After the George Floyd killing and backlash over his killing, America exploded in protests that sprang up in seemingly every major city, starting obviously in Minneapolis (now famous for the looting of a Target store) and spreading around the country from New York City to Chicago, Los Angeles, Portland, Washington D.C. (I'm just naming the ones where I saw notably raucous behavior on live feeds Friday night). It was compounded by the Lousville protests over the death of Breonna Taylor, which happened in March but is just as tragic as George Floyd's story, as Taylor was killed when police tried to enter her home due to suspicion of drug trafficking and Taylor got in the way of gunfire (unclear who fired first, someone inside the home that wasn't Breonna or the police, but this happens much too often regarding disputed stories and who shot whom and who fired whom).
I've never been part of a protest, I guess I'm not popular enough or well connected enough, or more likely, just not overly passionate about one particular cause to join in a protest. I certainly have witnessed them plenty, having lived in various cities in my life. The closest I was to joining an organized event was the 2017 Woman's March (after Trump got elected) which looped around Chicago's downtown. I also see plenty of teacher's strikes, worker's strikes, and a union protest outside the building I worked at in downtown L.A. in which the building seemed to entered into a dispute over hiring of certain groups of security guards (unclear). The point is, there are a lot of protests around the US, and around the world, although I'm not sure how effective they are. They certainly are a show of how many people feel a certain way about an issue, which is significant in itself, much like President Obama used to say he would read any petition signed by 100,000 people or more. Hopefully the protests are civil and peaceful, leading to nobody getting hurt or worse, dying, but apparently there have already been deaths resulting from the George Floyd protests, which just exacerbates a sad situation. I don't blame protesters for being mad; they are upset about a long string of cases of police brutality (I'm not sure about racism in some of the cases but am sure that there has been some abuse of police power, especially towards black people) in what is one of the most emotional issues for POC (people of color- I learned this today).
MJ reminds me that Korea seems to have effective protests, for example the Candlelight demonstration (촛불혁명) of 2016-2017 demanding the removal of office of President Park, then the Korean president. There were large groups of demonstrators (up to 2.3 million on 12/3/2016, a record for protests in Korean, which only has 50 million people total) protested, notably with few police being hurt. A notably smaller group of people also protested FOR President Park. The Korean protests seemed to have symbolic gestures like releasing yellow balloons and blowing out candles to send a message to President Park. America's most recent protests are more violent, intense, and dangerous in comparison, although they are dealing with a more emotional topic, race relations and murder of innocent people. Unfortunately for America, recent reports indicate that these protests extend an opportunity for looters to exploit the situation and ransack buildings, set fire, steal things from wherever they can, in the pretense of joining the cause. Some of the violence, though, is also general anger, as I saw some videos in various cities of ordinary citizens attacking police officers verbally and physically. Just a lot of anger, and a sense that things have gotten out of control in this country regarding race relations, so some citizens feel justified in taking it into their own hands, forgetting that the cops that they are attacking are not the ones who committed the heinous acts that they are protesting about, or that they are not attacking some leaders of the country who are making it worse.
Oh and this is all going on during a pandemic. Social distancing and stay-at-home policies have gone out the window. I applaud others to act and try to make change in the country, but I wonder if the protests that we've seen Friday night (and Saturday night as I'm writing this) have been effective in achieving those goals.
Saturday, May 30, 2020
Wednesday, May 27, 2020
Hot-Button Issue (논쟁의, 论争的, 異論のある)
Often times when I'm learning other languages, I learn about words in languages that I already know- this often happens in Chinese, where my overall vocabulary is not that high (I did not take the Chinese equivalent of the SAT's) and where there are hundreds of thousands of combinations of Chinese characters that become words. More rarely, though, I learn English words- like today, I was reminded of what "de facto" means- it's a bit tricky, but it's useful to contrast it with "de jure," which means by law, something is that way, but the law isn't always reality, and the reality of who someone is or what something is is "de facto," in fact.
In today's society, much more than when I was growing up, people have strong opinions on "hot- button issues" (hot button started out as a marketing term in 1970's America where advertisers would prompt users to hit a proverbial "button" to get them to react to products, or so the theory goes). Whether it's due to the rise of social media, or increased polarization in politics (the left and right grow further and further apart on issues, it's like 2 versions of the United States), and everyone having all the news right away and being able to express it right away, average citizens are more and more expressive about certain hot button issues. It's also partly because no one wants to read a measured response on Facebook exploring both sides and finding merit in each side's arguments, nope, people are much more likely to be "upvoted" or get "Likes" for short, to-the-point, clear-cut opinion on something hot-button (ironic that we now have buttons we "click" on to like or love posts that cause certain issues to become hot button because they get the most attention and rise to the top of the page due to algorithms. For example, today NASA was scheduled to broadcast the SpaceX launch for its seventh Starlink mission, but weather got in the way and it was postponed. This was pretty big news due to it being the first time in more than 10 years a mission would launch into space from US soil (think Apollo 13), but it's not hot-button: there are no divisions of thoughts or disagreements one can have about it: it's happening or it's not happening. The bigger news of the day, carried over from yesterday, was the George Floyd police killing in Minneapolis, where a black man was killed because a white police officer put his knee on his neck while making an arrest, denying him the ability to breath for several minutes and eventually causing Floyd to die.
Racial relations in this country is ALWAYS a hot-button topic because it's such human stories, where there are videos of killing and police brutality and crime, and has roots of white-black race relations that have haunted the U.S. since its inception of the country. Every time police brutality happens it's a tragedy, and recently they've frequently been recorded using smartphones and posted online right away, so there is immediate public outrage; almost everyone on Facebook will post their stance on it. a condemnation of the officers, and I feel there is inherent pressure to take a strong stance on it; almost as though NOT taking a stance is frowned upon, suggests apathy and tacit approval of the action. Having watched the video, the incident is hard to stomach. The officer on top of Floyd is pressing his knee on his neck consistently without even thinking about it, just casually, while onlookers tell the officers that Floyd may be in trouble, and Floyd also yelling out that he can't breathe. Unfathomable behavior by the officer, and this isn't the first time something like this has happened. I think EVERY one of these police killings is a tragedy, but I also feel it's overreaching to lump them all into one category and use it as a tool for one's arguments. There definitely is racism, explicit racism in this country. But lumping each tragedy into all racial crimes seems wrong to me. For sure, the officer who killed Floyd was right to be fired, and to be arrested and have charges pressed against him. However, certain posts like "send this man to prison now!" are a little too strong (evades the right to a trial afforded each person), and doesn't answer to me why this was a racial crime: did the white officer do this to Floyd only because he was black? Or because Floyd was a suspect in a minor crime? Does this officer do this to all suspects? Is he just a bad cop, regardless of what race of suspect he is dealing with? I've dealt with some good cops in my life, I've dealt with some bad cops, and the bad cops can be arrogant, seemingly on a power trip, and dismissive all the time, but I've never had any evidence to show that they were being racist, although I'm sure some are. These are questions that I thought would need to be answered before this got labeled a racial crime, and I think should be kept in mind when deciding what to do going forward and making officers aware in the future.
For example, today I was stopped in the streets while running by an African American man and asked "Let me ask you a question. How you gonna let a man lie on the ground and not be able to breathe, man?" The implicit reasoning that since I was Asian, I was somehow complicit in what the Asian American police officer in the video (his Caucasian partner was tacking George Floyd while he stood to the side watching) did. I don't want to diminish Floyd's death and compare his suffering to my suffering of being questioned on the street (not physically assaulted at all), but I do think these kind of incidents can trigger the wrong responses, of blaming people for deaths. For sure the Asian American officer did wrong as well, and deserves punishment in a court of law, but did he also do it because he is racist? Is it right to be racist towards me because of the reaction to these (maybe) racist actions? Doesn't seem like that hate should fuel more hate-filled reactions.
I'm learning as we go along to, and I admit to being wrong many times, and would love to learn about these hot-button issues.
In today's society, much more than when I was growing up, people have strong opinions on "hot- button issues" (hot button started out as a marketing term in 1970's America where advertisers would prompt users to hit a proverbial "button" to get them to react to products, or so the theory goes). Whether it's due to the rise of social media, or increased polarization in politics (the left and right grow further and further apart on issues, it's like 2 versions of the United States), and everyone having all the news right away and being able to express it right away, average citizens are more and more expressive about certain hot button issues. It's also partly because no one wants to read a measured response on Facebook exploring both sides and finding merit in each side's arguments, nope, people are much more likely to be "upvoted" or get "Likes" for short, to-the-point, clear-cut opinion on something hot-button (ironic that we now have buttons we "click" on to like or love posts that cause certain issues to become hot button because they get the most attention and rise to the top of the page due to algorithms. For example, today NASA was scheduled to broadcast the SpaceX launch for its seventh Starlink mission, but weather got in the way and it was postponed. This was pretty big news due to it being the first time in more than 10 years a mission would launch into space from US soil (think Apollo 13), but it's not hot-button: there are no divisions of thoughts or disagreements one can have about it: it's happening or it's not happening. The bigger news of the day, carried over from yesterday, was the George Floyd police killing in Minneapolis, where a black man was killed because a white police officer put his knee on his neck while making an arrest, denying him the ability to breath for several minutes and eventually causing Floyd to die.
Racial relations in this country is ALWAYS a hot-button topic because it's such human stories, where there are videos of killing and police brutality and crime, and has roots of white-black race relations that have haunted the U.S. since its inception of the country. Every time police brutality happens it's a tragedy, and recently they've frequently been recorded using smartphones and posted online right away, so there is immediate public outrage; almost everyone on Facebook will post their stance on it. a condemnation of the officers, and I feel there is inherent pressure to take a strong stance on it; almost as though NOT taking a stance is frowned upon, suggests apathy and tacit approval of the action. Having watched the video, the incident is hard to stomach. The officer on top of Floyd is pressing his knee on his neck consistently without even thinking about it, just casually, while onlookers tell the officers that Floyd may be in trouble, and Floyd also yelling out that he can't breathe. Unfathomable behavior by the officer, and this isn't the first time something like this has happened. I think EVERY one of these police killings is a tragedy, but I also feel it's overreaching to lump them all into one category and use it as a tool for one's arguments. There definitely is racism, explicit racism in this country. But lumping each tragedy into all racial crimes seems wrong to me. For sure, the officer who killed Floyd was right to be fired, and to be arrested and have charges pressed against him. However, certain posts like "send this man to prison now!" are a little too strong (evades the right to a trial afforded each person), and doesn't answer to me why this was a racial crime: did the white officer do this to Floyd only because he was black? Or because Floyd was a suspect in a minor crime? Does this officer do this to all suspects? Is he just a bad cop, regardless of what race of suspect he is dealing with? I've dealt with some good cops in my life, I've dealt with some bad cops, and the bad cops can be arrogant, seemingly on a power trip, and dismissive all the time, but I've never had any evidence to show that they were being racist, although I'm sure some are. These are questions that I thought would need to be answered before this got labeled a racial crime, and I think should be kept in mind when deciding what to do going forward and making officers aware in the future.
For example, today I was stopped in the streets while running by an African American man and asked "Let me ask you a question. How you gonna let a man lie on the ground and not be able to breathe, man?" The implicit reasoning that since I was Asian, I was somehow complicit in what the Asian American police officer in the video (his Caucasian partner was tacking George Floyd while he stood to the side watching) did. I don't want to diminish Floyd's death and compare his suffering to my suffering of being questioned on the street (not physically assaulted at all), but I do think these kind of incidents can trigger the wrong responses, of blaming people for deaths. For sure the Asian American officer did wrong as well, and deserves punishment in a court of law, but did he also do it because he is racist? Is it right to be racist towards me because of the reaction to these (maybe) racist actions? Doesn't seem like that hate should fuel more hate-filled reactions.
I'm learning as we go along to, and I admit to being wrong many times, and would love to learn about these hot-button issues.
Sunday, May 24, 2020
Universal Basic Income (全民基本收入, 보편적 기본 소득, ユニバーサルベーシックインカム)
One of the most popular and often-discussed topics of the last few years in American politics has been UBI, or the concept of a universal basic income, most often espoused in Democratic Presidential candidate Andrew Yang's campaign proposals. $1,000 per month to every American adult, but he dropped out in January after the New Hampshire primary due to a lack of support. Little did he know that just a couple months later, the whole world would go into global pandemic and become a petri dish for examining the effects of universal basic income, as Congress passed a bill that gave $1,000 to every American citizen who made under $65,000 based on last year's tax returns (humble brag- I made more than that, but even I got a little money from the emergency federal stimulus). Of course, President Trump famously put his name on every check that was sent out, but (surprise!) I did not see that check because I had it direct deposited to my bank account. There was speculation that stimulus would not be the end of the checks to U.S. citizens, but so far no more has come trickling down. I'm not particularly surprised, as each $1,000 stimulus deal costs trillions for the government which is already heavily in debt and doing deficit spending, which will eventually have to catch up to any government sooner or later (look at Greece and a bunch of other European states!) but that kind of long-term thinking is way too far down the road for the immediate pandemic crisis.
That's one of the things I found somewhat flawed about the Yang UBI proposal: Every single adult got $1,000 a month, so it covers the people who most desperately need it, who are struggling to make ends meet every month, but it also covers Bill Gates, Jeff Bezos, and tons of millionaires and billionaires. Even me, I'm glad to get $1,000 per month on top of what I make, but I don't necessarily need it (for now, knock on wood) to pay my rent or to put food on the table, it would just be a bonus check, and I'm not sure I would feel richer and inject that money back into the economy immediately, which is part of Yang's theory, that UBI would pay for itself because the money gets spent right away and is circulated back into the economy. For people with higher incomes, that may not be the case as not only did those people not really need the money in the first place, they won't spend it. However, cutting off the UBI checks for people over a certain income threshold (like $50,000 a year) doesn't seem right, neither.....maybe a formula used like the recent coronavirus stimulus (for every $1,000 earned above $80,000, you take x amount out of your check for the month). Perhaps that could be a good middle ground.
Also the fact that it cost trillions of dollars to get one injection of $1,000 per adult, just imagine having to come up with that money every single month- that's like one of the heftiest rent agreements ever, to be paid by the U.S. government. And it's in perpetuity. Even if UBI does one day become a reality, it seems terribly costly and one of the first things that a new administration would consider repealing (like Trump trying to repeal Obamacare) in order to cut costs, etc. A heavily political divisive topic that despite math possibly proving that it could work, would be too difficult politically to pull off in this country, unfortunately (and that's one of the reasons people complain that nothing ever gets done in this country).
Another stimulus measure similar to UBI has been the increase in unemployment benefits in certain states. In CA, for workers who were laid off/ lost their jobs since March 15, California EDD (Employment Development Department) , through the federal government's provision in the CARES act, called pandemic unemployment compensation, started giving out $600 a week for each week of unemployment on TOP of the normal $400+ they usually give out. That's a really big step, much bigger than the federal stimulus's $1000 one-time hit, because this is WEEKLY. That means more than $1000+ WEEKLY, not monthly. On top of that, CA is currently not requiring that people continue to look for work during this pandemic, so on the unemployment application they expressly tell the applicant to "answer honestly," because it doesn't matter if you're looking for work or not, they will approve the application anyway. This seems like an example of how UBI can go too extreme, where a worker is getting paid about a $27/ hour wage NOT to work during this pandemic (the special benefits run out in July, for now). There are plenty of stories now about people just sitting at home, not looking for work (even if there was work out there) and just taking in the benefits, because some jobs (many jobs, in fact) don't pay $27/hour (given a 40-hour week). I know my first job out of law school was for $23/ hour at a small law firm. If I was given the option to work back then for that rate or just sit at home, I would seriously consider just being at home and enhancing my career by studying or something. UBI can fail, it seems, if the basic income is too high, and we're already seeing that play out in CA (that is, of course, if you can even get your application filed and start receiving benefits, which has been very difficult for some because the EDD phone line is constantly busy, can't get any customer service, and it takes them weeks to process a filed application.
Fantasize on,
Robert Yan
That's one of the things I found somewhat flawed about the Yang UBI proposal: Every single adult got $1,000 a month, so it covers the people who most desperately need it, who are struggling to make ends meet every month, but it also covers Bill Gates, Jeff Bezos, and tons of millionaires and billionaires. Even me, I'm glad to get $1,000 per month on top of what I make, but I don't necessarily need it (for now, knock on wood) to pay my rent or to put food on the table, it would just be a bonus check, and I'm not sure I would feel richer and inject that money back into the economy immediately, which is part of Yang's theory, that UBI would pay for itself because the money gets spent right away and is circulated back into the economy. For people with higher incomes, that may not be the case as not only did those people not really need the money in the first place, they won't spend it. However, cutting off the UBI checks for people over a certain income threshold (like $50,000 a year) doesn't seem right, neither.....maybe a formula used like the recent coronavirus stimulus (for every $1,000 earned above $80,000, you take x amount out of your check for the month). Perhaps that could be a good middle ground.
Also the fact that it cost trillions of dollars to get one injection of $1,000 per adult, just imagine having to come up with that money every single month- that's like one of the heftiest rent agreements ever, to be paid by the U.S. government. And it's in perpetuity. Even if UBI does one day become a reality, it seems terribly costly and one of the first things that a new administration would consider repealing (like Trump trying to repeal Obamacare) in order to cut costs, etc. A heavily political divisive topic that despite math possibly proving that it could work, would be too difficult politically to pull off in this country, unfortunately (and that's one of the reasons people complain that nothing ever gets done in this country).
Another stimulus measure similar to UBI has been the increase in unemployment benefits in certain states. In CA, for workers who were laid off/ lost their jobs since March 15, California EDD (Employment Development Department) , through the federal government's provision in the CARES act, called pandemic unemployment compensation, started giving out $600 a week for each week of unemployment on TOP of the normal $400+ they usually give out. That's a really big step, much bigger than the federal stimulus's $1000 one-time hit, because this is WEEKLY. That means more than $1000+ WEEKLY, not monthly. On top of that, CA is currently not requiring that people continue to look for work during this pandemic, so on the unemployment application they expressly tell the applicant to "answer honestly," because it doesn't matter if you're looking for work or not, they will approve the application anyway. This seems like an example of how UBI can go too extreme, where a worker is getting paid about a $27/ hour wage NOT to work during this pandemic (the special benefits run out in July, for now). There are plenty of stories now about people just sitting at home, not looking for work (even if there was work out there) and just taking in the benefits, because some jobs (many jobs, in fact) don't pay $27/hour (given a 40-hour week). I know my first job out of law school was for $23/ hour at a small law firm. If I was given the option to work back then for that rate or just sit at home, I would seriously consider just being at home and enhancing my career by studying or something. UBI can fail, it seems, if the basic income is too high, and we're already seeing that play out in CA (that is, of course, if you can even get your application filed and start receiving benefits, which has been very difficult for some because the EDD phone line is constantly busy, can't get any customer service, and it takes them weeks to process a filed application.
Fantasize on,
Robert Yan
Wednesday, May 20, 2020
Layoffs (해고, リストラ, 裁员)
So little time, so many ways of saying "layoffs" and "being let go" in all languages. Even in English, there's a handful of ways to describe one of the most traumatic events in life: being terminated at your work, the awful realization that you are no longer employed. "Got canned," "packed my stuff, "laid off" all come to mind, except there are slight differences between being terminated for personal performance issues as opposed to "mass layoffs" as part of a company-wide cost-cutting measure. All the Asian languages have various ways to say it too, including getting "necked" in Japanese (probably similar to losing one's head in the olden days), "restructured" (リストラ) which is like the ultimate euphemism depicting a company's need to restructure its personnel structure. And the Chinese provide imagery as to how much of a small fish in a big pond the average employee is, as being let go is called "frying squid"(抄魷魚). apparently the story with squid is that people used to live on site at the factory they worked at and used quilts and blankets as a place to sleep, which they would have to roll up when they were let go, which looked like rolling up an octopus. What these terms all have in common is that the employee is not quitting or voluntarily leaving, it's a forced termination, and usually quite unexpected, leaving the employee a little shell-shocked and not knowing what to do next.
Currently in the legal industry (and a whole lot of other industries around the job world), lawyers are being laid off at big firms and in-house legal departments due to the lack of work from the onset of the coronavirus (clients delaying their cases, not paying their legal fees, rethinking the litigation or merger and acquisition they were planning on due to changing business needs), so the situation has become quite similar to 2009-2011 when I was in law school: lack of demand for lawyers, lawyers with no work to do and unable to bill enough hours, thus firms being unable to justify their cost and having to "restructure" them. It's a sad and unfortunate situation compounded by the fact that almost law firms are facing the same situation, so being laid off doesn't mean you will find a job and get right back on your feet soon, it's usually a lengthy delay to wait for the economy and the legal industry itself to turn around, and some people just leave the entire field entirely! Suddenly one's entire work routine is obviated, all contacts with co-workers and bosses severed, and worst, NO MORE HEALTH INSURANCE! Certainly I'm not trying to garner sympathy or pity for lawyers where many people are suffering much worse financially whereas lawyers hopefully have saved up some money during their time separating clients from their wealth, but that is a big discrepancy to go from making big law-figure salary to making zero. (Hopefully they got a severance package?)
I've been laid off more than once or twice in my life. Luckily for me, I'm used to it, and my initial expectation on the jobs I begin is not to work forever at that company, it's whenever I am no longer needed. I don't take getting laid off that hard, but then again I am in the unique position to be able to start the next job pretty quickly. I am, in many respects, like those workers rolling up their quilts at the factory, I don't think I do the usual desk decorations like putting family pictures up, getting my own orthopedic chair to improve my sitting posture (although, that's not a bad idea as I'm getting older, and I've always slouched).
Layoff could be a good opportunity to do something new! Learn a new language, start a blog, start a Youtube channel, start a vegan diet, I've done 2 of those things during this lockdown already. I think layoffs are indicative of the working world in the 21st century: Not always working at one company for one's whole life, and changing careers sometime midway through one's working life. MJ's already done it once; I've been lucky enough to not have had to change careers yet after 9 years of working in it, but it's definitely possible especially if my line of work gets replaced by automation/ computers (always possible for many jobs out there). That's why I go on reddit often to look up "what jobs do people have and how fast can you obtain them?" just to get some new ideas and look at the shiny toys that other people have, as the grass always looks greener in those other careers. Then I'll look at people who I knew in high school/ college who became (theoretically, on paper) more successful than me ("Always compare yourself to people better than you, not worse than you!" my parents always told young Robert when he complained about comparisons to family friends' children) and see that they've already weathered the long, steep climb to become a doctor and is a resident (fill-in-scientific-term-here)-ologist at a (pretty desirable location, usually urban city) hospital and I think what many people probably think when they look back and regret the college major they chose instead of biology," Ah, should have become a doctor."
Fantasize on,
Robert Yan
Currently in the legal industry (and a whole lot of other industries around the job world), lawyers are being laid off at big firms and in-house legal departments due to the lack of work from the onset of the coronavirus (clients delaying their cases, not paying their legal fees, rethinking the litigation or merger and acquisition they were planning on due to changing business needs), so the situation has become quite similar to 2009-2011 when I was in law school: lack of demand for lawyers, lawyers with no work to do and unable to bill enough hours, thus firms being unable to justify their cost and having to "restructure" them. It's a sad and unfortunate situation compounded by the fact that almost law firms are facing the same situation, so being laid off doesn't mean you will find a job and get right back on your feet soon, it's usually a lengthy delay to wait for the economy and the legal industry itself to turn around, and some people just leave the entire field entirely! Suddenly one's entire work routine is obviated, all contacts with co-workers and bosses severed, and worst, NO MORE HEALTH INSURANCE! Certainly I'm not trying to garner sympathy or pity for lawyers where many people are suffering much worse financially whereas lawyers hopefully have saved up some money during their time separating clients from their wealth, but that is a big discrepancy to go from making big law-figure salary to making zero. (Hopefully they got a severance package?)
I've been laid off more than once or twice in my life. Luckily for me, I'm used to it, and my initial expectation on the jobs I begin is not to work forever at that company, it's whenever I am no longer needed. I don't take getting laid off that hard, but then again I am in the unique position to be able to start the next job pretty quickly. I am, in many respects, like those workers rolling up their quilts at the factory, I don't think I do the usual desk decorations like putting family pictures up, getting my own orthopedic chair to improve my sitting posture (although, that's not a bad idea as I'm getting older, and I've always slouched).
Layoff could be a good opportunity to do something new! Learn a new language, start a blog, start a Youtube channel, start a vegan diet, I've done 2 of those things during this lockdown already. I think layoffs are indicative of the working world in the 21st century: Not always working at one company for one's whole life, and changing careers sometime midway through one's working life. MJ's already done it once; I've been lucky enough to not have had to change careers yet after 9 years of working in it, but it's definitely possible especially if my line of work gets replaced by automation/ computers (always possible for many jobs out there). That's why I go on reddit often to look up "what jobs do people have and how fast can you obtain them?" just to get some new ideas and look at the shiny toys that other people have, as the grass always looks greener in those other careers. Then I'll look at people who I knew in high school/ college who became (theoretically, on paper) more successful than me ("Always compare yourself to people better than you, not worse than you!" my parents always told young Robert when he complained about comparisons to family friends' children) and see that they've already weathered the long, steep climb to become a doctor and is a resident (fill-in-scientific-term-here)-ologist at a (pretty desirable location, usually urban city) hospital and I think what many people probably think when they look back and regret the college major they chose instead of biology," Ah, should have become a doctor."
Fantasize on,
Robert Yan
Monday, May 18, 2020
Ways of waking up (일어나는 방법, 唤醒方式, 目を覚ます方法)
Waking up is a big deal in everyday life, incorporating everything from when one wakes up, where one wakes up, what part of the REM cycle you are in when you wake up,
1.) Waking up on own: my most highly recommended method. The glorious feeling of your own body deciding that it has had enough sleep and waking up refreshed to start the day. The best mornings I have are the ones where I wake up on my own, full of energy and able to run long distances or do a great amount of physical tasks for the day. Unfortunately, these are also the instances when I wake up the latest, like 10AM, 11AM, sometimes even noon.
2.) MJ's dad used to wake her up by clapping really loudly in front of her face at the appointed time, or speaking really loudly in an adjoining room to get her attention until she woke up, pulling the covers off in one swift motion (pretty aggressive method) or (this is my favorite method) exclaiming that it is later than it really is ("Oh it's already 9AM!" when it's only 8AM and getting MJ to be alarmed about the time enough to wake up. I hope to try this on my children one day; MJ will be my guinea pig for now to see how effective it is.
3.) Different people wake up in different intervals; whereas MJ is a groggy, half-asleep but conscious of what's going on around her type of sleeper, I am pretty much either "on" or "off"- either I'm awake or not awake. I might wake up at a certain interval during the night, but then I'll go right back to sleep and keep dreaming. (Even waking up cannot break up the storyline of the dream I was having, I'm somehow able to catch up after drifting up again, sort of like a TV commercial break).
4.) I'd say 90% of the time my alarm wakes me up. Almost all the time, I wake up to my alarm; at least my body does not develop antibodies or becomes naturally immune to the sound of Apple Iphone's alarm beat. There are, however, those select times the alarm is not loud enough, or I've buried my phone under something so that it thinks I'm pressing the snooze button infinitely, which I'm not. And those are times I get to work late and have a rude awakening about what time it is. Am I a "hit the snooze button" person? Rarely, but only if I've given myself a "landing strip" to not have to wake up until I absolutely have to, where there's a bargaining stage of telling myself when I
5.) Recently, the stock market has been a good motivating factor to wake up! At 9:30AM, rain or shine, the stock market opens, and that's when the market is usually the most volatile for the rest of the day and has had a whole night to process new information, swing in the after-hour trading, so it can be a really big shock to the senses when the news (bad or good) comes out, and that's enough to get me out of bed and ready to go. I guess money/stock market is my version of MJ's latte art and coffee that gets her out of bed: a positive inspiration.
1.) Waking up on own: my most highly recommended method. The glorious feeling of your own body deciding that it has had enough sleep and waking up refreshed to start the day. The best mornings I have are the ones where I wake up on my own, full of energy and able to run long distances or do a great amount of physical tasks for the day. Unfortunately, these are also the instances when I wake up the latest, like 10AM, 11AM, sometimes even noon.
2.) MJ's dad used to wake her up by clapping really loudly in front of her face at the appointed time, or speaking really loudly in an adjoining room to get her attention until she woke up, pulling the covers off in one swift motion (pretty aggressive method) or (this is my favorite method) exclaiming that it is later than it really is ("Oh it's already 9AM!" when it's only 8AM and getting MJ to be alarmed about the time enough to wake up. I hope to try this on my children one day; MJ will be my guinea pig for now to see how effective it is.
3.) Different people wake up in different intervals; whereas MJ is a groggy, half-asleep but conscious of what's going on around her type of sleeper, I am pretty much either "on" or "off"- either I'm awake or not awake. I might wake up at a certain interval during the night, but then I'll go right back to sleep and keep dreaming. (Even waking up cannot break up the storyline of the dream I was having, I'm somehow able to catch up after drifting up again, sort of like a TV commercial break).
4.) I'd say 90% of the time my alarm wakes me up. Almost all the time, I wake up to my alarm; at least my body does not develop antibodies or becomes naturally immune to the sound of Apple Iphone's alarm beat. There are, however, those select times the alarm is not loud enough, or I've buried my phone under something so that it thinks I'm pressing the snooze button infinitely, which I'm not. And those are times I get to work late and have a rude awakening about what time it is. Am I a "hit the snooze button" person? Rarely, but only if I've given myself a "landing strip" to not have to wake up until I absolutely have to, where there's a bargaining stage of telling myself when I
5.) Recently, the stock market has been a good motivating factor to wake up! At 9:30AM, rain or shine, the stock market opens, and that's when the market is usually the most volatile for the rest of the day and has had a whole night to process new information, swing in the after-hour trading, so it can be a really big shock to the senses when the news (bad or good) comes out, and that's enough to get me out of bed and ready to go. I guess money/stock market is my version of MJ's latte art and coffee that gets her out of bed: a positive inspiration.
Saturday, May 16, 2020
Inspiration (灵感, 영감, インスピレーション)
Inspiration is just about a beautiful word: we use it to describe brilliant ideas we have (I got an inspiration!), about people who do great things ("Bono is an inspiration!") or goals we hope to achieve ("Latte art is my inspiration!") Apparently MJ's inspiration every day to wake up (not very early, but eventually) is to do latte art with her new coffee machine. We all have inspirations, and most of our actions are dictated by those inspirations.
For me, inspiration changes every few years. For the stretch between 2012-2015, it was to travel the world and see everything the world had to offer and get away from the mundaneness of law school, or the stretch between 2016-2017, I was inspired by dodgeball. For the last few years, it's been the stock market (and trying to make money off it, apparently not an easy endeavor). Often though, I lose track of my inspirations or just don't feel it anymore. For 10 minutes when I sat down to write this blog, I didn't know what to write because I didn't feel inspired, mostly because of the pandemic and quarantine I haven't been inspired by anything. Every day feels similar, living in the same apartment, eating the same plant-based food (not necessarily inspiring food, but at least it helps inspire me to get on a scale to see how much weight I've lost since the day before). I think that's probably true universally during the shut-down: we've lost a lot of inspirations due to not going out into the world and talking to people (still can through zoom, but something about face-to-face inspiration is just a bit different and inspires one to take action).
Recently, though, I haven't had much inspiration: part of it is kind of just grinding and slogging through the day, blocking out inspirations in my mind, and the realization that some inspirations can be distractions: traveling, for example, is expensive and doesn't really create any practical value (certainly has sentimental and aesthetic value, but does not necessarily translate into marketable skills or $$$). I kind of wish I had cool inspirations like MJ: I guess I'm just turning into a boring person. Part of the reason we decided to move to a new state, new school, new part of the country was to get some new inspirations: and then the pandemic happened, and I realized I didn't get a chance to meet anybody new here in a new city, have zero friends, and don't have much hope of making any for awhile, at least in person: Funny how the concept of showing up at a meeting or gathering and going "Hi! I'm new around here, trying to make some friends!" became so inconceivable overnight. I usually get some inspiration from my co-workers or people who I interact with Monday-Friday, but remote work sucks all that up.
There are both positive and negative inspirations (often called "carrots" and "sticks") to get people to act, and studies have shown that a combination of both is most effective, not just all of one. Just for weight loss, for example, I do inspiration from the scale saying a certain number, but negative inspiration like my co-worker once remarking that my stomach looked like it was "being happy"- definitely not flattering and motivated me to shrink that stomach if I could. Politically, Donald Trump was mostly known for using negative inspirations ("build a wall to keep out all the illegal immigrants") as opposed to President Obama who ran on an inspiring message of hope and change for the better; both apparently work. Today I found a pretty persuasive argument that Kim Jung Un had spread the rumor last month that he was suffering from bad health and may be in grave danger, as a way to see if there were any traitors in his regime and punish any who would act in any way to take over North Korea. That seems like the most negative of aspirations, to imply punishment for misbehavior.
Fantasize on,
Robert Yan
For me, inspiration changes every few years. For the stretch between 2012-2015, it was to travel the world and see everything the world had to offer and get away from the mundaneness of law school, or the stretch between 2016-2017, I was inspired by dodgeball. For the last few years, it's been the stock market (and trying to make money off it, apparently not an easy endeavor). Often though, I lose track of my inspirations or just don't feel it anymore. For 10 minutes when I sat down to write this blog, I didn't know what to write because I didn't feel inspired, mostly because of the pandemic and quarantine I haven't been inspired by anything. Every day feels similar, living in the same apartment, eating the same plant-based food (not necessarily inspiring food, but at least it helps inspire me to get on a scale to see how much weight I've lost since the day before). I think that's probably true universally during the shut-down: we've lost a lot of inspirations due to not going out into the world and talking to people (still can through zoom, but something about face-to-face inspiration is just a bit different and inspires one to take action).
Recently, though, I haven't had much inspiration: part of it is kind of just grinding and slogging through the day, blocking out inspirations in my mind, and the realization that some inspirations can be distractions: traveling, for example, is expensive and doesn't really create any practical value (certainly has sentimental and aesthetic value, but does not necessarily translate into marketable skills or $$$). I kind of wish I had cool inspirations like MJ: I guess I'm just turning into a boring person. Part of the reason we decided to move to a new state, new school, new part of the country was to get some new inspirations: and then the pandemic happened, and I realized I didn't get a chance to meet anybody new here in a new city, have zero friends, and don't have much hope of making any for awhile, at least in person: Funny how the concept of showing up at a meeting or gathering and going "Hi! I'm new around here, trying to make some friends!" became so inconceivable overnight. I usually get some inspiration from my co-workers or people who I interact with Monday-Friday, but remote work sucks all that up.
There are both positive and negative inspirations (often called "carrots" and "sticks") to get people to act, and studies have shown that a combination of both is most effective, not just all of one. Just for weight loss, for example, I do inspiration from the scale saying a certain number, but negative inspiration like my co-worker once remarking that my stomach looked like it was "being happy"- definitely not flattering and motivated me to shrink that stomach if I could. Politically, Donald Trump was mostly known for using negative inspirations ("build a wall to keep out all the illegal immigrants") as opposed to President Obama who ran on an inspiring message of hope and change for the better; both apparently work. Today I found a pretty persuasive argument that Kim Jung Un had spread the rumor last month that he was suffering from bad health and may be in grave danger, as a way to see if there were any traitors in his regime and punish any who would act in any way to take over North Korea. That seems like the most negative of aspirations, to imply punishment for misbehavior.
Fantasize on,
Robert Yan
Wednesday, May 13, 2020
Diet (减肥, 다이어트, ダイエット)
Ever since the pandemic began, I've lost 10 pounds! Hurray for me! I've never been a skinny person, and my goal has always been to stay below the magical BMI index line from overweight to "normal." It's always been right at the edge, but due to a conglomerate of factors in March including a long winter, eating my parents' food (salty, oily, and too fatty, according to MJ), and unhealthy habits, I ballooned past the magical "80 kg" limit (MJ has a scale from Korea that measures in Kgs, which brings a whole new level of stress and anxiety when I add another number or Gasp, TWO! to the scale because each of those represents 2.2lbs). I'm a very number-based person, so I get a physical response from seeing my bank account and stock market account rise, and a similar response happens when I see my body weight go down.
1.) sleep well. May be a little counterintuitive, but getting a full night's rest allows the body to "reset" and burn off some calories (mentioned in Bill Bryson's book The Body!). I generally weigh the least when I wake up in the morning OR
2.) After I've exercised and exorcised my body of beaucoup water weight. I didn't know about water weight early in life, but it explains a lot.......I carry tons of water weight in the winter because running outside doesn't get enough pounds to come off due to sweat. In the summer, I'm usually at my lowest due to sweating profusely in the heat.
3.) Do a marathon. After I trained for a marathon, I was at my lowest weight since I was 13 years old... and then promptly put the weight back on back to a normalized setting.
4.) Diet. I've come to realize that this is probably the biggest factor in one's body weight (and possibly in one's overall health). It's not easy to start on a diet with so many nice-looking things around you and lifestyles that we've gotten used to over years and years of repetition. They say the journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step, which is true, but I actually don't think the first step is the hardest: most people can try a meal or two without fatty food, or meat, or sugars for a day. It's doing that day over day that becomes extremely difficult, to resist "cravings" as MJ calls them, to say no each time despite your stomach saying "YES, EAT IT!!!" I find for dieting at least it's the 3rd, 4th, 5th, maybe 6th steps that are really hard and not to just revert back to old ways cuz that's much easier, and that after getting over that hump (it's almost like running through an uphill and not stopping) that it becomes much easier and just a natural course of life. For MJ and I, we don't have much food in the house anyway, and most of is vegetables or plant-based, so there's no real risk of falling to temptation, because there is no temptation. The pandemic and staying indoors has definitely helped that. But now I'm confined to eating raw carrots for lunch or just a light salad or vegetable mix and feel fine...like letting my body know, "hey this is how it's going to be every day from now on!" and my body reluctantly agreeing. After a day of not eating anything sugar-based (no cookies, cakes, ice cream, chocolate, etc.), my body says, "OH Hey, this isn't so bad after all," and I need it a little less the next day until I've functionally cut it off (except for my birthday, when I had some birthday treats). Definitely evidence that sugar is as addicting as drugs and body needs to "detox" to wean off of it, and then it feels great.
A big thing is not eating too much rice or noodles.....those tend to pump up my body weight higher than anything (It's amazing how meticulous I am about checking the scale now, and being able to anticipate based on what I ate the day before how much I will weigh). Also, it depends on how quickly the food passes through your system (Bill Bryson delicately wrote in The Body that food lasts in your digestive system for about 24 to 36 hours before it passes through). Well, after that food, especially heavy food, gets "passed through," it will cause a massive change in body weight.
5.) Don't overeat. I've found from not overeating that I used to overeat before. Over the course of a meal, there's a certain point where I've probably satiated my hunger and don't need to eat anymore, but I blow past that like a California stop sign and keep going until I feel really full, which is a sure sign of unneeded calories. Stopping short of being too full also means I get hungry earlier later on, but then I can just have a really light snack later on that controls that burning desire to have food.
1.) sleep well. May be a little counterintuitive, but getting a full night's rest allows the body to "reset" and burn off some calories (mentioned in Bill Bryson's book The Body!). I generally weigh the least when I wake up in the morning OR
2.) After I've exercised and exorcised my body of beaucoup water weight. I didn't know about water weight early in life, but it explains a lot.......I carry tons of water weight in the winter because running outside doesn't get enough pounds to come off due to sweat. In the summer, I'm usually at my lowest due to sweating profusely in the heat.
3.) Do a marathon. After I trained for a marathon, I was at my lowest weight since I was 13 years old... and then promptly put the weight back on back to a normalized setting.
4.) Diet. I've come to realize that this is probably the biggest factor in one's body weight (and possibly in one's overall health). It's not easy to start on a diet with so many nice-looking things around you and lifestyles that we've gotten used to over years and years of repetition. They say the journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step, which is true, but I actually don't think the first step is the hardest: most people can try a meal or two without fatty food, or meat, or sugars for a day. It's doing that day over day that becomes extremely difficult, to resist "cravings" as MJ calls them, to say no each time despite your stomach saying "YES, EAT IT!!!" I find for dieting at least it's the 3rd, 4th, 5th, maybe 6th steps that are really hard and not to just revert back to old ways cuz that's much easier, and that after getting over that hump (it's almost like running through an uphill and not stopping) that it becomes much easier and just a natural course of life. For MJ and I, we don't have much food in the house anyway, and most of is vegetables or plant-based, so there's no real risk of falling to temptation, because there is no temptation. The pandemic and staying indoors has definitely helped that. But now I'm confined to eating raw carrots for lunch or just a light salad or vegetable mix and feel fine...like letting my body know, "hey this is how it's going to be every day from now on!" and my body reluctantly agreeing. After a day of not eating anything sugar-based (no cookies, cakes, ice cream, chocolate, etc.), my body says, "OH Hey, this isn't so bad after all," and I need it a little less the next day until I've functionally cut it off (except for my birthday, when I had some birthday treats). Definitely evidence that sugar is as addicting as drugs and body needs to "detox" to wean off of it, and then it feels great.
A big thing is not eating too much rice or noodles.....those tend to pump up my body weight higher than anything (It's amazing how meticulous I am about checking the scale now, and being able to anticipate based on what I ate the day before how much I will weigh). Also, it depends on how quickly the food passes through your system (Bill Bryson delicately wrote in The Body that food lasts in your digestive system for about 24 to 36 hours before it passes through). Well, after that food, especially heavy food, gets "passed through," it will cause a massive change in body weight.
5.) Don't overeat. I've found from not overeating that I used to overeat before. Over the course of a meal, there's a certain point where I've probably satiated my hunger and don't need to eat anymore, but I blow past that like a California stop sign and keep going until I feel really full, which is a sure sign of unneeded calories. Stopping short of being too full also means I get hungry earlier later on, but then I can just have a really light snack later on that controls that burning desire to have food.
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