Life Updates - Ejection

12 April 2026

Wix removed dates from blog posts?? When did this happen??

Wow, it has certainly been a while.

It’s been a while since I updated this site, and for a while everything went on the back burner for a bit. Life has a way of forcing us to rearrange our priorities, making reflection feel optional, until one fine day there’s a sudden urge for introspection. A good way to make sense of it all is to sit down and actually put it into words, especially now that I have ample time to do it.

Last year I made a decision that, on paper, didn’t make a lot of sense. I left an extremely stable job in healthcare in Singapore, one that offered growth, variety, and a clear path forward, with the intention of relocating to the UK and continuing in the same field. There was no dramatic catalyst. No burnout, no toxic environment, no moment where things fell apart. If anything, everything was… good. But that was precisely what made it a bit unsettling.

Somewhere amidst the repetitive daily routines, in the quiet moments walking to work, a question kept popping into my mind: is this all there is? Not in a cynical or ungrateful way, but in a way that made me realise how easy it was to settle into a life simply because it works. I could see the entire trajectory ahead of me. Incremental progression, familiar milestones, long-term service awards, a version of stability that many people would be happy to have, and regard as “successful”. And I think that’s what made it harder to ignore. There were no push factors, nothing pushing me to change, but maybe something was quietly pulling me elsewhere. 

At some point, the question stopped being “do I really want this? / How much do I want it?” and became something simpler, but heavier: Would I regret not trying?

And the answer is a definite yes.

This was the only framework that mattered. Because staying would have been easy, and probably optimal in many ways. But it also felt like the kind of decision that accumulates quietly over time, until one day you realise you never really gave yourself the chance to choose differently.

I call this whole operation / project “Ejection”, partly as a joke, partly because that’s what it felt like. Not an escape from something bad, but a deliberate departure from something good. And if I was doing this, I didn’t want to do it halfway, or just “for the sake of it”. Once I decided that I wanted an English speaking country, the choices are actually quite limited. Besides the obvious options of Australia and New Zealand, there was also the UK, USA and Canada. Australia would mean a relatively smooth transition. Many Singaporeans (including healthcare workers!) have moved to various parts of Australia for work or even retirement, and New Zealand has a similar trend, just with smaller numbers. This path has been walked many times before. However, my journey was never about optimisation, or taking the easier path. It was about exploration. If I was already stepping off the expected path, I might as well lean into it. The UK it is. 

There is also an element of time sensitivity, because this whole ejection operation would become more difficult the longer I stay on in Singapore, be it career-wise, having more work responsibilities, or personal life, having more family commitments and such. I’m sort of in a sweet spot for experimentation, or if anything, I do believe I’m approaching the tail end of the possible time frame. This helped to solidify my decision to leave even before the end goal was finalised. It also helps to nudge me to actually take substantial action to secure my job and life overseas. 

Right now, I’m still in the in-between stage. While I have accepted a job offer, I’m still waiting on several other approvals while getting a headstart on living in the UK, which in practical terms means I’m kind of in a limbo. There’s no real fixed routine, no formal anchor tying things together, and a lot of uncertainty about what comes next, and when it’ll all happen. But interestingly, it doesn’t feel as uncomfortable as I thought it would. If anything, there’s a certain ease to it. The absence of structure is more spacious than I thought. If I set out to create an era of “funemployment” for myself, I might as well fully embrace it. After all, our identity is more than just our jobs. 

Part of this comfort comes from knowing that my runway is longer than I tend to give myself credit for. I do keep a close eye on my finances, and on paper I do understand my constraints. This is probably true for many people of my age group with similar years of working experience. There’s often more room to manoeuvre than we assume. Not infinite room, of course, but enough to try something, let it play out a little, before deciding what that means for you.

There is value in stepping outside a system that was working and see what emerges when you’re no longer held in place by it. There is value in proving to yourself that you can make a decision like this and sit with the consequences, both the freedom and the uncertainty that comes with it. Maybe things will fall into place, and I’ll continue on my plan as intended, but I’m mentally preparing for the possibility that everything might fall apart and I’ll have to recalibrate and possibly return. Even so, the journey up to this point has been so fruitful and very worthwhile. Not in a dramatic, life-altering sense, but in a quieter, more personal way. Because this was never purely about the result. It was about removing the lingering thought of what if…?

Even though I don’t know exactly where this leads to yet, I do know that whatever happens next, I won’t have to wonder what might have been if I had just stayed put where I was. And for now, this feels great, and I will continue to enjoy life, as it is, to the best of my ability.