Who do you want to be

I think we should ask our children this question more. It helps us take the pulse of the kind of influence that the external environment, ourselves and the activities we allow them to engage in, have on them. Kids internalise the notions of good and bad mostly from the social environment around them and they learn what is acceptable or not. They are feeling the contours of our social interactions and the consequences of it.

To ask them who they want to be is to help them consolidate their learnings and have them recognise consistencies or inconsistencies without being explicit about it. I recall asking my young little 5-year old cousin, ‘why are you jumping around?’ and she replied ‘I’m a frog’. Then when she starting walking instead of jumping, I asked ‘why are you walking now?’ and she responded promptly, ‘I’m a penguin’. There is clearly this sense of our actions and behaviours explained in terms of our identity even from that early age.

Being careful in moulding and helping children understand where and how they find their identity is so important because that’s going to affect the way they think about work and play. For children who responds saying they want to be ‘a doctor’ or a ‘firefighter’, then parents or adults around them should recognise perhaps they already equate identity to professions or jobs. If they respond based on character values (eg. A kind person) or socio-economic status (eg. Rich person), you’d also realise how much those sort of values you’re inculcating in them.

And for now, it’s probably a good thing we should be reflecting upon as an adult. Who did we want to be and did we become him/her? Why?

What makes money

On one hand the government should not really bother about what makes money because that is how innovation happens and introducing constraints on the way people can make money is stifling innovation. But on the other hand we already have tonnes of laws limiting ways people make money. For example through fraud, counterfeiting, extortion, etc.

Now the question is whether clickbaits that generate advertising revenue is fraud. Or bot accounts providing services to increase follower counts. Are they not fraud? Don’t they “counterfeit” the real followers? Can plant based proteins be sold as meats?

How about when you pay for a subcription but you didn’t use the service – can the payment demanded and collected be considered an extortion? After all, that sounds like the scammers along the streets of London handing out flowers and then harrassing you for a “donation” sure seem like extortion to us.

I think we should care about what makes money as a whole society and we should learn to scrutinise them. Because what makes money will happen and will become gradually industrialised if it can be. And it will concentrate wealth and resources in those who are doing it.

Rising expectations

If we take stock of the advancement in living standards over the course of the last 3 generations, the improvements have undoubtedly been phenomenal. Yet the average experience of life as perceived subjectively seemed to have barely become more joyful.

If anything, our generation seem more disappointed, emotionally worn and exhausted than the previous. I’m afraid it is entirely because out expectations, our hopes and dreams have continually outpaced the improvements we experienced.

Every time something genuinely gets better, our expectation rises by so much more. And it seems, we have come to associate expectations with having standards that it is a bit toxic on our mental health. We have to learn to clean up our thinking about standards we uphold for ourselves and the kind of expectations we put upon others. Making others responsible for our happiness is pretty much a sure route to unhappiness.

Purpose on a platter

The fresh grads entering the job market and other young adults still finding their bearings in the market often want to be paid well and also have a sense of purpose in their career. They sometimes fantasize about the sense of purpose in fields they did not enter: medicine, teaching, psychology, etc.

On the other hand I’ve known cynical doctors, wearied teachers and exhausted psychologists who knows their purpose but are so worn out by work they wonder how things square. Then there are banker friends who made tonnes of money and think they need to do their part for the world and hence, get involved in sustainable finance (which honestly have mixed track record and credentials).

Purpose does not come with a job; at least not served on a platter. The story that runs in our mind about our work gives us the sense of purpose. Of course the story must compel us positively and move us forward in the direction the career tend towards. This alignment is not to be taken for granted. One can be promoted into misalignment because the career progress doesn’t fit the story of greater purpose – it can become diminished purpose.

That is why I care so much about stories. Especially the stories we tell ourselves; and this is why I enjoy coaching others especially on careers – the alignment (purpose), the planning (strategy) and the tactics involved. I’m writing an eBook which I hope to share with my readers. Watch this space for more details to follow.

Balancing Trust

Economists have long discovered that trust is an important input to economic development. And institutions in the economy can promote or degrade trust in the society so the institutions that destroys trust ultimately can destroy long run value even if it creates some short term ones.

Focusing on the institutions that promotes and activate trust as a social capital opens our eyes to the various means in which trust is built. On one hand there are institutions that have trust created based on openness and allow broad participation. Then there are institutions that build trust through exclusiveness, tight security around who can do what.

In general, as western ideas permeate, the former is preferred more than the latter. But we ought to recognise there will still have to be gatekeepers, curators to help maintain quality of interactions, and uphold the rules. While a secretive benign dictatorship may not be so pleasant, anarchy is not a viable alternative. The idea of authority and hierarchy is logically part of creating order though it can be abused.

There has to eventually be a balance between maintaining gatekeeping and authority functions against closing it up so much there’s too much exclusivity. The issue with capitalism and markets is that we know they have a tendency towards unequal distribution, even when we equalise opportunity. So even in an open system, there can be accumulation of power and eventually abuse.

Educating the masses and getting people to appreciate the power of reason is not enough to ensure open systems will always maintain trust. More checks and balances to be considered.

Celebrating Youths

There’s a large part of our online media and even traditional media celebrating achievements of youths. The other ideas of ‘strawberry generation’ and the apathy of youths have recently been fading away as the world situation made things more difficult for the millennial generation. It’s important that we recognise the youths who are making a difference and shaping the future that we all want to live in.

One of the challenge with blarring about our 40 below 40 or 30 below 30, and other lists consisting of well-accomplished youths is that we create this sense of despair in other youths. We end up discouraging the ones who have tried and failed or achieved less at the same age. This further reinforces ageism – discrimination of older workers.

We need to think of better ways to celebrate our youths while encouraging others to move forward and continue shaping the future that we all care about. Our youths recognises that we are all one people and there is no inter-generational warfare going on. But they should also see that there is no hurry for those who had more obstacles in life to go through. Life is not that short, pacing things out helps.

Continuous Learning

When I was in school, I was lulled into a sense that we spend first 15-20 years of our lives just doing non-stop learning and cramming all the things we have to know about the world to prepare us for it. And then we just go out there and probably regurgitate or apply all that we learn non-stop for another 40 years or so before we retire. And then we can rest and enjoy the fruits of our labour.

So it got confusing when adults have to go to schools too; and they have to learn new things. Well, it was understandable, that the world is changing and some things in school became obsolete or superseded by new things we had to learn. So people in the workforce had to be retrained. But at the same time, there were skills required in work that wasn’t taught in school as well so it was 2-way: (1) School was not exactly catching up with what is needed for the 40 years or labour; and (2) Work wasn’t really sure what they wanted from their people because it kept changing.

If we are going to be continuously learning through life anyways then what should we really be preparing ourselves for in school? In the first 20-years? We should probably be focusing on how to learn; and being good at it so that during the period where our labour is needed, we can pick up on things and apply them quickly. But often learning requires doing, and instead of having schools create imaginary work for students to do, why not channel them to do real work and solve real problems?

For now, schools have been trying to do that but it is usually difficult for organisations designed to deliver mass education to do these things. So if you’re in college, or even before, I suggest you to try looking for work, different jobs, part time jobs. But make sure they are useful; and to draw relevant, suitable employers, you need to craft your own story about what you are exploring, and what you want to do.

Email Course – Building your story for your career

I’m working on an email course that is just about that; it is designed mainly for first-job seekers who are looking to dive into a career. But it is also relevant for undergraduate students trying to find their bearings in the job market, testing out job hunting, and polishing up those skills. Stay tuned for more updates.

Being above average

At some point most of us realise that performance grading on a bell curve would mean we just try to be ‘above average’ unlike the times when in school we could have grade inflation and hence more people could get A. And of course there is less room than in school to dispute your score – especially in Asian societies. When we were all in school, we were sort of forcefully pitted against our classmates in various different things ranging from exam results, to fitness and so on. There’s a sense of that relative performance is quite important; but I think the key is considering relative performance of what.

For our co-curricular activities, we don’t face such anxiety. If we are not in a uniform group, we opt out of the comparison of our ability to do drills. When we are not in a music group then we cannot be compared against our peers on our skills on the musical instruments. But for most basic subjects, we cannot avoid the comparison and we will be graded, and probably ranked. But once we step into the workforce, we realised that all the different dimensions are being considered and lumped together into a single grade. That is vague and hard to work on. It’s difficult to aim for any grades because you’re definitely pitted against your colleagues or peers in all the different mysterious ways you can’t even begin to work on them.

Therefore you cannot aim to be above average. You cannot aim at relative performances even if you know that’s what matters and probably how the bosses make these performance reviews. You’ll need to find absolute metrics to work on; to focus on sales calls you make rather than sales you achieve, to measure and quantify your useful inputs and have the outputs/outcomes as an afterthought. And you must not create anxiety for yourself when the outcomes don’t work, but maintain the curious mind searching for relevant and suitable inputs to work on to drive the output.

Disconnecting

I had the chance to be disconnected for a couple of days and I must say that it was a really good time for me. I managed to really stop thinking about work, feeling I have to do this or that in order to move forward and just be really present with things. Embarrassingly, it was refreshing for me – which probably mean that I really needed the break. And of course it wasn’t just about work but also my personal mental hygiene and stress from having to juggle commitments to family, and social relationships.

I realise it makes perfect sense to remain disconnected for at least a couple of hours a day just to get that real rest which we all need. I suspect I’m going to find it difficult but I think I will have to try it to know. To put my phone on airplane mode maybe 7-10pm before I go to bed. Or some other hours like that. Even just for 2 hours would be really good – mind you, when you are awake that is.

I begin to realise how normal it must be to plainly just be present with the people who are physically around you and to enjoy the things in the moment rather than be obsessed with something else in the distance or distant future. How joyful and peaceful life was! Before the smart phone took over so much of our attention.

Diet Coke and Fried Chicken

I’ve been having cravings for coke and fried chicken. Well, Diet Coke because sugar has been causing me to be anxious and a bit unwell lately so I tried to shape the craving a little. But then Coke and Fried Chicken are bad for me overall – so why is it that I can’t shape them further and convert them to something else? Why is Diet Coke a valid substitute for coke but not water? How about fried chicken? Can it not be substituted with broccoli?

What we think of as substitutable when it comes to such taste/preferences is interesting. Not least because there are some outrageous substituting going on when we choose to spend time scrolling through social media as oppose to interacting with those physically around us. Or if we decide to substitute entertainment on a screen for sleep. I think it’s important we are conscious about what we are substituting in our lives more deeply.

Are you substituting a high pay check for meaning in your work? Is liking photos on instagram and commenting on people’s posts a substitute for real-world friendly interactions with others? Is buying expensive salads a substitute for working out in your mind? Would you substitute the high stress but high paying career for a lower stress and low paid career? What can money substitute in your life?