It Hits the Fan

I don't think I wrote resolutions for 2008, since my only goal at the time was to somehow manage to throw Tom out of the house. Though I did manage to succeed, I still haven't gotten rid of all of his stuff or recuperated any of my monetary losses, so I suppose at some level I was a failure in that respect. I'd give myself a 85% (roughly a B+) for that accomplishment. Not too impressive in the grand scheme of things, but there lies the problem with aiming low: even if you accomplish 100% of the things you set out to do, still kinda feels like you won the Special Olympics.

So this year, I've decided to take a different tactic and instead aim high. I'm setting up an intimidating list of goals and I figure that if I can accomplish 85% of this list, I'll be able to say I've done something worth writing about. So here goes:

1) Live truly independently - otherwise known as the Steph mantra: "bitch, be cool." This is something of a broad overarching theme for the rest of my goals for this upcoming year, since it became clear upon reviewing my behavior over the last year that I have not yet truly learned how to embrace living on my own. Finances and career-wise, it wasn't really a problem. It's more that I found myself flying in a holding pattern: always waiting for... someone, or something to happen to me, so that I could change my life to respond. Even though I haven't had anyone to share my life with for an entire year now, it's taken me as long to realize that I have still been living my life as though I am waiting for something or someone to tell me what I need to do next. Maybe it's a reflex built in from years of always answering to someone else: I stayed in MA after college because Jerrod wanted me to, I learned how to earn enough money to support two because Tom needed me to. The only time I ever defied the wishes of people that I loved was when I decided to go to college far away from home - to date, it is one of the toughest things I have ever done. Even then, although I knew that I was doing something that my family did not like, they still gave me their love and support and reassured me they approved of my decision. Were it not for their open reassurance that things were going to be okay, I probably would have turned down the degree from MIT in order to spare my family the hurt of my going far away. It seems that such a great part of my happiness is derived from making other people happy, and having spent so long living that way, it's a little unfamiliar to make life changes without having anyone to confer with. At times, I admit to feeling lost and prone to indecision when I don't have someone reassure me that I'm doing the right thing. A little while back, the HR department made the entire office take a Myers-Briggs test, and I came out as an ENFJ (hint: not your typical engineering type. I'll have more to say about this in another post). Although I cannot say I agree with everything that is said in that assessment, I do think that I need to pay special attention to what they have to say about the importance of ENFJs practicing spending time alone in order to become aware of their own needs. So this year, I will practice being aware of my decision-making process, and understand whether I am making a decision based on what I need, or what people that I care about need. I also want to make a point of being able to step back and realize that my life has importance regardless of whether I matter to the people I want to matter to or not. Last October, I found myself in a really bad way when I hit a real snag in a budding relationship with someone that I care very deeply about. He said some things to me that I found really hurtful, and he couldn't find it in him to tell me anything reassuring that I could hold on to and bring myself back to a healthy equilibrium and try to move forward. That really caused me to go on a downward spiral - all of my subsequent actions and behavior were less than stellar because they were based on feelings of insecurity, and those actions consequently spawned more insecurity that I'd screwed things up worse with every step that I tried to take. I couldn't do anything and feel good about it because I thought I didn't matter in his life and he didn't care about me anymore and it was all my fault. I balled up and I crashed because his approval meant so much to me, and the fact that he couldn't reassure me that he still felt any positive feelings at all about me put me so off-kilter that I couldn't recover. It wasn't until earlier this month that I really began to understand that he just doesn't talk much in general - to anyone at all - and a byproduct of that behavior is that he rarely (if ever) expresses any kind of positive affirmation to anyone. In other words: I got wrapped around my own axle over something that I really shouldn't have taken so personally from the start. I need to stop taking other people's actions so personally, as hard as it might be to remove myself from external context. In addition to making me miserable because it drives me to see the worst intentions in other people's actions, it also turns me into the thing that I find most unattractive in the world: a person that needs someone else in order to be happy. Around November 2007, I wrote a post about finding neediness unattractive (though in that particular case it was "someone else being so incompetent at basic survival skills that I needed to take care of everything for them"), but am I really so different if I need the approval of someone else in order to feel good about myself and go on? Being on the receiving end of that kind of attention can't really be all that good either. I can't imagine that anyone wants to feel the pressure of someone else's world falling apart without their approval - it's a lose-lose situation. It's such a fine line to walk to make room for the people who matter in your life without building your world around them... I need to learn to catch myself when I fall on the wrong side of that line - preferably before I ruin everything in the process of flailing wildly to regain balance.

2) Dance more - much less daunting than the first task. Ballet at least 1 time a week in Porter, no matter how lousy the driving conditions or how tired I feel after a day of dealing with my arsch-hut coworkers. After trying out that Pilates DVD I got for Christmas and finding out that every standing move they do in Pilates is poached from classical ballet and given a new name, I might as well go to a class where it's all strung together in a tastefully choreographed manner instead of just grunting along with the television while Denise Austin spouts out cheery words of repetitive encouragement. Ballroom dancing as well - it's about time I learned how to follow, so I'm not the one awkwardly towing my partner around next time one of my friends gets married and I have to get up and do a courtesy dance with an usher because I didn't bring a date (man, that's so awkward). Besides, it looks like it could be fun.

3) Learn at least one new fire toy - in addition to improving my skills with poi, torches, and fans. After some consideration, I think this year's new toy will be the fire hoop, which means that I will probably just bite the bullet and buy the practice hoop from Hooping Harmony that I've had my eye on, and possibly mod it later to be compatible with fire spokes from Flamma Aeterna (which looks like it involves some careful measuring, time on the drill press, and half a dozen helicoils of the appropriate diameter). Now that my busted-ass ankle has nearly healed (only 12 weeks AFTER the whole pre-Fall Wildfire debacle), leg pain is no longer an excuse for not following through. Also on the list of things to do in this category: retrofit my fans to be properly weighted towards the wicks, or just get/build new ones; completing the CarbonX dress and other apparel; design, document, and build a fire toy gear bag.

4) Pay more attention to music - when I went home this past Christmas, I spent a lot of time playing all of my old sheet music on mom's grand piano. I didn't know how much I missed playing an instrument until I re-discovered how relaxing that was. This year, I will do some research and I will get a keyboard. As of yet, I don't have any requirements beyond headphone compatibility (so as not to annoy the neighbors with late-night playing), and perhaps midi-output compatibility (in case I ever want to write and compose). Beyond that, it needs to be something apartment-sized. I think it will go in the corner of the living room once I get rid of Tom's DVDs and the bookshelf full of mediocre books.

5) Create a website - I think it's finally time to organize and consolidate my web presence all into one place. It'll give me the opportunity to learn my way around more advanced HTML, Java, and a variety of other languages and web applications that are out there that I have been meaning to become more familiar with. I have to brainstorm ideas as to how to organize the content in a way that is relevant to visitors, but I think I will want to use it as a tool to better display my fashion design portfolio and facilitate my (currently word-of-mouth) custom clothing business. I'll convert my old desktop computer into a server - it's served as nothing but an expensive doorstop for the last 3 years anyhow.

6) Learn VHDL - I have been exploring the job market and testing the waters to see if it is a viable option for me to move, and the one thing I have learned is that I am nowhere near as marketable today compared with my peers as I was 3 years ago when I was fresh out of college. Why? Well, there are actually a number of reasons having to do with the fact that no one wants an EE with 3 years of experience right now, but one of the other reasons is because I don't know Verilog or VHDL. FPGAs are everywhere, and if I want to continue working with embedded technologies and PCB design for cutting edge systems, I need to keep up. Since college, I've considered myself highly impaired when it comes to interfacing any kind of hardware with software, but it's time I stop accepting that as "the way things are," and start taking responsibility for my own professional development. If I want the freedom to go wherever I want and be assured that I'll have a job, I need to make myself more marketable.

7) Improve my Mandarin and Cantonese (and if I'm really good, a little Hokkien too) - I haven't been nearly as dedicated to my learning as I should be. I had a goal to eventually learn how to read and write simplified chinese characters, and so far I have been pretty poor at putting it into practice. A little pinyin here and there does not constitute a proper learning challenge, so I need to be more disciplined and maybe work with flash cards. I think improving my listening comprehension will be a much easier task thanks to all the free soap operas on mysoju.com (that soap about the Hong Kong cake shop was so good).

8) Travel - originally this wasn't on my "list of things to do in 2009" but it jumped off the "would be nice" list recently after I spent a bit of time listening to a number of really interesting stories about seeing different parts of the world. I realized that having adventures within driving distance is all well and good, but having adventures and learning about other cultures makes you a far more interesting person overall. I used to envy people who had time for overseas travel, and I thought it was a really big deal because it seemed so daunting (it's something I never felt comfortable doing alone, but never had anyone to do it with), but it really is time that I stop being intimidated by how much effort it "seems" to take to travel, pick a place, and just go see it - regardless of whether or not I have someone to do it with.

9) Make the effort to see people that I love - this goes along similar lines as my "travel" goal, since I am far away from some people that I care about. I spent 9 months away from my family last year, and I think I unwittingly caused myself to be very depressed by staying away from them for so long. I claimed that I cared and wanted to be part of their lives more, but planning for travel always seemed like such a pain in the ass that I avoided it because the spontaneous part of me was averse to the idea of "planning" fun. Unfortunately, I have begun to realize that the restrictions of scheduling in people's lives demand planning ahead - I shouldn't take it personally when people can't spend time with me because they are busy when I suddenly want to make plans. People can't be flying in a holding pattern waiting for me to want to see them... it's unhealthy (see goal #1). Planning isn't as big a deal as I think it is. I keep saying things like "I wish I could spend more time with you" - but rather than wishing and bitching and griping about it, I should act on it. Whenever I find myself wishing I could be there with my mom and my brother, I will book a plane ticket and I will make plans. Rather than feeling insecure because I don't know when I will see Matthew again, I will take the initiative to make plans and let him be the one to reject me if that is what he finds in his heart; because nothing is worse than waiting for the phone call that might never come. I will spend the time, the effort, and the money - if these people are worth it to me, I need to stop saying so and start doing. No more regrets about the things I haven't done - from now on I only want to regret things that I have done and wished that I hadn't.

10) Get Organized - the desk, the workshop, the cabinet full of brewing equipment, the pile of documents I need to keep track of. It all has a general place in the apartment, but that is simply not enough. While it's a step up from last year, where everything was piled up around Tom's piles of crap, the general areas need more definite organization. The workshop needs a major overhaul - a couple of storage devices with little drawers. The cloth in bags and drawers needs to be put on "bolts" a la Paige's impressive cloth storage solution. The desk needs to have its drawers cleaned out and the files gone through to dispose of old expired documents (how far back does one typically archive bills and bank statements, anyhow?). If there isn't enough room in the file drawer, I will purchase a file cabinet to suit my archival needs. I will have a better mail-sorting system so the mail does not pile up on my kitchen counter, taking up valuable cooking space. THROW OUT/SELL/CRAIGSLIST MORE CRAP. This year's goal is to cut down on owning extraneous stuff. Also on this year's list of goals: get rid of all of Tom's things in the basement. Set a deadline on which he has to get it out of the basement, be firm about it, and if he misses the deadline, go through the pile and keep or sell anything of value to recuperate monetary losses. If needed, I will seek out moral support from other people to make sure that I stick to this goal and not fall back on being too nice.

11) Make more aggressive financial growth - CDs are nice, and they are safe. But I am still young and have time to be more aggressive. I think I need to play a more active role in maintaining my finances. Up until now, I have sat on a portfolio of long-term stocks and only actively dealt in CDs and savings accounts. I see people around me day-trading and using the crappy economy to their advantage - I admire their ambition and I think that I should follow their example, or at the very least become more educated in ways to improve my financial growth (if nothing else, more money will open up more opportunities to pursue some of the goals I've listed).

12) Revisit my old art supplies - I finished a small watercolor painting last December as a present for someone (a present I almost didn't give, I was so nervous about it)... I forgot what it was like to express my feelings on paper. I often find myself wanting to tell people "you are beautiful, amazing, and inspiring" but a lot of times words really fall flat, and they're not always prone to get the reaction you are looking for out of the people you tell them to because they sound cheesy and contrite (especially since I'm no wordsmith or poet). With artwork though... if you do it right, you can express that feeling all over the paper and get it out there, while still keeping the words to yourself.

13) Embrace all the the good stuff there is about being Asian - while continuing to stay away from the bad stuff (like irrational Cantonese logic). For the longest time I distanced myself from everything that had to do with my heritage because I was so irritated with all the bad things that I associated with some of my more unbearable relatives (there is nothing quite like people who listen to ultra-conservative talk radio and *believe* it out of fear). Now I'm realizing that I took all the good stuff for granted - things like cakes from Bengawan Solo, Hong Kong diner food, squid snacks, cheap clothes, Chinese television (period dramas!), and so many of the other distinct things that were part of my childhood - I want to revisit them all. Some of it is just the little things, like breaking down and finally accepting that I have to go to a Chinese salon to get my hair cut after years of botched hairdos at American salons (I've always wanted to have long beautiful, uniform-length hair like my non-Asian friends, but I've finally come to accept that I have to get it done in pointy Asian-hair layers, or it will just stick to my head like a nasty greasy headful of Prell). But some of it is also a reaction to losing more family members over the years - I realize that if I don't save the things that they have left behind (like my grandmother's recipes, or my uncle's knotwork), they will be forgotten and lost to the world... and being forgotten scares me - I don't wish it on anyone, especially people that I love.

So there it is. In conclusion, 85% of this list, and I'll be all set for 2009. No more "winning the Special Olympics" for me.

Further bulletins as events warrant.