Archive for December, 2022
Ask an Economist Anything
Posted in Art, cartoon, tagged Dismal science, economist, Q&A on December 30, 2022| Leave a Comment »
Adult Learner, Patience, and Relaxed Longing
Posted in Hobbies, piano, Reflection, Uncategorized, tagged adult learner, patience on December 29, 2022| Leave a Comment »
I started learning piano around the same time as my kids. It seems like they have different mindsets and perceptions of time. My boys don’t seem to have the same urgency to get results, nor do they get affected much by other good performers. In contrast, adult beginners tend to want results more quickly and have high expectations from the beginning.
I like this passage from The Art of Practicing:
Comfort, ease, and joy can be cultivated through practice. To do this, we must give up excessive ambition and the desperate struggle for results, and let ourselves feel the pain of our longing, of having to wait to make music the way we want to. We can learn to relax with this longing and to enjoy its soft, warm presence in the heart.
Presence is the state of being fully present, of body, mind, heart, and sense perceptions being completely engaged with the activity of the present moment. For a performer, this means not only being engaged with the music but letting the energy of the audience affect you. In practicing, it means being at ease in your surroundings and being aware of each movement and each sound that you make.
It’s a good reminder to be more present during daily practice, patient with results, and to cultivate a sense of relaxed longing.
New Year Resolutions
Posted in Reflection, Resolutions, Uncategorized, tagged Calvin and Hobbes, Daily journal, Deliberate practice, Matthew Mcconaughey, New Year resolutions on December 27, 2022| Leave a Comment »
My resolutions, if they exist, generally revolve around 1) getting better at certain activities, such as piano, Wing Chun, and basketball, or 2) developing certain habits, like meditating and journaling daily.
On getting better, the challenge is to 1) set up a routine for regular practice, and 2) be conscientious enough to focus on areas that’d help me improve. The latter is more difficult, as activities that’d likely help me improve most tend to be the less exciting drills, self tests, and evaluations that are not well-defined and require mental efforts.
I would also like to set a regular time to review things. Without reviews, I forget many things, including experience, books I read, or movies I saw. I hope this blog can help me to be more reflective of life events and media consumed, and be more organized with my photos, videos, and drawings. This in turn might help me remember the more important things in life.
Matthew Mcconaughey kept a diary for 35 years, and this is what he said when he reviewed them to write his memoir: “I enjoyed myself more than I thought I would. I laughed, I cried, I realized I had remembered more than I expected, and forgot less.” I’m not sure my memory would be as good as his, but I think my future self would love to read my real time feelings and thoughts.
Most people don’t stick to their resolutions beyond February, and I’ve failed many times (e.g. regular review has been a challenge). But life is a journey. If I fail, I can be more like Calvin and be content with myself.
My Daily Parenting Challenge
Posted in Daily Life, Happiness, Relationship, tagged cartoon, experience vs remembering self, parenting on December 21, 2022| Leave a Comment »
Kids are a source of wonders, but also frustrations.
Traveling with young kids can be extremely taxing, but they also create great memories.
Luckily, in most cases we tend to remember the good times, and forget the daily frustrations.
Or in Kahneman’s terms, our experienced self might feel stressed, but our remembering self will thank us for creating those special memories.
I often remind myself to take a long view, focusing on building good relationships while downplaying the daily, short term stuff that annoys me. But it’s easier said than done.
It’s a constant challenge.
The Perfect Pitch Rivals
Posted in Daily Life, Hobbies, piano, Relationship, tagged Family, perfect pitch, piano on December 19, 2022| Leave a Comment »
My two boys and I started learning the piano at around the same time two years ago.
We came up with a friendly competition, that whoever passes the ABRSM level 8 first would be entitled to a Grand Piano for the family. Qualifications don’t matter to me at this point, but it’s nice to have a little shared goal.
One day I noticed that the boys have good ears and can remember lots of soundtrack music from the video games we played. After some research and testing, I found out that they both have perfect/absolute pitch (i.e. can identify the notes/chords played on a piano without reference note).
Suddenly my little rivals seem to have levelled up with a special talent (along with the other advantages kids have), while I can only practice harder and smarter, and hope that I won’t be left in the dust.
I added some of their recordings to my channel to document our journey together (the recordings they like and want to post).
Self-consciousness and Chat GPT
Posted in Happiness, Health and wellness, tagged Chat GPT, performance anxiety, Self Conscious on December 18, 2022| 1 Comment »
As I grow older, I care less about what others think of me. Perhaps this is because I’m more self sufficient and can decide with whom I want to spend my time. As long as people I care understand me, what others think matters less. Real friends should be more forgiving of my little mishaps and less likely to be jealous of my fortunes.
But why do I play worse piano in front of an audience, feel awkward in a big party, or unwilling to do things (e.g. dance) that might make me look stupid in public? Intellectually I understand that we are all going to die someday, and others generally care much less about me than I do. So I should be less afraid to try more things or look stupid. But in reality it’s not easy to break this tendency, and being overly self-conscious could act like a self-imposed constraint.
I was wondering what Chat GPT has to say about this and below is its response:
Why do humans feel self-conscious?
Self-consciousness is a feeling of being aware of one’s own thoughts, feelings, and actions, as well as how these may be perceived by others. It is a normal and natural part of human psychology and can serve as a way for people to reflect on themselves and their behavior.
There are several reasons why humans may feel self-conscious. One reason is social comparison, or the tendency to evaluate oneself by comparing oneself to others. This can lead to feelings of self-consciousness when we perceive that we are not measuring up to the standards or expectations of others.
Another reason is self-awareness, or the ability to introspect and think about one’s own thoughts and feelings. This can lead to self-consciousness when we become aware of our own thoughts and feelings and how they may be perceived by others.
Self-consciousness can also be a result of social anxiety, or the fear of being judged or evaluated negatively by others. This can lead to feelings of self-consciousness in social situations where there is a fear of being judged or evaluated.
Overall, self-consciousness is a complex and multifaceted feeling that can arise for a variety of reasons and can be influenced by both internal and external factors.
Social comparison is not healthy. Self-awareness shouldn’t affect my performance. It seems like social anxiety is what I care about most. With practice I probably can mitigate the negative effect of being overly self-conscious, and channel it to come up with higher quality work.
One Second Decision, Mental Toughness, and Quitting
Posted in Daily Life, Health and wellness, Hobbies, Reflection, tagged Annie Duke, chris bosh, Emerson, Mastery, mental toughness, quit, sisyphus on December 16, 2022| Leave a Comment »
There’s a fine line between success and failure. Often there’s only one chance in a situation. You either make it or lose it all.
David Goggins called it the one second decision, whether an MMA fighter taps out or bet his health and future to have a chance to win.
Great athletes often have that mental toughness. Ex-NBA player Chris Bosh wrote in his book, Letters to a Young Athlete:
Pain is temporary; glory is forever. If you want to excel, you have to get used to the pain. You have to get used to exhaustion. I can’t promise you that it will ever be a comfortable feeling, but I can guarantee you that you can become familiar enough with it that you can visit that mental and physical space on your path to getting better and not have to worry that you’ll crumple under the pressure.
There were times when I didn’t train enough and struggled in the middle of a long distance run, I’d find myself with thoughts like ‘why am I doing this’, or ‘this is silly and meaningless.’ Luckily I was too ashamed to quit in those official runs. On a smaller scale this is something I face in my daily exercises. If I quit frequently, it’d no longer be a habit.
Quitting once gives us a precedent to quit again, while persisting despite discomfort trains our mental toughness. Chris Bosh put it well: “You become capable of the grind by surviving the grind.
So is quitting bad? Not necessarily.
Annie Duke argues that we are often too reluctant and slow to quit (we don’t ignore sunk costs and value opportunity costs properly). If we persist in something that doesn’t fit us, we might waste a lot of time. Ralph Waldo Emersion said: “All life is an experiment. The more experiments you make the better.” Quitting gives us opportunities to try more things.
But does quitting also make us a jack of all trades? Some call those who die on their quests to climb Mount Everest reckless. But often it’s also those who don’t know when to quit make history.
There is no correct answer. I think it’s best to experiment enough to know what we like, and then put in effort to be as best as we can in the area we want to pursue. Quitting shouldn’t happen when we are in the middle of a tough situation, but when we calmly reflect on our priorities in life.
We have to enjoy the whole process, the struggles as well as the accomplishments. What would I be willing to do day in and day out to master or achieve something?
Again from Chris Bosh:
You have to figure out how to love it – all the sprints, all the miles, all the weights, all the preparation. Pretend you love it, trick yourself into loving it, whatever it takes…
Your blessing in life is when you find the torture you’re comfortable with…it’s work, it’s exercise. Find the torture you’re comfortable with and you’ll do well.
Run and Explore
Posted in Daily Life, Health and wellness, Travel, Uncategorized, tagged Explore, Running, Travel on December 11, 2022| 1 Comment »
I’ve been running 5-8K daily for years, following Murakami’s footstep. It’s a routine that helps me stay fit and sane. As it’s a daily habit, I mostly run similar routes, so it’s not particularly exciting. Even though it might not feel fun at the moment, it’s essential for me, as it helps calm my mind and feel better about myself.
Running in new cities, whether during work or tourist trips, are different. They are novel and fun. I find it much easier to do longer runs in new cities, and think it’s a great way to experience the cities’ layout, sights, and people.
Being able to run outdoor in a new place has become one of my favorite things to do during travel.
AI, the end of shared experience, and what’s left for artists
Posted in Art, Hobbies, tagged AI, Art, Creator on December 9, 2022| Leave a Comment »
Mario Gabriele thinks that as AI improves, we might enter a period of endless, individualized media, with much less shared culture in the future. The trend is probably right.
But humans will continue to value shared experience, which suggests shared experience would become more niche and on a smaller scale, like watching live sports, concerts, or playing multiplayer games. Having shared experience and media consumption often facilitate bonding, and sharing what we like with our loved ones brings us joy.
Mario also noted that as AI generated art becomes better than human’s and requires much less effort, artists would need to adapt. For those who have dedicated a lifetime mastering a craft, this development might feel unfair and unwelcome.
For me, I value the process of being a creator. As long as I feel like I’m improving, it doesn’t matter if some AI or human using AI can easily produce better art than I do. It would probably be nice to learn to employ the technology to make better art. That said, I don’t rely on art for making a living, so the development doesn’t affect me as much.
Everything in life is optional in a way, and art fits in this category for me. The main reason to create art, even though it’s unlikely to bring me financial reward or change the world in any meaningful way, is that I value the activity and the accompanying result for their own sakes.
Nostalgic period
Posted in Daily Life, Happiness, Hobbies, Reflection, Uncategorized, tagged nostalgia, reflection on December 8, 2022| Leave a Comment »
It seems like we all feel nostalgic towards certain period. For me it’s the late 80s-90s. The music, shows, and anime/manga during that period still invoke emotions and memories.
The ‘First Love’ Japanese drama series on Netflix revisits some popular themes from that period (e.g. Titanic, Utada’s songs). Watching the new Slam Dunk movie also reminds me of the times when basketball was a much bigger part of my life, while walking around Tokyo, where there are still Tower Records store, remains me of the time I spent sampling music after school.
Recently Netflix added lots of old anime I watched when I was young (e.g. Slam Dunk, Rama 1/2, Yuyuhakusho). With so many options out there and limited time, I probably won’t be watching most of them. But it feels nice to introduce some of the things I used to like to my boys as a kind of shared interests/experience. So if my kids are interested in any of them, I’d try to find time to watch with them.
For now, I’m grateful that we already share some common interests in basketball, piano, and games. And I look forward to more activities that we’d enjoy together.
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