No ones coming…
and that's honestly ok
We’ve all been tricked into waiting around for someone to come and turn our lives into the ones we see on the screen. No one’s coming.
- Noah’s ark
The last two months have been interesting ones. At the start, it felt like the only purpose of the last 2 months was to prepare for my trip, which is now just a day away.
It felt like everything was just cleanup until I get to that end. It felt like everything was meant to pale in comparison to the planned vacation. And I ended up being wrong.
In fact, that mindset made me complacent and do the bare minimum for absolutely everything and anything I was taking part of or finishing. I think some might call this phenomenon SENIORITIS.
Let’s dive into April and May, but first, for those that don’t know me…
I’m Neeor. A self-proclaimed goofball who gets into every nook and cranny to learn more from others. I am currently exploring Computation Biology by reading a textbook. I join some cool programs on the side to network and make friends with people cooler than me. My dream is to either live in high-tech society or completely off grid with no Wi-Fi and lots of cows. I’m currently looking for some cool hiking trips and places to co-work, like cafés, during the summer.
This is the year I graduate high school, the so-called new beginnings where I get to meet new people and do what I want. University is coming next year and the so-called freedom will hit. It’s interesting everyone says this retrospectively, but while you’re at this point it’s nothing but confusion, and feeling stressed. Turns out, the only sense of freedom I had was because of senioritis and having no classes.
Truth is that nothing and no one was coming. I’ll always have supports and people I care about and those who care about me, but I had to learn to make new friends and realize those who I only talked to because I shared a class with them. There will always be the next thing given to me by university, but nothing actually fascinating wasn’t going to come to me for free. I had to find the people and make the experiences for myself.
I know it seems grim and depressing, but it actually lit something up with me. I’ve always waited for approval to do something, and it forced me to take shortcuts. Then I remembered the speech from my biology teacher last year, telling me that doing extra work on something that actually matters, is formative even if it gets nowhere. Forget the failing, forget the learning, forget the skills gained, it just forms you more as a person because you know what you worked on, and it wasn’t for someone else.
Anyway, enough about my philosophy rant, The last 2 months have been jam packed, so here’s an uncomprehensive list of everything I did.
I’ve recently taken to the rule of thirds, the 3 priorities rule, and more numbers involving 3. It’s not a lucky number, it’s just a mindset, I swear.
Moonshots are basically companies that solve big problems by 1000% compared to 10% and probably has close to 0 viability. But it just goes to show that solutions exist for everything, the only thing limiting them from coming to market is the business side of things (which is still important, but the solutions exist in the world).
What we created was a biodegradable solution to polyester using chitosan fibers, having better tensile strength and existing in the environment for just 2 weeks compared to 20 years. Honestly, it felt like a perfect solution, because it also uses crustacean shell waste from the fishing industry, with very readily available chemicals to make chitosan and chitosan fibers. But there was an issue.
The chemical structure, while strong, is actually a fiber that is more like yarn. In its reactions with other chemicals, it can cause discoloration or a complete breakdown of the physical structure. This mainly happens with negatively charged particles. We believe there may be a way to fix this, but this was something that we had yet to overcome, and only learned this by talking to Miika Nikinmaa, who does research in biomaterials. It’s also a very expensive solution, costing $50 per kg vs. the $1.5 per kg of polyester.
It taught me to make contact with the real world sooner, but also that there is always more technical detail to learn. I had a gut feeling that there was something we were missing, but I didn’t know how to find out about it. The easiest way ended up being talking to people. I realized that we needed to investigate our issue more, to realize just why polyester was so commonly used instead of cotton, and other existing materials.
It’s still an interesting solution and an interesting problem it’s solving, microplastics, and you can find more about the project, including a one-pager and an in-depth article, on our website crustex.typedream.app.
Conferences and People
I’ve met so many people over the last 2 months because of the conferences I’ve been to. It was a bit of a bummer that there was no biotech, but I think that knowledge from all parts of the world can be extremely helpful.
Rotary Club Chinook Lunch
I got invited to lunch for the members of the rotary club (most of which were in their gray haired years), but the work they were doing was fascinating. I was invited to speak on the youth side of things, on the initiatives started by my high school and how effective they’ve been.
These people have humor that is, well, beyond my years, but they also truly have a passion for helping others. From my understanding, they each run their own events and help fund humanitarian efforts! I think they would benefit from adding some startups to their list of funding though… (May, if you’re reading this, hit me up)
Forward Summit
This summit focused on indigenous in Canada (and Calgary) and how their development is paramount to the development of Calgary and our economy.
Honestly, from the years of learning about them from social studies, they didn’t leave a good impression on me. Their way of life was interesting, but it wasn’t something I thought was relevant in the modern world. There are lots of stigmas and stereotypes around indigenous people, and honestly, some of them can appear to be true at first glance.
But it’s our job to look deeper, to realize the injustices that lead them to the things they have and are left with now. It’s also intriguing how their way of thinking, mainly 7 generations ahead, and the sustainability, is something we genuinely need in our companies, especially those in the green space.
While it honestly opened my mind so much going to this conference, it was also a blast doing photography for Miki Reeder and his team again! New side gig?
Alberta Inventures
It was a blast meeting and seeing all the smart people at inventures. It makes sense why it’s such a big event, and I met a ton of familiar faces. Probably should’ve taken more pictures for you guys…
While I did end up exploring various topics like Health Tech, Mixed Reality, E-sports, Robotics, Indigenous ways, and more, I think the greatest thing I learned was actually the first keynote speaker.
He mentioned that the best-selling companies go towards their culture, and that culture is the reason everyone buys. But even deeper than that, we see the world because of who we are, not what it is. We see the world because of our experiences, not because of what it objectively is. That’s why even a very good product objecively might end up doing nothing because people don’t perceive it as “for them” or useful to them. Whatever they end up buying is an extension of themselves.
Additionally, the obvious is only obvious after it’s pointed out. Until then, we could be oblivious without knowing what we don’t know. That’s why we have to try to learn more, because you can always understand people or a topic better, and that actually gives you more control and leverage on the person or topic.
Nature and mindfulness
Yeah, with classes done I had a lot of time to think, and the best place to think is in the forest. In the depths of the woods with the yeti and big foot. While I wish I was in the Alaska forest, I just want to the parks in downtown, but I was surprised to find actual hiking trails and dirt paths. So I picked up a few friends and went exploring.
There isn’t much to say about the trail, it was fun to explore them. But one thing I did realize that the sun directly vs. through the window is extremely different. The feeling of being outside is important more than just you being happy and with friends, but it makes you more productive during the day too, you’re in a better mood, and you start appreciating the small things in life.
Also, a good stick goes a long way, in hiking and in life. There’s an entire account called stick reviews on Instagram and it’s honestly a gold mine. Having that childhood (I know, I’m still a child) stick imagination come back was great. Got the imaginative juices flowing, and since I went with one of my hackathon themes, we actually got the creative juices flowing.
No conclusion, because this is just the beginning…
One big thing that’s over for me is the end of innovate. I’ve been part of a program called The Knowledge Society (TKS), which has taught me everything I know about the world of technology, taught me more about mindsets and being a high performing individual. I’ll write an article soon on medium (follow my account), outlining my entire experience and why I recommend it for anyone that thinks they are curious and want to learn about emerging tech.
It’s a mix of teaching self learning, curating your environment, meeting life-long friends, building a network, building your portfolio, exploring what you want in life, and way, way more. So much so that it sounds like too much to be true. I will be joining the second year program Activate next year, however it is still exciting that I’ve finished the first year program and learned so much. And now, it’s time to start everything on my own, with what I’ve built and learned, without that extra sense of accountability.
This isn’t the end, it’s just the beginning
"No conclusion, because this is just the beginning". Love that