You Can Do This!

For anyone who’s ever struggled with being different and being denied their goals and dreams for not conforming with the norm, Miss Mela Habijan’s message for you is: “No matter how the world sees us, being different is a gift, and even if the world keeps saying no to us, we need to keep saying yes to ourselves.” You, too, can use whatever makes you different to transform your life and make it flourish and shine—whatever your gender identity, sexual orientation, life choices, race, shape, size, or economic status.

Do we really still need to uphold high standards of English language fluency when audio and video are replacing reading and writing and when the consensus seems to be “it doesn’t matter how you say it, as long as your message is understood”?

There’s no such thing as being too old to achieve anything, proves this former stay-at-home mom who made a name for herself in at age 49 as the first female and first Filipino-American executive chef at Hollywood’s iconic Yamashiro restaurant. There, she enjoyed fame and success cooking for celebrities such as Bruno Mars, Cardi B, Jojo Siwa, Paris Hilton, H.E.R., Jennifer Hudson, and JoKoy. In 2023, she moved back to the Philippines after over 30 years after she was named Philippine Airlines’ Assistant Vice President for Catering Operations.

Struggling with abandonment or trust issues? Anger management problems? Perfectionistic and obsessive tendencies? A lack of assertiveness or people-pleasing patterns? All these can be manifestations of childhood trauma, which, when left unhealed, can damage our self-esteem and well-being and debilitate us from living our best lives.

Diplomats are masters at negotiation, conflict mediation and resolution, and communicating effectively with tact and grace—essential life skills that can help us get ahead in life and improve our personal relationships while still standing up for ourselves and our beliefs and values.

All the doom and gloom about climate change can make us feel hopeless and helpless, so we tend to turn a blind eye out of guilt and apathy. But every little thing we do is magic, and our collective efforts really can amount to something that can make an impact, assures this episode’s guest. Lou Albano has always been passionate about the environment and has made getting people to actively care for Planet Earth her personal goal. She pioneers journalistic coverage on climate and the environment at GMA News Online where she is the lifestyle managing editor. Her stories on the environment led her to be chosen as a member of the second cohort of the Oxford Climate Journalism Network, where, together with top science and environment journalists all over the world, she learned about how to more effectively convey the message in doable ways that can move every citizen into positive action. You won’t be the same after listening to her here!

“It's okay to be ugly. What's not okay is to give up on yourself. It’s absolutely fine that you don’t fit in the mold of what everyone else thinks is beautiful. The real challenge is improving the rest of yourself. This involves unraveling years of trauma, self-flagellation, and failure by truly looking the monuments to pain that you’ve built into the blueprint of who you are. From there you can work towards forgiving yourself for the things you are not and the life you don’t have. This is the work that will improve your life, but it’s not instant or easy.”

This episode could very well have been inspired by these beautiful words from a piece in Projectvanity.com by its founder and editor Liz Lanuzo, the OG Pinay beauty blogger who has harnessed the power of embracing her true beauty towards fulfillment and success. A 15-year veteran in the beauty industry, she is also the founder of In Her Element Skincare, designed for busy women who, like herself, are lazy when it comes to applying skincare.

Listen and learn from our intriguing conversation about beauty standards and stereotypes, beauty vs. attractiveness, beauty politics, beauty empowerment and disempowerment, youth worship and ageism in beauty, and the three steps you can take to find and embrace your true beauty.

“It's okay to be ugly. What's not okay is to give up on yourself. It’s absolutely fine that you don’t fit in the mold of what everyone else thinks is beautiful. The real challenge is improving the rest of yourself. This involves unraveling years of trauma, self-flagellation, and failure by truly looking the monuments to pain that you’ve built into the blueprint of who you are. From there you can work towards forgiving yourself for the things you are not and the life you don’t have. This is the work that will improve your life, but it’s not instant or easy.”

This episode could very well have been inspired by these beautiful words from a piece in Projectvanity.com by its founder and editor Liz Lanuzo, the OG Pinay beauty blogger who has harnessed the power of embracing her true beauty towards fulfillment and success. A 15-year veteran in the beauty industry, she is also the founder of In Her Element Skincare, designed for busy women who, like herself, are lazy when it comes to applying skincare.

Listen and learn from our intriguing conversation about beauty standards and stereotypes, beauty vs. attractiveness, beauty politics, beauty empowerment and disempowerment, youth worship and ageism in beauty, and the three steps you can take to find and embrace your true beauty.

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Two-time Palanca Award winner, Rappler columnist, essayist, and author Shakira Sison wants you to be brave. She doesn’t mean “raging in anger and waving your fists in the air to fight, but the kind of bravery you feel in your chests when you’re reading something that empowers you or makes you feel like you don’t have to stay where you are or wait to be rescued or for what is handed to you. The kind that makes you want to better yourself and find your own way and be independent.”