Blame It on the Pop

don't worry even if the sky is falling down.

hyperbolic discounting

“Hyperbolic discounting” – a tendency to weigh immediate costs too heavily and ignore longer-term benefits. Took me a while to find this term that is kind of fitting of my present predicament. heh. Economics seems to have a term for everything. I am, perhaps , trapped in this discounted paradigm. High paying job offers are really a pity to let go. Maybe the time isn't right yet. Maybe I should concentrate at the job at hand first and focus on graduating early. It's too early to tell anything.

perhaps my supervisor is right. just perhaps.

pity

Sometimes when the whole world is turning in your favor. Opportunities just drops from the sky like rain. Imagine you were getting yourself ready to run out into the rain to collect all the opportunities when you felt a hand holding you back. You turned your head only to hear him say,"Opportunities like these will come again." You struggled to break free and he held on tighter. Frustrated, you went back inside the house and stared out of the windows. The drops of opportunities splashing on the ground; wasted. Now, I would have to write an email to reject credit suisse as well. :(

its really excruciating to see job opportunities slip away like that..

"you should not be looking for work now."

it keeps coming back to haunt me. how can I not? I am graduating in dec.

tired

When I knocked on his door, I was expecting him to be more supportive on my plans to seize a job opportunity. I naively believed that we share the same belief - the purpose of education is to ultimately prepare the student for work. Though I thought I had a strong case, but there was no room for negotiation. My request to take a 3 months no pay leave was rejected. His argument being that if he approves this, it will set an example for other students to follow. This was despite the fact that I was willing to delay my graduation by 3 months. There was no institutional red tape. The minimum length for studentship will still be fulfilled.

I had lived my life grabbing opportunities with both hands, I was not about to let this opportunity slip away like that. "Opportunities like these will come again."he said. But before I can tell him how much I want to become a quantitative analyst, he made this stand clear. "you should not be looking for work now. you should be concentrating on your research."..."you look for work only when I have decided that you have done enough." Enough for him is 3 journals publications. "Why do some masters student get to graduate without even a single conference paper? I might as well publish 4 and graduate with a PhD." I thought to myself. But right then there was no need for such useless irresponsible statements of comparison. "I cannot allow you to go. I do not believe this internship is best for you." There. He made a decision for me which my parents would not even make. Much that I would like to tell him that my decisions are my responsibility to bear. There is no need to create more bad blood.

I kept quiet and rested my case. There was no point in trying to convince him to see how good an opportunity this would be for me. I hope to graduate as soon as possible. He, on the other hand, hopes that I will stay in research to publish more papers. I am not an academic paper mill.

i should take a rest. take a long holiday.

the red queen says..

"Be what you want to be. Or if you'd like it put more simply- 'Never imagine yourself not to be otherwise than what it might appear to others that what you were or might have been was not otherwise than what you had been would have appeared to them to be otherwise.'"

give yourself a pat on the back if you manage to decipher this

what is your ikigai?

or rather, what is your reason for waking up every morning? This is one of the key questions Dan Buettner asked when searching for the reasons behind longevity. Dan Buettner is a holder of 3 world records for endurance bicycling. It is during his bicycling trips when he became interested in the blue zones . What is common among these centenarians is that all of them have their own ikigai - their reason to wake up every morning. For some of them it is the moment of holding their great grand children, for others it could be something as simple as the desire to fish for his family. Yes, you heard me right. A japanese centenarian goes out to catch fish 3 times a week for his family. I asked myself the same question now. What do I look forward to when I wake up every morning? I have figured out mine. So what yours? Go figure.

Catch you around in yr 2090!