juliana ong

“It sounds like you typically look for a connection that starts at a 10/10. Maybe what you want is something that starts at a 7/10.” I didn’t like hearing this. But it makes a ton of sense. When you are love-drunk you are also drunk-drunk. You’re not really seeing the person, you’re seeing your own phosphorescence.

There isn‘t a clean way to get around the idea that personal expression is always at least in part performative. Expression is partly fun because it’s performative.

It’s also not like this type of behavior is a new thing. There has always been the type of person who is performative of their own interests or pursues their work because of the kind of... See more

“Ancient Chinese literati didn’t fish to eat,” says Cao, echoing the classic wisdom. “They fished to cultivate patience, to observe nature’s rhythms, and to achieve that perfect balance between action and inaction.”

“True love is a peculiar kind of insight through which we see the wholeness which the person is—at the same time totally accepting the level on which he now expresses himself—without any delusion that the potential is a present reality. True love accepts the person who now is without qualifications, but with a sincere and unwavering commitment to

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Here’s something I’m very thankful I was told while I was still in my 20s: that the point of all this “hard work” is to recognize the person it makes you, not what it “gets” you

But choice is not the same as freedom. Freedom is actually the ability to make a choice in the middle of restrictions.

You need some shared philosophy of what constitutes a meaningful life to sustain friendship over time. Why live here? Why work in this industry? What are we afraid of? What are we hopeful about? Do you know me, see me? Will you tell me when I’m wrong?

And just as emotional language has entered the business world — where we talk about psychological safety and vulnerability — business language has seeped into romantic relationships. We want “return on investment” and to “hedge our bets” and “this is not a deal I signed up for.”