It has been a long time since I have sat down to reflect on everything that happened in the last year. As we all become increasingly bombarded by news, notifications, opportunities, and activities, there is little room left to think and reconcile with the inner status of ourselves. What makes us happy, what inspires us, what makes this life worth living?
2023, like many previous years, has been a whirlwind of excitement, new opportunities, achievements, and growth. At the same time,I had never worked so hard in my entire life, juggling between fulltime grad school,research, and a full time job all at the same time.I was forced to cut the fat in my life and focus entirely on productivity, including some breaks which in hind sight, were necessary. However, it was only after being so stressed out that tears started coming out of my eyes while having to keep going because time does not stop, that I truly learned the importance of setting healthy boundaries between life and work. Pushing as hard as possible was incredibly exhausting, but at the same time, it was amazingly fulfilling to realize that all the early mornings and late nights paid off as I was fortunate to be able to contribute to innovation in AI and technology that could help make people healthier, happier, and live a better life.
Here are some of my favorite moments in 2023, big or small :
I found out that you can get some of the best freshly made New York bagels overnighted to you. It is so worth it.
I made a mobile app/art project inspired by the movie They Live, which uses AI to recognize price tags and calculates total price after tax — there is an Easter egg where all the prices get replaced with sarcastic consumerism signs.
I went to South Africa for three weeks where I presented at the National AIDS conference, climbed Table Mountain, and visited the southern tip of Africa.
I got to spend Lunar New year with my closest friends from back home, making dumplings together for the first time in many years.
We submitted a large language model project proposal that won the Grand Challenges, the project then ended up being featured on Bill Gates’ end of year notes as one of the highlights for AI innovation.
I saw my parents for the first time since the Covid pandemic 4 years ago and took them to Hawaii.
I was selected for an NSF funded research program called DREAM to conduct interdisciplinary research in computing, where we developed a new Machine learning architecture to predict wildfire spread using remote sensing data.
We celebrated Christmas, birthdays, and my graduation with our best friends with an ugly sweater party and many cheers.
Most importantly, I was lucky to have made a whole lot of great memories with wonderful and loving people in my life, each of whom have shown such kindness and passion for life that it gives me energy to keep going forward.
On the other hand, a lot of the celebrations and amazing feelings of joy and happiness were also accompanied by a sense of guilt. Conditioning oneself to enjoy making an effort for long periods of time also meant that taking a break and indulging felt bad somehow — perhaps a trade-off between dedication to a meaningful cause and ability to have pleasure for the sake of pleasure. All while the fear of losing control constantly plays in the background as making any mistakes seem unforgivable. Is it strange to feel undeserving of so many wonderful things in a world of great suffering? Is it hypocritical and contradictory to have a career in helping the least fortunate in the world while participating in potentially exploitative activities like certain tourism amongst some of the most fortunate? Perhaps the cognitive dissonance will never go away once a glimpse of truth in human nature reveals itself, and I truly admire those who seek adventure in its purest form, un sheltered by the comforts of the modern world.
So where do we go from here?
Needless to say, what I look forward to the most is getting the ultimate precious thing back in life — free time. More than ever I have realized the value in making space for creativity, rest and doing nothing. Of course, it will take some time and effort to find the tranquility and inner peace I let go of for the sake of productivity, but I trust that I will find it again.
One of the biggest things on top of mind is our relationship with technology. An unexpected outcome of making a pivot to working in tech is that I be came even more of a minimalist when it comes to it. This is possibly a natural conclusion to the end of many explorations in certain subjects- less is more. Just like great art and design, great technology should foster a seemless experience and put the user’s best interest first. Unfortunately, there is still an in increasingly large number of platforms and applications that resemble parasites of the mind, feeding on attention and engagement using whatever means possible.
A dear friend also in tech once said to me, “ you know what your problem is? You want to give people what they need, not what they want.” It made me think about the philosophy of technology and business in general- how has addictive creations like social media and endless notifications become the norm? Will we ever be free to think and act ever again? Is privacy just another illusion? Could there be so many connections to the point of exceeding max capacity?
Providing people with what they need sometimes means they may not realize it, and other times it requires one to put down all of the preconceptions about how things should be and focus on the problem itself through deeper understanding of human nature- acceptance of what is and the imperfection of it all, which is easier said than done of course. However, isn’t the fact that there will always be more puzzles to solve what makes the world so endlessly fascinating?
2023, you have been a wild ride full of tears, laughter, ups and downs between restlessness and peace, and inspiration. For the first time in a very long time, I feel like transforming from an observer to a creator of my own life.
Standing at the beginning of this next chapter, I would like to be more giving, more loving, more brave, and more content but not complacent. I would like to keep growing with the wondrous world around me as there is so much more to explore. I would like to stay present in each moment take it all in as they go by as this is the one chance that we have — as real and beautiful as life itself.