January 2012
6 posts
I need more snow days so that I can be this...
The result of 5 hours of work today. Visit my website here!
Go in with a plan, but plan on changing it
This coming quarter is crunch-time for TEDxUofW. We’ve got our vision and we’ve got our team. In 10 weeks, we will have our entire event planned out.
Last night, I spent an hour with our Event/Logistics Director to map out milestones for the quarter. As we were planning, the notion of remembering to keep ourselves flexible came up. No matter how detailed our plan became, we reminded...
Perusing through my Tumblr’s HTML and saw this at the top. Very creative!
December 2011
1 post
November 2011
2 posts
Time
October 2011
5 posts
Diaspora Alpha is pretty awesome! I thought G+ was clean, but Diaspora takes white space and crisp design to the next level
“The happiest people don’t have the best of everything, they make the best of...”
Instrument
What do you think of when you see this?
For me, this photo means many things: cello, masterpiece, Italy, art. But the meaning I want to highlight is instrument.
—-
Here’s another photo.
What words come up with this? Camera, lens, electronic. But tonight I came up with a new way of viewing it: as an instrument.
My cello has faithfully served as an expressive medium for me...
September 2011
2 posts
Just started watching Sherlock
Now I’m hooked! For all you Netflix users:
http://movies.netflix.com/WiMovie/Sherlock_Series_1/70151278?trkid=2361637
Purposeful Persistence
(note: first post in 3 months!)
I’m come to an interesting conclusion recently: hard work won’t always pay off. Smart work won’t always pay off. Persistence won’t always mean success.
Sometimes, all you need is patience.
Even more interesting than my conclusion is where I got it from. To begin, I’ll start by showing two screenshots.
This shows games I played on...
June 2011
1 post
Push
(Life has been so crazy that I haven’t had much time to write. Here’s a post to break my hiatus!)
You are as good as you push yourself to be, and as capable as the community you surround yourself with.
An interesting phenomenon that I’ve noticed with myself is that I tend to perform at a similar level to my collaborators/competitors. In sports, video games, music, and so much...
April 2011
10 posts
10 Days
It’s been 10 days since I started my [self] project. Here are some thoughts on each of my photos and an explanation behind some of the symbolism behind each one.
My first photo was actually inspired by something I read on a friend’s “About Me” section. It had been a while since I had done black and white, and to really make the photo stand out I chose to forego the...
WatchKathryn Schulz: On Being Wrong
Really interesting perspective on failure- shattered my perception of the win/lose dichotomy.
New Read: In The Plex
(in case any of you are wondering why I haven’t posted a book review in several months, I’ve been picking up a lot of books but not finishing them. I feel that I wouldn’t do the book justice and give it a proper review unless I read it cover to cover. This may be the one that brings me back though!)
Same Speed
Today I went for my first bike ride for a few months.
Around 25 minutes in, I looked down at my speedometer and an intriguing thought came to my mind. I was cruising down a hill at a cool 34mph when I remembered what it felt like climbing earlier and struggling to stay above 15mph. Going downhill, I put in no effort but I was moving quite fast and keeping up with the cars. When I was climbing...
WatchMusic changes lives. Absolutely incredible TED Talk on how music transformed the kids of Venezuela.
“Jose Abreu on Kids Transformed by Music”
WatchCaroline Casey: Looking Past Limits
One of the most inspiring videos I’ve seen in a while. A remarkable story of an incredible life; people like these are the reason I am so driven to do what I do. Biggest takeaway for me? Being free means being completely and wholly yourself.
From the Inside Out
In the past few days, one of the most-listened to songs on my iPod has been “From the Inside Out” by Hillsong.
I’ve been thinking a lot about change. I’ve been thinking about what it takes to radically reshape your life, and how to set yourself on the path for substantial yet sustainable self-improvement. My number one value is self-development, and that priority is what...
March 2011
9 posts
WatchSalman Khan: Let’s Use Video To Reinvent Education
Fascinating TED Talk from the creator of Khan Academy. Highlights:
Do it as long as necessary until you have mastery. The traditional model- it penalizes you for experimentation and failure, but it does not expect mastery. We encourage you to experiment. We encourage you to failure. But we do expect mastery. In the traditional model,...
Decisions
I almost didn’t go swimming today.
Something that really stuck with me from Grant Kollet’s MGMT 490 class (Freshman Business Seminar) was the substantial amount of decisions we make each day, and how the vast majority of them are made underneath our consciousness. Here’s a breakdown of one set of decisions I had today.
—-
Decision #1
As much as I told myself that I...
Pilot
A long read but definitely worth it. Those of you who have read Outliers by Malcolm Gladwell will find this interesting, especially relating to the section on Korean pilots. Here’s the account of a pilot who was flying into Japan during the earthquake:
“I’m currently still in one piece, writing from my room in the Narita crew hotel. It’s 8am. This is my inaugural...
Fukushima 50
While their co-workers were evacuated from the Daiichi Unit 2 Reactor, 50 employees have remained on-site to give their best efforts to prevent a nuclear meltdown. Every hour, they battle radiation that normal nuclear engineers receive in a lifetime.
They are living examples of what it means to be a hero.
When faced with difficult situations, it is my hope that I can have as much courage as...
"Final"
I wish more professors would learn from my International Business professor and make their finals short but challenging. We’re watching The Social Network and answering five short (150 word) questions. They are by no means easy questions, and points will be awarded not for “right” answers but for well-thought out and persuasive answers.
With my “typical” finals based...
The Apple Store's Role in Japan During the...
This is the way things should be. Here’s a story you probably won’t hear on the news- Apple putting profits aside and utilizing its technology to help people in Japan. I have so much respect for Apple after reading this manager’s account of Apple’s efforts to help. Full disclosure: I work at Apple as a manager at one of its stores in Japan. The earthquake hit while I was...
During the 1997 Daytime Emmys, the Lifetime Achievement Award was presented to Rogers. The following is an excerpt from Esquire’s coverage of the gala, written by Tom Junod:
Mister Rogers went onstage to accept the award — and there, in front of all the soap opera stars and talk show sinceratrons, in front of all the jutting man-tanned jaws and jutting saltwater bosoms, he made his small...
New Read: 4-Hour Body
February 2011
10 posts
I think I’ve become enough of a power user to give my Chrome Notebook a run for its money!
At the moment I have 3 windows open, with my primary one running 12 tabs. With Pandora streaming, Gmail and Twitter constantly refreshing, and me bouncing around tabs like a sugar-high eight-year old on a pogo stick, I’ve finally noticed a decline in performance. At times the typing is delayed,...
Top 10 Thinking Traps →
Source: Litemind
Summary:
Anchoring (Relying on First Thoughts)
Status Quo (Keeping On)
Sunk Cost (Earlier Choices)
Confirmation (Seeing What You Want to See)
Incomplete Information (Assumptions)
Conformity (Everyone Else)
Illusion of Control (Influence)
Coincidence (Probabilities)
Recall (Memory)
Superiority (The “Average”)
Extraordinary
I’ve always had this theory: There are no such things as extraordinary people, just ordinary people doing extraordinary things.
Something that has always helped keep my humility in check are the conversations with people who make my eyebrows perk up and my lips mouth a silent “WOW” as they tell me about their life.
Several times I’ve had people praise me as...
Body Language
A year ago, I read The Definitive Book of Body Language:
I found it to be highly interesting and when I began to apply it I was surprised at what some of the people around me were communicating. You may have read or heard somewhere that 90% of communication is non-verbal. This book marked the beginning of my realization of that figure’s validity.
After I finished the book, I made an...
Famished Heart
First, the beautiful.
Twelve years old and knowing nothing about anything. I’m sitting on a boardwalk by a beach in northern France, the girl I’ve fallen hopelessly and achingly in love with sitting beside me, her head resting on my shoulder. We’re watching the sun go down and wishing we could stop time, because when nine o’clock comes we have to go back to our...
Wordpress
Tonight I begin my adventures with Wordpress!
With MAMP installed, a few tutorials open, and Digging into Wordpress at my side, I begin a crash-course in CSS, HTML, PHP, and more.
Spoiler alert: My motives for learning Wordpress aren’t just for fun. I’m working on revamping the whole “Forward Motion” idea (as well as my two other blogs) into a full-fledged blog with a...
Sleeeep
My sleep schedule for this week has been a bit odd (and may become a habit for the quarter):
Get home around 7-8pm. Eat dinner.
Take an hour long nap.
Study, go to bed around 2-3am.
Wake up at 7:30pm, and repeat.
The Other Arm
I’ve noticed a strange phenomenon. Back in my competitive swimming days, I used to put so much effort into making sure I made my sets on time and that I swam as fast as I possibly could. I focused on turnover, speed, and efficiency. But now that I swim “for fun”, my mentality in the pool has completely changed. I don’t focus on the clock anymore to pace myself- in fact, I...
The Order of Things →
Malcolm Gladwell’s article in the latest issue of the New Yorker. An interesting read about the subjectivity of rankings, the difficulty of measuring certain variables, and the self-fulfilling prophecies of rankers on rankings.
(It was awesome to see UW mentioned!)
January 2011
11 posts
Psych
I am obsessed with Psych.
In these past three weeks, despite midterms, I have watched the 3rd and 4th season and I’m currently halfway through the 1st. In case you’re wondering, yes, I’m watching them out of order. Excluding shows with continuity (Lost, Dexter, etc), I have a theory that it takes three or four seasons for actors to fully settle into their roles. Additionally, I...
"There are no limits..."
“Bruce had me up to three miles a day, really at a good pace. We’d run the three miles in twenty-one or twenty-two minutes. Just under eight minutes a mile [Note: when running on his own in 1968, Lee would get his time down to six-and-a half minutes per mile]. So this morning he said to me “We’re going to go five.” I said, “Bruce, I can’t go five. I’m a helluva lot older than you are, and I...
Book Review: Where Good Ideas Come From
Where Good Ideas Come From by Steven Johnson
★★★★☆ (4/5 stars)
Recommended? Strongly, especially for entrepreneurs and those seeking to better understand creativity/innovation.
This has been one of my most enjoyed reads in a while. It’s well-organized, very insightful, and immensely thought-provoking. Johnson explains his perspective on innovation in seven chapters:
The Adjacent...
Watch
Neil Pasricha: The 3 A’s of Awesome [TED Talk]
One of the most inspiring and uplifting Talks I’ve seen in a while. Definitely gets me thinking about Attitude, Awareness, and Authenticity.