My 2018: In Review
My 2018 was chock-full of adventure. Looking back has me really excited for 2019. I’ll share some highlights from the year, as well as values and resolutions going into 2019.
Highlights
Values & Resolutions
Q4 2018 has been a huge season of change for me. I’ve spent a lot of time lately questioning my values. What are they? How do I define them? What level of abstraction is appropriate? Morals, values, vision, what’s the difference? I can’t say I’ve got it all figured out, but it feels good to think about, I believe I’m getting closer to an answer that works for me. Here’s who I want to be:
- A man who has enough financial, psychological, and spiritual stability to fully love his wife, his family, and his friends.
- A man who measures his life by the amount in which he improves the lives of others.
- A man who asks for things from God, and listens to his response.
And here are some things I keep repeating to myself:
- You can measure your values by measuring your resource allocation. Where do you put your time, money, and attention? Those are what you value.
- You do things for a sense of achievement. Sometimes you do things that give you a short term, immediate, sense of accomplishment, but you trade-in effort towards a long term, more meaningful, sense of fulfillment.
- Relish your confusion. Confusion is step 1 toward comprehension.
- Willpower never lasts. Habits last.
- 100% of the time is easier than 98% of the time. “Just this once” is a slippery slope.
- Do things to impress yourself, not others. Particularly online. The internet is never impressed. You are easily impressed.
- Sleep is a panacea — for the mind, body, and soul.
My resolutions last year were to:
Read 36 books. ✅
- It started at 50 books, but about half way through the year I realized I was racing through books to check a box, instead of absorbing the message. I’d rather read 1 book a year that changes my life (for the better) than read 50 and feel nothing. I strove for 3 a month, one fictional, one educational, one spiritual. Here were my top 12:
Meditate 1000 minutes. ✅
- This was random, but I’m really glad I did it. I started meditating with Headspace due to stress at work (and jet lag), and found a noticeable difference in my mood, focus, and ability to control thought. I’ll be doubling down on this one in 2019.
Make at least $1 outside of your day job. ❌
- This one didn’t pan out. I spent a handful of Saturdays floundering around at coffee shops trying to make the next Duolingo, but for the most part my heart wasn’t behind it. It’s a dream I won’t let go of, but I’ve got a ways to go before achieving it (Not just making $1, but more generally, having a profitable side hustle).
Choose 1: Make it to Korea with Jen, get promoted, or get a new job. ✅✅✅
- If you asked me in August 2018 which of the three career goals I could accomplish before the year was up, I was certain 0/3 were obtainable. In August, I was put on loan to a sister team at Coupang, which focused on business outside of Korea (meaning no trips). It also meant my big summer project was postponed, which felt like a simultaneous postponement of promotion. Landing a new job before 12/31 felt like a moonshot as well. I was 0/3 for onsite interviews this year (Google, Palantir, Blue Origin). I took a break from interview-prep for the summer, and felt vastly underprepared to succeed interviewing anywhere before the year was up. Even still, knowing 3 for 3 of my career goals were likely to fail, I was strangely at peace with it. I knew Jen & I could vacation to Korea, even if we didn’t get to go through work. I knew promotions were a forever-six-more-months dangling carrot, not something I should measure my life on, and I knew that if I couldn’t land a new gig in the winter, I’d be ready to perform again by spring of 2019.
All that said, God is good.
(1) In the fall of 2018 my life entered a crescendo of excitement. My on-loan project at work wrapped up quicker than expected. The schedule was tight, but it looked that by October I could transfer back to my exciting summer project. Our department planned an annual summit in Seoul for the middle of October… What better time to reignite the previous agenda, with all stakeholders in one centralized location?! Jen, time to buy a plane ticket! ✅
(2) At the beginning of September, I vocalized my strong desire for promotion to my manager. I was given the “6 more months” schtick, but I made it pretty clear that I both deserved it and that I wouldn’t hang around much longer without it. He understood, and took it to his boss (my director). The director pulled me aside and said look, you deserve it, but our org is in a weird place right now, if you are to get promoted, it has to go through the CEO. We can submit the document, but it’s unlikely to succeed until next year’s review cycle in April 2019. (Shoutout to this director, he fought for me every step of the way.) Fast-forward 2 months, the week after returning from Seoul, I’m pulled aside, once again, and happily informed that the promotion has been approved. ✅
(3) Right before our trip to Korea, a friend-of-friend asked if I’d be interested in interviewing with a company called Convoy. I had never heard of it, but I figured why not? If anything, it would be good practice to restart the interview season if my promotion didn’t pan out. I prepped a little, but I wasn’t what I would consider “fully prepared”. I vividly remember the morning of the interview, boarding the bus to Convoy HQ, consumed with dread, destined to make a fool of myself in a room full of strangers. I took a deep breath and kept telling myself, hey, nothing to lose. The interview loop was pretty standard, a healthy mix of coding, design, and leadership evaluation. I remember slowly coming to the realization that every person I met that day was an absolute genius. Slow to pick up, only because they were equally amicable, humble, and welcoming throughout my stay. The domain was something unexpected, but felt vitally important. What product do you own that wasn’t shipped on a truck (or 7) prior to receiving it? If trucking goes autonomous, who controls the marketplace? Also, did you know that trucks are completely empty 40% of their time on the road? What waste! It’s an exciting world with plenty of problems to solve. The tech stack was also exciting for me, something fresh, something new, something not Java. (Node, TypeScript, Postgres, GraphQL, React). Finally, the start-up is an absolute rocketship 🚀, having just closed Series C from CapitalG with a $1 billion valuation. November 26th I began my first day with Convoy. ✅
*Note: I ended up leaving Coupang before any official promotional benefits kicked in. This was bittersweet, particularly after all the effort my director put in, as well as any bonuses I would likely leave on the table. In hindsight, I could have probably pushed back my start date with Convoy to January instead of November. Like my mother used to stay, “Don’t wait, the time will never be just right.” I couldn’t wait, it was time to try something new.
What’s next: 2019
Good bye fried rice, hello fried chicken!
- Play the piano, 30 minutes, everyday.
- Go to concerts with friends.
- Meditate 2000 minutes.
- Contribute to Open Source.
- Post more Mediums.
- Take more video with Jen.
- Choose 1: Glacier, Banff, or Crater Lake.
- Swim 1000 meters a week.
- Reader harder books. Or, maybe, read books harder? IDK, but I want them to mean something. Maybe I’ll start writing book reports or something.
- Write 1 book report.
- Write, everyday.
- Make at least $1 outside of your day job.
Thank you for reading! I hope your 2019 blooms with possibilities.
This was cathartic to write, I encourage others to do the same!
