Hi Guys
Hope you have had a great week!
This past week I binge watched two of the hottest trending thriller dramas on Netflix, the Korean Squid Game and the Japanese Alice in Borderland.
I was motivated to watch Squid Game after my Mum and sister told me that they finished it in just a couple of sittings.
Given widespread commentary on how over-the-top gory it is and also the American entrepreneur, Jason Calacanis, expressing similar sentiments on a recent episode of the All-In Podcast, one of my favourite podcasts (which covers economics, tech and politics), my expectations going into it were relatively modest.
I came out of it recommending it non-stop.
Yes, there is blood and gore but to me the show was outstanding, not for its goriness but for encouraging me to think about things that I would say or that I would do if time were to suddenly become finite.
I appreciate that you may not have seen Squid Game, so in a two sentence summary for context, the nine episodes are about a series of life-and-death survival of the fittest games - mental as much as physical - where winners advance to the next round and losers are shot to death (hence the goriness aspect). The last person standing collects a life-changing cash prize that is equivalent to the initial number of players at the start of the game (456) multiplied by 100 million won (~US$84,300) = 45.6 billion won (~US$38.5 million).
I don’t want to give away too much more about the nine episodes, but there is a particular sequence in episode 6 (titled Gganbu, roughly meaning “A good friend”) that is my favourite 1/2hr of the entire series.
In this episode, players are split into pairs and given ten marbles each.
The pairs are allowed to play any game of marbles so long as a winner is decided within a 30-minute limit.
The loser is shot in the head.
My favourite sequence in this episode is between two lead female characters, Kang Sae-byeok and Ji-yeong.
They agree to a one round winner-takes-all game:
Ji-yeong: Let’s…end the game in one round. Let’s bet everything and just play one round
Sae-byeok: Fine. What are we playing?
Ji-yeong: Why are you in such a hurry? Are you dying to kill me?
We’re just playing one round. We have some time left.
Let’s do it last minute.
Sae-byeok: Then what are we going to do until then?
Ji-yeong: Let’s talk.
Sae-byeok: Talk about what?
Ji-yeong: Things we couldn’t tell other people.
One of us is going to die here anyway.
No matter what we tell each other, there’s no reason to feel embarrassed.
Even without having seen the episode, the above lines are enough to trigger some important meaning-of-life considerations.
How many of us have questions that we would like to ask our colleagues, friends, strangers, heck..even our immediate family members, but are too timid, don’t-think-it’s-important-enough, think we can leave them for another day or just a bit too lazy to ask?
I know I fall in several, if not all, of those categories.
How would your attitude change if you were told your window to ask those questions was limited or quantified for you?
I know this is easier theorised than actioned, but ultimately all “reason[s] to feel embarrassed” as the character, Ji-yeong, puts it would fall by the wayside. As the legendary co-founder of Apple, Steve Jobs, himself stated and foreshadowed:
Remembering that I’ll be dead soon is the most important tool I’ve ever encountered to help me make the big choices in life. Because almost everything - all expectations, all pride, all fear of embarrassment or failure - these things just fall away in the face of death, leaving only what is truly important. Remembering that you are going to die is the best way I know to avoid the trap of thinking you have something to lose. You are already naked. There is no reason not to follow your heart.
Steve Jobs - Commencement Address at Stanford University, June 2005
So with that, I would encourage you to firstly watch Squid Game (preferably in Korean here versus the English-dubbed version on Netflix) and secondly, if you have, to head into the new week with a sense of inquisitiveness coupled with an equal dose of shamelessness knowing that our time is, at the end of the day, limited.
Continuing with the theme of things-I’ve-watched-recently, I’ll end today with a quote from M in the latest James Bond movie (spoiler alert, however it has been out for a while now, but apologies if I am giving away the ending!):
The proper function of man is to live, not to exist. I shall not waste my days in trying to prolong them. I shall use my time.
M (played by Ralph Fiennes) in No Time To Die.
p.s. After doing a little digging, the quote comes directly from the American writer, Jack London. The creator of James Bond, Ian Fleming, used this exact quote in one of his Bond novels, You Only Live Twice.
This week’s video
This week’s video is a throwback to one from last year
I need to get back into a habit of recording, editing and uploading videos!
In the meantime, after all that cliffhanger excitement from Squid Game and Alice in Borderland, here is a calming piece that I recorded at another point in time where there was real anxiety - the start of COVID-19 lockdowns. I hope you enjoy it!
Have a great week ahead!
David
Hi David,
Your rendition of Secret Garden was so tender and soulful. I really enjoyed it. Thank you so much for sharing it here.
I’ve not seen the Squid Game yet. Mostly, I heard that it was very addictive but nothing more. This is the first time that I have come across some of its details. Now I understand why it became ‘talk of the town’ globally.
On the topic of the limited time that we have in our lives, there are a number of inspiring lines that I use to give myself courage when I’m hesitant about embarking on something that I feel unsure about. For example:
Do what you love and let it kill you.
Live each day as if it was your last.
We are here for a good time, not a long time.
They’re great.
However, I wonder how much self-awareness do we have to know what it is that we really want to do or have in our lives, and not basing it on what other people have or have done.
What do we want the most?