How are your New Year’s resolutions coming along?

I guess it’s a pretty good time to ask that question, because at this time of the year you are probably either making good progress, or you’ve given up on them.

I had a chat with a friend about his resolutions (most of which are related to his passion for music), and he had this to say, “I’m always so excited about my resolutions when I set them. But then school starts and the work starts coming in and there are all these meetings to go to—and my priorities change. So I never end up making good on them. I hate that!”

I think most of us can identify with that. It’s disappointing when you feel like you’re reacting to the circumstances that are thrust upon you, rather than consciously pursuing what is most important to you.

But that conversation got me thinking: what is the true purpose of resolutions, and goals in general, for that matter?

Duke students are notoriously driven and goal-oriented. I’ve met people who will not be satisfied unless they get into Yale Law, score 40 on the MCAT, make it to the Dean’s list every semester, or become president of their student organization.

These are all great goals to set, but I don’t believe that goals have much intrinsic value. Now don’t get me wrong, I’m a huge fan of goal-setting, and at last count I’ve written down a ridiculously large number of 57 goals that I would like to achieve in 2010.

But if we think about some of the most inspiring goals that we’ve already reached so far, I dare say they’ve been somewhat of a letdown. When we set a goal, we often think to ourselves, “Wow, it would be AMAZING if I could pull this off.” But when we actually do pull it off, the feeling is good and there’s definitely a sense of accomplishment—but it is almost never as amazing as we thought it would be.

Since achieving our goals in and of itself does not bring us the fulfillment that we desire, what then is the true purpose of setting goals? I think there are three main ones.

1. Goals enhance the quality of your life right now.

Having something to reach for creates hope and anticipation for the future. Having goals makes it more enjoyable to live in the present, because you’re excited about what you hope is going to happen.

During National Service, I served as a manpower officer in an infantry battalion where many of my men were primary school dropouts. They had little to look forward to after their two years in the army were over—they were not going to university, they were unlikely to land a high-paying job, they had no idea how they were going to make a living. Many of them went AWOL (Absent Without Official Leave), for which their punishment was to have their two years of service extended. Since they did not have goals that they wanted to achieve after they got out of the army, they felt that more time in the army wasn’t that bad anyway.

2. Goals determine the kind of person you want to be.

If your goal is to speak to a crowd of 100 people, then you’re going to need to be a person of a certain amount of courage and confidence. You’re also going to need to be a person who is sufficiently knowledgeable about a specific subject that 100 people want to listen to you talk!

You need to be sure of what character traits you want to develop, and then set goals that will specifically help you become that person.

3. Goals are markers to your final destination.

Many of us have grand dreams of what an ideal future would look like—what kind of family, career, car, house, and influence we would like to have. But grand dreams are realized by taking small and unassuming steps. Goals are precisely those steps which will help us get to that fantastic final destination.

In closing, the US Army employs a model of leadership called “Be. Know. Do.” In essence, it says that you first need to be clear about exactly who you want to be before you can decide what you want to know. Only then should you decide what you want to do.

So go ahead and be an achiever. In fact, go ahead and be an overachiever! Just be sure to put the “being” and “knowing” before the “doing”—that’s the key to purposeful goal-setting.

Over the last few weeks, many Duke students have been in a frenzy updating their resumes and applying for summer internships. Investment banking and consulting seem to be the hot favorites.

According to the Duke Career Center, the top two hiring industries for 2009 Duke graduates are financial services (26 percent) and consulting (19 percent), and the top seven for-profit employers are Morgan Stanley, Bank of America, Goldman Sachs, Exxon Mobil, Boston Consulting Group, Barclays Capital and Microsoft.

Those statistics paint a pretty good picture of how popular banking and consulting are. In fact, out of the first 10 friends I thought of who have filled out internship applications, nine of them applied to one or the other.

But why exactly are banking and consulting so popular?

I attended a talk last semester by George Grody, a visiting professor in the Markets and Management Studies program, where he asked the audience—all Duke undergrads—that same question.

“That’s where the money is!” shouted one student. That’s where the money is.

Well, money is a good reason to apply for a job, but I don’t think it’s good enough. Don’t get me wrong, I don’t think there’s anything wrong with wanting to be rich, and I don’t think money is the root of all evil. It opens doors for you both financially and socially, and it can be used for many noble causes. But at some level, we’re all keenly aware of the fact that there are billionaires out there who are extremely unhappy.

I have a theory as to why we think money will buy us happiness though. It’s because unless we actually have it all—money, cars, mansions, etc.—we’re not fully convinced that such luxuries will not bring us fulfillment. We recognize that we are not 100 percent content right now, so maybe if we score one more A, go to one more awesome party or travel to one more exotic destination, we will become just a little bit happier.

On Sep. 18, 2009, the Wall Street Journal published an article about well-paid bankers who had lost their jobs during the economic downturn. A 27-year-old, Ajmal Sheikh, was working 90- to 100-hour weeks at UBS, making over $250,000 a year before he was laid off in Nov. 2008. But in the summer of 2009, UBS asked if he wanted his job back. At the time, Sheikh was working on a long-standing interest of his: a project that helped to provide doctors with electronic health records. After doing some soul-searching, Sheikh decided that he had to turn UBS down and pursue what he was truly passionate about.

What a tough decision that must have been! When you’re 27 years old, earning $250,000 a year, driving a fancy car and living in a nice penthouse in Manhattan, everyone you know probably looks at you and thinks, “You’re the man. You’re living the dream.” Even if you’re not actually happy with your life, I can’t imagine how difficult it must be to give all of that up.

Sheikh summed it up well when he said, “If you give people a taste of the good life, they just want more. You think to yourself, ‘I’ll quit next year to follow my dream.’” Losing his “dream” job, ironically, allowed Sheikh to pursue his real dream.

To borrow an analogy Stephen Covey uses in “The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People,” Sheikh had been so busy climbing the ladder—Should I skip rungs? What’s the best climbing technique?—that he had forgotten to check if the ladder was leaning against the right wall. Getting laid off gave him the opportunity to do just that. It’s a good thing he realized that the ladder was indeed leaning against the wrong wall so early on in his career.

So when I see such a large number of Duke students getting excited about banking and consulting jobs—and about all the money they will be making—I wonder if they’ve already asked themselves what they truly want out of a career. And just to make it clear, I don’t doubt that for some people, banking or consulting is exactly where the ladder should be.

In closing, I’m reminded that, “That’s where the money is” was what bank robber Willie Sutton said when a reporter asked him why he stole from banks. I fully recognize that I’m speaking as an idealist whose work experience consists only of two summer internships. I believe, however, that if money is your primary reason for choosing a career, you’re robbing yourself of the fulfillment that is yours to claim if you were to pursue your calling rather than your ambition.

Distinguishing between calling and ambition isn’t easy, but therein lies the key to a satisfying work life. Let’s not settle for second-best when it comes to something as important as our career.

Yesterday I had the opportunity to talk to a group of international students at Duke about academic integrity. I gave the talk on behalf of the Honor Council, which is an organization that promotes the Duke honor code.

The academic culture in the US is pretty different from many other countries– it’s very different from Singapore, that’s for sure. As such, a lot of international students in the US don’t have a good idea of what kind of behavior will result in severe consequences if they are caught.

In fact, the number one excuse that international students give when brought before the conduct board for academic dishonesty is that they “didn’t know that this constituted cheating.”

That’s something I find very hard to believe. As an international student myself, I can safely say that copying someone else’s work during a test is cheating in Singapore, and it is also cheating in the US. Copying and pasting a sentence from someone else’s essay and passing it off as your own writing is plagiarism in Singapore, and it is also plagiarism in the US.

The difference lies not in what constitutes cheating; rather, the difference lies in what constitutes something serious enough to warrant severe punishment.

So, 99% of the time, when international students who have been caught for cheating say that they “didn’t know that this is considered academic dishonesty,” what they really mean is that they didn’t know that this was so serious that they might get kicked out of school if they were found out. I’m almost certain they knew that their behavior was unethical.

Thus, eradicating academic dishonesty comes down to students making a personal decision that they will do the right thing no matter what the circumstances, rather than deciding that they will not do a “bad enough” thing that might get they expelled.

As leadership expert John Maxwell says, what sets great people apart is that they make great decisions early on in life, and they spend the rest of their lives managing those decisions. If you don’t make a conscious decision that you are going to be an honest person, chances are that big enough temptations will arise that’ll make you behave in a dishonest way.

Truly, greatness is a decision; it doesn’t happen by chance.

I lost a good friend last week when she committed suicide. I found out about her death when people started writing posts on her Facebook wall like “Goodbye” and “I hope you’ve found the peace you were looking for.”

A slightly weird way to find out that my friend had passed away, I thought.

I was saddened and shocked, and I still am, over her death. It’s painful to know that she’s gone—just like that. But I think a part of me felt shocked, too, because I was once again confronted with my own mortality. I was reminded that even though I’m in my 20s and I don’t have any health problems, I am one day going to die. If you were to ask anyone, “Do you think you’re going to live forever?” you will most likely get a reply that goes something like “Of course not—we’re human.”

But it is one thing to believe in your head that all humans eventually die, and it is another to have someone look you in the eye and say, “You are going to die. You are certainly going to die.”

I once read a psychology paper about people who try to evade death by engaging in death-defying activities like skydiving and bungee jumping. The paper argued that these activities are not “death-defying.” Rather, they are “death-denying.” We all know that we are mere mortals, but we often acknowledge this fact without actually coming to terms with it. Thus, participating in “death-denying” activities provides us with an avenue to further convince ourselves—in the subconscious realm—that we can escape death.

Over the past two years I’ve gone white water rafting, hang gliding, paragliding, skydiving and bungee jumping. Every time I complete a skydiving or bungee jumping attempt, I feel a little bit more empowered, a little bit more fearless, a little bit more immortal. I understand why some people constantly pursue stunts or activities that are literally life-threatening. It’s not just about the adrenaline rush or the adventure; it’s primarily about the accompanying sense of immortality, the feeling that death does not have a hold on you. I now recognize this as a foolish pursuit founded on an escapist mindset that leaves you with a sense of emptiness whenever you are not getting your quick fix of pseudo-immortality.

So when I learned of my friend’s death, I was reminded that there is no avoiding it. Since death is a reality for all of us, the question to ask ourselves is not “What can I do to make myself feel more immortal?”

Rather, we need to ask the question: “What do I want my life to count for?”

In “Repacking Your Bags: Lighten Your Load for the Rest of Your Life,” authors Richard Leider and David Shapiro found that most people’s number one fear is having lived a meaningless life. We all want to leave behind a legacy that is unique and special. I don’t believe there is such a thing as a “perfect” legacy. Maybe you want to be remembered as a loving and generous person, or maybe you want to be remembered as a passionate person who helped to further a humanitarian cause, or maybe you want to be remembered as an intellectual who changed the way the world thinks about an issue.

But whatever it is that you want your legacy to be, you should be living every single day of your life building it. It’s a bit too late to start thinking about your legacy when you’re on your deathbed as it is not built in a day, but day by day.

On my deceased friend’s Facebook wall, there were many posts which described what a kind and warm person she was. Her legacy is her kindness and warmth—and I have no doubt that her life counted. It feels kind of strange to say this, but I guess our legacies will be summed up by what people write on our Facebook walls when we pass away.

What would you like your friends and family to write on your Facebook wall?

For me, I’d like people to write posts describing me as a man who really loved life and who really loved lives– just like the tagline of this website. My friend’s sudden death has caused me to make a recommitment to building this legacy day by day. Moreover, I want to fully come to terms with my mortality, for I believe that it is only when you are fully ready to die that you are fully ready to live. Eventually I’m going to die. In the meantime, I want to build a life that counts. And I want to really, really live.

To my friend whose life of kindness and warmth burned out far too soon, I look forward to that day when we meet in heaven. Until then, your legacy will echo for eternity here on earth.

I recently came back to Duke after spending 3 weeks in Peru. Here’s a picture of some native Peruvians.

The native people of Peru are descendants of the  Incans. The Incan empire dominated Peru from the 1400s to the 1530s. In the 1530s, the Spanish conquistadors arrived on the scene and conquered the Incans.

Many of the native people in Peru today still speak Kechua, the language of the Incans.

One interesting thing I learned is that, originally, there was no word for “thank you” in Kechua (although today there is). More about this later.

During the time of the Incan empire, the people often made offerings to the gods. It was hoped that the gods would be pleased, and would bless the people with good weather and a bountiful harvest. Llamas and alpacas were often sacrificed, but when an “extra big” blessing was needed, the Incans sacrificed young children and teenagers. These were considered the “best” kind of offering.

The tour guide told us that the “chosen” children were very willing to sacrifice their lives, and their parents were also willing to have their children be sacrificed!

The Incans believed that sacrificing your life was a way to serve the community, to serve the greater good. They believed in the concept of paying it forward. This explains why originally there was no word for “thank you” in the Kechua language. The way to express your gratitude was service. The Incans knew that everyone would be willing to lay down their lives for the community.

I’m not a fan of human sacrifice, but I do think that we have much to learn from the Incans.

Service is not just an admirable action, or something to make us feel good about ourselves. Service is meant to be a lifestyle, a mindset. Service is the call to operate out of a vastness of vision, to give of yourself because you know that you are part of a community, and that you are part of something far greater than yourself.

My older brother, Jonathan, owns a gym and he’s really into health and fitness. He recently did a radio interview where he was asked fitness-related questions. During the interview, he said something which I thought was pretty striking:

“We have confused what is average with what is normal. It is average to be obese, to have a poor diet, to be at risk for cancer, diabetes, and cardiovascular disease. But it is normal to be in good shape, to be lean and strong, and to have a low risk of contracting degenerative diseases.”

We have confused what is average with what is normal.

Jonathan was talking specifically about physical health, but I think this applies in many other areas of life as well.

One of my good friends recently told me that he’s found a magical technique for building rapport and making new friends. “All you have to say is, ‘Oh man, I’m so tired. I really need a nap,’” he explained. “You’ll immediately connect with people, and they’ll always respond, ‘Me too! I’m so tired, I could really use a nap right now.’” And just like that—ta-dah! You’ve established common ground with a stranger.

The most hilarious thing is that my friend sometimes uses this magical friend-making technique even when he’s not tired and does not need a nap. I never imagined that “I really need a nap” could become a kind of figure of speech!

It’s noteworthy that although it’s clearly not desirable to always be tired, we’ve come to accept it as normal, simply because everyone else is always tired. If you’re always upbeat and full of energy, some might even consider you weird!

I believe that we need to raise our standards of what we consider “normal.” When these higher standards are in place, our behavior will undoubtedly change. When you change your thoughts and beliefs, you’ll gradually modify your actions too.

If you’re fully convinced that it is normal to get enough sleep every day, it is normal to have deep and meaningful relationships, and it is normal to be passionate about igniting change in whatever field excites you—regardless of whether or not this is “average”—I’m sure that your life will be more fulfilling and fruitful.

Who doesn’t want to be normal, right?

In our culture of always having a hundred and one things to do but no time to do them, it’s easy to neglect the small things: replying that e-mail you know you ought to, returning that phone call, being punctual—and not five minutes late—for your meetings.

It’s Chicken Soup for the Soul author Jack Canfield who said, “How you do anything is how you do everything.” When we intentionally do the small things well, even if that’s not the “average” thing to do, we will naturally do the big things well too. But we have to first decide that we will not let what is average influence what we consider to be normal.

Lesson 12 was the last lesson of the semester. The students in the class bought me a Jesus soft toy, because they wanted to inspire me to become a great ethicist like Jesus. I thought that was really sweet of them! Although I do think that the soft toy kind of looks like Einstein, don’t you?

Being an instructor for this house course has been a defining experience for me. A few days ago, I asked myself what personal significance this course has had to me. The one word that jumped out at me was TRUTH.

I believe in the notion of truth. I believe that it is often complex, confusing, hidden or elusive. But there is such a thing as truth.

At an academic institution like Duke, I’ve had the opportunity to hear countless experts talk about their views on a great number of issues. It often amazes me how many different opinions on the same issue you’ll hear from experts. This is true whether they’re talking about scientific theories, healthcare, leadership, the economy, the environment, or engineering practices.

Considering the fact that some of the smartest people in the world can’t agree on what is correct, it’s tempting to think that everything is relative or circumstantial or situational– that absolute truth does not exist.

But this house course has been a reminder to me that although the truth is often hard to sieve out, truth does exist. Through the assigned readings and the students’ sharing of their personal experiences and beliefs, I feel like I’ve come that much closer to finding the truth in many ethical issues.

I’m an idealist at heart, and one of my favorite quotes is by writer Joshua Harris:

“Ideals are like stars. We will not succeed in touching them with our hands, but by following them, like the sea-faring man on the ocean, we will reach our destiny.”

This house course has helped me to see that truth is an ideal we must never give up on.

In the spirit of Thanksgiving– Thanksgiving Day was yesterday–I’m thankful to have had the chance to be an instructor for this class, I’m thankful that I got to know my students who are such amazing people, I’m thankful to have been able to learn so much from all of my students, and I’m thankful that there is such a thing as truth

A wise man once said to me, “People don’t do what you expect. People do what you inspect.”

This saying is relevant to the topic of discussion for Lesson 11– the ethics of privacy.

One of the readings dealt with the issue of companies monitoring their employees’ e-mails. How ethical/unethical you think this practice is depends largely on how much you think employees are “owned” while on the job.

Three fundamental definitions of privacy are that it is:

1) the right to be left alone

2) the right to control access to one’s personal information, and

3) the right to withhold certain facts from public knowledge.

Looking at these three definitions of privacy, it’s clear that managerial monitoring of e-mail is in violation of one’s privacy rights. Thus, the question is not whether the monitoring of employees’ e-mails infringes upon privacy rights. Rather, the question is whether employees are still in full possession of these rights when they are on the job.

If employees are “owned” while they are at work, then some of their fundamental rights are waived, and monitoring their email isn’t a big deal. But if employees are seen as individuals whose primary focus is work, but who are still in complete possession of all their fundamental rights while they are at work, then monitoring their email is a big deal.

Most of the senior citizens in the class have held positions as managers some time during their careers, and they had plenty of stories to tell about subordinates who did their very best to slack off on company time– unless someone was looking directly over their shoulders.

That wise man is right– people do what you inspect, not what you expect.

The senior citizens felt that companies should reserve the right to monitor their employees’ e-mails, but should not exercise that right unless they suspect that something criminal or fraudulent is going on. If you start routinely monitoring e-mails just to check up on your employees, it establishes a culture of mistrust. How great can an organization or company be when people don’t trust each other?

To monitor e-mails or not to monitor e-mails… I believe that it’s less about what you choose to do, and more about how you choose to do it. If you see people merely as a means to an end– a means to help you achieve your goals or earn more profits– I don’t think that anyone could ever fully trust you. But if you see people as an end in themselves, I’m pretty sure that even if you’re forced to monitor e-mails, you’ll do it in such a way that people know you still care about them.

“Always recognize that human individuals are ends, and do not use them as means to your end.” – Immanuel Kant

I learned many things about abortion in this class on the ethics of reproduction.

For one, I learned that many Christians believe that abortion is not morally wrong. (Before this class, I’d never heard a Christian say that abortion is completely okay!) And they have Bible verses to back up their beliefs. For example, Numbers 3:15-16 says, ”‘Count the Levites by their families and clans. Count every male a month old or more.’ So Moses counted them, as he was commanded by the word of the LORD.”

These Christians take this to mean that fetuses and infants younger than one month old are not considered persons. Okay… I think this passage is taken out of context, but it’s still new to me to hear Christians saying that abortion isn’t unethical.

Next, I learned that many women see abortion rights as vital for gender equality. They believe that women need free access to abortion in order to achieve complete political, social, and economic equality with men.

Truthfully, as a male, I’ve never considered the right to have an abortion as a factor that affects gender equality!

I also learned that one of the key ideas which is at the heart of the abortion debate is the issue of death being a “bad” thing. Killing someone– if that’s what you believe abortion essentially is– is only wrong if death is a bad thing… but why do we immediately assume that death is a bad thing? In some cases, couldn’t living be a worse option than dying? Or do we think that death is a bad thing because most of us have yet to fully come to terms with our own mortality?

But the one thing from the assigned readings that jumped out at me was this passage that talks about how the debate should be less about abortion and more about other issues:

“There are women who are raped and become pregnant; the problem is that they were raped, not that they are pregnant.

There are women who are starving who become pregnant; the problem is that they are starving, not that they are pregnant.

There are women in abusive relationships who become pregnant; the problem is that they are in abusive relationships, not that they are pregnant.”

Well said! The abortion debate often distracts us from tackling the real issues.

I believe that this applies in our personal lives too. When we start accepting full responsibility for our lives, we’ll stop blaming others/our parents/the government/the system/etc. for the unhappiness we feel. Blaming others is just technique we use to side-step the real issues in our lives, and make ourselves feel better because our problems are “someone else’s fault.”

I believe that questions determine your focus in life, and your focus in life determines your behavior, and your behavior determines the results you get. If you don’t take full responsibility for your life, you’ll be asking questions like “Why does this always happen to me?” or “How could the government do this to me?” or “Why couldn’t I have grown up in a better family?”– questions that are certain to lead to more unhappiness.

But when you start taking full responsibility for everything that goes on in your life, you’ll start asking questions like “What can I do to ensure that I get the desired results next time?” or “What can I do to grow as a person today?” or “What can I do to make the best of this situation?”. These are empowering questions that help you get to the root issue of why you’re not getting the results you want.

This Jim Rohn quote sums it up nicely: “Don’t wish it were easier; wish you were better.”

Today I was the star of the show. Well, kind of

The topic today was the ethics of romance, and I’m the only Duke male undergraduate in the class.

So the class decided that my views would be representative of the entire Duke male student population. Well… for anyone who knows me, I think you’ll agree that my views on romance and love are probably not typical of a college student

We spent a lot of time today talking about what the romance-scene on college campuses is like. Not surprisingly, the older folks had a hard time understanding the hookup culture that’s so prevalent. (I didn’t know what the hookup culture was all about until I came to Duke, so I added that link just in case you aren’t familiar with it either.)

In the old days, people went on dates, but today there are far more “hookups” which involve physical intimacy without any sort of long-term commitment.

The older folks were rather disgusted with the hookup culture, and they pretty much concluded that– this is my paraphrase, of course– the present generation is going to hell.

When I said that I don’t believe in “hooking up” with girls and I don’t believe in casual dating and I believe in taking a girl out to dinner and in the idea of courtship, two of the older women immediately exclaimed, “Bless your heart, Dan. Bless your heart.”

Bless my heart? Hilarious stuff!

I’ve always thought that girls who participate in the hookup culture do it because they enjoy the physical intimacy and aren’t interested in being in a committed relationship. But after hearing the female Duke students express some views contrary to this, I asked, “Does that mean that girls who engage in the hookup culture aren’t actually willing participants?”

One female Duke student replied, “We’re not willing participants! We would much rather have a dating culture, but boys aren’t interested in dating. So we have no choice.”

That response caught me by surprise! So girls who play the hookup game actually want deep, meaningful relationships, but they have to settle for hookups. So basically they’re trying to have their emotional needs met through physical means… which I don’t think is possible?

Hmm… no wonder the female Duke students were so upset that boys don’t ask them out on dates anymore!

I’ve always felt slightly old-fashioned for thinking that the only proper method of pursuing a relationship is for a guy to court a girl– but I guess that most modern women are still fond of that approach?