Rise of Thedore Roosevelt

Theodore Roosevelt is one of the heroes of the Art of Manliness, a site I subscribe to and regularly read, because he epitomizes what he himself called "the strenuous life." Indeed, Roosevelt valued action above all and his speech the Man in the Arena has become immortal.

It is not the critic who counts; not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles, or where the doer of deeds could have done them better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood; who strives valiantly; who errs, who comes short again and again, because there is no effort without error and shortcoming; but who does actually strive to do the deeds; who knows great enthusiasms, the great devotions; who spends himself in a worthy cause; who at the best knows in the end the triumph of high achievement, and who at the worst, if he fails, at least fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who neither know victory nor defeat.

Edmund Morris' biography of his rise from a sickly child suffering from asthma to one of the greatest Presidents the United States ever had is truly a masterpiece of narrative and it only pushed me to emulate Roosevelt even more. Like him, I seek to be a historian. How he managed to write several books while working full time is a feat in itself. Even more, he frequently left the city to explore the great outdoors as a hunter and naturalist. I have begun climbing mountains on weekends, but there is more, much more of the world for me to see. As a politician, he reached the pinnacle by becoming the youngest President at 42. Yet he did not just reach the top, he became one of the greatest. I have always felt a calling for public service. To trace his steps and accomplish a fraction of what he did would be to live a good life.

Communion with God

This was the first book of Neale Donald Walsh I read so I have been reading them in inverse order. In this book, he discusses the ten illusions including need and superiority. These points are all sensible but more so for me after having immersed myself in Buddhist thought. I still find it hard to grasp egolessness and how everything is one, but understanding this is what allows Neale to argue that there is no such thing as need. If one were one with God and everyone else, then it is only the illusion of separation that creates the idea of need.

Without the need to feel superior, we begin accept things as they are. We learn to stop struggling and just be. We appreciate ourselves for who we are - to the extent that we accept the existence of a self. We begin to be grateful for who we are and what we have. We look to God with joy and gratefulness instead of fear. We begin to feel abundance instead of scarcity. We dispel the illusion of the self and of separation and we start to feel we are all one.

International Economics

As a college senior, I read some chapters of this book by Paul Krugman and Maurice Obstfeld. While I aced the basic economics class the year before, I only received average marks for this course. I found it difficult to understand some of the theoretical chapters so I ended up having some knowledge of international trade and finance, but not any intuitive understanding of its concepts. Last year, six years after college, I finally read this book from cover to cover. I doubt I can explain comparative advantage to someone else anymore than I could when I was in college, but I feel I have a better grasp of the economic headlines today - the sovereign debt crisis in Europe, the impact of foreign exchange on the Philippine economy, and recurring fears of another global recession.

I once seriously considered taking a master's degree in Economics. After taking a couple of graduate subjects in Political Science, I realized there was not much new to be learned from my professors so I planned to enroll in the School of Economics. But life happened. I became a father at 22 and my career in IBM just kept on growing that I finally gave up on graduate school.

As a manager in the BPO industry, I actually see how currency exchange fluctuations can frustrate my attempts to reduce cost. This is international economics in practice.

After Dark

After Dark describes a night in Tokyo, but I can hardly remember the plot. The focus is less on the narrative, but more on the setting and the mood, on how an entirely different world exists when the sun is out. I wonder how Murakami would have written this had he been in Manila instead.

In Manila, the world after dark is brimming with life and energy. Not just from the usual centers of night life such as red light districts, but almost every concentration of tall buildings has probably more people working at night than during the day. After all, Manila is now the number one outsourcing destination for voice services. With most of the BPO companies still operating out of Manila, most of the half a million people working for this industry make Manila after dark vastly different from Tokyo or any other city after dark.

Here, workers who hardly see the sun start their day after sunset. Usually waking with a nasty headache, they usually head to Starbucks before reporting for work at 9pm. They then answer calls and emails and process transactions for the next nine hours or so. They usually spend their breaks drinking more coffee and smoking outside the lobbies. On a Friday or on any weekday they feel like it, they start happy hour at 7am and will drink until late morning.

I was once a call center agent myself. I am now in a senior manager role and start work in the afternoon, but it is exactly midnight as I write this. This is Manila after dark.

How the World Came to Be What It Is

Steve Hagen invites us to see the world as it is, unmediated by concepts. This was tough reading for me even though the Buddhist thoughts being explained were quite familiar. I remember reading this book at the airport while waiting for my wife to arrive from her US business trip. I went to the airport really early, around 5am, and I waited for over two hours. I was really tense while waiting as I did not inform her beforehand I would be there and there was a chance I might not spot her among the crowd.

I actually almost missed her. For some reason, I was certain she had already passed by so I started running past the barricades to the area on the other side of the gates where the taxi cabs were waiting. And I found her there, pleasantly surprised to see me. It was the first time we had been apart for two weeks so it was great to give her a surprise welcome. I also did it because I once came home from abroad really hoping to see her at the airport but it was not to be.

So how is this personal note related to Steve's book? I do not know. This is how I saw things when I was reading. So this is what I wrote about.

Analects and the Art of Ruling

Below are some timeless precepts from Confucius' classic Analects. Much of Confucian ethics is consistent with what one can read in leadership books, but the emphasis on integrity, respect for authority, and on being a gentleman, give it a uniquely Asian perspective on the art of ruling.

- Rule over them with dignity and they will be reverent; treat them with kindness and they will do their best; raise the good and instruct those who are backward and they will be imbued with enthusiasm.

- The gentleman desires to be halting in speech but quick in action.

- If I took anyone it would have to be a man who, when faced with a task, was fearful of failure and who, while fond of making plans, was capable of successful execution.

- The Master is cordial yet stern, awe-inspiring yet not fierce, and respectful yet at ease.

- The gentleman helps others realize what is good in them; he does not help them to realize what is bad in them. The small man does the opposite.

- If a man is correct in his own person, then there will be obedience without orders being given; but if he is not correct in his own person, there will not be obedience even though orders are given.

- When a man in office finds that he can more than cope with his duties, then he studies; when a student finds that he can more than cope with his studies, then he takes office.

Some of my colleagues question my respect and reverence for those who lead me. While I understand the value of argument as a former college debater, there is a lot to be said for respecting the established order unless the Son of Heaven loses his mandate from heaven.

Hey, Nostradamus

I have never understood why students will bring guns to school and start shooting at random the way the shooters did at Columbine. I have often wondered whether it was an American, or a developed country phenomenon as it has not happened in the Philippines. In Hey, Nostradamus, Douglas Coupland depicts the story of a young couple whose lives are forever changed by a school shooting incident. One life is snuffed out senselessly, and another tries to move on with life, but the past continues to haunt him until his own life ends violently. I can only describe this novel as bleak.

The book forces the reader to feel the pain of a victim and it is a truly depressing feeling. I do not know if I could have reacted any more differently than Jason if I were in the same position. I do not even want to imagine violent crime, but there is no use denying its existence. It has happened to real people, and it will continue to happen to real people. Perhaps I cannot understand this because there is nothing to understand. It is senseless and that is all there is to it. Life truly can be nasty, brutish and short so it is good to be reminded how we should enjoy every moment we have with the people we love.