I have wanted to demo wushu for a long time, along with being good enough to demo.  On Friday, I got my chance!  I’m still not good enough to demo, but Dennis overlooked that and asked me to help demo for the Chinese Graduate Student Association.  Check out the video below the fold.

 I really enjoyed doing the demo.  The crowd was great, and really helped me push on.  My butterfly and cartwheel were dreadful, also my form is painful to watch.  On the upside, I liked my jump front slap kick.  After the demo, we went back to Dennis’ and had a few drinks.  I mixed up some lychee and Midori based drinks.  All in all a good night.

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A recent post at the BetterThanYourBoyfriend blog entitled “Living Transparently”  really reinforced the reasons why I live an “open source lifestyle”.  Being open with everything I do is a very important core of who I am.  I’ve learned in my 22 years that you really shouldn’t do anything you wouldn’t tell anyone who asks, and really shouldn’t say anything that you wouldn’t feel comfortable telling just about anyone.  Lies usually get found out , and hurtful words usually filter back to the intended target over time.

What really inspired my pursuit of an open source life is when I was growing up and really immersed myself in open source software.  It was something I viewed as a complete 180 to how things are normally done.  Everyone shares their info, and together, everyone is better off.  This attitude is supported by my academic training as an economist.  When everyone contributes, more value gets created than the sum of the parts.  There is no “cost” to giving out my knowledge, and instead, everyone is made richer.  If someone asks for help with a problem they have, or asks for a piece of my knowledge, I give it to them.  I have increased the amount of knowledge that exists between the two people, or increased the total “wealth” of the system, making me a small amount richer.  Witholding information to gain a competitive edge only works for a very short time, and creates a large opportunity cost of lost knowledge (this cost is born both by you individually and by the system as a whole).  Being skilled is where the real differences should happen.  For instance, I could have Paul Krugman teach me everything he knows, but I wouldn’t have 1/10th the analytical power he has.  This is why giving information away will not put you out of a job.  All you have to do is “capture less value than you create” in the words of Aaron Wall.  

As far as actions and words aside from knowledge, similar to Tynan’s experiences, I feel that living an open life forces you to think about what you will say or do.  I don’t edit my life to satisfy everyone, but I do undergo a thought process identifying the benefits and costs of a particular action.   I generally try to act in the most ethical way as possible at all times.  I don’t steal, I don’t plagairize, I don’t lie (except some white lies, but those can be ethical) because I would not want to have to tell someone about stealing, plagairism, or lying.  When talking about someone, I will only talk about them if I have something nice to say, which according to psychological studies, will make me look good too.  Lastly, being open with people really opens up the amount of brains I can strategize with.  I can bounce my goals off of people and filter out the bad ones, and get greate advice on achieving my goals.  It generates an incredible amount of value while consuming almost none, and also makes for great happy hour conversation

I was talking with Jeremy at Chipotle about my goals for this year, and decided I definitely need to write them down in a persistent place. So here is my SOW (consulting lingo. It means “Statement of Work”) FY 2009. I’ll come back in 2010 and show verifiable progress on the goals I can show (such as landing an Aerial). From my time in consulting, i’ve learned that goals need to be quantifiable.

Goooooaaaals:

Branding:

Goal: I will improve my branding, both personal, and for Mastadon Label. Starting off this year, I already have a website that has 20k pageviews a day, and a startup clothing company. I really need to kick it up to make myself really stick out

Specific Goals:

• Start a blog and write 100 good posts on cool stuff I have been doing
• Get a Mastadon Label shirt screentime on MTV.
• Build a cohesive style that will reflect across all of my personal brands

Sports/Fitness:

Goal: I will continue to progress in wushu and to start learning to trick. I completed a triathlon last year, and don’t really care to continue, but would like to stay in top shape and improve my strength greatly.

Specific Goals:

• Learn Butterfly Twist
• Learn Aerial
• Learn Back Tuck
• Learn Flashkick
• Complete learning first staff form
• Compete in one wushu competition
• Do kettlebells at least twice a week

Personal Life/Development:

Goal:This year is my year to graduate from UMBC. I’m on track to graduate in Spring. From there, I want to go teach english in Taiwan and hopefully learn Chinese. It would be great for my personal development to get out of my comfort zone and live in a country not much like the US, and learning a language that is supposed to be very hard to learn. Teaching english would also allow much downtime that I could use for my other goals, such as continuing wushu progress, and learning to write really well by blogging. Also, I put the goal of taking one really good photo on there because it’s hard to do, and I really need to start shooting again.

Specific Goals:

• Graduate College with a BS
• Move to Taiwan
• Start learning Chinese
• Build my internet marketing/SEO skills
• Invent 2 mixed drinks
• Take one photo I am proud of