Category: otherStrength

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dual_earning=THEIR main advtg over me

Posted on by tiger40490

 

k_divorce

This is a recurring sentiment about my US cmc peers. Most of my U.S. cmc peers have double income, well above me in terms of household income.
Jolt: Now I feel that’s about the only advantage they have over me.

  • wellness .. am better than majority of them
  • family harmony .. they are not better. Look at my bonding with my kids. YY.Tao?
  • marriage .. mine is more stable than many of them. H.Yi?
  • edu credentials .. mine is higher than most of them
  • long-term financial support by the state .. my gov is better than theirs by a large margin
  • pff .. despite their higher income, I don’t feel they are actually better off. This is just like latency race .. what’s enough? If we are well-off enough, then why envy those 50% richer?

— new: unstable marriage of two high flyers
[[Divorcing couples: a profile analysis]] finds “dual-earning couples often struggle with the management of multiple demands placed on them — earning money, the responsibility of maintaining a home and raising kids.” I have never questioned the advantages of dual_earning. Now I think there are a few DISadvantages.

  • the wife would be busier and have less time for kids
  • the husband must take on more parenting work
  • the wife (perhaps husband too) is more tired on more days
  • more conflict in marriage, leading to insecurity in kids.

Given the income disparity in my marriage, my wife is mostly supportive, rather than competitive and independent. Our parenting duties are well-organized.

Q (posed in 2020, 2021 or 2022): given the cashflow high ground, how could H.Y improve their marriage and communication.

A: professional couple counselling. This service costs a lot in the U.S.
A: hire a maid to reduce the home-making workload on each parent

Perhaps emigrate to a lower-income country where systems are less complex and everyday life simpler and more convenient.

Surprisingly, the high ground doesn’t provide enough of a buffer of protection against marital risks. The high ground improves risks related to family cashflow, but the high-earning wife is also very independent and doesn’t want to play a supporting role to the husband. Not a risk factor in itself, but in some cases, this can indirectly create new risks. Many divorce cases involve two high-income earners.

A lower-class stable couple (earning 100k/Y) look at the higher-class the Yi’s with envy. But would the Yi’s envy the stable marriage of the lower-class couple? I think Yi’s xpSelf would.

Now 100k/Y is well above the median household income, so why would this couple still envy the Yi’s. Would a $400k couple envy someone still higher? It’s endless like the low-latency arms race.

ctbz(寸土必争)[def]: micro-saving add up over5Y or involution #H2O

Posted on by tiger40490

k_ctbz  k_X_power_descriptor  k_soul_search

In popular usage, 寸土必争 has a wider meaning, but in my case, ctbz := Once I set a realistic and measurable target for my endeavor, I push myself to execute my plan with ruthless, clinical precision, often semi-consciously beating myself up whenever I deviate visibly.

寸土必争 is often a daily struggle, tough for everyone. Therefore it’s actually my competitive strength! Most adults or young people don’t monitor their burn rate, calorie-quota or regular exercise. The cumulative effect would eventually show up.

Among these scarce resources, usable time is the most scarce, available up to age 60 (only 55 for some).

This is a killer talent and a visible personal advantage. Among the specific talents, the most significant (used to be $$) is calorie-quota budgeting. It has long-term health benefits.

Among these endeavors, my success is most visible and decisive in $$, and least in time-saving.

This is one reason for my carefree life at this age when my peers endure stress. This (and other) freedom comes with responsibility.

— warning .. ctbz can be hazardous. With cherry, other eaters would discard half the flesh. However, due to ctbz, i try to eat all the meat off the core. This is actually dangerous. When I do this without full concentration, the stone can get stuck at the throat or go down.

— domain: water.. in mid 2022, I found joy in saving water. The small actions make me feel /righteous/?/ and earn me self-respect. It sharpens my perception on numerous water wasting scenarios that are often overlooked. The small savings add up to a modest amount, but the sharpened perception will help me score big wins.

— domain: diet
Polyclinic dietitian said .. without precision, calorie reduction will be futile.

calorie-quota is a similar concept to carbon-quota. Each country each year is given a quota. If you over use bit by bit, then someday you need to borrow from the future quota.
— domain: workout
flexibility (+ muscle) declines with aging and requires periodic stretching, perhaps a few seconds each day — ctbz
— domain: burn rate .. my burn_rate_control (ffree) is the front page success story.
Some people save for months then spend all the savings at year end.  Other people waste numerous small amounts of money on a monthly basis. Over decades they “throw down the drain” a painful portion (like 10-20%) of their income. elaborate planning of NY/SG trips is a case study.

See also ctbz on small spends

— domain: time micro-saving
My Focus on time utilization is a great example of my ctbz habit. Many people spend time (and $) in “fun” places that actually don’t create a lot of pleasure.

Large number of small time-wastage is similar to large number of small $-waste. Some of us feel the pain only years later when our peers make progress in their spare time (or their office hours).

— domain: divorce dispute (if it ever happens) .. Grandpa said that in the unlikely event, we need to fight to resist and never give in
— my ctbz attitude/habit is effective (in some but) not in all domains:
With early rise, I feel my 寸土必争 attitude may be unnecessary, possibly counterproductive.

Weekly coding drill don’t need 寸土必争. Momentum is more important.

 

##I told boy %%strength against addictive food++

Posted on by tiger40490

See also https://btv-open.dreamhosters.com/wp-admin/post.php?post=16866&action=edit and https://btv-open.dreamhosters.com/wp-admin/post.php?post=13129&action=edit

This blogpost had an initial focus on “addictive” and kids.

In 2019 I told my son that most people tell themselves they can’t live without starch, fried chicken, or any meat for that matter…. Now I realize I show a fairly remarkable internal strength over these addictive foods, similar to grandpa. Here are some notable examples:

  • French fries and round thin potato chips — are a real addictive food in my case.
  • sugary drinks — Raymond told me most kids are addicted. Prevalent in U.S. and Singapore lifestyle.
  • coffee — (almost always with sugar and creamer or condensed milk) is mildly addictive to many many people

On a separate note, many people can’t accept raw vegetable salad without salad dressing. Again, I have trained myself to overcome that dependency. Even though I have my limits on what raw vegetables I could swallow in non-trivial quantity, I am now more “flexible” than most raw veg salad eaters.

The body is weak because the temptation is often overpowering.

  • eg: home cooking temptation… I had numerous blogposts
  • eg: as an official, the temptation of corruption (Clinton) can reveal a career-killing weakness. Similarly, As a leader of a team, the temptation of favoritism towards certain individuals
  • eg: the big4 temptations of an American young adult — Sex, Drugs, Cars, Debt
  • eg: when I read CSY’s mail about radiologists, I react negatively (hopefully less than many people in my shoes), partly because other people’s envy is tempting

Broadly, temptations are arguably the #1 most prevalent, often most powerful, most destructive derailer (trouble-maker, show-stopper) in half the endeavors of an individual’s life. As powerful, as destructive as a F5 Twister in the movie.

Based on these and many other examples, it’s no exaggeration to say that temptations rule many lives and ruin many lives. Precisely because of that, /lackluster/dull/?/ interests, /weariness/?/, desensitized reaction .. is life enhancing. More than that, it is often a massive competitive advantage. Imagine, as a stock trader, if you are less affected by emotions [fear, greed…] and can operate more like a cold-blooded machine, you would have a huge advantage. You would get ahead pretty soon. This is a killer talent.

— Buddhism .. has a lot to say about these temptations, sufferings, detachments,
==== my desensitized zones:
— copying homework from classmates
— gambling
— addictive day trading
kinda similar to gambling addiction
— leveraged trading .. is seductive to many retail traders
— video entertainment on smartphone .. I can see 30% of the commuters are addicted.
I find it a very poor entertainment.
— arcade gaming .. in my teenage years in Beijing, I noticed that my cohort were more addicted. I used to spend an hour or so [1] in an gaming arcade and pop my RMB1 coins into the machines. I mostly [2] played the aircraft shooting-up game and never very good at it.

[1] my cohort were spending hours and hours
[2] my cohort were playing many more games, harder games.

— 耐得住寂寞 is related to temptations at a fundamental level. 耐得住寂寞 includes a wide range of endeavors. For some of them, if the practitioner is not tempted by the wrong things, then it’s easier to stick to the practice over a long stretch, and get ahead.

LocalSys self-learning is hard for me because of the temptations and distractions.

— sugary drinks or any drinks
My son has this addiction.
When I came to Singapore in my teenage years, I started to notice that diners always ordered some drinks for their meal.

— coffee .. is reported by many as a mild addiction. Coffee has many health effects. Fine coffee is quite an expensive lifestyle .
In my experience, I have found my life not even 0.001% diminished by my lackluster interest in coffee.

inter-personal^personal effectiveness: long-term

Posted on by tiger40490

These and other personal success stories reveal a theme different from the mainstream, traditional narrative like “interpersonal effectiveness outweighs self-management”

My success in wellness is all about self-mgmt (including …) Just compare to the guys around.

My success in persona finance is all about self-mgmt including long-term planning.

My success in tech job market is mostly about tech muscle building, a challenge of self-mgmt.

My success in terms of career longevity (dev-till-70) is mostly self-mgmt.

In family leadership, I think interpersonal effectiveness is important and I have limited success.

In organizational leadership (within my chosen career path), I would say interpersonal is still secondary to GTD and other capabilities.

##[21]me as knowledge specialist #Genn #Ash.S

Posted on by tiger40490

See also

Genn described some business article and hinted that my career might show some features of a specialist. It made me think about where I have some practical expertise, beyond the theoretical and academic expertise. As a good illustration of the difference of practical know-how vs theoretical expertise — Many developers (like Ash.S) have reasonable theoretical depth, but presumably better than me at GetThingsDone (which I can’t confirm).

[t=can teach]
[tt=can teach in a school]

  • U.S. immigration.. yes a lot of experience and personal insights, even though
  • — tech career
  • [tt] practical concurrency design? I guess I can spot more weaknesses in real designs, more than other observers can.
  • [t] java swing .. I actually have a lot of proven, hands-on know-how that most developers lack.
  • [tt] SQL queries .. a non-theoretical subject
  • c++ toolchain
  • [t] tech interviews + tech resume
  • — wellness
  • weight improvement, diet in general
  • raw veg diet
  • — school learning
  • exam preparation and other Grade 1-12 learning strategies
  • [tt] Learning English .. I have lots of personal insight to share with fellow Chinese speakers.
  • — financial
  • stock picking

Y ctbz plann4 NY↔SG trips #w1r1

Posted on by tiger40490

My 15 to 20 roundtrips constitute a rich reservoir of real experiences, involving many decision and lessons.

k_ctbz

By default, the same flight would inflict

  • either huge $cost in terms of biz class seat
  • or heavy stress on my “system”

My ctbz provided big savings on $cost and wellness. Looking back, I think my planning was (extremely) elaborate:

  • I learned from experience and optimized on transport cost, to the extreme. eg: I remember pulling 3-piece luggage on the street of White Plains..I had no choice but pull 2 pieces at a time.
  • Unable to sleep while sitting up, I learned from experience and optimized rest before and after the long leg of the connected flight.
  • I learned from experience and optimized/maximize the amount of family time, usually 9 days +/-. Also minimized forgone billing.
  • .. Many would point out that contractors are unlucky as we can’t afford to take these unpaid leaves, but looking back I have no regrets.
  • I learned from experience and optimized for tech learning, workout/stretch (dangerous?), blogging on the trip. I hand-picked reading materials for carry-on. See Q2.
  • I had to prepare for temperature change throughout
  • ^^^ Overall, I score myself 98 marks on ctbz/optimization and planning

Q3 (paradox): why did I /endure/ so much suffering [lost sleep, stress, headache..] , when I (supposedly) had a basic ffree and carefree ezlife?
A: I wanted to keep my U.S. job while keeping my GC alive. Without the GC, without the U.S. as alternative to SG, I would lose one major defense/cushion for family livelihood.
A: SG job market was/is tough and very limited. It has major impact on family well-being (beyond livelihood). In my previous SG jobs, I had work hazards in the form of traumatic experiences, deep scars, low self-esteem, job insecurity.

So the elaborate planning was part of the grand total cost of setting up my 2nd base i.e. the U.S. (SG being home base). This grand total cost covers IB4US and c++US periods. “Headache” is a common phrase to describe the elaborate planning but actually tongue-in-cheek.

Paradox –> My carefree ezlife was not so adequate, so comfortable after all. I still needed to sacrifice quite a bit for my family’s future.

Q2: what’s the total non-financial cost of each trip? Lost sleep, physical fatigue for sure.
A: I had lots of fun on each trip, starting from the night before. My elaborate planning was kinda active learning by experiment.
A: I had heightened/elevated motivation for tech learning on the trip.
A: I had some workout on the trip, too.
A: I needed to take precautions to avoid many common missteps, but the stress profile was kinda mixed positive/negative

level@confidence in effort^talent^luck

Posted on by tiger40490

k_not_only_luck

Background — locus@control blogpost

Q1: Examine the causes of some exceptional result in a person (not an organization). Which cause gives you more confidence — personal Effort of the individual, talent or external factors like luck, timing, advantageous location (SG/WallSt)  or the current favorable competitive landscape?

My answer focuses more on wellness than personal finance or career resilience. For career resilience, the competitive supply/demand/SWOT landscape is the backdrop (and the elephant in the room), so we can only compare effort vs talent against this backdrop.

Luck is, by definition, least dependable least consistent.

— Innate talent? Most people associate innate abilities with long-term reliability but I am skeptical. I don’t think there is any scientific experiment to measure these ill-defined qualities. How about

  • creativity in arts or writing
  • endurance of heart/lung/muscles
  • knee (and other) joint resistance to wear
  • aging of bone strength
  • aging of memory capacity
  • aging flexibility

— Reliability of our own effort is even more controversial. I have confidence in habitual effort of burn rate control (in me and other family members), tech xx (QQ, coding drill etc), but less in tough wellness regimes such as

  1. starch and fat restriction
  2. skip dinner
  3. home yoga
  4. pull-up

As describe [18] CONTINUOUS coding drill, the effort needs to become a sustainable (ideally lifelong) lifestyle element. Only then will it produce long-term benefit.

—-

Q2: if talent and effort are both less reliable than needed, then are we bound to lose the exceptional/excellent condition such as the current carefree life? (At the national level, is Singapore bound to lose it’s exceptional position? )
A: as far as my nuclear family is concerned, I am the best reliable pillar one can find, in both effort and talent, and also my judgement, but less reliable in my health.

This Q2 reveals the implicit relativity in reliability of individuals. Every human being is less than 100% reliable, in talent, in effort/motivation — This is beyond debate. However, (one aspect of) one individual can be more reliable than another individual.

Take wellness effort/habit as example. Compared to my age group, if my reliability is at least average, then the good results (above-average wellness condition) is likely to last. I can’t and don’t need to match the wellness effort of a super-healthy individual (who?); I only aim to be better than average. The average guy’s wellness declines at some rate. My decline is likely slower.

Therefore, going beyond wellness, my overall answer to Q1 is — I have more confidence in Effort than talent or external factors. Effort including motivation, habit, a focus on the right priorities.

— Singapore’s position?

PM LHL said “Singapore must guard that reputation zealously.”

My confidence in Singapore is more in the effort, commitment, attitude, trust in government, less in talent or geographic location.

The competitive landscape is the least reliable factor, offers temporary protection and advantage, always shifting and never to be taken for granted.

##what U r good@: U may perceive as important2everyone

Posted on by tiger40490

— eg: (OC) effectiveness through leadership vs individual effectiveness

  • “You can’t remain a hands-on non-lead developer past 40..”
  • “communication skill is more important than technical.”
  • “If you don’t deliver what the boss wants, then your hard work won’t be recognized” — is propagated by those who has that talent, like my ex-classmate lsagain.

— financial planning

  • eg : burn rate and non-work income — am good at these two fronts, so I consider them important to everyone. I still believe most people at my age struggle

I think ffree is indeed valuable to everyone, but my approach of ffree involves tough sacrifices like creature comfort, FOMO, and credit risk.

  • retirement planning — those who can claim how important it is for everyone
  • contingency reserve — those who has it claim how important it is for everyone. When disasters strike, this reserve is indeed important for everyone, but the unprepared still survive.

— wellness:

  • eg: yoga  — The practitioners believe from young kids to older adults, daily yoga practice is often required…
  • eg: BMI green zone — since I found a winning formula, I now advocate various fasting schemes
  • eg: daily exercise — some 4% of the population can work out 4 times a week and then believe it is important for everyone. Jenny Lu (MS) .. dev-till-70: 7external inputs
  • eg: longevity lifestyle — those who are able to follow such a (strict) lifestyle often advocate the importance of longevity, but for some people, the prospect of dying at 66 is not so regretable.
  • eg: healthy cooking — those who can cook claim we are what we eat…

— economy

  • eg: those countries able to “get into” life science claim that this industry is vitally important.
  • eg: those countries able to secure a strategic position in energy sector claim that energy security is about our survival.
  • eg: those countries able to maintain a strategic role in upstream digital transformation or knwoledge economy claim that it is the future.

— Other examples:

  • The citizens of China … boast of the advantages of “大国“.
  • eg: harmonious family, family activities — those who can achieve it often claim how important it is.
  • eg: “A happy child makes a hapy family”
  • eg: “train your kids from very young age to be independent”
  • eg: weekly 2-partner private time, common interest within a spouse… —
  • eg: “Every adult should learnt to drive, learn to cook”
  • eg: humor, joking is so very important…