I left MG last December and moved back to China. In a couple of weeks, it would soon reach my 6-month mark living in China without a full-time job.
During this time, I tried out all sorts of things.
For fun, I tried different kinds of sports, including bouldering, snowboarding, Badminton, bowling, and CrossFit. I biked around the city for local street food and also went birdwatching with two friends who are experts in this field. Both of they have a pair of very expensive looking binocular and a heavy-weighted bird glossary book on them all the time, even when hiking 3 hours for the birds.
For work, I took online courses on user persona, more data analytics stuff, python, and UX design. I tried to be a sales person, BD person, UX researcher, strategy consultant, driver, snowboarding instructor, and writer wannabe. After experiencing the crazy modern city life in China, I wrote my friend two long emails rambling about the shared bike scene on the streets and the variety of bubble tea selections available.
More importantly, I finally have the time to build this blog from scratch (using Webflow) and dared to start reading Infinite Jest by David Forster Wallace (10% done).
It was not until last week that I learned that this experience is actually what as Tim Ferries would call a “mini-retirement” - a period of time dedicated to experience, explore, and live life.
I have learned 6 things during my 6-month mini-retirement and I’m writing them down for personal reference in the future.
- It’s okay to be interrupted
- Physical proximity is overrated
- I discovered my passion for sports
- I can work outside of comfort zones
- When in doubts, try it out
- Being prepared is rewarding
1. It’s okay to be interrupted
I was all about the momentum and flow.
In the past I tend to focus on that one thing, that one course, one job, and one goal. If my goal was to finish reading a book by end of the month, I would feel frustrated if the plan was interrupted by things with a higher priority.
During my mini-retirement, I had no hard deadline meaning there was a large range of activities that I could choose from and I had the freedom to plan them out however I wanted. I found myself get interested in a topic and 2 weeks later decided another priority was more urgent. I didn’t get frustrated this time because I knew that I could return to the previous topic when the time is right. At the same time, I was still working on something that’s important to me, so the time was not wasted in any sense. Even more, sometimes I got inspirations from the new project that I could use in the previous one.
2. Physical proximity is overrated
Connections are not strengthened proportionally by physical proximity, and distance doesn’t weaken strong connections either.
Since college I never spent so much time in this city and I was excited to get re-connected with friends here. It turned out I did have great time with old and new friends that I have a connection with, and the relationships didn’t get weaken when we didn’t have the time to hang out offline in person. I also talked to friends back in Canada and Europe regularly just like before. However, in terms of people that I thought I might have a chance to re-connect with, being physically in the same city didn’t bring us closer.
This was a surprising finding. I thought where my location was would define my connections with the world. Especially with the pandemic and WFH shift, I became more and more location-oriented in the sense that although I’m free to choose which location to be, it would still be a difficult decision because that’s where I will cultivate relationships. Now I feel more open-minded and light—weighted than before about physical locations. Different locations have different perks, but regardless the location, I’m capable of maintaining and creating relationships with people that truly matter to me.
3. I discovered my passion for sports
Being in a COVID (almost) free-zone, I had the privilege to participate in all sorts of sports, including but not limited to:
Bouldering (indoor)
Snowboarding (indoor, such a privilege)
Badminton
Bowling
CrossFit
Weight training
Hiking (50km in 14 hours for charity cause)
In the past, I ran (as a 2 time half-marathon finisher) and trained in the gym only as a mood booster. It was not because I wanted to do it, but more because if I didn’t do the workout my days would be really bumpy.
The past 6 months changed my mind.
I noticed I seek to play Badminton because I want to improve my footwork and postures*. I hike because I enjoy being in the nature. I train for better performance of snowboarding and bowling. I start to have fun doing sports.
The essence is to optimize performances and receive feedbacks, which is the motivation behind virtually everything I do. I have moved sports performance higher up in the priority list.
*My Badminton coach corrected me that, "moves" is a better word.
4. I can work outside of comfort zones
I was not able to perform any work-related activity productively outside of “scheduled work time”. In school, that was in the early mornings, and at work it was after work but before dinner. Everyday as soon as it passed 8pm, I felt instantly tired and low in battery.
Towards the end of last year, I was preparing for an exam and working a full-time job the same time. During work days, I only had time after dinner to study and do the practice tests. I calculated total hours needed and divided them into each day. If I started at 7:30pm every night and studied for 3 hours straight, plus the hours on weekends, I would be able to finish it. And that’s what I did, for 3 months.
I thought that was as far as my productivity could go.
Since I moved back to China, I found myself working at 3 different time zones: China time, Eastern time, and non-working hours in China time (for the consulting project). I have had meetings at 6:30am and also at 12:30am; I prepared presentations around lunch time as well as late in the night. I did the work in train stations, in hotel rooms, on my coach, and on a treadmill.
As quoting a fellow consultant, “Consulting work is all about multi-tasking.” I think it’s true for other kinds of work too. The fact that I can now work comfortably outside of “scheduled work time”, means the “scheduled work time” is not a constrain to creativity anymore. Of course, it’s better not to abuse this. Being present and have proper rest is crucial. Acknowledging this “superpower” in a way reminds me effectiveness is more important than numbers of hours.
5. When in doubts, try it out
Having the ultimate freedom and unlimited time in hand, inevitably I started to overthink career options. I was battling between two fields, UX research and data analysis. Understanding user experience and quantitatively solving product related questions are both intriguing to me and just overthinking the options didn’t help with decision making.
Instead, I gave UX a try. I learned the idea of “capping the investment” from Tim Ferries- he moved from LA to Austin,TX and gave it a 6-month cap. In 6 months if he still couldn’t fall in love with the city, he would reverse the decision and move back. I set a cap for one month and spent two hours per day on UX research. I read textbooks, watched YouTube videos, took Coursera courses, talked to experience researchers over coffee chats, and filmed usability test videos where I pretended to be a first time user landing on the homepage.
The four weeks went by fast because I had one job to do: to learn about UX research and not worried about anything else. I found this method cleared up my mind really well. I stopped wasting time thinking of doing it, but actually did it. Neither did I worry about wasting time on something I won’t eventual like- there was a cap on how much time I would spend on learning this topic and everything was under control. Even though now I decided not to pursue a full-time career as a UXR, UX related stuff I learned from those days still feel relevant and helpful.
6. Being prepared is rewarding
Be open to opportunities as long as they align with the long term goals.
I was given many opportunities during the past 6 months that I didn’t see coming, and they turned into snowballs that attracted more opportunities. One of the reasons is simply that I was open to opportunities and excited about any adventures; another reason is that I was prepared unintentionally so that when the opportunities landed on my laps I was able handle them.
Before I was approached by the consulting project, I didn’t plan to do any actual work at all. Since I have been interested in consulting and charity, I accepted the offer. It turned out my past experience with UX research and competitive analysis became a huge asset when doing the work despite I had zero experience with strategy consulting. The training I got during the project on presentation and story-telling potentially led to another career opportunity. I never planned to reach A from B and then eventually C; but the books I read, the trainings I received, or even coffee chats with people in the past have prepared me for novel challenges.
Same thing happened in writing. I first got the idea of launching a personal blog from Nat Eliason and signed up for Webflow. That was exactly one year ago. It didn’t take me one year to design a web page on Webflow or to write a post. It took only a couple of hours. What I lacked was the feeling of readiness. Between now and then, I have been accumulating materials in Bear and self educated everything about domains and hosting. When I felt ready during the mini-retirement, I didn’t have to start everything from absolutely zero; I already have one-year worth of preparation done.
This is another way of saying keep doing what you think is right even if you don’t see instant results. As Marcus Aurelius once said, “Just that you do the right thing the rest doesn’t matter.”