Tag: plans

I Ramble: 7 May 2021

In the name of Allah, The Most Gracious, The Most Merciful.

I have been listening to a lot of heavier music. I think I am somewhat imploding. It’s like those high school feels never quite left me. Maybe our teenage years are far more formative than we realise them to be. It shaped our current perspectives, values, and character to quite an extent.

And in one of the heavier songs I listened to, one line never failed to haunt me, “Where you gonna be in the next five years?” (Spit It Out by Slipknot)

Right now, I’m going about my life with absolutely no plan.

I have no idea what I’m doing with my life.

I don’t know how or what I’m supposed to contribute to the grand scheme of things.

I am 31 years old now and turning 32 in August. I am only a Retail Supervisor in a global flagship store of the number two clothing company in the world right now.

And then we have people like Sanna Marin who became Finland’s prime minister at 34 years old.

I feel so much paler in comparison to other people. It’s not about the success that bothers me. Success is subjective, to me, at least. It’s about the implication of productivity that comes with the success. In simpler terms, have I done anything meaningful with my life? Have I utilised my time and energy optimally as an individual?

I think that always bothers me. Which is very ironic considering I am a lazy bum.

I feel quite divided on taking Ramadan as breaks from my usual commitments. On one hand, I feel it will be good for my soul by just concentrating on the core things in my life. On the other, I feel quite vexed by the lack of work I do. I think I shall stick to treating Ramadan as a summer holiday from the daily grind. I think it is the best time to rest the body and nourish the soul. I imagine that if I were a rockstar, I wouldn’t want to attend any interviews or shows or participate in a tour during Ramadan. I would rather take that much needed spiritual break.

I should probably lay out some plans and work towards executing those plans.

Sometimes no plan is the best plan but sometimes no plan will get you nowhere because you didn’t plan on getting somewhere in the first place.

And Allah is Al-Mu’min, The Giver of Faith. – MM

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I Plan: Areas of Focus; 20 July 2017

In the name of Allah, the All-Compassionate, the All-Merciful.

Righto, I’ve mentioned I’ll be busy but I think the term ‘busy’ has somewhat been overused. Let me use ‘engaged’ or ‘occupied’ instead. So basically, I’m going to list the major commitments I currently have. Sometimes, I just need to see things right in my face in order for me to work things out accordingly.

  • Uniqlo (Yes, I’ve signed the letter of appointment with them yesterday. 🙂 )
  • Metropolitan Muslimah (MM)
  • Rubber Bandits (RB)
  • Street MOB Clothing (SMC)

I know working retail won’t leave me with a lot of time on my hands but that’s where I’ll have to manage my physical fatigue, which naturally comes with retail work. I believe I will be exhausted during the first week of work so I’ll have to talk to Lee about it tomorrow during SMC’s meeting; to give me a grace period of a week or two in terms of working on SMC.

I really hope I can get back into vlogging. I miss it. I also miss songwriting. Mortal also needs to be finished hahaha.

So yeah, happy to be fully engaged in 2017.

Enjoy your day, guys.

And Allah is Al-Basir, the All-Hearing. – MM

I Plan: Visual Novel Project – Title Screen Second Draft (A Singer’s Dream)

In the name of Allah, the All-Compassionate, the All-Merciful.

Huzzah! So I’ve decided to pick up my visual novel project again. I just started learning about switches and variables in RPGMaker VX Ace, explained in Chapter 2 of the guide book I’m using. I’m barely into a few pages of it and I’m already having a headache now. There is quite a lot of information to absorb. However, I managed to figure out the very basic mechanics of having a switch that opens up a door and transporting the player sprite to another map by going through it. I was completely overwhelmed by it at first but after trying it and seeing the result, it just dawned on me how easy it can be. Like the lightbulb just switched on by itself after you tried so hard to light it up. Hahaha!

My progress is definitely going to be very slow but at least I managed to try out something new and grasped the idea of switches already.

Also, I went for a redraft of the title screen. Image and font used were taken from sites that allow their resources to be used for free, even for commercial use, and no attribution is required.

Psst! Here are my resources!

Fonts: http://www.1001fonts.com/free-fonts-for-commercial-use.html

Images: https://pixabay.com/

And here is my new title screen!

title screen

And Allah is Al-Aziz, the Almighty, the Self-Sufficient. – MM

I Plan: Lifetime Agenda; 2 June 2017

In the name of Allah, the All-Compassionate, the All-Merciful.

Crikey, sometimes it had to take you 10 job applications before you realise just where your interests truly lie.

As for me, a lot.

So I have finally come up with a chart that shows my interests and areas of work I would like to dabble in.

This should definitely keep me busy enough, even during my ‘free’ times. Hehe.

😉

NH Lifetime Agenda

And Allah is Al-Quddus, the Most Holy. – MM

I Plan: Visual Novel Project – Working Title (A Singer’s Dream)

In the name of Allah, the Beneficent, the Merciful.

A has been a major influence in my life lately. I find myself getting interested in the things he is passionate about. The best part about this influence is that he also has a radical amount of belief that I can do the things he is super pro at. He would absolutely deny he is skilled at them of course because that is how humble he is and he always acknowledges his skills are only a loan from God.

I love coming across people like him because they give me a lot of reminders in staying humble and massive support in boosting my already established self-confidence.

What I really like about our friendship is that our interactions are healthy. No joke is lame, no comment is stupid, no opinion is dismissive… even if we have disagreements and differences, we simply acknowledge that it makes the other special or unique. To sum it up in his words, we are in a League of the Weirdordinary. There is absolutely no pressure to live up to the other’s expectations because expectations are not supposed to be placed. It is all about tossing an idea and igniting a spark to it. If the person wishes to let the flame burn, then the other will continue to fuel it. If the person wishes to let the flame die, then the other will simply leave final words of encouragement.

It is all about the passion.

This, I now realise, is the type of friendship I absolutely thrive in. All of the wonderful people in my life has allowed me room to grow. Yes, including my ex. They have simply allowed me to be the weird person that I am yet at the same time see the person I could be.

Wow, I just churned out a ramble post when the subject of this post is about a plan.

Yes, A has planted the idea of making my own game into my head. Well, his ambitions for me were bigger — to create games that would impart Islamic values to children through stories about prophets and caliphs. However, he remains pragmatic towards his vision involving me. He shares his support in letting me create a game on a smaller scale first — I’m thinking of a linear Visual Novel (VN) — and he reminds me that for my first attempt, I should just write about whatever comes to me.

I shared this with Nora and she is supportive of my wish to create a VN too. I was feeling quite clueless on embarking on it so she suggested that I write out my story first. I will be sharing the story here as well as my progress in creating the VN, kind of like uploading my production notes.

Basically, the working title I had in mind is A Singer’s Dream. It is about a girl who aspires to be a singer but each time she makes a step forward in realising her dream, life keeps pushing her two steps back.

That is all I have right now. I have yet to think of the aesthetic concept for my VN as well. I suppose that will be the next thing I will be working on after the script is finished.

I am blessed with the fact that I have the software I needed for the job. Right now I have:

  • Write Your Own Novel for writing the story,
  • RPG Maker VX Ace for creating the VN format,
  • and a tonne of audio software for producing the background music (BGM) or ‘official soundtrack’ (OST) — Cakewalk, GameLooper, Music Creator 6 Touch, Rapture Session/Pro, SONAR (which exports easily to RPG Maker VX Ace), and Z3TA+2

Come to think of it, the processes involved in creating this VN encompass my interests and passion.

I will definitely ask A and Nora for help throughout. I read up on creating a visual novel; it is usually done by a team rather than an individual because of the various areas of expertise and skills needed as well as the huge amount of time needed in creating one. A linear VN may take up at least three months.

That is that and we will see how it goes.

And Allah is Knower of all things. – MM