Cats, Ignorance & Bliss.

Could being somewhat simple be a good thing?

I stare at the cat nested so comfortably on the sofa and wonder whether the simple, minimalist life that she is leading is more comfortable and peaceful than the complex, difficult life led by her owners who operate in an intricate world with many rules and high expectations. The cat closes her eyes slightly and purrs. I could see her grey, short-hair glisten in the lamplight in my living room and her chubby, round figure stretched out on as far as possible as she lay there and napped peacefully.

You have to live in a complicated way and to be a complicated person with many complex skills if you are going to succeed in society's incessantly fluctuate world during your evanescent life. As humans capable of high-levels of thought, we complicate things with our endeavors. But these complications are not natural; rather, they are constructed.

What should we do then? Revert back to our simple modes of life where everybody lived on farms or were hunter-gatherers? Or is it possible, in a technologically advanced civilization, to lead a simple life?

To me, the core source of humanity's mass-neurosis, our struggle with stress, our excess grief, is our limited processing capability. We are finite creatures living in the Information Age with limitless information at our finger tips. How do we process it all? How do we make decisions given we can no longer know all the possible facts? This realization of our physical limitations can be frustrating at times.

You see, the cat eats, the cat sleeps, and the cat plays. This sums up the life of a cat. Human beings, on the other hand, have no such limitations because of our brains. But great opportunity comes at a great cost. People become more advanced and they outrun themselves. Perhaps we should learn from the cat and keep a mindset that is content with simple things, while reaching for extravagant goals. Maybe the proverb was true that "with great wisdom comes great adversity". If adversity is a consequence of moving forward, then shouldn't we at least develop good coping habits to endure such adversity? Small things such as enjoying a simple meal, or an engaging conversation with a friend. Perhaps happiness is a state of mind that must be nourished with small, digestible experiences that we make pleasurable by choosing to enjoy them rather than overlooking them as insignificant in our monumental pursuits.

Being An INTP

What is an INTP?

Within the last year I've taken the Myers Briggs Personality Test and discovered I was an INTP. An INTP stands for Introverted, Intuitive, Thinking, Perceiving. It is one of sixteen personality types described by the Myers-Briggs Personality Test. Unlike most other personality tests, which are B.S., this test has a lot of nuances on it such that 90% of my friends who have taken it have said that their personality descriptions resemble them accurately. Sometimes, the personality test is scary because it reveals stuff about ourselves that we really didn't know previously. I recommend taking it online at www.personalitypathways.com or other free sites. It should take no more than 30-40 minutes.

How was the Myers-Briggs Test developed?

Isabel Briggs Myers and her mother Katherine Myers created this personality test based on Carl Jung's ideas about personality types (typology). To create their version of the test, the Myers interviewed individuals for forty years and took detailed notes on their unique idiosyncrasies. As a result of their research, they found 16 stereotypes, or common patterns of behavior. To organize the 16 types, they used 4-letter types. Each of the 4 letters can be either of two possibilities:

1. Extravert (E) or Introvert (I).
2. Intuitive (N) or Sensing (S).
3. Thinking (T) or Feeling (F).
4. Judging (J) or Perceiving (P).

Any given person has a unique combination of 4 letters. For example, my combination of letters (personality type) is INTP. I'll explain later what this means for me.

Extroversion versus Introversion

This first 2-letter possibility is called your "dominant trait", meaning this trait guides and directs how you apply the other 3 personality traits. It is the most important trait and has the biggest effect on your personality. Most people in America are extroverts. Extroverts direct their energy and attention outwardly. They are energized by prolonged socializing, and by the outer world of people and things. They hate being alone for too long, speak what's on their mind, can be somewhat impulsive, and tend to be outgoing and aggressive. On the other hand, introverts tend to be more quiet, contemplative, and think before speaking. An introvert enjoys reading a book and having a deep conversation with few people rather than speaking with a large group of people. They enjoy ideas and focus their attention inwards towards their inner thoughts and feelings. One of the best analogies given was by Isabel Myers. She exclaimed that speaking with an introvert is like speaking to the General's assistant. What you see is not the person's actual personality (the General, so to speak), but are speaking to the person who the introvert decides to portray to you. In fact, introverts are more private and difficult to get to know. Extroverts, on the other hand, display that what you see is what you get. They are who they appear to be and are less private with their thoughts and feelings. Are you an introvert (I) or extrovert (E)? In short, introverts direct their thoughts and energy in, whereas extroverts direct their attention and energy outwards.

Intuitive versus Sensing

Intuitives are the abstract, dreamy types who are future and past-oriented. They like to fantasize about future plans and possibilities. Sensors, on the other hand, are detail-oriented individuals who focus on the present and do not like to think about abstract or theoretical things. In contrast, intuitives love good metaphors. A good way to think of this trait is how to perceive the world. Intuitives who observe an object might think of the metaphorical significance of it, and discern relationships between that object and other objects they've seen in the past in different contexts. For example, to an intuitive, an apple could represent knowledge of good and evil. To a sensor, an apple is just an apple. They notice the surface-level details. Sensors are excellent with details. Are you a sensor (S) or an intuitive (N)?

Thinking versus Feeling

Thinking and feeling refer to how you make decisions. Thinkers tend to make decisions by detaching themselves from emotional and interpersonal considerations, and instead focus on what makes most logical sense to them. Feelers, on the other hand, primarily make decisions to increase group harmony, or to make people happy. Thinkers come across to feelers as being cold or too analytical, whereas feelers come across to thinkers as impulsive and too emotional. Are you a thinker (T) or feeler (F)?

Judging versus Perceiving

Judgers are those people who are organized, structured, meet deadlines on time and have a high need for closure. Perceivers, on the other hand, are flexible, less good at planning but better at improvising, and are more creative. A judger tries to control his or her environment, but a perceiver is more likely to "go with the flow", and to consider every possibility before making a decision. Hence, perceivers could come across as indecisive and judgers could come across as high-maintenance. Perceivers are also much more likely to procrastinate, dislike routine and prefer loose structure to allow for greater flexibility. Are you a judger (J) or perceiver (P)?

Great! You have your 4-letter type. Now what...?

Now you can google your 4-letter type description. Please keep in mind this is not identical to who you are. This is a template, a stereotype. Think of the personality test as a spectrum rather than a binary thing. It's not black and white: you are not an ESFP or not, or any other personality type. In actuality, researchers found that statistically people are a mixture of several personality types. Think of the personality test (MBTI) as a bunch of nodes or a grid. Each point on the grid represents a personality. Almost everybody lies somewhere in between each of those nodes, a mixture of personalities. You may resemble an ESFP in some regards, but you may also have a pretty strong judging function, so you may resemble an ESFJ (the most common personality type in American culture). The important thing is not to treat this test as the ultimate authority over your personality. People are dynamic and unique. They are constantly changing and cannot be precisely categorized. In actuality, I think personalities are constructed by the complex, cyclical and dynamic interactions between people's genetic personality predispositions and their environment (personal experiences, upbringing, etc.). Hence, there are many different types and subgroups of personalities within each 4-letter personality group. The test is a general instrument, and is not completely precise. Just as every American doesn't have the same accent in English, every 4-letter personality is not identical. However, the personality test is excellent at describing the general patterns of personality analogous to someone saying people in the Southern U.S. generally speak with this accent whereas people from Brooklyn, New York speak with a different accent. The instrument is pretty dang powerful in this general regard.

So, now that we understand the theory behind it...

Ok, enough with the theory. Now that we all understand the underlying theory and principle behind MBTI, I want to talk about my personality type and what it means to me (although, I'm really interested in hearing about your experiences with MBTI too if you want to comment below). To sum up an INTP in as few words as possible, the INTP has been nicknamed the Thinker and the Architect. Adjectives that have been used to describe my personality type are thoughtful, analytical, complex, quiet, eccentric, ingenious, etc. Wikipedia, the most reliable source in the world, described INTPs as "quiet, thoughtful, analytical individuals who tend to spend long periods of time on their own, working through problems and forming solutions. They are curious about systems and how things work." For the most part, this is true about me. I also don't like too much structure because I think it can sometime restrain creative thought and problem-solving. For me, life is a puzzle, and its my job to figure it out. I love aggregating information and making new connections. I love to discover things and solve difficult problems. For example, I like special relativity because it allows me to explore the implications of infinity, the speed of light, and other mind-bending ideas that are difficult to wrap your mind around. I love complexity because it challenges me, and allows me to think in new ways to understand the universe. This is my main goal in life: to understand everything, at least the things that interest me. This is a blessing and a curse, since I'm interested in so many different things: philosophy, music, writing, poetry, physics, psychology, photography, art, programming, to name a few of my hobbies. I love to many things and there's not enough time in a day to pursue them all.

I have been on this path to self-discovery since my early childhood. I've always been curious about the person that I would become: my career, my interests, and my family. I would imagine myself 10 years in the future as a kid, being an adult and wondering what my life would be like. My main difficulty growing up was feeling misunderstood, since I thought and acted differently than other people. I really had to work hard to fit in. Until one day I just decided to be myself. I love ideas and talking about them. Most people just like to make small talk, but I am horrible at that. So I do either of two things: I pretend that I'm interested or I talk about what's more interesting to me. For example, recently I've been fascinated by the concept of probability. Does true randomness really exist or is it a human construct because we only have finite information about everything? For example, if we roll a die and call the outcome random, is it because it is truly impossible to know the outcome? What if we knew the direction the person planned to throw the die? What if we knew the friction that the die would incur when it interacted with the table and the precise direction the die would move in order to calculate the precise outcome? Then couldn't one argue that true randomness in this situation never actually existed? Rather, the uncertainty is caused by the observer's lack of information of the true conditions of the situation at hand: all of these variables (friction, intent of the thrower, etc.). Most people aren't interested in this stuff. But I live for thinking about these things, because I enjoy them. Just like some people enjoy singing, dancing or writing my deepest and most rewarding pleasure comes from understanding a difficult concept or figuring out a problem I previously did not understand or was previously unsolved. The EUREKA moment gives me this high that I can't explain. To me, this is what it means to be an INTP. One day I want to work alone for long periods of time solving difficult problems. I want room to be myself, and to express my idiosyncrasies, odd or otherwise. Another few facts about me: I only realized I was strange when my friends pointed this out, to me my thought and behavior patterns make perfect sense. I'm a bit absent-minded because I'm always thinking of interesting problems to solve. I can be somewhat oblivious in public. I'm not too interested in social rules and am suspicious of social institutions, especially when they persuade people to conform to particular standards. I hate conforming. Why be anyone other than yourself? This is who I am. I'd be happy to answer any questions you have or hear any thoughts. Feel free to comment below :).

Cambridge University, UK

So how was Cambridge?

A lot of people ask me, especially friends that I haven't seen in a while, how my trip to England was this last summer. I spent the summer of 2012 in Cambridge, UK studying international relations, national security and international business at Cambridge University.

Overall, I would say that I had the experience of a lifetime. I started my trip landing in London, UK at Heathrow Airport. I was to stay there a few days prior to the start of my program at Cambridge University in June. I was accompanied to my hostel on a taxi cab by two elderly folks from New Zealand. The couple was very outdoorsy and loved to ca-yak and fish, and they traveled a lot to indulge their hobbies. I felt sorry for the old man since he had so much trouble traveling through airport security (his knee had a metal device in it which alerted the metal detectors every time he moved through one). They were a sweet couple that was full of knowledge and stories to tell. I always find those people interesting: their wisdom, their experiences, and their perspective refined by years of life. I could always relate better to older than younger people throughout my childhood for some reason.

We arrived at my hostel: the Clink 261, a dingy place with cramped quarters, in which a dozen bunk beds were cramped into a humid, somewhat stinky room. Within the hostel I met several Australians were on vacation and traversing Europe with their mates. I also met a New Zealand fellow who took the bunk bed above me. He was trying to become a construction worker and purchase his own flat (the British term for apartment). According to him, work in New Zealand was limited: the most prestigious jobs were dairy farm managers. Thus, at the age of 18 my friend flew to London with the intent of starting a new life. London certainly gave you the feeling that it was packed with opportunities.

I went to the local McDonalds with free wifi to phone my parents to let them know I was ok at least once a day while I was in London. London was a conflagration of a modern, cosmopolitan city and medieval Europe. Most buildings dated back from centuries in the past, made of brick and somewhat falling apart. Occasionally you would see a large stone-carved Gothic Cathedral. I visited Westminster Abbey near the British Parliament, London Eye and the Thames River. It was a beautiful church with magnificent stone arches inside and elaborate stained glass decorations reaching up to the high, one-hundred foot ceiling above me.

What were the people like? Incredibly diverse. I met a French, Australian, Russian, and New Zealander while in London. Since a lot of buildings were old and needed maintenance, work for construction workers was vast and the social classes were clearly divided between the middle, business class and the lower, construction-worker class. It just so happened that most of the construction workers congregated at McDonalds where I reached out to my parents. Just as New York never sleeps, so too did London never sleep. The streets are always buzzing with people going to and fro to various appointments, engagements and to work. There were so many things to do in London: visit art, science and historic museums. Go to great restaurants, clubs, and pubs. The possibilities and things to do there are endless. I thoroughly enjoyed the adventure of rising early in the morning to take a double-decked bus and the Tube, the British term for underground subway, to random places that I fancied. I visited the British parliament square and some of the most famous museums in Europe. The Tate Modern and observed some Picasso, the British National Museum and saw ancient Egyptian tombs, and saw Les Miserables in the Queen Theatre. I loved the excitement of being on my own and navigating a city a world away from my home in California. A few days later I left King's Cross Train Station, the same place where Harry Potter was filmed leaving to go to Hogwarts from Diagon Alley four days later to Cambridge.

Arriving in Cambridge...

When I arrived in Cambridge at my apartment on Lensfield road I was greeted by a German aerospace engineer grad student studying at the University. My room was spacious, with a sink, desk, lamp, cabinets and a small, twin-sized bed. I loved my room. It was about as large as my living room at home. It gave me plenty of room to think about life, about school and other random things at night (I always like to think in spacious areas). My room overlooked the street where I could see people walking to and fro. Unlike in the states, drivers don't have to yield for pedestrians. So you have to be REALLY, REALLY CAREFUL when crossing the street. I had my fair share of near-death experiences with friends trying to cross the road in traffic.

The atmosphere of Cambridge was a quaint town with many buildings from the 12th and 13th centuries, including the colleges themselves. I was amazed by the architecture and scenery of the place. If every person was removed from the streets, it would seem as if you were in medieval Europe. There were hundreds of tourists with cameras taking pictures of the colleges as you tried to get to class, street musicians and wonderful shops where you could find interesting keepsakes. The food produced by the university was abysmal. My friends and I compensated by making regular trips to Sainsburys, the British equivalent of Walmart, to get decent food. I have this funny story. I walk into a Sainsburys and ask if they have trash bags. Little did I know that trash bags were called "litter bags". They take me to an aisle with trash bags and on the box of bags it says: "Refuse sacks". I laughed a little bit and wondered how many more times the Sainsburys workers would look at me cluelessly when I asked for these items they've never heard of in their lives. Don't get me wrong, some of the restaurants had sublime food. Particularly, I remember this Mediterranean restaurant across the street from King's College, one of the colleges that I was studying at, was extraordinary. They had this steak that was so juicy and delicious that it seemed to melt in your mouth like butter.

There are many fun things to do in Cambridge. My friends and I would play soccer every week at Parker's Peace, apparently the first park where the official rules of soccer were implemented. It was so much fun playing pick up games after class with Spanish, Dutch, French, Russian and Italian students. I started to play with a group of friends from Brigham Young University. They were a friendly bunch, full of energy, innocence and enthusiasm. After several hours of soccer we would go back to their apartment where they had a big, flat screen TV and we would watch the WWII T.V. Series Band of Brothers. When my nineteenth birthday passed that summer they surprised me with tasty cheesecake and a birthday party. It was one of the happiest days of my life. I was with friends who put this whole event on for me. I will never forget my friends from Cambridge.

What about academics? When I was in Irvine at school I struggled with the fact that nobody seemed as passionate or interested in their education than me and several other of my friends. At Cambridge, it was a complete reversal. Everyone there meant business, and had interesting feedback to share. Some students were from various parts of China, others from India, Sweden, Russia and Singapore. I loved the eclectic ideas brought forth in class discussions by students. Sure, there were those kids from Harvard, Yale, and Stanford. But in a debate in my favorite class where I experienced this diversity of thought (my Foreign Policy Analysis Course), everyone was on equal level. The only thing that mattered is your ability to present your ideas and create logically sound arguments. It was Heaven for me. I would discuss ideas for hours on end within and outside class. Instead of just swallowing a bunch of material for memorization and spitting it out for the professor later, the professor would ask questions like: "You have studied all of these theories of Foreign Policy. Now what theories do you have?" It was knowledge creation instead of knowledge regurgitation. My thirst for intellectual engagement was quenched by people who challenged and sharpened my thinking.

The professors were also much different there. I met my FPA (Foreign Policy Analysis) Professor Alex at the Snug Bar right next to my apartment building. We ate dinner and talked about the nature of academics and future prospects for PhD students. I exclaimed how much I love discussing ideas with other people and how academia seemed like a good route for me. One of the things that we also discussed was how education at the university level is becoming more and more interdisciplinary. This is because new problems are more complex and require many different areas of expertise to solve. We also talked about the role of quantitative analysis in social sciences. In England, social sciences are treated much more like a humanities disciplines, with little quantitative analysis, as opposed to social science in the U.S., where social science is a very statistics-based discipline. For example, my friend was doing a research project on game theory, and had a complex algorithm to map out the effect of one-child policy in China, but the professor had no idea how to create algorithms using game theory. This is odd that an economics professor did not know this well-known quantitative procedure in game theory. I suppose the English educational system is much more focused on the language-based, qualitative analyses in the social sciences. Even hard science majors are expected to be able to write competently. It stands to reason that it is not enough to think deep thoughts, but you must also be able to elucidate those thoughts to the world in a clear and concise manner. If only those universities in the U.S. would adopt the same attitude.

Anyways, I was having the time of my life because my mind felt starved from not having a lot of people at home to relate to on the intellectual level. I could actually discuss my ideas with my professors and have a beer with them at a local pub, unlike the UC system in which you are a number or name which the professor does not often notice. I loved ideas, but it seemed that only a select few of my friends at home did too. Here, on the other hand, everybody talked about ideas, and everybody loved testing them, experimenting with them, and stretching them as far as they possibly would go. My mind was stimulated, and I was thoroughly enjoying the rush.

What did I learn about myself and how did I grow as a human being? I learned more about my introverted nature. I would stay in my apartment for hours on end doing research, theorizing about new ideas, and making relationships that I previously thought were not possible while friends partied at various pubs and bars. It's almost as if I live most of my life inside my own head, observing people's thoughts, actions and behaviors and making relationships between them. I love knowledge. I love discovering new things. And unlike a lot of people who just discuss the "practical" things and only learn on a "need-to-know" basis, I take ideas to their extremes by discussing them as far as they possibly can go. It's a strange thing to feel like you are an observer of your life and are not actually living it. I love complex problems, and was craving opportunities to solve them. While in Cambridge, and still today, I am going through this process of self-discovery. I never really understood myself completely. Only that I was different from most people, and that I felt alien to my own family and friends. Mainly because of the way that I thought about things. I don't want to sound vain. What I mean is that I love to analyze things, and think of new ideas. People often tell me what I think about is impractical or speculative, but I really enjoy thinking nevertheless. My ideal career would be something in which half of the time I'm thinking of new ideas and half of the time I'm implementing those same ideas. Another thing I learned about myself is that I was capable of doing and learning anything I set my mind to. I excelled because of my ability to learn and be creative. Most people are great at memorizing. I only memorize when I think something is interesting, which is why I remember it. I'm much better of constructing new systems and creating new ideas than mastering current ones. I don't know why. I think this is why I did so well at Cambridge.

What other adventures did I have while overseas?

1. I took a road trip with several of my friends to see an Olympics England vs. South Korea Men's Soccer match in Cardiff, Whales.
2. Visited and went motorcycling through London with my cousin Joshua (fun but a bit scary since the streets in London are so narrow).
3. I visited Oxford with several friends from BYU, where I sat at the Hogwarts table where Harry Potter was filmed.
4. I visited Edinburgh, Scotland and hiked in the beautiful Highlands. I also saw the Queen of England entourage while traveling there.
5. I had tea and crumpets in Cambridge.
6. I saw MI6 Headquarters. Didn't see bond unfortunately :(.
7. Traveled to a castle in Richmond, an English countryside town.

I also had the chance to visit Darwin's apartment and go punting, or canoe down a beautiful Cambridge stream. More than anything my trip to Cambridge kindled my excitement for adventure, and enthusiasm for tomorrow given that I persistently work to solve today's problems. Maybe one day I'll come back :).

What did I do when I got back? I started a company Envisio, LLC based on a business plan competition in our International Management and Business Ethics class. You can check out our website at envisiollc.com. We sell phone cleaners! :)