The ISEE Trajectories

Summary

(First created: 01/03/2026 |Personal Opinion) As a high school band parent, each year I go through the cycle of the Fall excitement when the marching season starts followed by the Spring emotions when the band program wraps in a final performance and ceremony. For the last two years, I can’t help but feeling sad when the seniors come on stage being honored and bidding their farewell. My sadness doesn’t come from the fact that I will never see them again but because, as I clap and cheer for them when they smile and wave to us in the limelight, a cold realization creeps in my mind: for some of them, this very moment is the peak of their lives! Delay Your Peak On our annual drive into the snowy mountains before Christmas, my son anxiously flipped through his phone in anticipation that the early admission actions of his dream college may come out in any minute. While he regretted that he should’ve studied harder or faked some leadership to boost his chance in the twisted college admission process, I assured him that an early setback in real life is a good thing. Think about it, for those K-12 students helicoptered by their parents, college admission is their first contact with reality! I then pointed to the layers of mountain ranges around us, explaining how each layer is like a person’s life trajectory, and delivered my edict to my son: delay your peak! Life Trajectory People often conflate the word “powerful” with “strong” and likewise “vulnerable” with “weak”. But in fact they’re orthogonal: The state of powerful and vulnerable are external to one self. Which university you go to How much money you make What title you hold The state of strong and weak are internal to one self. So a powerful man can be weak and a vulnerable homeless person can be strong. To answer the question of what determines a person’s position in the strong-weakness spectrum, I propose below lemma: ISEE Lemma 1: He who knows and accepts his reality is strong. As long as one doesn’t deviate too mu...