The Journey of Emily Fan

"It's so hard talking to you. You're so stubborn and narrow-minded." "You want to quarantine so that you don't have to do chores."  These words my parents said to me replay in my head as I sit in the room anxiously waiting for my test results to come back out, hoping to safely reintegrate with my family after flying in from the East Coast. 2-4 more days left. I know my parents were probably joking or dealing with their own frustrations when those words rolled out of their mouths.  Sometimes I wonder if quarantining was all futile due to the whole house air circulation. Or my brief interactions with my family as I head out to take a walk or bike ride. I sense my throat getting sore and start to wonder if my sense of smell has deteriorated. Sometimes my mind leaps to agonizing about the possibility of months of brain fog that might occur from COVID-19.  But at some point, I don't have to worry about getting brain fog for the rest of my life or about ta

I am sometimes afraid of reducing my responsibilities and taking time off / having free time since I am afraid of using that time unwisely, for instance, by watching YouTube, playing video games, or scrolling through Facebook. And I know that this is the case for many people. Upon reflection, this is because initially, my extrinsic motivation to do work decreases because I have relieved myself from my deadlines and responsibilities. However, having more time for myself because I don't have responsibilities allows for more reflection time (to make diagrams like this), which would lead me to find what intrinsically motivates me, so if I end up exploiting my intrinsic motivations, I would be more productive. There is a delay in this part of the loop, and because of that, I would in fact initially be less productive if I relieve myself of my responsibilities. Regarding the arrows What the + means: having more free time / taking time off  leads to more   personal reflection . What the

You might think: wow I’m 1 out of 7,500,000,000+ people. That’s approximately 0%. In the midst of global crises, it seems as if the impact you can make is roughly 0%. Great. :/ I feel. Cupertino is only one city that I lobbied to push from stronger climate policies, Cupertino High school was the one school where I contributed to the environmental club, my family only consists of 3 other people.  But what if because there are so many people there is the possibility that there is at least one that shares some of your views? What you care about? They might not be apparent. They might be hiding what they care about because they believed the world didn’t care (that was me for a while to some people). But they are there. Or maybe they’re your role model but only if you’ve heard about them. The fact that there are so many people means that there inevitably means that there are people who care about making the changes in the world you care about.  Someone once told me that the impact you make

A lot of things didn’t make sense to me in high school, and oftentimes I would pose questions and put my thoughts on Facebook. Is it possible that people are neither good or bad, but that they only have a perception of what they deem important? For instance, greedy people may put a disproportionately large importance on material possessions. Cheaters may put a disproportionately large importance on success. In contrast, selfless people may prioritize helping others and people of integrity may prioritize moral values over success. What does this mean to us? What should our priorities be? Let me just accept myself for who I am and acknowledge that even though I accept myself, I can be much better than I am right now. We judge ourselves based on our past achievements and failures. My past achievements and past failures are in the past. That, I cannot change however much I wish I could. I shall simply work in the present for the future. I'm used to a sy