OK.. .I’m crazy

[Xue Sheng]

As if I don’t have enough to do I have enrolled and been accepted in a Graduate program to get my Masters of Science degree in Computer/Network Security.

Yup… I’m certifiably insane. :xtrmshock

 

[terryl965]

As if I don’t have enough to do I have enrolled and been accepted in a Graduate program to get my Masters of Science degree in Computer/Network Security.

Yup… I’m certifiably insane. :xtrmshock

Great news I'm glad youare up to it.

 

[shesulsa]

Right on Xue! Congratulations!

 

[bluemtn]

Way to go Xue! Best wishes , too!

 

[Jade Tigress]

As if I don’t have enough to do I have enrolled and been accepted in a Graduate program to get my Masters of Science degree in Computer/Network Security.

Yup… I’m certifiably insane. :xtrmshock

Damn XS, Congratulations!!!! :asian:

 

[theletch1]

Congratulations! As for being insane, well, sanity is such a relative thing, isn't it. I tell ya, those who are not active or live a life full of actually living instead of sitting on the couch from the end of the work day until bed time just can't understand how we do it let alone why we do it. Best of luck in your studies...both martial and academic.

 

[Kacey]

Congrats! Just remember to leave some time for yourself and your family.

 

[Xue Sheng]

Thanks everyone.

I have to admit I am a bit nervous about the whole prospect of going back to college but less nervous than I was when I posted. I was told classes start April 30th :xtrmshock But luckily I found out I can start in the second summer semester in mid June. I also just got a bit of a promotion in my already short handed office. Which happily means a raise but unhappily means I do not lose any of the responsibilities I already have and get a bunch added on.

Now if I can just figure out how to make it a 30 hour day I’ll be fine.

 

[Brian R. VanCise]

Congratulations Xue that is awesome!

 

[Sukerkin]

Well done, sir.

It's a hard road doing a Masters as you've got to do a lot more of your own thinking, as I'm sure you're already geared up for.

I've sometimes said that getting your Masters is harder than getting your Doctorate as it's the first time in your education that you've had to really utilise your abilities (rather than 'merely' learning other peoples work and recounting it).

 

[Xue Sheng]

umm.... errr..... well how do I put this??????

Things have changed.

Last week I was pretty sick, bad case of bronchitis (which also prompted me to return to Qigong training this week), and all I could do was cough, think, read and occasionally post on MT. But the thinking and reading is what got me, I do not often get time to sit anywhere by myself and think for any length of time these days and a week of that was rather nice and a bit enlightening (although I could have done without the coughing).

OK to the point for starters that masters program I was accepted into I am withdrawing from, I do computer/network security stuff all day and I have no desire to study it anymore than I already have. Besides with my recent promotion and my added responsibilities I am going to be going to so much training over the next few months it is making my head spin.

I have decided what I really need to do is to contact the Beijing Language and Culture University this evening, or I should say my wife will be contacting them for me, and discuss their distance learning program in Chinese Language and Culture. It looks good from what i have read but not easy and should I survive I will at least know how to read and speak Mandarin. The full bachelors degree is between over 140 and 150 credits, but this would be a second bachelors for me, should I decide to go that far with it, but it appears I do not have to and I am not sure I really want to. To be honest when I started my illustrious college career, way back when, I was a Chinese studies major and until last week I felt I was to old and to far into my current career with to many responsibilities to return to it, no matter how much that little voice inside kept telling me to give it a try.

I realized somewhere in between coughing spasms that if I want to train CMA and research CMA history in China like I truly want to I need to understand the written and spoken language as well as the older (traditional) written language and this will give me what I need to do this. As well as the structure I need to keep me motivated and possibly a required yearly trip to Beijing, which I would be doing anyway, so that works for me as well.

So after all this yakking it comes down to I have decided to start following what that person inside of me has been telling me to do for years. I need to pursue the Chinese stuff now with more intensity and become fluent in Mandarin so I can do what I want to do.... and being able to talk to my in-laws wouldn’t hurt either.

The career will handle itself without the MS degree but the rest will not unless I get off my butt and start pursuing it now and I am not getting any younger and I want to do this now, not later.

I do truly appriciate all of the previous congratulations on my MS degree but I have to be honest with myself and if I am I really don't want to pursue it any furhter, I'm not geting any younger and there is no time like the presant to pursue it.

OK I have said too much already and likely made many of you all sick of my yakking I will stop now

 

[Sukerkin]

Not to worry, my friend. Serious consideration of your options and goals is a mark of mature intelligence in it's own right :tup:

To give a tad of perspective to your own change of heart, I changed careers twice (well three times really) before I ended up what I'm doing now.

My first job was in the City (financial/trading) which I fell into because I did a degree in Economics and knew some people in the 'trade'. Within a week I knew it wasn't for me but it took me another six weeks to 'escape' as I worked out my notice.

I survived the embarassment of that abrupt "Abandon ship!" (and the concommitant loss of warmth in some of my friendships) and went to run my own business for a while. That was cut short by my bike accident. So then I followed my heart and began museum work, which lead to my taking my Masters. Then I had to abandon that for fiscal reasons and now work in software and electrical control systems - I vastly preferred my previous job but this one pays the mortgage :shrugs:.

The point of all that is that your path through life is seldom straight, so don't worry that the odd sudden decision change comes upon you .

 

[stone_dragone]

Changing your path is good.

...but the voices in my head still say you're crazy (entirely unrelated to your courses of study)! best of luck.

 

[Nobody]

Well it was not a short trip to go crazy for you now was it! In fact i have never seen a short trip to crazy!

Well now we have it the answer i mean go Xue Sheng! I mean crazy!:uhyeah:

Have any of you noticed the most crazy people are the ones acting normal, an the ones that are acting scary an they are usually just having a bad moment an very normaly