On September 10, 2019, I lost my job in a mass layoff. Now, after having endured a month-long unemployment, fortunately concluded by signing another job offer today, I decided to sit down and retrospectively document my journey, which, although arguably small and inconsequential in the grand scheme of things, was important and transformative for me. As the cliché goes, you learn a lot about yourself when going through obstacles. Indeed, over the span of this month, I have subsequently come to identify my weakness, my insecurity, my solitude, and later, my resilience and my self-worth.
Tonight, I had the chance to attend a talk given by one of my favorite non-fiction writers, Yuval Noah Harari, whose latest book, 21 Lessons for the 21st Century, has quite notably set off a long, enduring existential crisis for me ever since I read it. Organized by Stanford’s Human-Centered AI organization, the talk was focused on the societal impact of AI and was carried out in a conversational style with Stanford’s own leading AI researcher, Fei-Fei Li.
Growing up in China, one of my favorite conversational topics is to complain about its education system. For context, I have 16 years of survival experience and, even though it has been more than a decade since I graduated from high school, I still have regular nightmares about failing an important exam or being punished for talking too loud during a class break (both of which have actually happened). Hence, I do consider myself a subject expert.
The title says it all.
No, seriously, this post is all about me. So much for not talking about me…
This may be cliché but, on this very last day of 2018, I want to end the year with a reflection of things that have greatly influenced me this year. These “things” come in various shapes and forms: persons, books, podcasts, courses, events, and YouTube series. Whatever they are, as long as they left a big impression on me and helped me grow, be it personally or professionally, I’m going to list them here.