Aspirations

I seem to be getting closer and closer to my career goals everyday.

I mean...I still have a long way to go, but things seem to be slowly falling into place recently. I definitely have been feeling blessed lately. I'm back in Japan working (just as an ALT though), still dating my wonderful boyfriend without much conflict (mostly internal petty things on my part), and things just seem to be going really well. I still struggle financially, because I haven't received my first paycheck yet, but I have lived on low funds in Japan before and can somehow still manage (mostly with the help of my boyfriend buying and giving me things and parents giving me money when they can).

Recently, I have been thinking more about my career path. Since I graduated with an undergrad degree in PR last December, I haven't done much concerning that degree and skill sets I obtained. I've mostly been focused on getting the ALT job confirmed and in place, then actually moving to Japan and settling in. Moving to Japan is just the first step. After my one year contract as an ALT ends I hope to move on to something more of my expertise and passion.

Before coming back to Japan, I became a follower of quite a few J-vloggers and Japanese YouTubers. I then fell in love with the YouTube Japan community. Previously, I never gave much thought about becoming a vlogger or uploading videos on YouTube myself. I thought it would be cool to get a following, but I think everyone has thoughts of wanting to become famous at some point in their life. After watching these people upload their lives in Japan on YouTube and gain a following, I began thinking. What if I try that when I move back to Japan? Because I took some media classes in the last part of my college career, I was given many assignments that I had to produce my own content and upload it online. These classes give me opportunities to see what its like to try and gain a following. I haven't had much success, but during these classes I would keep thinking of what kind of content I could cover when I return to Japan. I've gained all kinds of inspirations from various vloggers and bloggers, but I was never certain of any ideas I though of. It is hard to come up with content that isn't already out there or something interesting enough to gain a following.

Some ideas of themes I want to try for my online presence are:
Fangirl life in Japan (especially as a foreigner)
Being plus sized in Japan
Interesting restaurants and food finds in Japan (already have a blog from a class project set up for this)

I have also been making my presence on Twitter much more active since that is a big outlet in Japan. Recently I've had a lot of success in interacting with my favorite J-vloggers. At first it seemed to be just likes, but now they've been replying to tweets I mention them in. That is a BIG confidence boost. One of my goals is to become friends with them and make connections for my career future. But that is why I had this big revelation for starting up blogging and possibly even vlogging. If I ever meet any of them and become friends, I need to have a good online personality and presence set up with at least some good content to provide. Most of them may have become famous through YouTube, but they have other careers as well. One of them even has a dream job of mine, working as an English vocal coach (not sure of the exact title) with Japanese actors and entertainment people.  While I do hope to be genuine friends with J-vloggers and become part of YouTube Japan community, I don't see myself making a career out of blogging and possible vlogging. My biggest insecurity is that I don't like the sound of my voice or seeing myself on video. I've slowly started overcoming this insecurity with the help of students I teach telling me I have a pretty voice and that I'm cute (also bf recently said that my voice was one of the things he first became attracted to).

I'm still very anxious about everything, but I have some time before I need to have my next career step in place.

Wish me luck~