This may be the night that my dreams might let me know
All the stars are closer.
If there’s one advice I would give to young kids who are ambitious about their goals and dreams, it will be “Hold on tight to your dreams. Don’t let anyone or anything discourage you from going after your dreams. It’s your life and you are the one who is going to make it happen.”
You’re probably wondering how I came to this conclusion. Well, a little more than a year ago, when I was applying for jobs during the final project weeks and before graduating from graduate school, my now ex-boyfriend questioned my lifetime goal to work for Disney. At that time, I compromised with him and replied: “Okay, what about Gensler?” (Gensler is one of the biggest corporate Architecture firms in the world with many successful projects in various fields.) He actually preferred me to go for Gensler and discouraged me from going for Disney. But of course, I’m not the type of girl who would give up her dreams because a guy told her to go another way.
I still chased after my Disney dream. Even though it was not easy, I did everything I could to get my foot into the door. Because I had already interned at Walt Disney Company back in Summer 2011, I wasn’t eligible to be an Architecture & Facilities intern, so I agreed to be a contracted Non-WDI employee and kept waiting until the Company was eligible to hire people again. They were on a 2-year hiring freeze due to the layoffs so they depended on outsourcing much of the work during these past few years. Becoming a contracted employee through a small architecture office that partnered with WDI gave me the opportunity to meet one of my NCARB ARE mentors. He worked at Gensler and WDI and was heavily involved with AIA SoCal chapters. After months of patience and waiting to be a WDI employee, I was officially offered a position as an Associate Facility Designer for WDI California in May 2018. Even though the word “associate” is a downgrade, I believe my role in projects is very crucial and I don’t let the word bother my working capability. I am grateful to be accepted by everyone – my architectural design studio, my project team, and those from other various disciplines.
Even though it has only been a month since I’ve become an official Walt Disney Imagineer (I still can’t believe I get to call myself an ‘Imagineer’), I’ve never been happier. Yes, I put in many hours for work and am constantly thinking about work, but I know my own schedule and priorities. Because I am now single and living alone, I devote my Mondays-Thursdays for work and studies so that I can decide to have some fun on the weekends. I also believe that whatever I am doing at work complements/helps me study for my ARE exams. In other words, I am the one who understands how I enjoy life and that multiple systems in my life must move simultaneously in order for my life to continue.
“It’s a gamble. All of it. But I’m putting my money down on my career and believing that love will fall in place.“ – Sutton from The Bold Type (cheers to the show’s producers & Freeform for understanding how twenty-something year olds are getting through)
Because I got through the Disney door, everyone now has expectations of me. I must fulfill their expectations or go higher and prove that I am made to stay as a WDI architectural designer. I am not afraid, not weak, and definitely not a damsel in distress. I am a princess-in-waiting, waiting to be the next queen without you.
#dreambigprincess
Hiraeth 