The Game Plan
First, a little brag:
I am guaranteed to finish in the top 25 in the Sports Illustrated pool. In my four years of participating, I've never finished above 200th place or so. Maybe 175th my first year. This is an amazing turn of events.
I've spent most of 2009 so far trying to figure out my next step. Ever since I came back from Beijing, I've felt a life assessment coming on. I've noted before that life seems to organize itself in four- to five-year chunks; this year marks my fifth at SI. It's been rewarding beyond my wildest expectations and I've learned a lot, but I need either to figure out how to step up my responsibilities at the magazine (a tricky proposition, since everyone in the industry is essentially hunkered down in a holding pattern), or to figure out where to go next.
My parents are also getting increasingly persistent in asking me when I'm going to start doing something with my life. This means going back to school. Getting my master's was a brief mollifier, but we all knew that the only degree that matters is the kind with a "D" in it. They actually asked me if I had all the undergrad prerequisites for med school (answer: no). They are pretty serious about me considering law school.
I went home last month for my dad's 65th birthday. Waiting for my flight back to New York at the airport, I sat down with my parents and we made a tentative plan for my future. They really want me to apply when law school admissions open up again next winter, for the 2010-11 school year. Just typing that makes me blanche a little, but studying law is in the 75th percentile of things I might like doing, so I can live with it. As my parents see it, I am almost 30 and it is way past time to get serious about my life.
So I have the rest of this year to go after that silver sliver in the 99th percentile. I'm not about to quit my job or anything -- I am too Asian and too practical and too timid and not disciplined enough for that -- but I do realize that I could be doing way more writing for myself than I've been doing (which is to say, little to none).
To push myself, I am doing two things this month: Script Frenzy and Gotham Writing Workshop's advanced screenwriting course. I'm making this commitment in my blog because I'd love for anyone else interested to join me (friend me as "sunnydlita" on the Script Frenzy site), and also because I need to be held accountable (the main reason I enrolled in the Gotham class).
I have an incredible amount of fear when it comes to pursuing this ridiculous dream. My mom asked me a couple of weeks ago: If I could go back ten years, would I have chosen a different educational/career path? Would I have declared pre-med and gone to medical school instead? I considered her question seriously and replied that I wouldn't; I have too much respect for the field of medicine to enter it knowing that I have no calling for it. But you know what I do wish? If there is one thing I could change about myself (a blasphemous hypothetical, I know, since God designed me exactly the way I am for a reason), it would be to have a passion for medicine.
I wish I wanted to be a doctor. There might have been a brief phase when I was 13 and had just finished The Joy Luck Club for the first time and wanted to rebel against the Asian clichés by majoring in psychology in college, but for the most part, I really wish that being a doctor was my dream in life. I know full well that being a physician is not something that should be taken lightly, that going through that gauntlet is one of the most difficult things a person can do, but at least I wouldn't have the niggling self-loathing, the feeling that there is something wrong with my orientation.
Anyway, for as long as I have left, I will be writing. The project I've picked for Script Frenzy is one I started sometime last year. It's called W.W.J.D., and it's a Christian/indie rock romantic comedy. Feel free to nag me about it any time; I'll need it.
I am guaranteed to finish in the top 25 in the Sports Illustrated pool. In my four years of participating, I've never finished above 200th place or so. Maybe 175th my first year. This is an amazing turn of events.
I've spent most of 2009 so far trying to figure out my next step. Ever since I came back from Beijing, I've felt a life assessment coming on. I've noted before that life seems to organize itself in four- to five-year chunks; this year marks my fifth at SI. It's been rewarding beyond my wildest expectations and I've learned a lot, but I need either to figure out how to step up my responsibilities at the magazine (a tricky proposition, since everyone in the industry is essentially hunkered down in a holding pattern), or to figure out where to go next.
My parents are also getting increasingly persistent in asking me when I'm going to start doing something with my life. This means going back to school. Getting my master's was a brief mollifier, but we all knew that the only degree that matters is the kind with a "D" in it. They actually asked me if I had all the undergrad prerequisites for med school (answer: no). They are pretty serious about me considering law school.
I went home last month for my dad's 65th birthday. Waiting for my flight back to New York at the airport, I sat down with my parents and we made a tentative plan for my future. They really want me to apply when law school admissions open up again next winter, for the 2010-11 school year. Just typing that makes me blanche a little, but studying law is in the 75th percentile of things I might like doing, so I can live with it. As my parents see it, I am almost 30 and it is way past time to get serious about my life.
So I have the rest of this year to go after that silver sliver in the 99th percentile. I'm not about to quit my job or anything -- I am too Asian and too practical and too timid and not disciplined enough for that -- but I do realize that I could be doing way more writing for myself than I've been doing (which is to say, little to none).
To push myself, I am doing two things this month: Script Frenzy and Gotham Writing Workshop's advanced screenwriting course. I'm making this commitment in my blog because I'd love for anyone else interested to join me (friend me as "sunnydlita" on the Script Frenzy site), and also because I need to be held accountable (the main reason I enrolled in the Gotham class).
I have an incredible amount of fear when it comes to pursuing this ridiculous dream. My mom asked me a couple of weeks ago: If I could go back ten years, would I have chosen a different educational/career path? Would I have declared pre-med and gone to medical school instead? I considered her question seriously and replied that I wouldn't; I have too much respect for the field of medicine to enter it knowing that I have no calling for it. But you know what I do wish? If there is one thing I could change about myself (a blasphemous hypothetical, I know, since God designed me exactly the way I am for a reason), it would be to have a passion for medicine.
I wish I wanted to be a doctor. There might have been a brief phase when I was 13 and had just finished The Joy Luck Club for the first time and wanted to rebel against the Asian clichés by majoring in psychology in college, but for the most part, I really wish that being a doctor was my dream in life. I know full well that being a physician is not something that should be taken lightly, that going through that gauntlet is one of the most difficult things a person can do, but at least I wouldn't have the niggling self-loathing, the feeling that there is something wrong with my orientation.
Anyway, for as long as I have left, I will be writing. The project I've picked for Script Frenzy is one I started sometime last year. It's called W.W.J.D., and it's a Christian/indie rock romantic comedy. Feel free to nag me about it any time; I'll need it.