignments. May God help me in completing this one.

  • Backdate – Emotional Housekeeping

    Where do I start? A lot has happened last week. Mixed emotions and experiences that almost triggered me into that survival mode again. Five major adjustments from my usual routines:

    1. Coordinating expo and working with my mother
    2. School friends came over for a visit and wanted to hang out
    3. A session of strength training that sent my body feeling weird
    4. Defending my stand and negotiate to undergo my DRP with my supervisors
    5. Going through my already full routines in addition to above event – I had exam, class and teaching group exercises as usual

    Discussing on event 1, it was okay at first. The folks who are supposed to be working with my plan just decided to do their own thing. And I felt that my time is not respected. It might seem that I can come up with a plan as quick as a snap of fingers, but actually all the scenarios have been thought up for days or even weeks in my head. And I know my mom was tired and she sacrificed a lot, but I am also upset that she did not stand up to her needs – and took it on us when she was overwhelmed. To some degree, I did that too when things are out of my control. It is our dynamics that concern me a lot. How do we address differences. How to communicate all these things. My brother did not seem to want to help or cooperate until my mother stepped in, and maybe manipulated him to help. So really, after all this, I really need to reconsider how I would want to be involved with my family again especially in helping them with business. A lot of reframing and boundary setting need to be outlined, so as to not exhaust myself. I am tired of putting on the self that I automatically project whenever I am with my family members. They are puppets of their insecurities without feelings, not human. If I choose to follow their flow, I will succumb to their insecurities, and be like them too. So, I need to be careful.

    Internally, I feel that I should not feel guilty, because I already communicated my availability and the stuffs I needed to deal during the event. I am not a superhuman, and I already did my best. What I am disappointed about is, all these chaos distracted me from concentrating for my exam. Partly it is also my fault, because I want to control everyone’s time to fit in mine. And turns out it was not for the best too. I also feel that I spent my time meeting my friends more than I can afford to spend. My rationale is that they are here for a short time, and I should take the opportunity to meet and catch up. Maybe situations like this triggered my critical perfectionism or I call it Rebecca that guided me to make this judgement. It really weren’t my friends’ fault. It is mine for not drawing the line.

    I am also so stressed out because of conflicts with my supervisors, it was an intense session meeting them last week. But it turned out so well after we all communicated our concerns, and we left as a team again. My supervisors really are my people. I love them so much for helping me. I pray that we could all work together well to finish my studies. That really was something positive or progress I made, because I dare to stand up for myself and voice out my needs. My DBA circles are the best people I have been with, except a few – I so can detect now who have dysfunctional tendencies and who are healthy, and who are in between.

    Other than that, I am just already physically exhausted from training. But I know this is good for my future longevity in fitness career. I am only started here, there are lots of adjustments I need to make for optimum growth for my work and my training in fitness. I got to restructure my time and recovery to fit in group fitness instructing, powerlifting training and CrossFit. Fitting in exercise, training, proper nutrition prep and recovery are really hard and takes a lot of discipline. So far, the best things and moments that are rewarding and positive to me are from fitness and my DBA studies. These are the things that I would like to keep for a long time.

    Seriously, it is the family dynamics that bother me the most. Because I am still depending on them financially. I am looking forward to severe ties with them professionally. I still can spend time with them, but I no longer can participate in all their insecurities about money and power; especially money. This is where I learn from them, that I could not live off like how I want to with financial stability. I have long unsubscribed to their definition of life and success. I will do a life audit to structure my life better.

    All for a better emotional and physical fitness. I got this!

  • Heaviness

    Today I’m feeling the heaviness and grief again. Woke up feeling really sluggish, even the meditation did not calm me down.

    I’m feeling overwhelm thinking of what’s gonna happen in a few days during event, and how I’m gonna need a week to recover my body so that I can be my best with my body in teaching.

    Then again, this might not be true. I tend to have this catastrophic thinking. I’ll do well out of this. There’s so much fear with events, the tiredness, the unproductivity, the crowd and people. Maybe I should just focus on what I needed to do and have faith that the other people will do their jobs.

    I worry on meeting my supervisors, I’m so tired dealing with them and with the load I needed to do for this study. I kind of sense their character flaws. Not that I’m better than them, but I feel that they are putting inconsiderately and unnecessary perfectionistic expectations on something that is less important than the whole process of research itself. I can negotiate with them and tell them how I feel tomorrow.

    I’m thinking how much I do miss him and the absurdity of my brain still looking for good justification why he did what he did. Then I stopped myself, to not think about it, but just feel my emotions fleeting. We did have good times, so my body is craving for it. Just observe, the intensity will fade. He still is the asshole that he is, for treating me with disrespect; remember that.

    My whole body is aching too. I didn’t know I have a weak back and upper body until I did CrossFit and powerlifting. Maybe I’ll feel better after stretching, shower and have a good breakfast.

    Everything I need to deal today, it’s gonna be fine and okay.

  • Missed Deadline

    Oh my God! I’m supposed to submit a draft early morning today. Not tomorrow.

    Well I really do my best, if only people know how hard I am trying. I feel guilty though, but I’m not gonna beat myself up cause I really did everything I needed to prepare myself to write today.

    Now I need to meditate it out.

  • DBA – 3rd Semester, In!

    This weekend I spent a lot of my time for activities involving my DBA studies.

    Had my 4th presentation on my DBA research proposal, that I do not have any fear to talk about it to anyone (hopefully) at all. The more I present and received feedback from lecturers, the clearer I get on what are the challenges to do it; and how can I improve the research. My confidence also grew a lot. The lecturers and my peers had warned me that the actual defense session is going to be brutal. I do not yet feel threatened or stressed out by it, but I have still to prepare myself for what can happen.

    Explaining my literature review leading to research framework

    I did the presentation in the midst of class learning about PLS-SEM, but glad that I managed to catch up what was it all about after missing about one and a half hours of lecture and demonstration.

    I feel the time is just right. Had I presented my proposal before I have the slightest idea what PLS is all about, I might be fried and burnt down to ashes, if methodology is asked out of me. The more I just let things flow and not stressing over it, the more convinced I am that Allah has everything laid out for me. I just need to do my best in my capacity and with the help of others around me.

    All of us DBA classmates minus one, with Dr Chua and her husband

    We also had a nice dinner last night at a native cuisine restaurant at Hotel No. 5. It was a nice and chill hang out with my classmates and the lecturer. I don’t really know what was nice about it. The whole experience, the company, our dynamic conversations that really made the night, I guess. We spent for a whole 2 hours there, but it felt longer that time.

    At this point of time, I really am feeling that I am together with my tribe – people who are more like me; and less like the people who I tried so hard to belong to. I feel like I have really grown and upgraded; and I am so pleased with myself. Thank you Allah for all the experiences you sent my way. And for my mom, for being there for me in the toughest of times.

  • Serotonin

    I was scrolling through my Instagram just lying on my couch having millions of thoughts on things that I should be doing right now.

    Then there’s one post by Derric Chan I guess, I’ll check back what’s the handle, sharing on feel good hormones. There are 4, and based on my lifestyle, I’m pretty much ok with most of the hormones except serotonin.

    No wonder meditation appeals to me a lot these days, and that I’m consistently trying to reduce my stress as I have been living under chronic stress these days and I avoid stressful people and situations. It seems to me that my body is protecting me by telling me that this is good for me cause I lack of it.

    Coping up with today’s lifestyle and my expectations and others, often I find that I am consistently stressed because I put myself as a high performing person at work. I gotta unravel this needs to be high performer. I am now ok being the last person among others. I don’t compete with people anymore. I only compete with myself. And maybe cause I still attach myself to the idea of success as according to my parents – that I gotta be a good child and not disappoint them; that made me feel less than who I actually am.

    I don’t want to blame my family anymore it’s unfair to them. Maybe I haven’t confronted myself enough. True, I gotta set my standard, but not to the extent of torturing myself. I guess everyone at some point has this. Like my PT client, she always wants to do more. It kind of triggered me. Maybe I am upset cause I used to, and sometimes, be like that. She sounded disappointed when I said that she should take it easy with her training. I just want to be kind and for her to not torture her body. Maybe I have crossed her belief. Whatever it is, I have found her obstacle to become better with training. This is also a huge reminder to always be kind to myself; body, mind and spirit.

  • You are the By-product of the People You Surround Yourself with

    Taken by my friend, when I saw this photo, I saw myself as a different woman!

    One of the things I appreciate the most these days is having close friends who see me in the best lights despite of my flaws.

    Growing up consistently feeling not good enough despite of being raised in a socially well and respected family, attended one of the best schools in the country, receiving the best education, done this and that at national and international level, I often question what am I doing with my life even though things are quite smooth and steady at that moment. Imagine, if everything is stripped off of you, the wealth, the fitness, the youth and beauty, your careers, your family or spouse – everything that signifies status in today’s society – what is left for you as a dignified human being? For years, I was feeling worthless because I cling to these things to validate my existence and self-worth.

    My confidence and self-appreciation grew when I received positive validation like feedback from my peers at the gym as instructor, my friends who value me, like how is it possible that they see me like that. The only person that did not see how awesome I was, was myself. I am my worst critique due to how my parents taught me growing up, and because of the competitive nature at school – I never was the best in any category, and people abandoned me, so I figured I didn’t have anything special to have people sticking around by my side.

    As I focused inwardly, I started to understand more what really mattered for me. Having friends or surrounding myself with the people that see my light and the value I bring to the world, makes me value and respect myself more; and that all of us, our path, each of us is special, regardless of what the society or the ‘norms’ tells us. Thank you, my dear friends, for showing me who I am, and to myself, for believing that I am worthy and that I am good enough.

  • Completing my LR Matrix

    Oh my God, I have 126 papers to organise into LR matrix to help me with research references. Tonight I did the matrices for Technology Readiness Index and Technology Adoption Model.

    Scary thing is, I feel like my references are not enough. But of course I did find a major discovery that I could use in my research argument.

    For example, as the case with TAM, apparently some literature proved that not both indicators – Perceived Ease of Use and Perceived of Usefulness, are statistically significant towards intention to use a new technology. In a marketing research by Muk & Chung (2014) showed that in Korea, perception of usefulness is more important than perception of ease of use, which are different than the targeted samples from the United States. Similarly, a research by Jimenez et al (2021) showed the same towards intention to adopt AI applications in agriculture industry. Interestingly, findings by Mohr & Kuhl showed that perception of ease of use is more significant than perception of usefulness in adopting new technology in agriculture. I see the pattern here, that, young and technology adept population favour ease of usefulness over their perception of usefulness in order to use a new technology; while Easterners or less savvy tech users put more importance on whether the new technology is useful for them or not.

    These are from just a few applied papers that I have read. Perhaps I could form an argument here, given that they value usefulness over ease of use, users are likely to use the new technology if they can be convinced that the new technology supports the farmers ambidextrous attitude and ambition towards managing their farms with AI technology.

    I need to find more paper and evidence on integrating TAM and TRI to form TRAM. I have read a few, but not sure why there is only one paper in that reference folder now. Tomorrow, I will find more paper on TRI in agriculture sector or AI adoption, and then find evidence on entrepreneurship and ambidexterity among farmers relate with propensity to adopt new technology. One more paper to review and I call it a night!

  • DBA Journey: Consistency & Progress

    Third semester in on my DBA journey. Still do not get the hang of writing consistently. I managed to come up with a draft for my research proposal. However, it is still lacking of stuffs like structure, evidence and further idea synthesis.

    My goal is to finalise my proposal by this week (9 -15 July 2023) so that I could be cleared for research defense session by end of the month. I used to have Trello laid out to track my progress, it might be organised but highly tedious for me. So, let’s try another approach.

    I’m gonna publish a list here for me to complete by this month, and update what I do as I progress along.