My Wonderful Tenth-Impression
By Jonathan Lam on 02/03/16
Tagged: the-homework-life the-homework-life-thought
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First impressions. Something we'll have to deal with for the rest of our lives. For every interview. For every new place. For every new person. We're surrounded by a world that demands quick judgement or falling behind. It's a simple fact of life that anytime you meet someone or something, there's going to be that first interpretation, a first glimpse into something much more complex. It's how we can rapidly gauge personality or level of intelligence, and we learn that we have to make great first impressions. We have to show ourselves off with a blast. As they say, "You'll never have the second chance to make a first impression." It's true. It really is.
I'm awful at making first impressions.
Unfortunately, this is the case. No matter how much I try to get the point across that I am a pretty decent guy with pretty decent intelligence, the point never gets across too quickly. No one meets me and exclaims to their friends or family: "Whoa! I met a wonderful boy Jon that's so smart! I bet we'll be friends!" It's simple: I'm not an impressionable guy. On the outside, I am pretty mediocre. Glasses, Asian, acne, several-times-mended shoes. Average height, average vocabulary, average looks. Nothing too special there.
I'm the kind of guy that likes to build up a reputation. It starts out new every time I go somewhere new. New classes, new friends. The summer camp I went to. The community college event. I'm terrible at first impressions, but my tenth- or twentieth-impressions are rather great.
What does this say about me? I like to think of myself as a steady worker. Someone who starts with one standard— the one from the first impression— and never drops below it. The hard-working friend that improves over time. That is responsible. That is intelligent. That is honest. I don't start off with a blast, but I try to finish on a respectable one. Lasting impressions are my thing.
The problem is that this kind of personality I have isn't very promising in our kind of society. We are an advanced society, where interviewers take a few minutes with you and then move on. If you're not brilliant, you won't be considered. Simple as that. Straight from Google, they stress the importance of speed.
Things move quickly around here. At Internet speed. That means we have to be nimble, both in how we work and how we hire.
I fear that the largest obstacle in my way is my limited interpersonal skills. I'm not a brilliant speaker. Put me up on stage, and I stutter (or, in the more common form of a piano recital, I mess up quite badly). Make me talk on a phone, and I forget what to say. Give me someone to talk to, and I can't make eye contact nor sound sincere. However, put me on paper or on a computer, in math or in code, and I'll zip away. It's a problem I have, and a problem I'll fix.
I meant to write this post mainly for two reasons:
1. To self-deprecate and complain about my life, as usual, and
2. To re-assert the purpose of this blog
The second point is more important. Besides the coding aspect of it, this site has been a faithful way for me to speak out my feelings. I can talk (type, to be more technically correct) more freely, and I believe I am become more successful. It's the act of informal writing and thought-developing (the majority of which exists in the form of these "thought"-tagged opinion posts) that I still believe will benefit me the most in any form of expression, interpersonal or writing-based. Thank you, blog!