Back to Work

My trip to California and Oregon was a welcome break. To revisit a different world and way of life to what one has not experienced enough; the West Coast vibe, the spectacular scenery such as the California coastlines and surrounding hills, desert landscape (Anza-Borrego Desert State Park), Oregon parks and waterfalls, Portland with it's quirky atmosphere, Willamette Valley and Silver Falls State Park. Wedding was the best I have attended, a young couple with bright, fun spirit and their visible love and affection; reception in a former Orchard under beautiful blue sky, drinking wine and meeting wonderful people.

We rented a house with a pool in Orange County near the church and reception venue, to avoid the traffic coming Menifee. The house was beside a park where I walked in the morning with other regular park goers; mostly Asian living in the neighborhood which made me feel more at home. I always loved Los Angeles having lived here in my youth; living with my father and brother working on a real estate project, going to work in a factory in City of Industry from our home in Glendale. Old memories came back to me especially of our trips along the highway, visits to Las Vegas, travelling the Pacific Coast highway from San Francisco to Los Angeles.

I have been to Los Angeles a few times since moving here nearly 15 years ago. I always have good memories of California;  of the feeling of freedom and being in the future. The wedding made me understand time is indeed moving fast plus my approaching retirement in a couple years. I wondered if my life had gone as planned. I looked tired and old in the wedding pictures; with old memories and old ways of thinking. I imagined that visiting California and Oregon would return me to my youth, to make me see the world as a young man and be imbued with new ideas and purpose. It was a fleeting feeling on the days after I returned home.

I completed one course on mindfulness and meditation and completing another. Based on evidence, the practice of meditation and mindfulness are proven ways to transform the mind. This will be the way to change not just a trip or vacation to the West Coast! I also started a new session with an experience therapist using my company benefit. My minds tries to go back to old patterns of toxic rumination and on consciously reminds one self to keep one's mind away from the gutter. My daily practice makes me aware of these thoughts and to seek a different framework of think; one filled with hope, optimism and light.

Running the Years

I will be in Los Angeles for my niece's wedding. Afterward, I will be in Oregon to visit my son. It will be a good vacation seeing my brother in California and revising my son. The wedding is a significant milestone in our clan's life as the first marriage of our children.  The years have gone by quickly with the challenges of life affecting our generation: 2 first cousins with a stroke, another dead with a stroke as well, and nieces and nephews growing up getting married and having kids.  

I also have my own challenges at work with the younger generation coming up and we struggle through the changes in the company, meeting new people, and adjusting to technology changes like artificial intelligence. Last week a project I managed went live with almost zero issues which is a rarity as people rush their projects to go live and meet deadlines without proper testing and preparation. Our team got a lot of praise, some from top management and I got credit for leading the project.

It is a welcome development for me as I am in my new or rather old role as project manager, surviving the last year as scrum manager without proper training and support and with our preparation from management. I survived the transition with meditation, reflection, and a little therapy; using this situation to get more training and learn new subjects like artificial intelligence.  AI is heralded to be a watershed like the coming of computers that will change all facets of life.

I have heard such stories before with blockchain, digital currencies like Bitcoin, and other new technologies that did not quite meet their potential. I will soon purchase an electric vehicle: a VW ID4 standard, the cheapest SUV that one could get, and claim the tax credit. Learning to live with an EV would be different and would be perfect with the solar panels I installed last year. In the twilight of my career, I still try to be relevant by keeping up with the latest trends and get the same feeling I got reading Alvin Toffler's 'Future Shock' which heralded a new world.

I just read the book about having a digital mindset, as if the mind can be molded into something new, to adapt to this new world of massive data and artificial intelligence that somehow would change one's life.  I reflected on the way my mind has worked all these years as I cleared out the stuff in my garage, my impulse buying of new gadgets, the chaotic way I tried to store these stuff and eventually donate or sell these items in the Facebook marketplace; realizing that my mind was working on impulses and daydreams perhaps with a touch of ADHD.

I realize that that type of mindset made me succeed in my role these past many years until it did not; I got overwhelmed; not realizing that I had sunk into a hole of my own making until I managed to crawl out. Management was not exactly the best and one had to accept and live with the situation. But I got out into the light with new technologies and ways of thinking to discover and thrive in.