A species in which everyone was General Patton would not succeed, any more than would a race in which everyone was Vincent van Gogh. I prefer to think that the planet needs athletes, philosophers, sex symbols, painters, scientists; it needs the warmhearted, the hardhearted, the coldhearted, and the weakhearted. It needs those who can devote their lives to studying how many droplets of water are secreted by the salivary glands of dogs under which circumstances, and it needs those who can capture the passing impression of cherry blossoms in a fourteen-syllable poem or devote twenty-five pages to the discussion of a small boy's feelings as he lies in bed in the dark waiting for his mother to kiss him goodnight... Indeed the presence of outstanding strengths presupposes that every needed in other areas has been channeled away from them.

- Allen Shawn

The Sadness of Happiness

But I have to admit it--being Gretchen and accepting my true likes and dislikes bring me a kind of sadness. I will never visit a jazz club at midnight, hang around in artists' studios, jet off to Paris for the weekend, or pack up to go fly-fishing on a spring dawn. I won't be admired for my chic wardrobe or be appointed to a high government office. I'll never stand in line to buy tickets to the Ring Cycle. I love fortune cookies and refuse to try foie gras.

It makes me sad for two reasons. First, it makes me sad to realize my limitations. The world offers so much!--so much beauty, so much fun and I am unable to appreciate most of it. But it also makes me sad because, in many ways, I wish I were different. One of my Secret of Adulthood is "You can choose what you do; you can't choose what you like to do." I have a lot of notions about what I wish I liked to do, about the subjects and occupations that I wish interested me. But it doesn't matter what I wish I were like. I am Gretchen.

The Happiness Project, Gretchen Rubin

Overdue Journal

Spring is finally here. Gone are the multi-layers, the snow and the cold-induced shivers. In a way, it has not been much of a winter, which I am pretty grateful for. Apparently last year the weather went so bad that they had to cancel their exams to wait for the snow to thaw and get the roads cleared. While the sight of snowfall was exhilarating through one's third-world lens, the novelty wore off quite soon after, where the trouble of dumping on layer after layer each time I needed to get out was becoming increasingly unbearable. And much like a castaway gone astray in a desert, I too had my fair share of struggling with mirages: my craving of warm coffee (read: comfort!) remained omnipresent, and I have had dreams (emphasis on the plurality!) of myself lounging on Kuta beach basking in the glory of the sun.

The first month of living in land far, far away was filled with an undercurrent of anxiety. So much for my fairy tale getaway! The interminable and excruciating wait for that email letting me know whether my applications had been successful did take away some of the fun. In fact, it was punishing. Nonetheless, when it came and the wait ended, the much-anticipated euphoria did not rush in as violently as I thought it would. Do not mistake this as a sign of ingratitude because I was over the moon with the result-- I still am. After much contemplation, I realize the reason why I could not feel as ecstatic as I could and should have been was that: I was not with the very people with whom I wanted to celebrate my winnings. And by 'people', I meant my parents.

Funny enough, I do not consider myself as close to my parents. In fact, most of the times when I was at home with them, I hardly had anything much to say. Most of the conversations revolved around me senselessly verbal-vomiting about how my life had been (read: filling in the silence and fulfilling filial duties). The conversations were unilateral. While my dad had ambitiously (albeit to no avail) tried to engage me in an adult-to-adult conversation regarding whatever was on the news that particular week (which I could not care less about), I have always been able to guess what he was going to say to me for the rest of dialogue right from the very beginning, from his very first opener. Of course, I have always been filial and follow through with the conversations because now I realized, on hindsight, it did not matter what we actually talked about. The fact that we spent quality time together was what was important.

I did tell my parents about the outcome of my applications, and they were thrilled about it, but unfortunately I just did not get the kind of closure that I needed. This has been quite a journey: never in a million years would my 16-year-old me ever imagine that the 22-year-old me is standing where I am today. And this-- I-- deserves a much cooler celebration than what that 10-minute Facebook chat could conjure up.

It was Very, Very Dangerous to Live Even One Day

She felt very young; at the same time unspeakably aged. She sliced like a knife through everything; at the same time was outside, looking on. She had perpetual sense, as she watched the taxi cabs, of being out, out, far out to sea and alone; she always had the feeling it was very, very dangerous to live even one day.

Mrs. Dalloway, Virginia Woolf

Summer Gem

Have the Courage to Make a Change

I congratulate you on this achievement. You have sacrificed a considerable amount of your time on earth. You have mastered a strange new language. You have postponed the start of your vocation. You've been swept up in rapid rumors in job opportunities and job conditions. You've changed your daily worth ethics, and you have foregone many of life's simple pleasures. Some of you have earned special recognition this afternoon, and we all congratulate you.

But, tomorrow, my friends, the slate is wiped clean again. Prospective clients don't inquire about class rank. The local bar association you will join does not have a special class of membership for law review staffs. Judges and jurors will not ask to see your resume.

You will be evaluated instead by your product, your energy, your temperament and your backbone. The reputation you develop for intellectual and ethical integrity will be your greatest asset or your worst enemy. You will be judged by your judgment.

The practice of law you've already learned does not lend itself to true-and-self analysis. If the problem is black or white, the client does not need a lawyer.

Instead, your challenge will be to use your education and all your life's experiences to exercise good judgment to select from among the shades of gray.

...

Practice law with consideration and courtesy. No matter how righteous the cause or clear your victory, assure that your adversary with his or her client leaves with dignity.

As Judge Perry Withmore in Little Rock used to tell us, you can disagree without being disagreeable. Besides, your adversary today may be your judge tomorrow.

Following the bar exam, your most difficult test will not be of what you know but what is your character. Some of you will fail.

The class of 1971 had many distinguished members who also went on to achieve high public office. But it also had several who forfeited their license to practice law. Blinded by greed, some served time in prison.

I cannot make this point to you too strongly. There is no victory, no advantage, no fee, no favor which is worth even a blemish on your reputation for intellect and integrity.

...

Dents to the reputation in the legal profession are irreparable. Every lawyer I know carries around a mental black book which is recorded in indelible ink the names of his adversaries who breached the presumption of good-faith dealing.

...

This ceremony is called a commencement because it's a new journey. Your law school studies are completed, but your education is just under way. Continue to study, but don't limit your studies to the law. If you strife to become a great lawyer, you must be more than a lawyer.

We are defined as persons and lawyers by the depth and variety of our experiences. Continue to broaden your horizons. Read religiously--works other than law.

Travel. By all means travel every chance, everywhere you can. Travel the back roads, not the interstates. Mingle with those of different background and culture and ages.

...

Take time out for yourself. Have some fun, go fishing, every once in a while take a walk in the woods by yourself. Learn to relax, watch more sunsets. Those of you who do not have your life planned out, don't worry. It wouldn't turn out the way you planned it in any event.

...

I hope you will consider trying the wide variety of professional opportunities that the practice of law will offer you. Spend some time in public service, whether as an assistant to the prosecutor or a public defender, or a legal service program. Or go to Washington and work for a congressional delegation or one of the feral agencies. Or go to your state capitol and work for a state agency or state commission. Or run for the legislature, school board, city council, or teach at your community college.

But whatever you do, choose a professional life that satisfies you and helps others. If you find yourself getting burned out or unfulfilled, unappreciated or the profits become more important than your work, then have the courage to make a change.

Roads We Should Travel, Commencement Address on May 8, 1993

by Vincent W. Foster, Jr

The Law School, University of Anskansas

Another Way of Being Social

When I was 9 years old, I went for summer camp for the first time. And my mother packed me a suitcase full of books, which to me seems like a perfectly natural thing to do because in my family, reading was the primary group activity. And this may seem as anti-social to you, but to us, it's just another way of being social. You have the warmth of your family sitting next to you, but you are also free to roam around the adventure land inside your own mind. And I had this idea that camp was just gonna be like this but better. I had a vision of ten girls sitting in a cabin cozily reading books in their matching nightgowns. Camp was more like a keg party without any alcohol. And on the very first day, our counsellor gathered us all together and she taught us a cheer that she said we'd be doing everyday for the rest of the summer to instill camp spirit. And it went like this: "R, O, W, D, I, E, that the way we spell 'rowdie', rowdie, rowdie, let's get rowdie!"

Yeah. And I couldn't figure out for the life of me, why we're supposed to be so rowdy--or why we're supposed to spell this word incorrectly?

The Power of Introverts, Susan Cain

Frozen in Muskoka

The Next Steps Always Seems to be Inevitable

And there's another problem. May be you never really wanted to be a cardiac surgeon in the first place. It just kind of happened. It's easy, the way the system works, to simply go with the flow. I don't mean the work is easy, but the choices are easy. Or rather, the choices sort of make themselves. You go to a place like Stanford because that's what smart kids do. You do to medical school because it's prestigious. You specialize in cardiology because it's lucrative. You do the things that reap the reward, that make your parents proud, and your teachers pleased, and your friends impressed. From the time you started high school and may be even junior high, your whole goal was to get into the best college you could, so now you naturally think about your life in terms of "getting into" whatever's next. "Getting into" is validation; "getting into" is victory. Standford, then Johns Hopkins medical school, then a residency at the University of San Francisco, and so forth. Or Michigan Law School, or Goldman Sachs, or McKinsey, or whatever. You take it one step at a time, and the next step always seems to be inevitable.

-- What Are You Going to Do With That?, William Deresiewicz