The OnceInlife Journey
What would you do if you only got one opportunity in life?
That question was the beginning of OnceInlife.
In 2015, at 26, I left my first full-time job with no clear roadmap—only a strong belief that life was meant to be lived boldly. I started OnceInlife Explorations, creating experiences designed to help young Asian women become more confident, courageous, and willing to step outside their comfort zones.
My first major project was a beauty pageant. What began as a one-person idea grew into a large-scale event with hundreds of collaborators, sponsors, media partners, judges, contestants, and ultimately more than 1,000 people in the audience at the grand final—all within four months.
I had no fear of knocking on doors. I went from business to business around Boston every day, asking people to believe in something that did not exist yet. And many did.
But building something from the ground up also taught me lessons I could never have learned in a classroom. In 2016, I ran a second pageant, this time choosing to work only with partners whose values aligned with mine. The decision came at a financial cost, and I found myself working multiple jobs—from bartending and emceeing to interpreting and translating—to keep the project alive.
A promotional video of the pageant I ran in 2015.
In 2016, I was recognized by City of Boston for raising environmental awareness through my events, however, that same year I experienced financial loss and got into a bad accident.
That same year, I had an accident that gave me an unexpected glimpse into how deeply I had tied my identity to what I was building. I was thrown from my bike, landed on my chin, and ended up in the hospital with five stitches.
What stayed with me wasn't just the injury—it was what I worried about afterward. My first thought was whether I would still be able to appear in public and continue being a public figure.
Looking back, I realize how little I was thinking about my own wellbeing. I was so focused on building OnceInlife that I had begun measuring myself by what I could accomplish, rather than by how well I was taking care of myself.
Eventually, I stepped away from pageants and began exploring a different way to create impact.
At the end of 2016, OnceInlife Expedition was born. I researched and interviewed the players in the travel industry extensively, developed a business concept around gamified travel and the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals, and was selected from thousands of applicants to pitch my startup at an incubator.
Then life unraveled.
A painful breakup, betrayal by former business partners, and a prolonged period abroad pushed my mental, emotional, and physical health to its lowest point. My anxiety and depression became so severe that I went nearly three weeks without meaningful sleep.
I had opportunities in front of me, but I could no longer move forward.
Interview with Sinovision in 2016, where I shared my experiences of running beauty pageants, raising environmental awareness and growing up as an 1.5th generation immigrant.
And yet, somewhere underneath all of it, one voice remained:
I wanted to live. And I didn't just want to survive—I wanted to live well.
Two things helped me find my way back.
The first was writing. I had kept diaries throughout my life, but had gradually stopped. Returning to writing gave me a way to hear my own thoughts again and reconnect with the person I had lost along the way.
The second was movement.
I joined a dragon boat team—first as a drummer, then as a paddler. For the first time in a long time, I felt alive again. I found strength in movement, community, and surrounding myself with people who gave energy rather than took it.
That led me to boxing, snowboarding, rock climbing, and eventually strength training. Because dragon boat paddling was heavily one-sided, I first stepped into a gym in 2018 to build balance and strength on my left side.
But I soon realized that strength meant much more than physical ability.
If I wanted to pursue the life I imagined, I needed to become strong enough—physically, mentally, and emotionally—to face everything that came with it.
In 2019, the all-women dragon boat team I paddled with made history as the first all-women team in 40 years to reach Division A at Boston Dragon Boat Festival, placing among the top 11 out of approximately 80 boats, most of which were mixed teams.
That journey changed the direction of my life.
And it became the foundation of what OnceInlife means to me today:
to build the strength, confidence, and courage to make the most of the one life we have.
This is only the beginning of the story.
2019 Boston Dragon Boat Festival, CYPN Mystic all women team made 40-year history and got into Division A! I paddled in the second to last row on the right side.