Have a lot to write about, but haven't had much time

I haven't been able to do due diligence towards my blog in recent months, and I apologize (to myself and to anyone who reads this) for that. There's a lot I've wanted to write about, but haven't found time to do so.

I've been deeply mired in a lot of emotionally draining circumstances in the past few months, and I'd be lying if I said that things are going splendidly. My mom found (another?) tumor in her neck, though it's still benign. Meanwhile, in my dorm, the escalation of some tension has culminated in some hate crime against me again, and far more clear in intent than just some chewed up gum on my door handle.

One of the works of art on my door

I love me some good whiteboard vandalism.

Fortunately, a lot of the people I am close to have lent me a lot of emotional strength, whether they know it or not, either by directly being there for me or by being an inspiration because their experiences I use as a blueprint for resiliency and growth. This past weekend at SBS spring retreat alone, I've witnessed the human spirit wrestling with weight much heavier than that which I bear, and that allows me to continue forward. It allows me to fight hate not also with hate but with love:

Take that.

In reflecting on this recent stuff, I am reminded of something I learned in CS 124 last quarter during the unit on sentiment analysis. When it comes to affected experiences, they can actually be classified in one of five ways called Scherer's Typology of Affective States:

• Emotion: relatively brief episode of synchronized response to the evaluation of an external or internal event as being of major significance (e.g. angry, sad, joyful, fearful, ashamed, proud, elated, desperate)
• Mood: diffuse affect state, most pronounced as change in subjective feeling, of low intensity but relatively long duration, often without apparent cause (e.g. cheerful, gloomy, irritable, listless, depressed, buoyant)
• Interpersonal stances: affective stance taken towards another person in a specific interaction, coloring the interpersonal exchange in that situation (e.g. distant, cold, warm, supportive, contemptuous)
• Attitudes: relatively enduring, affectively colored beliefs, preferences, and predispositions towards objects or persons (e.g. liking, loving, hating, valuing, desiring)
• Personality traits: emotionally laden, stable personality dispositions and behavior tendencies (e.g. nervous, anxious, reckless, morose, hostile, envious, jealous)

I think the recent months have consisted of a lot of negative emotion, but my mood has stayed afloat through a few experiences that have assured me that the negative things are merely episodic, and that even in the midst of such episodes there are people who are there to catch me. That can't be said for everyone, and I'm lucky because it's a very, very good place to be.

Additionally, I have been doing a lot of thinking catalyzed by my psychiatry class. It's on Modern Relationships from a Couples and Family Therapy Perspective, and it's incredibly eye opening. Between that class, conversations I've had with N- and E-, and SBS spring retreat, I've had a lot to think about. Expect stuff on (aka note to self:) negativity threshold and the relationship tension escape velocity, equilibriation and re-equilibriation, relationship resonance, first-order and second-order change, n-dimensional behavioral cones, regret vs. guilt, dynamic vs. static conversations, and what drives my decision-making on personal matters to come.

Quick couple of thoughts

Really busy this month so not much time to do a thorough update, but just a couple of things:

1) I'm realizing there's a lot of small things that can make me inordinately happy if I learn to recognize them. I was at Starbucks one Monday morning trying to get a coffee, and the cash register froze just as I made my order. I was waiting there for like 40 seconds (i.e. not much time at all), and the cashier apologized for making me wait and told me the coffee was on them. I was happy about this for like two weeks following. This is the first time after starting to read Search Inside Yourself by Chade Meng-Tan that I actually felt that yes, mindfulness exercises do work. I definitely am buying into it more now, and want to work on that.

2) I realized I never want to work at a place that I'm not proud enough to own working for. This might seem obvious, but it never seemed more obvious than when I was at a startup career fair held by the CDC. There were two tables in particular that made me particularly grateful of where I am career-wise and the privilege I have in not having certain pragmatic concerns be as pressing (e.g. income).

The first was a conversation with a guy from a company that sells gifts for men, and they are shipped in this wooden box with a pathetic mini crowbar. I found myself standing in this crowded space with a lot of, as far as I can tell, code zombies/monkeys with this guy shaking a small crowbar at me telling me how awesome his company, which as far as I can tell is full of men that subscribe to some stereotype of certain gender roles, and I just thought to myself "I am so happy that I am not you."

The second was a conversation from a different guy whose elevator pitch had this hook: "Do you want to win $1000? Come play in our Angry Birds competition!" This was already a pretty big red flag for me, but I heard him out, and my gut reaction was right. His career fair giveaway was two wristbands to an open bar in Palo Alto, and I found myself so relieved that I feel like my passions and personal sense of identity are captivating enough that I don't need to use the possibility of winning money or the promise of alcohol/other material goods to fascinate the people around me.

These two conversations made me realize how hollow and empty I'd feel working somewhere I didn't enjoy. If short, 5-minute conversations could seem like they were sucking the life out of me, imagine what 40-hour workweeks would feel like. Blech. I promptly left the startup career fair. (I felt much more at home at the social impact career fair the following day, although even there some of the companies present just felt greasy and fake.)

3) I'm doing this thing where I try to watch a TED talk every other day, amounting to 3 TED talks or so a week. This can be while I'm waiting in lines, between classes, in the restroom, whatever (this whole smartphone thing is pretty neat). I realized that in the process of working towards my degree within the infrastructure of formal education, I've lost sight of the joy of learning for the sake of learning. I rarely do leisure reading any more. I'm determined to change that, and TED talks are conveniently digestible, free, and interesting. I definitely feel like watching more of these talks makes me the 21st century equivalent of "well-read" in that I am more open-minded, keeping up with developments in fields that I care about, and generally becoming a more intellectually interesting person.

Thanksgiving

I haven't had a chance to do much introspection recently between classes, SBS, RAing, and Gaieties, so a more comprehensive post will probably come after finals are over.

With that said, I have thanks to give!

I am thankful for my friends. For this past quarter, I've felt like I'm in my own world. I don't have the people who I feel closest to and who know me the best around me on a day-to-day basis the way I've had in the past, so I've been more alone than I would like. But despite this aloneness, I don't feel too lonely. There are people to catch me if I fall. I hope they also know that I am here to catch them as well, even if I'm not physically around them.

I am thankful for my family. I'm not in the business of convincing myself that my family is perfect, but in spite of all of the strife and all of the rifts between my family, I have people in my life who value (in some way, anyway) my being part of their family. If nothing else, it means there are always people from whom I can learn and grow from, even if I don't feel like I'll ever become emotionally close with them. And of course, my mom has been among my biggest supporters since forever ago, even from hundreds of miles away.

I am thankful for my health. Many of the goals I have would be unattainable or much more difficult if I weren't as physically healthy. Sure, I'm not the pinnacle of good health. Between eye infections and fevers and just the common colds, there are days, maybe a few weeks at worse, that just downright suck. But I'm lucky that the word I had to use there was "days" and not something longer.

I am thankful for the countless of unsung individuals in my life who I take for granted. There are a lot of nameless faces who somehow improve my life, from custodial and kitchen staff in the dorms and dining halls, to the emergency medical personnel I've been able to rely on during on-call crises, to the classmates in section who reached to help me pick up a pen I dropped without hesitation. It turns out there are a lot of people who want the best for you, just in very little, less visible ways. I need to remember that when I'm going through personal struggles.

I am thankful for coming out of difficult times still with the capacity for love and trust and optimism. I don't think I'm wearing rose-colored glasses the same way I was in the past in that I don't try to coerce my perception of any given moment into something splendid. However, I am comfortable facing the reality that things might not be going well and still believe that they can and will get better, particularly if I do something about it. That's something I hope I don't ever lose, because I've seen what not having that looks like. There are people I know personally who, in the aftermath of particularly frustrating or upsetting experiences, adopt a mindset characterized by insatiable cynicism and general jadedness. It's downright paralyzing, and not how I want to live.

Happy Thanksgiving everyone!

Dad's Postcard and Care Package

My dad insisted on driving me to the airport, just like he insisted on dropping me off at Stanford before the school year started. He's back from his business trip to China (perhaps "business trip" to "China") now. He gave me a postcard with a penguin on a polar bear that, in a nutshell, said:

It made me sad to see you and your sister fight.

The divorce will be legally processed by the end of the month, and afterwards I will be going overseas and who knows what your mom will be doing. Both of us are in poor physical health. For all you know, the two of you might be the closest family either of you have shortly. You guys should get along.

I have one New Years' wish. I wish you guys would add me on Facebook. You guys are 18 now, I'm not trying to control your life. Please add me so I can know how you guys are doing.

Know that your mom and I will always love you very very much. You can always talk to us about anything.

Love, Dad 1/5/12

And my thoughts about it? Fuck you dad. It makes you SAD to see us fight? Boo frickin hoo. How do you think it makes us feel when you and mom fight, hmm? Both of you are in poor physical health? Maybe if you and mom stayed together, lived together, and looked out for each other like you had for the 16 years before my junior year, like my mom did for you when she saved your life in Michigan. And don't you use Facebook friendship as a starting point for repairing the damaged father-child relationship. If you want to get on better terms with us, you better talk to us, face to face, and tell us honestly everything you've done for the past two years, like we've beckoned you to do on numerous occasions. Maybe then we'll start to open up to you and trust you again. It's hard to give you the benefit of the doubt on anything when you've cheated on mom. It sounds resentful, but it will take much more effort than social networking to set you on the right path again. I don't like holding grudges, but I feel justified, for myself and for mom, in holding this grudge.

~~~~~~~~~~

Today was my second day back to Stanford after winter break and first day of winter quarter. I spent the majority of my day upstairs in K-, K-, and L-'s room, and some time in those hours they had sneaked together, put all of their stuff in a box, packaged it, wrote a meaningful note on origami paper and folded it into a flower, and delivered it to the doorstep of my room. And at midnight, they misled me into thinking they wanted to watch How I Met Your Mother so I'd go downstairs to get my hard drive, and I found it at my doorstep.

At first I had no idea what it was, and I asked my roommate about it, and he didn't say a word about it. He just shrugged even though he knew who was behind it. Very thorough planning on the part of K-, the deliverer. It was addressed to "Larry Lewis Liu" so I was able to narrow it down to a few people who knew about the middle name that K-'s friends gave to me.

I took it upstairs to try to find L-, who I thought was behind it because he said he had a present for me, but to my surprise, there were like 8 people in my RA S-'s room. At that point, I knew whatever was up was a bit bigger scale than I expected. I opened it, and the cardboard flap that opened up from the top the box said "CARE PACKAGE :)"

Turns out, over break, eleven of my dormmates had collaborated and decided they'd each bring me something that represented where they were from. From snacks, to soap, to homemade desserts, to magnets, to a hat (that is arriving in the actual mail soon!), to a book by an author I enjoy. There was a card written in an origami flower that L- folded, in which they each wrote an adjective or descriptive phrase they liked about me. I was speechless. I managed to choke back tears long enough to give everyone a hug and then excuse myself and leave under the guise of bringing the box back downstairs.

I have never felt so warm and loved before. It's an incredible feeling. And they couldn't have given it to me at a time when I needed it more. I was at an emotional low after cleaning out my room in preparation for selling our house, going over divorce paperwork with my mom, and my dad's postcard in the last few days of break. My last class of the day was a lecture for a class titled Love as a Force for Social Change, and as interested as I am in the class material for the sake of acquiring knowledge and education, all the anecdotes that the professor and students shared about how love has manifested itself in their lives only made me miserable because I did not have anything to share that was remotely as cherished as my colleagues cherished theirs.

I could not have asked for a better cohort of dormmates. No matter what happens, I will treasure for forever the past five months I've spent with them and the six to come.

Mistletoe! and thoughts on niceness

This was from StanfordGirlProblems, but it's great. Made me smile so hard and feel all giddy inside.


On an unrelated note, two days ago C- asked N-, S-, and I what was one thing I valued. Her own answer was niceness, because it is underappreciated and taken for granted. My initial reaction was that it is not underappreciated because nobody dislikes nice people. But then I thought about it a bit more, and it made sense. When people are really smart, or have a great sense of humor, or something like that, such a thing is often verbalized in a compliment. It's definitely far rarer to hear "you're just really nice." Maybe it's because the opposing complement (not compliment) of niceness is being mean or rude, which if you are you're just a terrible person, and so it's expected that you're not that, and thus are nice. Exceptionally nice is not distinguished from nice. Meanwhile, if you don't have a great sense of humor, you're not any less of a good human being, and so it's not expected that people will have good humor.

Every day

Pretty much every day.

Something not very everyday happened to me today, and I want to be sure I don't forget it. I can't remember the last time something made me smile so hard.

For three weeks, D- has been trying to talk to me. All I knew was that it was on an awkward conversation topic, so admittedly I hadn't exactly been actively trying to have that conversation with her. She finally caught me after school yesterday.

I've been acquainted with D- since 8th grade, but would actually have considered us friends only starting last year. She changed a lot in those 3ish years, becoming a lot more cynical and dubious, far less trusting and sunny and bubbly. Over the past year, she's said a lot of things that have stung quite a bit, but it made me kind of really determined to crack her shell. Especially one email she'd sent me that really struck me, in which she scathingly berated me for being too idealistic, having my head stuck in the clouds, and naive.

Today, the conversation actually happened. By happened I mean D-'s friend who knew what's up pretty much dragged her to me and was like GO TALK and she had no choice. There were a few other people tagging along that didn't know what was going on so we left them for a remote staircase away from all other life forms.

I realized over the course of the conversation that I'm absolutely horrible at accepting gratitude? Not really the right phrasing, but I dunno I'm horrible at taking compliments or the like. I found it prudent to poke fun at D- while she was telling me everything and I'm pretty sure I came across as rude and insensitive, because it was pretty easy to tell that the conversation was difficult for her. In fact, she gave me a nice long hug, which is totally out of character for her, and I was totally taken aback. I just ended up quoting Sheldon, in all his awkward glory: "there there." Go me...

The gist of the conversation was about how she was sorry for being really bitchy to me in the past few months to a yearish, and how she's going to miss me once I graduate because there's nobody in her class like me. This made me feel so wonderful asdj;foiaw;eo. She also used a funny metaphor about how there'll be a "big larry-shaped hole" in her life, which of course I haaaad to point the oxymoron and I think I embarrassed her more UGH and I don't think she thought I was taking her seriously.

I realized that despite our love-hate relationship and all our jibes at each other, D-'s among the people I'm going to miss most once I graduate. And it's sad, because a lot of the people in my grade I've had classes with for nearing 7 years now, and I'm not going to miss them nearly as much.

I also feel privileged. Maybe that's just me being self-centered, but I feel like I got to glimpse a side of D- that she doesn't show to many people (or anyone?). If we didn't have that conversation, I'd be pretty damn convinced she's just cynical of everything and everyone (goes back to that email), but now I feel rather victorious. I've heard things from her friends about how she was like years ago, but the years haven't seen to have done her faith in humanity any good. I'm so glad I didn't graduate with a misconstrued impression of who she is.

Speaking of everyday activities, I like this quote. I used a similar notion in one of my college essays, and it really resonates with what I value in a relationship, romantic or platonic.

"Appreciation is a wonderful thing: It makes what is excellent in others belong to us as well."

-Voltaire