[MUSIC]
How many of you guys would consider yourself school oriented?
not just saying it as an adjective, but
really thrive on having a goal and meeting that goal.
I am definitely a goal oriented person.
I love having a long term goal and working towards it knowing that each
of my movements I was going to eventually help me reach that goal.
But did you know in a survey,
only 6% of people end up being in their childhood dream career.
I fall into that 94% of people that didn't.
My childhood dream was to become a world renowned pianist.
And at the age of four, you'd be kind of confused not
knowing how serious you can go, and how would you know at four years old.
Rain or high hill, my mom told me, that was going to be my goal.
My mom was a piano teacher.
And she looking back, I'm realizing,
really wanted to become a world renowned pianist.
And she saw me as an opportunity to fulfill her lifelong dream.
And obviously it was with bowl intentions.
And I'm so thankful for all the sacrifices that she was offering so
that I can become.
I'm really good at piano.
But nevertheless, from 14 to 18 years old, I'm realizing that it was not my goal.
It was something that was imposed on me.
And that's kind of what I want to share with you guys today.
I believe that life is really not about having that
perfectly crystallized plan that you're going to work towards.
Rather, you should have the flexibility of being adaptable so that you can pivot
whenever you need to depending on where you are in your life stages.
So let me share with you guys three crucial parts of my life where
I had to pivot.
And I increased my ability to be okay with uncertainty.
So like I said my childhood was pretty much made up of anything that was related
to piano.
So if you guys were to think about your childhood.
You probably can come up with easily several games that you play with your
friends.
Or favorite activities that you had, whether it be sports or
music or anything else that brought you joy.
Mine it primarily consisted of two activities.
One it was practicing the piano.
Two performing the piano.
Anything else that was outside of these two buckets was deemed extracurricular,
and essentially a waste of time.
So, you can imagine, practicing the piano really became my life.
And I found comfort in that because I knew exactly what I wanted to do.
I knew that when I went to college I wanted to go to the Julliard School so
that I can major in piano.
And that would help me become a world renowned, renowned pianist.
Looking back,
I'm realizing that I didn't have any ownership on creating my own goals.
And that in turn didn't allow be to be okay in
the discomfort of being in uncertainty.
So if I had to assess it at that time,
I was about 0% comfortable being in uncertainty during my childhood.
What I did learn is that, I was super laser focused.
You can imagine if you had three to four hours of practicing the piano every day.
You can get very good at focusing on, a specific task.
The other thing I learned was, I was able to do repetitive tasks, day in day out,
without going crazy.
Can imagine playing the same piece over and
over again trying to perfect that note, trying to bring in the donation and
to make everything work together while you do it in one shot.
And the other thing that I learned, was being able to have that drive.
Because you knew that you had that goal.
So I take all of this, to say that I did learn a lot during my childhood.
But again, the con of it was that I was not comfortable with uncertainty.
So I went to UCLA, not Juilliard, for as a music major.
And I realized at that time very quickly that I didn't want to continue with music.
I thought that at least getting a degree in music was one way that I can play.
Pay respect to my mom who sacrifice 14 years of a lot
of money a lot of times so that I can get a music degree.
But towards the end when I was a senior,
I realized that I couldn't be a musician for two reasons.
Number one, was I wanted to be able to support my
parents financially because they went through a hard time when I was younger and
I definitely wanted to support them.
And number two, I really wanted to help others and
I didn't see how I could as a musician you can argue that as a musician you can make
people's lives better you're bringing joy to people.
But I wanted to do something that was a lot more tangible.
And so as a former as a senior in college, and as an immigrant,
I'm realizing now that actually was at a little bit of a disadvantage because
I wasn't really aware of the potential job opportunities or careers that I had.
I had a very limited amount of knowledge of what I thought I can do and
they were basically did three buckets healthcare, law and business.
And business I excluded right away because to me what I was
taught was business basically could be that you can own liquor stores or
you can own dry cleaners and there was not much outside of that.
And eventually ended up in healthcare because it just felt like
it was something that I would enjoy doing it would be helping a lot of people.
And you can make a comfortable salary.
So after a lot of debate and a lot of prayer I landed on optometry.
Now at this point I realizing that the uncertainty that I faced,
was very uncomfortable.
Because I was out about 0% uncertainty coming into college towards the end when I
made that decision.
I was at about maybe 10%.
I just really did not feel comfortable not knowing what was going to be my
next steps.
And there was a lot of anxiety that I felt during that summer when I
was really grappling with how to figure out what my goals were.
I went to optometry school, graduated.
And I knew that I wanted to do something with business because I
really just always had an entrepreneurial spirit.
So I graduated from optometry school and I decided to open a practice.
And I do want to share a little bit more of a personal story with you right before
I opened my practice, I was forced to become about 75% okay with uncertainty.
Now let me share with you guys what happened.
So right before I opened my first practice I was pregnant with
my first daughter Kayla and I had serious complications.
Later on I realized that I was diagnosed with something called
sepsis with DIC which was a very serious condition and I had almost died.
And going through that experience where you're not certain if you're going to be
given another day to live.
It really makes you 100% exposed to uncertainty because what can be more
uncertain than having uncertainty about if you're going to be able
to live to see another day.
So after that experience, I've been very thankful for every day that I get to live.
I've increased my dependence on God, and just have been so thankful for
every day that I've been given.
But on top of that, I had been very comfortable with uncertainty after that,
and coupling that with the uncertainty of starting a practice
cold that really made me become about 75% okay with uncertainty.
And just not to glaze over the startup part as well of the business side
because that in itself had a lot of trials and tribulations and discomfort.
But overall just coming out of that stage in my life,
I've learned a lot about how to start a business.
I learned about the importance of life and
I learned most importantly not to take each day for granted.
So on to the last part of my journey, that GSP.
So I started the GSP in January 2021, which was earlier this year.
And I'm going to be graduating in about a month in December 2021.
And there's a lot that I've learned here coming in I was at about,
like I said, 75% okay with uncertainty.
And what I was hoping to get out of this experience was to become
more like 100% okay with uncertainty, and I think I'm getting there.
So what have I been doing this past year at the GSP.
Well, I've been doing a lot of self reflecting, and this speech,
this talk is what came out of it.
I'm realizing at each of those important pivotal parts of my life, there is a lot
of life lessons that I've learned a lot of skill sets that I developed.
And a lot of relationships that I've built with different people in my life.
And I'm not saying that I'm 100% okay with uncertainty.
If I were to give you guys a visual,
if you see this uncertainty cloud run in front of you.
I used to want to get through it with a wind blur.
And I would try to dispel it as quickly as possible.
So I would just always be thinking about like all the things that I could do to get
rid of this uncertainty because it made me very anxious and very stressed
not knowing what was going to be next than not having a goal that I can work towards.
But now, if you can imagine this,
instead of going at it with a wind blower, I walk around the fog.
And I kind of look around to see if there's any angles,
different angles that I can approach it.
Or if there's any openings or
hints that can help me try to get rid of this uncertain deep cloud.
And I think that helps me because it makes me okay to be in that discomfort.
It reduces my anxiety level.
It also lets me excited about the future knowing that I can pivot at any time.
And so now that I'm about to graduate my goal loosely speaking
it's not a clearly defined crystallized goal by any means.
But I do know that I want to start building up practices and
I'm going to primarily focus in the medical spa space in optometry for now.
And so what I want you guys to take away from this are some of the tips that I've
learned through my journey.
Number one, it's okay not to have a crystallized and
fully fleshed out plan or goal.
It's really okay.
You have to imagine that there's going to be a lot of times that you pivot,
your interests might change.
Your strengths might get developed more on the certain part and
you want to use that strength.
You might realize that you have some weaknesses and before you because of that
weakness, you wouldn't have that ability to reach this certain goal.
But now that you can grow that weakness, it's now become a strength and so
now you can pivot and change your goals.
So that's one.
The next one is, it's okay to change your goals and pivot.
And the reason why I say this as a separate tip,
is because sometimes people feel really uncomfortable or
they feel like they're feeling when they change their goals.
Because they told people that, hey, this is what I want to do.
And when they feel that they isn't something that they want to continue
doing, then they feel embarrassed or a sense of shame that they didn't follow
through or deliver what they thought they wanted to do.
And this is a case, I would recommend hiding it, keep it with yourself.
Don't share it until you've accomplished it.
That worked really well for me.
And the third is, just know that this really is not it a destination for
rather a journey that you're going through and you should be enjoying.
And the way that you can do it is instead of thinking I have to create a three,
five or a ten year plan, think of it more in terms of a shorter sprint.
So maybe it's a six month plan, or it's a year plan.
But just give yourself the ability to create almost like an MVP.
And this is a business school so using words that resonate.
An MVP of your bowl and just be able to have it but
know that you can come back to edit it or change it at any time.
So what are my goals at this point?
It's twofold.
One is to be 100% okay with uncertainty.
And two is to remind myself every day.
That life is really about the journey and not the destination.
Thank you.
[MUSIC]