The Burden of Decision Lifted - Part II

Just when it seemed my mind was all clear, the boss' missus came along and planted doubt into my head. I explained that if I do go to Hawaii, I'll rot, degerate, lead a decadent lifestyle. But she asked me - What's wrong with that? Her point was that we only live once. At 60, I would look back at the 2 years in Hawaii as the 2 best years of my life. There may never be another chance of taking a 2-year fully paid holiday in Hawaii in my life. I would have time to achieve later, there is no rush to do it quickly. And she said that the only reason she was advising me as such was that she would say the same thing to her own children.

She is not wrong. I've often said that my 4 years in UK were the best time in my life, and that I would give nearly everything now in exchange for another 4 years there. Well, Hawaii isn't quite UK, but close enough. Shouldn't the opportunity be something I've always hoped for?

I started reconsidering, again. My heart was probably already decided on going to the psychology side; it was more my mind I needed to convince. My reasons started off being more trivial ones: (1) I enjoyed life as a student in UK, not just life in UK, so life in Hawaii will not be as enjoyable given that the student life part is missing; (2) My friends won't be there; I will practically be alone; (3) fundamentally, I don't really connect to the Americans the way I can connect to the Brits; (4) I enjoyed UK partly because of the playing and watching of football - the purist form of the game, whereas the US offers only the bastardised version of it that in fact uses more of the hands than the feet; (5) the bleeding air tickets back to Singapore from Hawaii through Japan are gonna cost me a bomb.

Then I stumbled across a more important consideration. The thing I hate most about my present job is the potential for me to feel 'small'. The feeling of being the lowest, insignificant creature in the group surfaces too often. If I step over to Hawaii, there will be many occasions when such sentiments are bound to descend upon me. I've had 3 years of this shit; I don't want more of it.

Which leads me to the main reason for my decision. My happpiness depends overwhelmingly on my self-esteem. My self-esteem is defined by my achievements in life and career. Doing psychology gives me a better basis to achieve later in my life than going to Hawaii. Going to Hawaii gives me happiness, but one that is short-lived and hollow.

I thank my boss' missus for probing these thoughts. I am now more convinced than before that a career in psychology is what i want.

The Burden of Decision Lifted

It feels good to be relieved of the burden of decision.

“What are you going to do after you leave the organisation?” has been the perennial question I’ve got, which I have not been able to answer. I didn’t know what I want to do. There were too many possibilities. I could stay or leave. If I stay, I could remain in the organisation, get a 2-year posting in Hawaii, or join the psychology department. If I leave, I could join a firm in an executive position, practise psychology, or run a business of my own. That’s a total of 6 options to decide from.

The problem is that I have no real financial commitments. No wife, no kids, no house. I should have enough for my parents to live comfortably, though not luxuriously. The key thing I must finance is my remaining car loan, but I can pay that off anytime. When one has no commitments, one faces no constraints. Hence, if an extremely conservative approach is to stay and continue what I have been doing, an audacious plan is to start a business with high profit returns but low probability of success. After all, if I fail, just restart.

The ongoing financial crisis complicates things. All of a sudden, my liquidity is hit. It was bad timing. I plunged in close to 100 units in July 08; by September I lost 20%; by December I had only 50% left. With less liquidity, my stomach for risk-taking dropped. The fear, also, was that if I should choose to leave, I would be forced to accept an even greater compromise in a new job than what I was originally prepared to suffer.

If the pay is at least 5 digits, I am prepared to compromise my interest – which is unambiguously work related to psychology. Conversely, if it is a job related to psychology, I will be willing to take a 25% pay cut from the present. But whether or not I can get a psychology job at 75% of my current pay or a 10K non-psychology job is uncertain.

All this uncertainty meant that I started looking inwards more and more. The option of not quitting became more attractive. But staying in the current organisation has never been a prospect. I need to get out. I have become too comfortable with authority and influence, and psychologically, I will be hit by the sudden loss of position if I stayed.

The 2 year posting in Hawaii will be pure self-indulgence. It will put my life – my career and ageing process – at a standstill for 2 years as I go to a low-stress, high relaxation environment. Maybe I can take another degree or a doctorate while there. I can also network, look for contacts, ideas and opportunities. All these as I accumulate a tidy savings back home while enjoying Hawaiian life on expatriate terms. It will be reminiscent of my university life, without being tied down to a bond.

Joining the psychology department, on the other hand, will mean doing something I like, facilitate my transition to the next career, maintain my existing salary, and hence, way of life. I had a chat with SF about where the psychology department is heading under the new Head, and I was thrilled because the new boss has similar visions as I do. There are also inherently advantageous interpersonal dynamics to me. The new boss is somewhat isolated as he drives forward while most of the incumbents prefer to hold back, and thus I can be his much-needed ally. I have been coveted by the department ever since I returned from university and twice they had tried to secure my services, but were out-muscled by higher “powers”. And my familiarity with my present organisation – people and issues – means I have more exposure and understanding compared to the incumbents, perhaps even the boss himself.

But these are mainly just peripheral considerations. Fundamentally, it is down to a decision between 2 years of enjoyment or 2 years of basic professional cultivation in my field of interest.

The breakthrough is this line of thinking and questioning. What do I want to achieve at the end of this decade, when I hit 40? What will give me a sense of satisfaction that I never had in my current job? What is it about some of my friends and their work that I have always envied but never tried to pinpoint exactly?

The answer: by 40, I hope to have started something on my own, something I can grow and build on. At the end of my life, I want to have something I can look back, touch and feel as my achievement. It will have to be something distinctly me, in my name, associated with me, such that whenever it is mentioned, people know I am the founder.

This must equate to an enterprise of sorts. But what sort of enterprise, or business, can I run? My strength, and my interest, is in issues to do with the mind, and its interplay with the heart. Hence, the enterprise is most likely psychology-related. Exactly which branch of psychology – clinical, occupational, educational, developmental or others – I don’t know yet, but it will be of one or more of these. I may start a clinic, a consultancy or even a research institute.

And if it’s this field I want to pursue, surely my decision now should be to do something that brings me closer to it rather than further. The only way going to Hawaii can bring me closer to my goal is if I take another psychology Master there. But I have no idea what degree I should take since I have no real experience in psychology. And I know in my heart of hearts that if I go to Hawaii, the most likely life I will lead is a decadent one. Under a no-pressure, no-supervision environment, there really isn’t anything to stop me from succumbing to banal instincts of lazing and degenerating. I will just waste my time and at the end of 2 years, find myself further from anything that I’ve ever wanted to do.

On the other hand, joining the psychology department brings me closer to my goal. I get exposed to the field of my interest for the first time. I get a real sense of what it means to be a practitioner, what gaps exist in the industry and what opportunities are available. I can even foresee a rough eight-year plan now to reach 40. The first two to three years will be to gain practical experience, widen my awareness beyond occupational psychology, establish a network and be socially known in the fraternity. The subsequent two to three years will be to gain practical experience outside of this organisation, establish my name and professional credence, and gain depth of expertise in different areas of psychology. And the final two to three years will be to conceive a business venture, formulate a plan, and seek contacts and clients. By the end of eight years, I should start something. Of course, this is a broad plan and timeline. It can slide, change, be aborted or replaced.

So the choice between Hawaii or the psychology department is clear. Yet, this rationalisation remains incomplete. The interplay of one’s heart and mind is complex. The factor I have not mentioned in my reasoning so far is that of my heart. I can’t bring myself to admit that a decision as important as that of my career and my self-identity – the very underpinning of my existence – is made from a non-rational consideration that emanated from my heart. And yet, I know that our mind ultimately succumbs to our heart – the ‘emotional brain’ it is called. In all my introspection, the factor of my gf perhaps exerts a far deeper but unconscious influence in the direction of my rationalisation than I know. I cannot deny that it could have told me silently, but persuasively, that if I choose Hawaii, I will also be deciding to end my relationship with my gf, which I don’t want to. Perhaps my heart has bidded my mind to persuade in the same direction. Fortunately anyway, both my heart and mind have reached the same conclusion.

And while I cannot claim that it is a large part of my consideration, staying in Singapore has the advantage of being around for my parents. I’m not saying much about this not because it is trivial, but because it’s my honest belief that 2 years away does not make me an ingrate and therefore it need not be an overwhelming factor.

But I have still not answered my first and foremost question – whether to stay or leave my present organisation. I have decided that if I stay, I will move to the psychology department, to bring me closer to my vision at 40. On the same reasoning, if I leave, I should still practise psychology, rather than seek employment as an executive elsewhere or attempt to start an enterprise rightaway. So everything now hinges on whether to stay to do psychology or go out to do psychology.

What I shall endeavour in the coming months is to start applying for psychology positions outside, and see what prospects are in store. In 1997, after I was offered my scholarship, I became too lazy to apply for other scholarships. In the past 8 years as I served my bond, I have never stopped wondering what if. This is a mistake I don’t want to repeat. If I decide to go to the psychology department, comfortable as it would be, I still want to go in with my eyes open and be well-informed about what I would have missed. Then my final decision will be set.

Our lives can be broken into decades, each shaped by decisions we make at the start based on incomplete information about the world and what we want. At 12, we make the choice of secondary school, which shapes our teenage years. At about 19 or 20, we make the choice of university and course, which shapes our initial career. At around 30, we make a more informed career choice, armed with real work experience, better understanding of ourselves, and some financial power. My choices thus far have all been good in retrospect. At 31 today, hopefully my decision for this decade will be a good one too.

Actions and Reactions

Every action of an insecure person is taken to directly or indirectly prevent, minimise, or salvage the loss of self-esteem.

Every reaction stems, directly or indirectly, from the lack of self-esteem.

The Misfortunes of Friends

Introspect, go beyond your socially conditioned reactions, and touch your inmost senses. You'll probably find, indeed, the same instincts that led the French essayist to say that the misfortunes of friends are not entirely displeasing.

Think of how you felt about:

A friend who scored badly in a test in school.
A friend who failed to land that plump job.
A friend whose business venture failed.
A friend whose kid did not make it into the top school.
A friend who is going to be retrenched.
A friend who failed his interview.
A friend who got rejected by that hunk/babe.

Such is the insecure state of our being. An existence where our self-worth is measured by our success, usually relative to others, and how we are perceived.

Achievers and insecurity

A friend just told me that McKinsey employs insecure people.

But McKinsey is an internationally reputed consultancy. Why would they do that? Aren't insecure people supposed to be low in self-esteem and possibly even clinical?

Ah, that's where you're wrong.

I don't know the truth about the statement about McKinsey. But if it is, I'm not surprised at all.

The conventional stereotype denounces insecurity as something bad. According to Wikipedia, it is a feeling of general unease or nervousness that may be triggered by perceiving oneself to be unloved, inadequate, or worthless.

What this leads to is a fear of failure.

Insecure people fear failure. This failure is defined broadly as an inability to achieve the things one wants. In work terms, it is the fear of not delivering. In relationship terms, it is the fear of not getting the person one wants. Insecure people fear failure, because failure reinforces their sense of unease and inadequacy.

But it is a fear that drives a person to need to achieve. It consumes him everyday, in everything he does, and at nearly every moment. It is a powerful, compulsive emotion - the sort that can engulf and drive a person to commit extreme acts. Everytime he achieves what he seeks to achieve, he survives that fear. The achievement, then, offsets some of his insecurity.

You can hence imagine that many high achievers are in fact insecure beings.

Insecurity produces, basically, unhappy achievers.

Insecurity

Insecurity... a topic close to my heart.

I'll start with something provocative. Someone once said: "There is something not entirely displeasing about the misfortune of a good friend".

If you identify with this statement, you are insecure.

Death, my feelings and my fear

I am never afraid of dying, but I am afraid of death.
Death takes away the ones we love.
It leaves behind a void, one that may never again be filled.
Even if it is, the feeling is never the same again.

I have never lost any person I really loved.
My dad, mum and brother are all living with me.
The day my dad and mum depart will be the day there isn’t enough left for me to live for.
My brother would have a wife, and probably kids.
My girlfriend would have her family, and friends.
No one will need me anymore.
I can go in peace.

I had to bear with death more than once, and some really hurt.
My grandma was ill. I held her hands and controlled my tears. I knew she would be leaving.
Memories swarmed within me.
I missed the days I was a kid and she took great care of me. At night, she coaxed me to sleep. When I couldn’t reach the lights, she walked me to the bathroom, turned on the lights and waited for me.
She stood up for me. She honestly believed in me when others didn’t. She insisted I stayed in RI even after dad left his job and my fees were a burden.
She protected me. She let me play and conjured excuses for me.
All these feelings would never return.

I twice held death in my hands.
They were named Nollie and Pearto.
One never opened its eyes. The other survived two weeks.
I never want to relive those feelings again.

I can handle pressure, emotional stress and physical pain.
But I can’t bear losing one I love.
That, perhaps, is why I fear commitment.
I fear the feeling of losing someone to death.

Happy 60th Birthday, Dad

Today is dad’s 60th birthday.

To celebrate this day, some may invite friends, throw a banquet or collect presents. But not my dad, or my family. My family has never had the habit of celebrating or giving presents, whether on birthdays, anniversaries or festivals.

We build our home not on special gestures on a few isolated days, but on a lifetime of love and unwavering support.

This entry pays tribute to dad, who has been a defining influence in the 30 years of my life.

Tough dad.

There are men who are skilled at paying worthless attention and insincere compliments in a kindly, charming way. There are conversely those, like dad, who have a great deal of warm, genuine feelings, but are unable to express them kindly.

At school, when I gleefully announced my 98% test result to dad, he flatly reminded me that there was no reason to be self-satisfied since there was another 2% to gain. When I played, fell and needed 4 stitches above my eye, dad showed no sympathy; his words were: “last year 3 stitches, this year 4 stitches – well done, you’re improving”. When I went home devastated after my GCE ‘A’ level economics paper filled with questions I couldn’t answer, dad was passionless, asking me blankly: “how will crying help your next paper?”

But this was how dad built my resilience and endeavour. He drilled into me that if I win now, I can lose next; if I lose now, I can still win tomorrow. Life goes on. There’s always a silver lining in the clouds, just as there’s always the next higher lap to strive for.

Dad’s dictum was “spare the rod and spoil the child”. The cane was his weapon. The worst I recall was the day I had a cough, my brother ate one chocolate, then another one, and told me to report that I ate the second chocolate (to be fair to him, I did agree). When mum came home, she gave me such a good lashing for eating chocolates when I was coughing, that I soon chickened out and protested it wasn’t me. But my brother refused to admit it still. Soon dad came home, fetched the cane, and began whipping the truth out of us. Eventually my brother confessed, albeit somewhat unconvincingly. (Till this day I still can’t understand what made me agree to my brother’s ploy in the first place!)

So for a start, this is dad, a person whose touch hurts, whose voice jars, whose tempers play him false, who wounds the people he loves, but all these only in the very act of protecting and nurturing my brother and I.

Soft dad.

But dad has his softer side too.

One example, mysteriously, revolved around the cane. A couple of times, after dad walked off to his room and returned with the cane in his hand, I started to giggle, and then he started chuckling too. Where the humour was, I have no clue! But somehow something tickled me, I found it funny, and dad obviously saw something funny too. Each time this happened, I escaped the cane.

Another example were the times dad, my brother and I queued for our turns on PCMAN. Dad was absolutely hooked. I was envious how he could always stay up late into the night to try to break the record score. I wish I had a video camera then to film his sheer determination to ‘clear the dots’ before the ‘monsters’ got him. I am not sure if dad realises this, but PCMAN was great in retrospect, for it created precious times when dad shared light moments with my brother and I in our childhood days.

Dad always advocated self-discipline. But as though his obsession with PCMAN was not enough to shatter his façade of self-discipline, he decided to pay my brother and I to do his job of mopping the floor during school holidays and weekends. Sometimes he even allowed us to bargain. Well, I guess dad would argue that he was just teaching us that we have to sweat to earn money, and of course, it had nothing to do with laziness. I must say I’ve internalised this value completely today, to the extent that I’ve sworn never to do housework – if need be, learn from dad: just pay someone else to do it!

I have always been amazed by dad’s legendary snores. He produced music in his subconscious. At times, there wasn’t much of a melody: it was silence for several seconds, and suddenly he’d burst into a loud snort. Other times, it was rhythmic, where each wave begins with a gentle sniff, gradually increasing in decibel until it peaks into a snort, before lowering into a gentle sniff again. Once, I was in my room and dad was sleeping in the living room, and I swore I heard an engine throttling.

Down moments.

Dad, and mum too, did cause me some anguish. Mum didn’t find dad’s snores melodious, and soon banished him to sleep in the living room. I felt sorry for dad and tried to talk mum into ‘allowing’ him back into the bedroom, but was not successful.

I also felt sorry when dad had to work late into the night at home. The image of him working on the mahjong table in the living room when I woke in the middle of the night still languishes within me. That’s probably how I picked up the idea of working through the night myself.

And if those times I was sorry for dad, there were other moments when I felt greatly saddened. Most deeply etched in my mind were the occasions when I eavesdropped on dad and mum’s late night arguments in the kitchen, dad’s raised voice and mum’s sobs, loose talk of divorce and how life’s not worth living. I always returned to bed each time sobbing quietly to myself.

And of course, that day dad was leaving for Japan for a one-week working trip, gosh did I burst into tears!

From provider to supporter.

When I was young, I appreciated dad for driving me to school when it rained, for making a detour to ‘fly’ at Jurong Town Hall Road, and for buying my brother and I $230 worth of Mask toys after striking 4D. Dad was my provider – financially, and in little forms of entertainment. I did not have much freedom until secondary school and junior college but strangely, despite my mischievous orientation, I did not rebel at dad’s disciplinarian ways. I’ve never quarrelled with him and I’ve always accepted what he said even if I did not agree.

Dad continued to be my provider until my enlistment for National Service and then university. Something then changed, and he, and mum, turned from providers, to supporters. They were no longer providing for me financially, but supporting me physically and psychologically. Dad would send and fetch me from camp regardless of the time, buy my favourite local foods, pack them into parcels and post them to me in England. Nowadays, he brings my car for a wash when I’m overseas, sends my suits for dry-clean, takes care of my breakfast, lunch and dinner, and even bear with my dogs when I take them home.

These seem trivial but in truth, they are to me the most valuable presents one can ever get from his family. They are little things that done on a daily basis amount to much, much more than any token of gift-giving. And understanding Dad’s predisposed lethargy just makes each of these acts even more amazing.

There remains only one form of love in this world that I am not skeptical of, and that’s a parent’s love for his child. I have this confidence only because dad and mum have shown me, beyond any trace of doubt, that their love for me is unconditional. From them, I have the assurance that even if the world collapses and everyone betrays me, my family will remain as the one source of support that I can always count on.

Today.

Today, I am what I am – my strengths and flaws – because of dad. He has taught me never to settle for second best, never be self-satisfied. Like him, I am full of emotions but poor at expressing them. The interior monologues I have, the perfectionist in me, and even my social lethargy, they all have their roots in dad’s character and the way he has brought me up. I am far from perfect, but it is dad’s influence that has made me good enough to become the person I am.

Well, dad, in keeping with our family practice I don’t have a birthday present for you today. Instead, I’d like to tell you that I owe what I have in my life to you and mum. If there is one thing close to my heart, it is my inmost thoughts and feelings, which I have always kept to myself. It is in this blog that I store these thoughts and feelings, and I hope opening it to you from this day on will be worth more than any birthday present.

Happy 60th birthday, dad.