There ARE no wrong decisions

Sometimes it’s embarrassing to admit how many stupid decisions I have made. But those are my decisions and they made me who I am today. The most insulting words have taught me how to forgive, the most devastating betrayal has forced me to become stronger, and the most challenging relatoinship has trained me how to respect. If anything, today I can put all these behind me. 

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Tomorrow is another day.  

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すごいですね：Japanese Human Beat Box at Union Square!

Yay, so this is my first iphone video recording, and my first youtube upload!  This Japanese guy was simply amazing, and this was just one of his many astonishing routines. I was lucky to have witnessed this with my own eyes at Union Square and I kept saying to myself, there are so many people out there doing things so interesting and so different from what we’re doing, but most of the cases we are not even aware.

Be curious, because life is still full of surprises.

At some point, you just need to stop trying

It probably happened to you too. I once had a crush on this guy who is from an entirely different background and I knew by my heart that there is no way this would ever work out in the long run. But I was very attracted. He was into me as well, for a while I guess. But I am sure he went through the same thinking process and decided “he likes me, but he does not love me”, which is a very powerful rejection to me and I was really sad for a good period of time.

I probably did something crazy, or at least I cried and I couldn’t let go. But eventually it doesn’t bother me anymore. Life goes on and then one day I realized: it is great that he was so straightforward with me that he simply was never in love with me. I was lucky in a sense that I didn’t waste my time, and it would have been even harder to let him go should I not knew I was not that special to him in the first place.

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But there are many people who are much more subtle than that. You never get a straightforward or honest rejection but you don’t exactly feel he’s that into you either. So you kept trying and kept your hope high, until maybe one day you saw him at a dessert shop with another girl feeding each other ice cream. The realization is hard but if that’s a sign convincing enough to let you stop trying, perhaps it would well worth it.

This is the kind of email I WILL respond to!

Dear Danye,

I came across your profile on linkedIn while going through the ‘Business & Jobs New York’ group, and you came across as a great person to connect with. I am writing to you because I am really interested in joining the XXX Group at XXX Firm and would really appreciate getting some insights from your end. I have been making online applications to this group and nothing has come up so far.

To give you a brief overview of my background; I graduated from XXX College with a bachelors in Economics/computer science, joined XXX Bank prime brokerage group for over a year then XXX’s wealth management as a Client Service analyst for a couple of months. Thereafter I went to graduate school at XXX University where I received my masters in Financial Economics.

I would like to forward you my resume for critique and directives. Kindly let me know if you will be willing to assist me. Your advice and time would be invaluable.

Many thanks and I look forward to hearing from you.

ABC

Of course, this is a very articulate and well-written letter. Now, why do I have an incentive to write back to this person, among all others? Because he/she perfectly answered three big questions in my little head whenever I am reading such letters.

不如乖乖做一只小绵羊吧

I am going to write in Chinese periodically and I hope that you won’t mind. Sorry if you don’t really read Chinese, maybe you can use google translate? I promise this will not happen often, but sometimes I just REALLY want to write in Chinese! Today is one of those days, apparently.

我很多年想不清楚一个问题

如果你是一个有些强势的女人，那似乎很容易让男人觉得有吸引力，不过然后交往起来男人又觉得有压力； 再之后开始矛盾重重，这个怎么办呢？ 

后来我的一个好朋友一语道破天机：是么？你为什么不能乖乖做你的小绵羊呢？ 

是啊。如果说强势是一种性格，倒不如说是一种姿态。没有谁会一直强势的（我不相信有完全不会温柔的女人），也没有那个必要。可是一个姿态做久了，容易变成习惯，习惯了之后就变得麻痹。所以你以为你根本没有强势的时候别人也觉得你很强势了。 

Can we just have a normal conversation?

A few days ago I updated my facebook status to “Sometimes I don’t understand why people just can’t carry on some normal conversation”, and I got the following comments from my lovely friends: 

• Because normal conversation is boring. (Really? Why I thought this is the best and ONLY way to really get to know anybody at all?)
• How normal are you talking about, define normal? (Right, nowadays everyone needs a definition to be on the same page about almost everything)
• I don’t know what a normal conversation is. I just can’t comprehend! (Knowing the person who wrote this, that totally makes sense! Kidding, I like people who can make fun of themselves. Not being too serious about yourself is the only way you can be serious about WHAT YOU DO)
• Because there is a shadow in everybody’s mind. Or they are just not that into you (Good point, and probably true)

But since when do you need to be into someone at all to simply start a conversation? Is this really about the post-dating age where attraction is not identified by being asked on a dinner + movie date, but hided in multiple incidents of “do you want to come along to this happy hour thing?” or “my friend is having a birthday you’re welcome to join?”

And just talk to me

I thought it would mean something beautiful, like as if you can read my mind; but then I realized it means much more, if I can always speak my mind. You started feeling me, before knowing me.

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But I wish you could stop for one second, and just talk to me.

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What can possibly go wrong with your resume?

We have been hiring in our group and the resume screening process is kind of fun. I know there are many articles all over the place on how to write a perfect resume and I can tell many of the resumes I’ve seen have tried very hard to follow these rules. But then, what can possibly still go wrong?

 

1)      What the hell is that experience on top of your resume?

Wharton MBA, 4.0 GPA, absolutely impressive. And all the other work experience only makes him more qualified for the job. Wait, but his most recent position for the last 8 months is in MUSIC PRODUCTION? It’s not that you can’t try something new about your life, but why is this RELEVANT TO THIS JOB that you’re applying? You can be a very artsy person or a super talented guitar player and that’s probably even a plus, and it could become a very entertaining topic at the interview. But it’s usually a BAD idea to put this in bold letters on the TOP of your resume applying for a job in a totally different industry, because people will have a REALLY HARD time making the connections. 

Your resume represents who you are before you get a chance to convince anyone face-to-face. You want to make it REALLY EASY for the resume screeners to pick you. 

2)      Those two lines at the bottom of your resume

Transition to a New Management Role

Remember this: Find out how people want to be treated and treat them that way. If you do, you will be very successful.

Attracted to someone who already has a girlfriend (boyfriend)

Previously I wrote a post on what to do if you are already in a relationship but are attracted to someone else, which surprisingly came consistently on top of my “most searched post” list. Then I realized recently that a more intriguing situation is: what if you are attracted to someone who already has a boyfriend or girlfriend? 

The fact is, and I feel you, this can be devastating. Yet again, there is almost nothing you can do.

 

But you might want to run through the following exercise to make yourself feel better and to understand what you should do your next step. For the interest of time, I am going to write from a girl’s perspective, but the rules should apply to both. 

• Is he attracted to you at all?

This is the first question you should ask yourself, because if the answer is a NO you will save yourself a lot of trouble. It is your freedom and right to like someone secretly and be happy about it, until one day you wake up and suddenly realized you’re over him. But that’s it. There is no hope and no future. He will NOT like you back JUST BECAUSE you’re good to him. So why don’t you save yourself some time?