Updates (December 26, 2024)

Asian stories that drive life in the West … Here is a list. Life is complete with levels of different education and work???

1. When I was working at the largest buffet in my area (2016), the old senior Asian women pushed me out of the restaurant business and wanted me to aspire for a Western life. The best feelings and rewards are living out doing your dreams here in Canada/West. There is no downside if you are living out your dreams. The amount of skills, knowledge and experience you get from going out there living your dreams is 1,000,000,000x beneficial in the long run. No other experience can compare if you do your dreams and believe in yourself. Basically you have to obsess with your dreams at the end.
2. I remember being aware very young that education up to university graduate-level education (PhD) was the way to have fun and enjoy life “a bit”. When I looked into documentaries on TV, I saw Asian students and business entrepreneurs aspire for technical skills first. They learned Math at a young age and were forced to learn math and piano/violin. I knew this was right. But I also knew the Western way was right too. It was a combination of the two. More passion like the West though with lots of adventure and exploration. Teachers or people who say math is not worth it are not correct. Math is definitely worth it. But you have to approach it your way with drive, spirit and passion. There is a reason to study math. What is the problem you are trying to solve? What is “your problem”? Is there any “trauma” you need to address?
3. When I was 19-20 years old going to school at a diverse Scarborough university (2003-2004), I sometimes walked from the train station (Ajax GO Station) to home which took 38 mins through the industrial area of town. One day, I encountered a yellow Asian man walking to the train station from the industrial area on Fairall Street. He looked healthy and in high spirits. He was middle aged now like in his late 30s to early 40’s. I passed by him a few times and did not think much really. But I was very surprised to see a high spirited man who was healthy and who was Asian. One day I projected to him a question, “What is the purpose of life for a yellow Asian man in the West?”. He replied it was “to study and work hard to be proud and healthy.” There was no racism, no buffer. It was human to human. Now I am middle aged. Now I realized it can be more healthy and more proud by working with people who are smarter and nicer than you. It can be independent and also be collaborative to have more and both. When you work with people like Ben Cybulski then the drive can be universal and helpful which is more than a typical drive or interest.
4. There are lessons learned from encountering the negative things in life that can happen in the West. I avoided the worst of the worst because when I was in Grade 9, I accomplished a really good thing. I studied CompTIA A+ computer technician certificate and was published in the Greater Toronto Area (GTA) computer newspaper. I was 14 years old at that time and was one of the youngest IT certificate holders. I read that a 15 year old Asian guy accomplished it too and so I did it. I had image to keep up since 14 years old. When I finally went to work in my field at 35 years old, I encountered smarter and more savvy people in tech, I was humbled and kept going. So you do what you like and seek employment in your field. Then you realize you have a skill but it maybe overshadowed by others. So you keep on trucking until you are pretty specialized 5 years later. It takes an average of 5 years to go from novice to something worthwhile. For me I had to focus on my problems and passion to make something of value to myself first. Then things grew from there.
5. more …

Problems running a review site:

• You have to review and learn everything to have the enough knowledge and material to present. Too much to do? Or does it become normal after awhile? Every new product is a minor feature add/tweak?
• You might be biased.
• You might have sponsorships and paid reviews …

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Problems running a computer repair store:

• You live at the computer repair store. You are there 24/7 as it is an independent time consuming business.
• You have to research and know so much. You have to know more than the textbooks, “encyclopedia”, documentation, The Internet, all the generations of technology since the 1980’s. You get into the groove and mindset of a seasoned 20+ year technician. You become the know it all … but not the know it all.
• You are at the mercy of developers and Microsoft/Apple. You wait for the latest updates and patches and see what it fixed and bugged out. You stay on Microsoft update forums to see what problems have arisen and wait for developers to release a patch. You sit and wait. The customers sit and wait.
• You sit all day in the office reading and keeping up-to-date. You literally have to become an encyclopedia. But the trade off is that you are an smart, smart encyclopedia. You are a smart, smart guy with health and a sharp mind.
• You don’t fix the bugs.
• You aren’t specializing. You are a jack of all trades. Specializing in programming or web development gives you a larger angle to address things. Programming or web development expands your mind to address more things.

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If you are not passionate and obsessed with what you are doing, then you are worried about “plausible stuff”. People and their problems are not your problems until it becomes a problem. Things like culture and race and preference may become a problem if you aren’t doing your passion and are obsessed with it.

I find some cultures obsessed with people and competition. The Western way is usually 90%-99.9999% passion and obsession. I grew up obsessed with computers quite a bit. When I meet “cultured people” with their competitive culture and people control, I am usually at a loss because they believe in education and career status as paramount rather than passion.

The competitive cultures think you are in competition with them and try to cut you down and stop you. They even try to convert you and change you to think like them. But the reality is what you do normally when you are alone is what it life in the West. But the competitive cultures think you are still competing and make this an issue. So at the end you walk away from them. It takes 1 or 2 generations born in West to dismantle this behaviour. That is why I work with Ben and Dmitry.

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The dark side of life. I have had a good run. I accomplished a good amount of things. It is because I paid attention and did not go to the dark side of life. The more you play in the dark side of life, the more you crave it and it may break you. It is good to stay doing what I have been doing. All you have to do is play your cards right. The rewards are world-class.

But at the end, you should be doing what you like with obsession so you stay in the green and achieve those milestones. It is simple like that. Don’t mess around …

The glint in your eyes of your youth matters the most. You can not lose that.

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The funny thing about life when you are born in the West …

You are programmed and taught that life is about learning, do your passion and then work hard and live and start a family …

But if you stick around longer at the learning and exploring stage, you push yourself to develop and explore more and with the help of Ben and other people who are mature, mature (people that don’t get in your grill and complement and help you and push you with open ideas) you get that space and power to develop and play. “Play in space”. After awhile you have that thinking and option to “play in space”. It is surreal. Took me years and years and to work with Ben and Dmitry.

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The cool thing about staying out long enough to learn is that when you have worked with Ben and Dmitry for so long you have accomplished something really good …

What we develop is pretty out there. The range is high. And it keeps going further as we continue to update and work together.

That is abnormal.

When you get to this level and work in it for so long, it become normal and you then can see past normal things and rise above conventional thinking. You rise above others in their thoughts and can have leverage and transform peoples thinking and ideas about a lot of things.

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The cool thing working with Dmitry Nefedov is his mission. He is determined to update his projects and have his Sophia projects to be stable and not cause any misfunction. That is such a great thing to do for life and as a passion. The scope is large but he manages to do so, so well.

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The cool thing about Ben Cybulski is how he looks at things. He is innovative and finds humanistic ways to use the computer better. He is doing the right things. He is not driven by money or fame. He is driven by principle.