PJ Thoughts #3: Why your environment and culture matter
A story about Jamba Juice, Chinese proverbs, and becoming the most authentic version of yourself
When I was nine, I had a really good friend named Michele.
Michele loved the color blue, so I loved the color blue.
She loved Hello Kitty and Sanrio, so I, too, loved all things Hello Kitty and Sanrio.
One day, Michele’s mom picked up Jamba Juice for us. While saying thank you, I told Michele’s mom that Jamba was my favorite, too.
But I told a lie.
With my dad working two full-time jobs as a busboy in the Tenderloin, my mom could never afford Jamba. So it was my first time having one.
Instead, I played it cool — as cool as a nine year old could be — and acted like I wasn’t having the best drink of my life slurping away at my Mango-a-Go-Go while thinking, “Why are there little round chunks of mango in this? It’s a smoothie, isn’t it supposed to be smooth? Oh, well. The mysteries of life.” Slurp, slurp, slurp.
My mom noticed these changes. She was mildly annoyed that my favorite color went from pink to blue, my favorite Sanrio character was no longer My Melody, and that I was developing a taste for the luxuries of life, packaged up in a styrofoam cup and orange straw.
Mom sat me down one day. “I have a story to tell you,” she said in Cantonese. Then, she began.
“There was a young, curious boy named Mengzi. As a child, his family lived near a cemetery.
Because he grew up close by, he imitated the funeral processions and rituals he saw. Seeing this and feeling worried that it was not the right environment for him, Mengzi’s mom decided they should move.
They ended up settling next to a market. Soon after, Mengzi began to pretend like he was a vendor, shouting what goods he was selling and pretending to haggle with make-believe customers.
Again, Mengzi’s mom was worried, so they moved again. This time, they finally settled near a school.
Surrounded by school children studying and reading, it was here that Mengzi found his love for learning. He began to imitate the scholars, dedicating all of his time to reading and learning.”
Mengzi was a real person - he grew up in 4th Century BC, and ended up becoming one of the world’s most notable philosophers and Confucian practitioners.
My mom finished telling this story, then shared this Chinese proverb: “近朱者赤，近墨者黑.” This roughly translates to, “Those who are near vermilion turn red; those who are near ink turn black.”
As a kid, I figured the conclusion was something of an Aesop fable or self-help book. “Pay attention to who you’re surrounded by, because you’ll be like them!” Or, “You’re the sum of the five people closest to you!” Or something Instagram-quotable.
As an adult, though, I’ve made a deeper discovery.
Yes, you are affected by the people you surround yourself by. But it’s so much more than the people.
It’s the culture, too.
When you’re born, you get thrusted into a society with pre-determined customs. There are rules and conventions woven into the cultural tapestry of your environment. You didn’t invent any of it. It’s just there.
Every day, you make hundreds of decisions. You pay attention to the big ones, or the ones that have clear facts and measurable results. What car will you buy? Where will you work? Who will you date? And so on.
Whether you know it or not, those decisions you make are influenced by the culture you exist in.
Growing up in San Francisco, attending a magnet school, and being the daughter of first-generation boat people from China and Vietnam deeply affected who I was, and how I made decisions.
Being told over and over again that I had to excel to have self-worth, feeling deep shame every time I came up short, and getting a 0.83 GPA at that magnet school affected that, too.
You’re the product of your environment and the culture it embodies. But you’re also a human being with your own unique thoughts, feelings, and actions. This is the beauty of being an individual! And it’s also the pain that you carry.
I’ve discovered, if you find yourself unhappy, you have to ask yourself two questions:
What does my culture value?
What do I value, independent of the culture, environment, or people around me?
This applies universally: whether you’re a Wharton MBA grad from an upper-class family living in a coastal elite city, or you’re from a rural province of the Philippines from a poor family wanting more for yourself, these questions are relevant to everyone.
When you feel dissonance, ask yourself: How is my culture and environment pressuring me to exist? How do I actually want to exist?
Little by little, you will begin to do two things.
First, you will swap out your actions.
You will begin doing things that actually make you happy.
You might allow yourself to get in touch with your emotions as a superpower — even if culturally, everyone else around you sees them as a weakness.
You might allow yourself to say, “Actually, I’ve never watched Star Wars before” — even when everyone else gawks at you like you’ve lived under a rock your whole life.
You might allow yourself to strive to break the intergenerational cycle of despair, hopelessness, or narcissism, by saying, “Yes, that might have been my environment, but that’s not the full picture of who I am. This is the holistic version of me: where I came from, and where I am now,” instead of getting sucked back into the cycle of drama.
Little by little, your actions shift. These actions say who you are. And therefore, you begin to shift, doing more stuff that makes you happy, and cutting out the stuff that doesn’t.
And finally, you will swap out your environment.
As you begin to align your actions more with you - the real you! - you will see shifts in your environment.
I grew up in one of the poorest neighborhoods in San Francisco in the 90s. It was the only place my parents could afford to live.
I didn’t want to grow up as a product of the poverty, anguish, or despair I was surrounded by. I didn’t want to work in the restaurant industry like my dad, I didn’t want to be homeless like one of my uncles, I didn’t want to repeat cycles of generational trauma.
I changed my environment, first by going to community college in Southern California, and then eventually to USC.
At first, I felt like a fish out of water: this is different, this must be dangerous, return to old patterns. But slowly, I found other students who were more like me. Kids whose parents couldn’t afford to send them to college. Kids who had an alcoholic parent. Kids who had a gambler in their family. Kids who felt alone.
Together, we felt less alone. Together, we created an environment that supported our growth, while honoring our roots. We created a new culture, made of a new environment, with new people.
Do for yourself what Mengzi’s mom did for him. If you want peace and contentment, ask yourself, “What do I want to value? Who do I want to be? What environment will facilitate this the most? What people will help me evolve into this most authentic version of myself?”
And then, experience the magic of becoming who you’ve always been meant to be. Marvel and relish in the uniqueness that is you. Allow yourself to leave spaces that don’t honor this version of you - even if that’s nearly 100% of your current environment.
You deserve to feel total joy and freedom in being fully lovable, fully accepted, and fully human.