How long does your gratitude actually last — late evening, Peel Street, Central, Hong Kong. I’m standing on the stairs, watching from this elevated spot over Peel Street — known in Hong Kong for drinking outside, meeting people, standing together on the street. Literally on the street. The evening is still warm. I watch people […]

Intuition vs logic — a few years ago. Winter. A dark evening. Snow hitting the windows of a wooden house in the Polish mountains where we’re sitting at opposite corners of the table, drinking hot tea. We still don’t know how much impact we’ll have on each other’s lives. But that evening we both recognize

“But besides all of this — you are loyal to me…” someone I had been closely cooperating with for several years said — more to himself than to me, nodding slowly, as if registering something he had finally come to see. He said it with full awareness of the difficulties and tests of my values

The hidden cost of always wanting more — I’m at Café Detour, Hong Kong Island. I came here in the morning, cutting through the whole rush of the city, to read something that would strengthen me — something tied to my values. But this glass-walled space, tucked into the corner of a busy street, gives

Why people judge you before they actually know you…“So you came here to expand your activities?” a young Japanese man asks, almost rhetorically. (Starbucks, Landmark, Hong Kong.) “No, that’s not my goal — I’m just traveling,” I answer. “You know, she’s very young…” a confident, openly self-assured woman from Indonesia explains on my behalf, seeing

Why some places feel like home even when you’ve never been there before — I’m walking down a narrow street. Everything is new. Nobody knows me here. After a moment I remind myself that it would be strange if it were any different — I’ve just arrived on the other side of the world. I

The fastest way to overcome perfectionism — and yes, everyone knows the concept. Not everyone knows how exhausting it can be. It tends to hit ambitious people hardest. Partly because they start attributing their successes to “perfectionism” — when often it contributes far less than it costs. For some people it touches almost every area

Why wanting less gets you more — real financial freedom means not letting money dictate your choices. Not letting it weigh into every calculation. It’s the kind of freedom where a brilliant offer or opportunity doesn’t move you too much. Doesn’t make a huge impression. People feel that your filter is different — and often,

How to find peace with uncertainty — we like to know. We like to have certainty. We like things to be declared, settled, clear. When we don’t know, when we’re not sure, we don’t know how to position ourselves or make decisions. The truth is — very few things are ever truly certain. Usually it’s

How your motivations make you easy to manipulate — we ask “what do you do?” all the time. Almost every day. And while the answer tells us something about the person, we learn far more by asking: “Why do you do it?” One question usually isn’t enough — but it’s a start. It opens the

Do people follow you or do you follow them? By “following” I don’t mean social media. I mean the general set of behaviors that show who leads in a relationship — who gets asked for advice, who others adjust to more often. Which role do you step into more often? Who carries more authority in

Why your energy gets you further than your resume — we tend to link earnings with education or skills. And yes, those things often influence what job we land. But there’s a certain “quality of being” in work, in teams, in relationships — that people with serious experience are willing to pay well for. Fight

Why life isn’t black and white — we love having answers. We love labels. We love sorting reality into neat categories. And while that comes almost naturally to us — our minds love shortcuts — it actually costs us a large part of our perspective and clear-eyed judgment. Is it worth changing? Depends. I think

Why happy people attract good things — do you believe in karma? Do you believe that good always comes back around? Or do you believe in chance and the harshness of fate? Whatever your personal view — there are certain connections between happiness and achieving success (not just professional success) that create a kind of

Can you learn to love change? A change of home, a change of job, a change of environment, a change in a relationship, a change within yourself. Change. What do you feel just reading that? Most people don’t like change. They associate it more with things getting worse than with an upgrade. Is change really