Hello friends,
Greetings from Austin!
I did a pep talk (almost) every morning, like the guy in this video I shared from last week did.
And I’ll admit, it was quite an interesting experience.
Every time I went to the mirror in the morning, I was exhausted.
But after my “pep talk”, I always left a bit more awake, energized, and awkwardly entertained.
There’s something surreal about staring straight into your own eyes in the morning, pointing fingers and commanding yourself of all the things to do for the day (be aware of my anxiety, ask for help, and go to God), as well as not do (don’t fall asleep, don’t get too distracted with Youtube, don’t worry so much). I felt like my own parent yet also my own life coach.
At one moment, I felt very conscious doing my pep talk cause my roommate was right outside of the bathroom, and I don’t think he knew. I didn’t want to bother him cause he’s working too, so I whispered my pep talk to myself.
Overall, the experience showed me building my self-confidence takes time (as I’m my greatest critic), yet I found myself easily entertained by my quirky interactions and came to appreciate myself in all my weirdness and tiredness.
On another note, in regards to my last weekend’s post on Faithfulness, I planned to quit TikTok and Webtoons in order to focus on work, but I couldn’t help binge read one of my favorite webtoons, Cheese in the Trap, before they set up a paywall to make it limited access. (rip capitalism 😭)
If you’ll allow me to indulge, Cheese in The Trap is a drama-filled webcomic following several imperfect characters, weaving in and out of different arcs of psychological misdirection, romantic comedy, and rewarding character development.
Seol, in the middle, is a trustworthy diligent marketing major who is the top of her class, yet overthinks life and struggles with the drama that encompasses this Webtoon (I relate a lot to her anxiety and overthinking 😅)
Jung, on the right, is a well-dressed marketing major who gets along with everyone, pays for gatherings, and is also top of his class, yet carries a mysterious manipulative aura, never showing who he truly is to others.
And Inho, on the left, is an arrogant rugged guy who’s not in college, runs away from a loan shark, and does part-time jobs while easily losing his temper, (thereby making him lose his part-time jobs). He seems to be connected to Jung though… adding to the mystery.
I love how this webtoon has unfolded. Just as the characters in the webtoon evolved over time, I found myself growing alongside, learning lessons about myself and others through the process.
In fact, after several weeks of binge-reading, eating into my work nights, I finally finished the series yesterday!
(I honestly can’t do this anymore as a working adult tho… 😳)
As I was reflecting over the webtoon, one takeaway from it was the importance of accepting imperfection.
While following the characters, I recognized their desire for perfection in so many areas of their lives - school, work, relationships. They worked their butt off trying to keep everything stable and perfect to the best of their abilities. When expectations were not met, reality hit hard, and with that, the drama that made the webtoon.
I saw that same parallel in my own life.
My own desire for perfection caused me to work my own butt off to be perfect in many areas. But through that relentless goose chase for perfection, I ended up falling into selfish idealism, focusing more on myself rather than on the people I was trying to achieve perfection for.
Whoever exalts himself will be humbled, and whoever humbles himself will be exalted.
—Matthew 23:12
Over the past several months, especially through my work, I’ve found my idealistic image of perfection shattered (and myself, humbled).
I learned that rather than trying to be perfect, I needed to recognize that life is about making decisions with limited knowledge and learning from mistakes.
The quicker I accepted that I can’t be perfect, the quicker I was able to ask for help, be okay with failure, and learn from my imperfection.
Thanks for tuning in! Happy 4th of July!
It’s going to be a weird day to remember with the pandemic ongoing, but I’m sure y’all will celebrate it well (social distancingly).
With that, stay safe, keep it savvy, and I’ll see y’all in the next update! 😊
Weekly Collections
Faith
This video is the final part of the Wisdom Series, exploring the purpose and meaning of the Old Testament Wisdom Literature (Proverbs, Ecclesiastes, and Job).
This 7 min video covers Job, a man connecting everything all together to understanding the sovereignty of God and “fearing the lord” amidst the toughest circumstances.
Entrepreneurship
So You Want To Be a Youtuber by Sabrina Cruz
Found this Ted Talk to be quite entertaining, and yet a good high-level overview of what it is like to be a YouTuber (an idea I’ve played around for years, yet never figured out what genre I’d focus on).
Watch this if you want insight over how to be a Youtuber, and what it entails!
Weekly Reflections
Mental Model
Margin of Safety and Backup Systems
Similarly, engineers have also developed the habit of adding a margin for error into all calculations. In an unknown world, driving a 9,500-pound bus over a bridge built to hold precisely 9,600 pounds is rarely seen as intelligent. Thus, on the whole, few modern bridges ever fail. In practical life outside of physical engineering, we can often profitably give ourselves margins as robust as the bridge system.
A critical model of the engineering profession is that of backup systems. A good engineer never assumes the perfect reliability of the components of the system. He or she builds in redundancy to protect the integrity of the total system. Without the application of this robustness principle, tangible and intangible systems tend to fail over time.
—(Mental Models: The Best Way to Make Intelligent Decisions)
How to apply the mental model:
Do you recognize the decisions you make and the margin of safety you have for your decisions?
What would you need to do to incorporate a margin of safety in your decision making in order to reduce the risk of failure?
Verse of the Week
“For am I now seeking the approval of man, or of God? Or am I trying to please man? If I were still trying to please man, I would not be a servant of Christ”
—Galatians 1:10 ESV
Challenging Quote
“Unless you are prepared to give up something valuable, you will never be able to truly change at all, because you'll be forever in the control of things you can't give up”
—Andy Law, Creative Company
If you guys have found the newsletter to be helpful, I would love to hear from you on what’s been good, any suggestions for improvement, and anything else you’d like to see!
Please don’t be shy to let me know and thanks in advance!