A Willing Heart

Tell us something interesting about yourself.
I’m in the legal profession, but I’ve always wanted to be in a creative field to express myself, or rather to just find a better platform. One of the areas I really feel passionate about is charity. I’m part of this group on Facebook called ‘Happy People Helping People’. On weekends, we help out with the cardboard collectors around Singapore, bring them out on trips, and more. We’re collecting funds for a pay-it-forward meal programme, where we’d pay the economic rice stalls around their area to cover their meals for the month.

What else do you do in your free time?
I like to read. I’m quite interested in exploring how public education can help a lot of social causes. There are a lot of conversations now around female empowerment and mental health issues—these are issues that I hold quite close to my heart, because of the people around me.

A role model I look up to:
My mum. She has really influenced me in so many ways—she retired once before, but she’s not one to sit on her laurels. She’s literally still working every single day, just coaching and teaching people. She’s basically teaching me how to pay it forward, and I’m trying to do that. I guess, for me, personal relationships are very important, so I tend to look up to people that have made a more direct impact in my life.

What’s the best advice you’ve ever received?
It’s actually what I’m trying to tell myself now—to think of how my life will impact others. Like, at the end of the day, when I’m gone, how I want to be remembered. It’s not about material things, but it’s more of how my life has impacted other peoples’ lives, and hopefully brought them a bit more joy.

If you weren’t living in Singapore, where would you want to be?
I’d either be in a third world country or somewhere off the grid like Mongolia or South America. I feel that there is so much more I can bring, and help them grow, and also to learn from them, whereas if I were to stay in my comfort zone, in a developed city, my learning experiences would not be much different from what I’ve had so far.