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Marie Friberger's avatar

What I see in this story is a beautiful reflection on leaning into an area one is not comfortable in, being held by others and realizing there is an opportunity to learn and grow. For some skills, the presence of others may not be necessary, but for storytelling it is different.

The angle of how storytelling is relevant to engineers and why it may be difficult ("disregard the rest of the fluff") is important.

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Michelle Elisabeth Varghese's avatar

I loved this reflection Chao! I believe you have many interesting stories and I hope they make their way to this Substack soon.

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Chao Lam's avatar

Awww, thanks Michelle - love how you have been encouraging me from the start

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Frank Corrigan's avatar

“As humans, we communicate through stories, and stories are engaging when there are personal, authentic details written in a playful manner.” Do you think the POP framework is helpful even when writing for personal use? Or is it only helpful for communicating to others?

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Chao Lam's avatar

Hmm, good question... To me it's complicated and intertwined. At one level, why write for personal use? If it's to clarify my thinking, then I usually need to pretend I'm talking or writing to someone else - that is kind of the way my brain (and perhaps all our brains) are wired! In which case, POP does help.

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Frank Corrigan's avatar

Maybe I asked that question in a leading way, but I hoped you would say something like that :)

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Rick Lewis's avatar

Thanks Chao! I've also posted your own helpful article to my own Pivot to the Podium site here. https://www.pivottothepodium.com/p/an-shy-software-engineer-discovers

Thank you for your story!

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Kathy Ayers's avatar

Chao, this is epic. It’s such a pleasure being in your online company. You have so much wisdom and depth.

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Matt Cyr's avatar

Great post here, Chao. Loved the recall of the VC snake story. Those big moments you haven’t thought about for a while, our past stories that lurk in the shadows, so often provide the best fuel for good writing. It took me awhile to learn that those feelings don’t always translate to the best words on the page, for me at least. And that can be intimidating. I still struggle with trying to write those personal moments accurately. Rick’s advice is right, writing is a better way forward.

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Simon Emslie's avatar

Great piece, Chao! This could apply to so much of writing and storytelling alike: “sometimes to gain clarity, you need to take action and just do it.” Your betrayal story hits hard - perhaps because of how manipulative the venture capitalist was trying to be.

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