Doctor, Lawyer, or Bust!

Unless you go Engineering.... or Accountant.


Chuckling already, are we?! Just like some previous posts, you laugh because you know it is true. This is an old, and yet, strangely common adage of the modern Asian culture. Sadly, this is also severely damaging to the mental, emotional, and intellectual health of the Millennial Asian. Not to mention, it is a terrible limitation placed upon the career options of the millennials.

Let's go back to the roots of the issue.

Asian history is a rough one. After many centuries, we've discovered that doctors (and now lawyers) are spared ill will in rough times because their services are welcome on all sides. Therefore, after two generations of this pursuit, we've basically screwed ourselves out of any meaningful placement in higher education because we ALL look the same. Asians perceivably all have straight A's, do extracurriculars of a rather non-athletic nature (because brute strength is for dumb people, right?); we all play a string instrument/piano... but, Heaven Forbid that we did anything in performing arts, especially, in acting, since only fools who can't make a living on a stage... as it is so very obvious, actors make zero money in our society.

OFFENDED?! You should be.

The issue is that certain flawed philosophies have been brought OUT OF CONTEXT and into the millennial age. They serve only to inject inaccuracies, fallacies, and worse, have forced our Millennial Asians to submit to conforming into a perpetuated stereotypical existence. The result? They all look the same. Which means, increased difficulty in differentiating themselves as capable candidates for higher education, for career paths, for just about anything. Because....!

If everyone is special (ie super high achieving and all of the same ilk), then no one is.

Didn't hear about this yet? Oh yeah... all that straight A, piano playing, math team nonsense is actually making it HARDER for Asians to get into college. See here and here.


So why Doctor? Why Lawyer?

Because, they have a "skill," which better translates in English to a "license." They perform services which all societies value... (kinda, *insert lawyer joke here*), and, they make a lot of MONEY. Isn't that was ultimately leads the decision making process in the cultural mind's eye? Doctors and lawyers are distinguished in the Asian cultures because they make a lot of money. This means power, position, honor, and bragging rights... particularly of and by the family.

"My son is a doctor!" ... "My daughter is going to law school."

And yet, shouldn't the Millennial Asian go to a school, choose a major, focus on a career path... shouldn't all that be for THEIR good? For THEIR benefit? For THEIR future? Why does so much pressure upon our poor children ultimately become about how much the parents and the family can brag... to impress people that the children may never meet nor mean a thing?

Am I saying that working hard and finding a good career isn't important?

Of course not! Look at me. I'm a doctor, have an MBA, and went to a UC college. That's not what I'm saying. What I AM saying is that we need to look beyond the doctor-lawyer paradigm. That doctor-lawyer-or-bust framework shouldn't be ALL we fashion our children's lives into becoming.

• What if they are seriously talented in music?
• What if they are excellent painters?
• What if they are great on stage?
• What if they like working with their hands?
• What if they wish to join the military and serve their country?
• What if they bake decadent delights?
• What if they are home cooks, needing a launching pad?
• What if they love animals?
• What if they have a natural ability in sports?
• What if they have a voice of an angel?
• What if they like to dance?
• What if they like business?
• What if they want to go work for themselves?
• What if they wish to be an entrepreneur?
• What if they have a natural attraction to politics?
• What if they love video games? (see here, "Video Games are Evil!")
• What if they DON'T WANT TO BE A DOCTOR?!
• What if they HATE the idea of being a lawyer?
• What if they just want to live a humble and simple life?
• What if they want to be happy?

There are so many opportunities in life. So many ways to make a living. And sure, some of these paths in life don't make as much money. So what?! There is ultimately a trade off in life; an equilibrium which we meet.

I've worked jobs and turned down jobs that paid obscene amounts of money. Why? Because, it took away from my family, my friends, and the fulfillment that life was worth living beyond the money.

Money is something we need in life. It is a tool for us to sustain our living. Yet, it shouldn't be our sole purpose... particularly where careers are concerned.

I've seen too many kids go to school to become things which were not their idea to begin with.

Doctors handing their diploma over to their parents, then going off to pursue their passions. Lawyers quitting forever, because of the stress. Engineers with no interest in the math. Accountants bored out of their minds, knowing that their life's work has summed to nothing purposeful.

Doctor, Lawyer, or Bust? My thoughts: If you pressure your child to become a doctor, lawyer, or anything else that really isn't the passion of THEIR life's pursuit. Then, it IS as bust and you have broken your child.

Instead, we should empower our Millennial Asians to pursue their dreams. The state of our economic ecosystems isn't so fragile that only being a doctor of a lawyer will garner them any stability or leverage in life. Rather, I would offer that Millennial Asians be empowered and encouraged to pursue interests, passions, and their natural abilities... that they break out of the shell we created for them... so that they can become more than just "Doctor-Lawyer."

And to be honest, more and more doctors and lawyers I know at present are telling kids to run from such professions.  I highly recommend the reading of this blog post by a lawyer I know personally:

• Why I Quit the Law Firm and Got a Non-Profit Internship

Together, let us craft a new age. Let us encourage school, career, and achievement to be about them... about our kids. About the Millennial Asian and their own life choices. Trust me, they will keep the work ethic and the values you've brought them up with. Through this freedom, they will become more... in fact, they will surpass the paradigms and completely surpass what we were and are.

They will become a new generation: Millennial Asians... a generation with no limits!

Girl Runs Away From Home. Why? Academic Pressure

You may or may not be following this: A 16 year old girl in California has gone missing. According to KTLA, her name is Mira Hu and she may have run away from home because of too much academic pressure. LA Times corroborates this story.

First, this breaks my heart. Mira, please... stay safe. And, when you're ready... go home. Just go home and be safe.

Secondly, can you IMAGINE the amount of social psychological pressure from the parents, the culture, the peers, and any additional perceptions on the matter to make a young girl run away from home because of an academic construct?! This needs to stop.

Honestly, I'm both terrified for Mira and disgusted that aspects of the Asian culture is willing to emotionally and psychologically terrorize their young Millennial Asians to this point. Given, this isn't how every single parent-child situation is. However, it is the overwhelming majority and tragically accepted stereotype.

This type of mishap is precisely the reason I decided to start this (uncharacteristically) controversial blog. I've seen too much of such cultural tragedies among those who identify with an Asian heritage. 

You've made a girl run away from home!

Think on that. And, think on what needs to be changed.


Update: Mira has come home. Hopefully the lesson is learned...

What's The End Goal?

The most common mistake I see during my mentorship sessions is a conflict of being Process Oriented vs. Goal Oriented. Mind you, there is NOTHING wrong with being process oriented. In fact, I am personally very process oriented. One of my biggest passions is nothing but process: cooking. Yes, I love the process of cooking. In fact, mimicking gourmet cooking is one of my favorite processes -- particularly when there are many steps for a difficult and technical recipe. I absolutely relish the process of cooking and making a perfect dish.

However, when it comes to career goals, we have a problem. In many Asian countries to where the parents of Millennial Asians came from, the schooling-career pathway was much more connected. In other words, the process to care of itself. You took an SAT of sorts, placed with a school, took another test, placed with another school, took another test, placed with a college, and finally a career. It was a straight shot from school to grades to work. That's how it worked in the "motherland." Good grades meant good schools with high rankings. Good schools with high rankings meant good jobs. It was that simple.

Sadly, it is NOT that simple in many other areas of the world and is quickly becoming just as complicated back in the "home country." The school, the degree, and even the grades are not translating directly into stable jobs. It is translating even less when it comes to getting into those ranked schools.... when considering medical school or law school, etc? Forget it! There's an entirely different system at play which is NOT compatible with the old Asian culture's way of thinking. In fact, this has even spawned the formation of private academic and preparatory counseling companies which specialize in making their candidates LESS ASIAN! Why? Because it's more likely for the Millennial Asians to get into schools.

In all cases, the lesson remains: It's not what you know, it's WHO you know.

So how does this help us Millennial Asians? It helps us because we form an accurate and mutual understanding of the situation.

See, in business, a situation analysis is done before and after ANY strategic move. The same should be done for life, especially when it comes to career paths. If school is a prerequisite for further schooling, then it is very important. If a particular major, ranking, or certification is required for a job, then it is very important. However, if such things are not so important, then the precursors are basically worthless. And with the end goal in mind (ie. independent living, job, financial stability), we end up with different courses of action.

We commonly see this problem at hand:

• Oh, you're going to college? Which college?
• College XYZ.
• What's your major?
• 123.
• What are you going to do with that?
• Uhhhh........

What should be happening is this:

• What do you want to do with your life?
• I want to be a professional musician.
• So go practice every day, win competitions, learn from the best, get professional exposure. Aim for Juilliard, get ready to land in Open Mic.
• Okay! I guess we need to buy an instrument.
• Yep, I guess we better.

Yet, stereotypically, almost every Millennial Asian is a musical expert by the time they are a Freshman in Highschool, right? Yet, "Heaven Forbid" they try to make a living off of it. *sighs*

So! What's the End Goal? If your goal is to drive to Disneyland, a reasonable person would take a direct route. It would only be an unreasonable person who would first detour to some place (say San Fransisco) miles away only because everyone else did it... only because it was the cultural thing to do.

The most reasonable course for anyone is to take a direct route to their end goal. However, to do this, your end goal must be clear. If you wish to become a nurse, don't go get a 4-year-degree and THEN you're BSN. Just get your BSN. Don't just be a "Bio Major" because that's the thing to do. EVERYONE ELSE IS A BIO MAJOR. You think you're special? Of course you're not. No "duh" that no medical school will begin to look at you... you look like everyone else.

If you want a chance, you must stand out as unique, valuable, and innovative.

You must have the end goal in your sights, and, never deviate from that cause. How do we solve this strife that Millennial Asians suffer from when it comes to school, career path, and this existential shame?

Empower them to pursue their end goals DIRECTLY.

This requires that the millennial and the parenthood understand AND agree. It means that both sides need to drop their pride and sense of "duty" to the culture. The duty in life isn't to the culture. The duty is to EACH OTHER! After all, you're family, aren't you?! It's prime time you acted like it.

First stop: School.

This first post is about school. Surprising, huh? I'm coming at this from the perspective of a mentor. I mentor a lot... for lack of a better term, I'm a life coach of sorts. It's part of my professional persona as a Doctor of Physical Therapy. And, it's also part of my role as a strategic consultant in business. I coach people (or businesses) to become better than they are now.

Sadly, when it comes to those I mentor who identify as Millennial Asians (MAs), we seem to get stuck on something... a topic that keeps recurring to which I take insurmountable energy trying to coach people away from. SCHOOL.

There was one time at a family gathering where several of my cousins (for sake of simplicity... they're cousins) chatted energetically for three hours on JUST SCHOOL.

JUST SCHOOL! It was crazy. My wife couldn't believe it. Noted, my wife is of an American-French-Canadian background. This wasn't part of her upbringing. But, hearing 15-35 year olds have a legit conversation for HOURS on just school. It was shocking to her.

Moreover, the last several months, I've been seeing an increased trend of Millennial Asians completely stuck in a rut. They want to do good in school but can't. They want to get into good colleges but can't (since the system is biased against them).

But, why school? What about school is so important? School doesn't mean you'll get any better of a job. School doesn't mean you'll live a life of true meaning... of significance. School doesn't mean you'll have financial stability. SCHOOL MEANS NOTHING BECAUSE KNOWLEDGE MEANS NOTHING.

The ability to apply means everything.

And to such point, how many friends have you heard of graduate with a 4-year-college-degree and end up working a job which they could've worked as a high school graduate? PLENTY. How many are doing things completely unrelated to those college degrees? PLENTY. And, there have been repeated articles and blogs citing articles that medical doctors actually don't make that much more than any other profession over the lifetime of their career due to all the other associated expenses to a point where their hourly rate is actually only mid-$30s/hour.

To make matters even more emotionally inflamed for me as a mentor, I find that kids keep going back to the ancient Asian value of "do good in school, get a good job, make lots of money." Is that what life is all about? REALLY?

Is there no personal pursuit? Do you have no actual personal goals? Are you just a shell of labor? If that's the case, financially speaking it would be easier not to have children to make up for that investment.

It's absolutely ludicrous to even think this way, as if the goal, being a job/money is the case -- then one should be thinking WHAT JOB do I want? What career path? Think backwards. Think on what is required for what industry and THEN make a choice of schooling.

Going to school for the sake of going to school is folly. It is a waste. Is not wastefulness to be shunned in Asian culture?

So..... this first stop... about school. What I have to say is this.

If anyone has had enough schooling, it's me. I've done undergrad and completed two graduate programs. I graduated with honors twice, mind you.

And, I've been in the position of a hiring manager -- so I'm telling you, it's not about the school that will get you a job. It has to do with you as a person. DO I WANT TO WORK WITH YOU?

Your grades don't have anything to do with it, neither does the school you went to. It has to do with YOU.... the human sitting in front of me who I am interviewing.

So, enough of this. I know this first post is a bit of rant. But really, I just had to. I've been so fed up with how many families and how many lives the Asian culture has destroyed that I was compelled to create this blog.

I'm Ben Fung and I am Counter Cultural. Until next time!

PS. I'm typically quite a positive figure. If you know me from my primary blog, you'll know that to be true.