Journey in 2018

Life is like a cup of ice cream. You always know what flavor you are gonna get.

As we go towards the end of 2018, I thought it might be a good idea to summarize a little reflection of my experience and thoughts throughout the whole year, for those who are interested in reading this blog and maybe my future self.

We are changing, for better or for worse. Therefore, it’s important and difficult to have a clear life goal. What helped me the most on finding myself is social network, aka my friends. I was always used to being alone, whether studying or watching TV shows. It gave me a comfortable feeling. As things change, I became more sociable and confident while talking to people. Well, still not confident enough to walk up to a girl and get her number though. Joke aside, talking to people can be really beneficial to each other since everyone has different background. Hearing other people’s stories and exchanging between thoughts are like precious gifts, as long as it’s not negative ones. In fact, many thoughts in here were derived from talking to my friends.

For a non native English speaker, being sociable can also improve the language skills. I remember the time when I was taking English as Second Language (ESL) class when I just moved here in US. When teacher told us a joke, everyone was like this emoji😂, and I was like this one 🙂. It was quite a learning journey. Working in restaurants gave me opportunities to pick up many vocabularies, of course, some Spanish as well. I think this happens to most non English speakers that when we learn a new word from someone, we would not only memorize the word itself but also the contents, the scene, and the person who we learned from. Just to name a few words that I learned:

• Paradise: from Trudy and I remember she was asking her sister for help to explain it to me
• Starch & miscellaneous: from Nick
• Squeeze: from Heather
• OG: from Dave 😎

If anyone from the above happens to read this article, I would like to thank you for helping me back then. It meant a lot. Therefore, if you have some friends struggling with language, just help them out, even just a pronouncement correction would be greatly appreciated and remembered. Of course, you have to make sure that he/she is willing to learn, otherwise things could turn out to be tragedy.

Enough language, let’s talk about change as I mentioned earlier. Everyone has different personality, which could help some people get along with each other but not others. Most characteristics we have today are built gradually as we grew up. I don’t disagree that some could be derived from their parents, but mostly it’s from the surroundings and environments. People can get synchronized in some ways if they stay together for a while. That’s why there’s a saying, “If you want to know someone’s personality, you can just figure it out from his/her friends’ traits”. It’s challenging for people to change their personalities. For example, shy people might be eager to become talkative so they could obtain more opportunities. The question is: is it 100% better to be talkative? Not necessarily. Plus, forcing oneself to do things reluctantly is not a healthy way of self improving. Therefore, do what hearts tell us. If the heart got lost, then that’s where friends and family come in.

As we change, we are ameliorating and becoming better us. This learning process can be laborious and boring, just like an old Chinese saying, “学如逆水行舟，不进则退”, which means “Study is like rowing upstream: no advance is to drop back“. However, if you have some companies by your side or studying with you, then things could get a lot easier and even become enjoyable. Luckily, I got some of those friends that guided me through many different things. Because of them, I got to know photography, cooking, stock investment, swimming, paddleboarding, rock climbing, etc. Most importantly, I think the golden award should be given to “Stay positive!” because last semester was miserable indeed. There were literally tons of tedious homework and projects while working a research paper. I deserved to suffer because I chose to squeeze two-year master program into one year. I just wished that I didn’t have to sleep so I could spend another 12 hours per day catching up the deadlines. Sometimes, my friends and I would just comfort each other by complaining about homework, professors, and life. In retrospect, I don’t think I could make it without those friends’ supports.

What doesn’t kill us makes us stronger. Indeed. We grow. We learn. We love. And we drink! 😉

Sometimes, looking back helps us remember what matters the most.

— December, 2018