Dear Yi Wen,
I’m writing to you from the year 2013. If this letter managed to travel back in time, you should be in 2010, and tomorrow is your first day of college.
You should be psyched! After all, everyone who’s graduated from college has been harping on and on about how college was the best time of their lives; and everyone who hasn’t had the opportunity to go to college have expressed a deep desire to have that experience. College is apparently the time you make lifelong relationships, return to your innermost core and rediscover yourself, viva la vida, and all that jazz… but right about now you’re tossing and turning in bed, unable to fall to sleep.
Instead of experiencing the rush that everyone else around you seems to be having as they gear up for college, you’re plagued down with your billion and one unfounded fears.
Is Business really the path you intend to pursue? What does Business even mean?! Will you be able to meet or exceed academic expectations? Will you be able to connect with your peers? What if you give others this overconfident and cocky vibe? What do you say or do to appear knowledgeable and intelligent? Your list goes on and on and on…
Initially, you wanted to pursue Mass Communications, but Dad pulled out the parental card and suggested Business. You debated that for a while – you argued that you’ve never had a passion for Business; unlike the one you have for Journalism. Dad proceeded to yank out more cards – the ‘I’m Decades Older, Therefore I Am’ card, the ‘You’ve Never Tried Out Business, How Do You Know It’s Not The Thing For You’ card, etc.
You’re going to shut him out. But take a step back, and listen to what he has got to say. He’s three decades older, and has been slogging his entire life. He probably knows better. I’m not saying you’re wrong, but I know you and you tend to get insanely obsessed with something and end up shutting yourself out to the rest of the world. It’s unhealthy.
Concurrently, your older sister has been trying to rectify any wrongs she’d made during her early days in college through you. You’re almost like her second chance. To this end, she has instructed in fine detail what you should or should not be partaking in university.
Investment Society, check, Bizad Club, check, Student Union, Political Society, Case Competitions, check, check, check.
Anything else you suggest is promptly slammed down with the promise that it’s all with your best intentions in mind. You think it’s an overused premise, and you think the advice given isn’t appropriate for your unique personality type; but conversely, listen to whatever she’s saying. Nine out of ten times, she’s right; they’re mostly universal truths that transcend all possible personality types.
These days, when I interact with freshmen around campus, I see a lot of myself in them (and you) at that age. And it makes me realize that everyone has to go through that same painstaking process of maturing, which involves that one tragic perspective-changing event or occasionally bumping into walls to finally get to the point of revelation.
To be honest, I was hesitating whether to intervene. I’m a strong proponent of self-education, and I didn’t want to screw up the natural progression of things. You should have the option of undergoing the brutal process of discovering your best self through diverse experiences and adverse setbacks. I really think that’s when we learn best.
Yet, at the same time, I’d like you to learn from some of my failures. Why fail when you can learn from my failures? There are certain things I wished someone had told me when I was at your age. If I had known it earlier, I’d be able to accomplish so much more! So I know it will change your life in profound ways.
You’re going to spend a significant portion of your college education daydreaming of another dimension – a utopia where you can shortcut your way to fame and fortune; the strategy you adopted to get through the A’ Levels won’t work in Business School, where you procrastinate the entire semester and expect to get straight As and deliver the Valedictorian speech on behalf of your graduating class.
And while you were lost in your own delusions, the world was moving on, or at least your peers in Business School were. At the end of the day, when the sun sets and your grades differed from expectations, you’ll be tempted to play the blame-game on the incumbent government and the college’s administration for having an over-emphasis on rote learning, and the bell curve’s existence.
But you’re going to start appreciating the business side of things, and see a potential connection between Finance and Journalism. When that happens, you’ll realize that you’ve lamented too much of college away!
You’ll rebound and strive for the impossible. You’ll be like that oppressed kid in the candy store who was starved from sugar for an awfully long time, attempting to cram everything at once, intending to make up for all that lost time, but eventually ending up becoming an absolute generalist, a Jack-of-all-Trades, instead of acquiring valuable technical skills or specializing in a single core competency.
Instead, give it a minute. In a New York Times interview with Emmy and Grammy award-winning stand-up comedian, Louis CK:
NYT: Does it matter that what you’ve achieved, with your online special and your tour can’t be replicated by other performers who don’t have the visibility or fan base that you do?
Louis CK: Why do you think those people don’t have the same resources that I have, the same visibility or relationship? What’s different between me and them?
NYT: You have the platform. You have the level of recognition.
Louis CK: So why do I have the platform and the recognition?
NYT: At this point you’ve put in the time.
Louis CK: There you go. There’s no way around that. There’s people that say: “It’s not fair. You have all that stuff.” I wasn’t born with it. It was a horrible process to get to this. It took me my whole life. If you’re new at this — and by “new at it,” I mean 15 years in, or even 20 — you’re just starting to get traction. Young musicians believe they should be able to throw a band together and be famous, and anything that’s in their way is unfair and evil. What are you, in your 20s, you picked up a guitar? Give it a minute.
Additionally, I hope you don’t see college as a path you pursue because everyone else is doing that, or as something to craft your resume with, to get a foot in that investment-banking door. I don’t want you to let an institution, or anything else define who you are; I want you to experience as much as you can, and go out there and do the extraordinary.
On the personality front, in certain aspects you’re pretty shallow. Your idea of having a rich social life is wasting time on social media networks and walking up and down Orchard Road with the same few people you knew from your childhood.
Over the next three years, you’re often going to contemplate deleting your social media accounts for good; do it. Each time you’re going to make the same lame excuses: Oh, I have to keep in touch with this friend in Hong Kong… or that friend in New York… Social networking might be fine for some people, but it’s so bad for you, especially if your self-worth relies on the number of likes you gather from the false impressions you generate on your Facebook profile.
Also, stop entertaining fantasies of becoming rich and famous. I don’t think anyone who’s ever wanted to be rich and famous just because they wanted to become rich and famous, has truly become rich and famous; quite the contrary, actually.
Instead, have sincere pursuits and expectations. Goals with genuine beliefs and honest intentions, and relationships with little pretense, with no need for dramatization or conspicuous affection or anything like that. While these things might sound like self-evident elements of life, they are not as common as you might think. I think a lot of people are inclined to interpret their lives and relationships based on what they have seen from Hollywood, or their Facebook newsfeeds. Which is sad.
You also think you’re a profoundly deep individual because you’re able to appreciate movies from the 40’s, quirky indie music and abstract art forms. But you’re completely delusional; liking black & white films doesn’t automatically raise your credentials or make you any smarter than the average person. And please stop trying to practice the art of sarcasm because it really isn’t making the world a better place.
Sorry that this letter ended up becoming a prolonged nag. I’m not trying to position myself as the beacon of knowledge, or the epitome of hope; I still have a ton of glaring flaws. But within my own slightly less sheltered capacity, I hope to be able to get you up to speed. Plus what would a letter from me to you be without a little scolding? After all, given that I’ve once been in your shoes, I’m your harshest critic.
All that being said, I think there’s a child inside you, and you should never ever let her go away, because she fills you up with a sense of child-like wonder.
There’s a small part of you who still thinks the world is a perfect place, where there is peace in the Middle East and cures for cancer; where there exists the concept of ‘eventual happiness’, and people age gracefully and live happily ever after. And I think it’s essential for you to retain this optimism to stay sane in this mad, mad world.
Quoting Gillian Anderson, “I love you, I believe in you, and I look forward to respecting you.”
Yours Truly,
Yi Wen
P.S. If this pay-it-backward concept holds true, perhaps a future me might be writing back to present me, and repeat. Also, invest in lots of Apple shares.