A Productive Quarantine Story
On personal development, finding your passion and dealing with adversity.

Most of the summer was spent in our shared garden, doing workouts, reading books, ordering takeaways and celebrating my birthday in lockdown.
Fortunate enough to be surrounded with parks and having housemates to socialise with during quarantine. We had a glimpse of our retirement.
The company closed the shop where I work due to lockdown and made me furloughed for four months from March.
I was made redundant by the end of July from my luxury fashion retail job in Savile Row, which is approximately 60% to 80% reliant on tourists or international clients.
However, I knew that job loss is foreseeable due to the current economic crisis and the nature of my job in fashion retail.
I used the free time I had in quarantine to find myself, to reflect on my life and to plan my future career goals.
On Personal Development
- Having a direction is very important, due to the uncertainties in job prospect of my previous experience. I knew I had to improve myself, gain more skills and find ways on how I could earn money when I lose my job. I focused on the current skills I have and improve my knowledge in the industry I want to pursue as a career.
- The Fashion course I did with Future Learn and years of experience in luxury fashion led me to get an interview with Chanel. Though, at that point, HR is only interviewing strategically to build a talent pool. Most companies are on recruitment freeze, it is challenging to get back in fashion retail, and most of the job opportunities now is online.
- My experience and knowledge with the fashion industry led me to get an internship with a sustainable e-commerce brand, where I now do the social media strategy for the brand.
I did the following free courses below on Future Learn, to expand my knowledge in the fashion industry and e-commerce. I also took a creative writing class on skillshare by Roxane Gay. It helped me to improve my storytelling and to find my voice.
- UNDERSTANDING FASHION: FROM BUSINESS TO CULTURE INSTITUT FRANÇAIS DE LA MODE (IFM) — Future Learn
- PEOPLE MANAGEMENT SKILLS CIPD — CHARTERED INSTITUTE OF PERSONNEL AND DEVELOPMENT — Future Learn
- FASHION’S FUTURE: THE SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT GOALS FASHION REVOLUTION — Future Learn
- CREATE A SOCIAL MEDIA MARKETING CAMPAIGN UNIVERSITY OF LEEDS — Future Learn
- Creative Writing: Crafting Personal Essays with Impact
Writing Poems
Finding your passion, you must find out what gets you in the flow state.
- For many years, writing poetry has been my creative outlet, but I never took it seriously until I joined Medium. I tried publishing it on my Instagram or personal website blog, but I never had the support I needed.
- Being part of the Medium community help me to shape my identity as a writer. Surrounding myself with the people who have the same ambitions as I am, changed the game for me.
- I was always uncomfortable to tell people that I write poetry, as in my previous experience, people have laughed about it. I now realised that they are not my crowd.
Watching Ali Abdaal’s deep-dive series have kept me sane during the quarantine. A piece of advice that Ali always suggest is “to monetise your hobbies”.
I’ve come across Medium when Ali had discussions with Valentine Perez and Cliff Weitzman. Ali creates a lot of valuable content. I take notes of the things I want to incorporate in my life.
Since then, I decided to join Medium in June 2020. Four months later, I’ve published 14 Articles intending to post 100 articles by the end of the year and publish a poetry book.
For publishing 100 pieces, I realised that the goal is too much. I need more time to figure out a system and create a new set of hobbies or let go of some of my current habits to focus on my current goals.
Poetry has been my creative outlet ever since. I write daily, I’ve worked in Luxury fashion retail for four years of my life.
There are times where it’s idle. When we don’t have any customers, I write any inspiration that comes in my head. I write it on the back of the receipt papers and keep it in my pocket or any piece of paper I can find.
These little moments of stillness, my brain process ideas, a memory or an emotion, and I try to put it in poetry form.
Writing on Medium and joining the Medium communities on Facebook was very helpful for me in gaining confidence with my writing.
Sinem Gunel’s group is one of the best group to join, as everyone is very supportive, and she provides valuable advice on how to succeed on Medium.
I now surround my self with people who works harder and who are more ambitious than I am. We support each other to be our best selves.
Adversity is an opportunity.
- I use adversity to explore other avenues in my life.
- Learning to manage my emotions in tough times, having a growth mindset allowed me to be open-minded and making something positive out of a negative situation.
I went through a breakup in June 2020, lockdown brought four years of relationship to an end, and job loss happened at the end of July.
Beginning of August opened a lot of opportunities for me, due to having connections in the art world. I socialised and made friends with few artists, which led to a lot of inspiration for my poems. I wrote a poem that got curated for the poetry section on Medium.
https://readmedium.com/the-time-where-i-met-a-russian-north-korean-bunny-f282ea6e2fe2
Intending to publish a book, I set a target to myself to write 50 poems by the end of August, where I achieved it at the beginning of September. I am now working on editing the book, doing market research to find my ideal readers and promoting my book at the same time. Though it is a lot of work, I enjoy the process and all the new things I learn in every step of the way.
These adversities in my life; post lockdown existential anxieties, going back to dating and meeting new people. I’ve been in euphoric states to low states.
It has been an emotional turmoil facing the uncertainties happening in my life. Coming to terms that the career that I had before was long gone, and I am now pursuing my passions.
The idea of living a creative life still gives me so much anxiety, there’s this fear for failure due to uncertainty, but I try my best to push through and overcome it.
I am aligning my habits to what goals I set for myself and use these goals as a direction to where I want to be.
Summary in bullet points
- Personal development — list and highlight your primary skills, think on what you can improve or explore other interests.
- Finding your passion — not everyone has the opportunity to explore their passion. To see it, you must look within yourself. Find out what gives you joy when you do it or what you often do without even realising it. Perhaps, reflect on habits or maybe talk to people who know you better.
- Adversity is an opportunity — making something positive out of a negative situation.
“That which does not kill us makes us stronger.” — Friedrich Nietzsche