2018 Life Update

My 2018 Life Update

2018 was a year of rediscovery. My first full year living in San Francisco and working at LinkedIn (I moved here in August 2017), and the first full year without my dad or granddad in my life (Sunday marked exactly two years since my father's death).

After three years in Hong Kong, I forgot how long it takes to adjust to a new city - to settle in, to make new friendships. With my break-up from a four-year relationship in January, and my dog Stella's unexpected death over the summer (she fell off my couch and knocked her head), my established day-to-day habits were turned on their head. 

Mid-2018, in a bout of neurotic organization, I stuck color-coordinated sticky notes all over my bedroom wall. Why?

I love writing lists. I love marking off completed tasks. But when I found old journals and notebooks strewn about with the same lists written over and over again in them, I realized I never check my wish lists once I write them down!

So this time, I "borrowed" some office supplies and stuck my goals right onto my wall, to be seen every day. And, now, by seeing them there, I’ve actually completed quite a few! 

In case you are curious, this was the logic I used (because of course I created rules and procedures):

Format:

In Kan-Ban style - three columns:

Not Started, In Progress, Finished

Colors:

Pink - long-term project to chip away at

Orange - needs preparation or training to accomplish

Yellow - easy to do, but I’m nervous to go do it

Rules:

1. Stick it up as soon as I think of it

2. Only take it down (as in not complete it) after serious consideration 

3. It’s okay to only work on a few at a time

4. Always be working towards one, even if it’s baby steps

Now, just a few months later, I've rediscovered my love for scuba diving (did my advanced open water certification, nitrox certification, and lived on a boat for a week in Belize diving 5 times per day), joined a weekly open water swimming group that swims in the San Francisco Bay (sometimes in wet suits), and competed in two sprint triathlons and one 30-mile bike race. Never thought I could swim a mile, but turns out I can!

Marin Relay Tri, 2nd Place! (don’t ask out of how many)

Diving in Belize

Guess what we are spelling

I also challenged myself to go to activities that I've been scared to go to - ranging from presenting a speech in Mandarin at a Chinese-English bilingual Toastmasters public speaking group to attending salsa and swing dancing lessons.  Heck, I even sang with an acapella group.. IN FRONT OF 300+ PEOPLE. Why not! I joined the board of the Harvard Young Alumni Club of SF...mostly so that I could host social events I would be arranging anyways - under the guise of a more formal entity. I even partook in a weekly trivia group. I was pretty bad at that one because I know zero pop culture, don’t follow sports, and don’t listen to music. But I had one shining moment when they asked, "how many squares are on a Scrabble board?"

Answer: a 7-letter word doesn't hit both Triple Word Scores, so its 7 + 1 + 7 --> 15 x 15 = 225. Now you know too!

At work, I've pushed myself to lean in more and seek out more opportunities - I'll be running a SQL training for all our analytical teams (BizOps, SalesOps, Pricing Ops, etc),  am taking on the Learning & Development program management for LinkedIn's Strategy & Analytics entry-level rotational program, and will be global road tripping to multiple LinkedIn offices for the project I support (that last one is my actual job). Possible spots - Chicago, NYC, and Hong Kong.

If you're in one of those cities and want to come by for a free lunch at a LinkedIn office, let me know, and I'll keep you updated as I finalize trip dates. 

What is the project I work on, you ask? As the Global Go-to-Market for Sales Operations, I'm part of the cross-functional team that runs "Project Upgrade", a two-year project to migrate our 12,000 customers from Lynda, which we acquired in 2015, over to our Linkedin Learning platform. It's been very hands-on and learn-as-you-go, which I absolutely love.

Looking forward into 2019, one of my goals is to write more - not just blog posts, but rhymes. (I've always loved rhymes). Here are some of my recent brain creations:

Other than that, what's going on? Well, last Christmas, my sisters gifted me with an illustrated copy of Fried Snake Soup, a rhyming children's book I had written for my niece Lorraine's birthday. My fan club has grown to two nieces (I know, I know, very popular).

As always, I use this newsletter as a way to stay in touch with the special people in my life. Some of you I see frequently, some of you I haven't seen in years. I hope you've enjoyed getting a semi-short update on my life; I would love to hear some more detail about what's been going on in yours!

Love to you all,
Caroline