Life and Terms after Socialization with Vietnamese
I have been reflecting after Vietnamese socialization in the West a lot …
Here are things I mustered up to solve issues with myself as a Vietnamese born in the Canada/West:
| Why study maths, physics and programming? | Vietnamese have a culture that has 2 viewpoints: 1. Tradition, 2. Evolving to work with globalization while keeping tradition. The policy in Vietnam right now is to become a scientific country to just stay relevant. Times are changing. But I also realize you need both. You need tradition and need to grow. It is in your blood to seek both really. You don’t realize this until you meet and are asked the questions that matter. Somehow you grow and manage that by socializing with other Vietnamese wherever they are. There is probably always someone there you can work with and learn from. Or you will search for it until you are fulfilled through travelling and books. Travel is most important then. The environment will show you. But also tradition is not backwards like we think in the Western sense as Vietnamese born in the West. Tradition kept Vietnam an independent country. And the old culture and values can push Vietnamese to stay resilient and push through. |
| What is at the end of young adulthood? | It is maths. You just think in maths like Westerners at the end of the day. You want that mind where you can calculate and partition and make decisions based on economics and problems and solutions. You got to move forward and work with the higher ups in society to feel good and have your math skilled personality you built over the decades play out. That is the driving force. To have the high maths skills play out in the top. It is addicting and makes the person who has the most logical mind thrive and feel good and make calls. Being emotional when you are young is fine and is for growth and experience. But being still so emotional in the West only gets you so far. You need a combination of emotional math growth I think to reach farther into the network. It can be calculative. |
| How do you get to know this and apply this? | After working basically fulltime nights stocking shelves, I said to myself I would rather live like a thinker in the West than stock goods. Live thinking and doing my thing instead of the capitalist thinking of just better efficiency in providing goods. I would live my life however I want and see that aftermath of ‘me’ trying to do stuff. I worked in my field and found the smart and great people and we started collaborating. Just working in your field you will then meet the remarkable people really. You eventually get up there. I was young traveler for 33 years eating junk food until I changed in 2017. Now after 8 years in August 13, 2025, I can market and teach a bit. |
| Why don’t you talk directly to other Vietnamese who are in the phase of growing and changing? | Usually it is the Vietnamese women from Vietnam who have lived in the West for 10+ years who have children of their own born in the West running their own businesses understand how to make ends meet. They understand life pretty much … full circle. They are able to make the decision to have kids in the West. That is incredible feat. The Vietnamese men in the West are trying to open more and do more and also assert themselves maybe. But at the end, the Western model of thinking that is so open is at the end to think about. The conclusions we make as Vietnamese people is ‘cultural’??? It is important to keep and learn about Vietnamese culture as it is in our blood and history. Basically we need to learn our culture and eat and celebrate who we are over the last 10,000 years. But more is to search and learn and evolve both ways. The Vietnamese one and the Western one and try to work at it growing it both. That is why there is South/East and West. We definitely need our South Eastern ways to touch down and feel complete and in sync. We need to grow and keep growing our understanding and to keep evolving or else we can not think and can not apply ourselves to have a full life. Tradition and culture should not be seen as backwards. Vietnamese who have lived or born in the West have this perspective that thinks everything ‘coloured’ is backwards. There is an angle you can create to think the way our people are is forward. If you don’t have a forward thinking about your culture, you go and just develop it over time. You are the person knowing what you know and you just have to develop it. You are the person who develops. This will take time but honestly it is just doing your thing really. Doing your thing will evolve one day after learning, learning from others, and learning from the greats. You eventually have your own thing going. It just takes years and years and even decades after you played out and tried out every scenario. You at the end of the day yearn for more. You just do more. You will even have to challenge yourself and each other to do more and be more. At the end, you stagnant and feel the need to rework. Or in another way keep refactoring and adding more features. Exercise your mind. Most people don’t reach this stage … But the trick is really to keep at your craft really … like really focus for decades and see … |
| What I learned and realized? | In the West, it is always growing and growing. You have to meet people in your life that also sees this growing and growing and not stopping. That will do 2 things. 1. Keep you positive, 2. Keep you healthy. But the problem is if you focus on growth all the time, you must find a wife that also accept the always growth and being with you regardless of anything negative in the world. |
| What do you do after realizing this above? | We all suffer in the West in some shape or form. That is the life of living modern in the West. When you are born in the West, you one day look for your ‘start’. You look for your homeland culture for understanding of who you are and come from. Then you realize you still have to walk while doing this searching. You keep growing and working and doing and suffering with others. You are in it together with other people who may have it different or worse??? Keep walking growing and suffering as a Vietnamese person in modern times. |
| What my dad says … | Who got to be smart. Keep getting smarter in everything to have a good life. Be smart to make the calls and make the decisions for yourself so you don’t get used and abused. Get the job that you want by learning and doing the best you can. |
| What does the Western lifestyle do? | Too many options and unlimited thinking that can cause depression and unhappiness. The Western system has unlimited expression and unlimited choices. That can cause fatigue and restlessness. Therefore keep doing you. And see where it takes you after years and decades. I made the decision to change in 2012. |