sorry sorry

Another three months thinking about this: It is possible that Zo turns out to be more ENTJ than I am but if I had to guess, the defining challenge of our relationship will be my ability to suspend judgment

Accepting the fact that it’s pretty much impossible for me to suspend my judgment. The only question is what I judge and how I express my judgment. The good news is that I tend to judge process. The bad news is that my expression of judgment skews negative. I will try my best to apologize: Of course, parents aren’t perfect just as our children aren’t perfect, so if you speak hurtful criticism to your child and see the light dim in their eyes a bit, simply apologize and get on with soul-building encouragement

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goodbye 2020

The defining quote of November: If you wake up in a puddle and smell pee, your water did not break. When I first heard this, I considered it highly unlikely but nevertheless searched for incontinence underwear. Thank goodness for Amazon Prime because I immediately gained twenty pounds of (probably water) weight and bodily functions became a bit of a struggle

The defining thought of December: What’s the point of being hyper efficient with regard to things that don’t really matter and creating unnecessary tension in relationships, what matters most? When we went to lactation clinic to discuss supplementing with formula (and Zo pooped on the scale and the nurse had to engage another nurse to help clean up the explosion), I overheard comments on latching and felt thankful that this was not an issue we encountered. Four weeks later, Zo has developed an elaborate pooping dance and seems to be occupied with this dance every (okay every other) time I try to feed. After yet another thirty minute wrestle, I made an executive decision: I will pump and he will bottle feed. And this is just fine because maximizing breast feeding is not what matters most

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Dear Therapist: because when she is fixated on perfection, you start to feel that her love and acceptance are contingent on performance // You might end the letter by explaining that the greatest gift she can give you as a parent is the freedom to be who you are

It is possible that Zo turns out to be more ENTJ than I am but if I had to guess, the defining challenge of our relationship will be my ability to suspend judgment. This is something I have contemplated over and over again. Do I sit with silence? Do I fake it till I make it (e.g. you are doing great)? Only time will tell but right now I am inspired by these six words

“College athletes were asked what their parents said that made them feel great, that amplified their joy during and after a ballgame. Their overwhelming response: I love to watch you play”

p.s. he took this lovely picture and not overly concerned that tummy time turned into nap time

new year >>> new goals

Hot Pot Party with Sariphen (Sari + Stephen) and Benise (Benny + Denise) and we talked about Marshall Goldsmith’s “What Got You Here Won’t Get You There”, a book that Stephen gifted us a few years ago.

The following were identified as potential areas for improvement for me
1. Winning too much
2. Adding too much value
3. Passing judgment

And I have decided to work on #2 (adding too much value). James said he is used to #1 (i.e. my constant attempt to optimize things that may not need to be optimized). James also said the main manifestation of #3 for me is #2 (i.e. I judge other people by telling them that my way is better).

James is going to help me track this using my new calendar from The Regional Assembly of Text.

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love ninja (count=792)

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Love Ninja
We already know Wee Ninja are more about love than hate, but Love Ninja takes it a step further, having the power to spread love without you even knowing it.

Motto
“Love is the answer…”

In 2007, I was ‘forced’ to read 7 habits. I survived the first 24 years of my life without self help books. Why should I start now? But everybody else in the book club wanted to read it. So I whined about it, sighed over it, finally read it and loved it, especially the section on the personal mission statement.

2007
To Love Myself: Sleep, eat, exercise & read.
To Love Family & Friends: Let people know that I think of them.
To Serve Clients: Accept that we do not know everything and do my best in dealing with the unknown.
To Serve Community: Seek influence, not recognition.

Part of the reason why I wrote “do my best in dealing with the unknown” is that, on some M&A projects, I wasn’t digging as deeply as I would like. Sam’s advice was that, if something important was wrong, I can trust him and other team members to pick it up. Since I’m doing this kind of work again, I’m guessing this wasn’t a big issue for me to begin with.

In 2007, I got some coaching from Lillian and realized that I needed to work on my listening skills. At OW, I realized that it makes sense to put as much effort into communicating my work as actually doing it. Hearing things like “we need to work hard to increase the reusability of slides” still makes me roll my eyes but I agree that fitting interesting ideas into a predictable structure is key to getting people to open up. In 2010, I updated my mission statement to include “listen, structure & communicate”.

2010
to love myself: sleep, eat, exercise & read
to love family & friends: let people know that I think of them
to serve clients: ask, listen, structure & communicate
to serve community: seek influence, not recognition

Looking at this today, I think what I most urgently need to improve is “let people know that I think of them”. Maybe love ninja can give me a hand!

live & let live

A few weeks ago, he explained his development plan to me.

Yesterday, he talked about it again. And it sounded completely different.

Me being me, I proceeded to grill him on why it changed.

In retrospect, it’s probably better to live & let live.

Either way, probably not the end of the world.

entjpersonality
– ENTJ being too critical and blunt
– INFJ being vague/unclear about what they want
– ENTJ not listening to extroverted feeling because it’s their blindspot
– INFJ being too sensitive to criticism, or holding back part of themselves
– ENTJ forgetting to show acts of thoughtfulness and appreciation every once in a while, because of being too caught up in their work (INFJs need to know they’re loved)
– INFJ having expectations that are too high or too idealistic

help me grow

Three weeks ago, I started working on a metric to measure career success in my 30’s: “I think it means building a diverse network which increases the likelihood that I can find a person B for every person A. If I’m successful at improving my CheiRank, people will come to me with important problems even if they know that I cannot solve this particular problem because chances are I know someone who can.”

The obvious next step is to update my networking spreadsheet. Which I have not updated since 2010. Which contains some names that I do not even remember. Meh.

As I update the spreadsheet, mostly by going through my LinkedIn contact list, I remember that so many people have helped me with so many things along the way.

And how many thank you cards have I sent this year? Six. Meh.

My short term goal is to send thirty thank you cards between now and American Thanksgiving.

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William and I had lunch last week. It has been six years since we caught up. Meh.

I could argue that, until last year, he lived in New York. But I visit New York at least once a year so it’s a pretty bad reason.

My medium term goal (to be achieved by August 9, 2015) is to come up with a process so that I catch up with people more often than once every six years.