The end of the calendar year presents us with a valuable opportunity to reflect on the year that was and plan for the year that will be. It's easy to glaze over the former and focus on the latter, but failure to reflect will eventually manifest as a failure to grow.

I started conducting a Personal Annual Review 9 years ago as a sophomore in college. It has been an immensely helpful exercise to which I would credit many of my greatest areas of progress. This annual exercise nurtures and develops sparks of inspiration, celebrates my uniqueness, helps me appreciate all the good in my life, tracks my personal growth, and allows me to strategically plan all the great and beautiful things I want my future to hold.

For the 2023 annual review, I will follow the template by Intelligent Change outlined in their “Best Year Journal” - a tool for setting relevant goals and having a fulfilling year ahead that I have been using.

Notes: See my previous Annual Reviews for 2022, 2021, 2020, 2019, 2018, 2017, 2016, 2015, and 2014.

Part 1: Reflection and Gratitude

What am I grateful for?

The Twelve Labs team from my Seoul visit!

These are the things that happened in my favor: opportunities that came into my life; people I met who had a positive impact; everything and anything for which I am grateful.

Joining Twelve Labs has been a phenomenal career opportunity: I joined an early-stage startup in the AI space with cutting-edge research, groundbreaking technology, and an amazing group of dedicated, hard-working people.
Living in San Francisco during the Generative AI boom in 2023 has been exciting: I attended multiple AI events per week, connected with ambitious founders & practitioners, and discovered trends & opportunities in a rapidly evolving space.
Being in a romantic relationship has continually been a blessing: My relationship with my girlfriend continued to be strong and stable through various phases of the year.
Reconnecting with my family and relatives in person has been refreshing: I have seen my extended family in Vietnam on three separate occasions this year - twice in the US and once in Vietnam.

What are my magical moments?

These moments may be heroic or intimate, simple or every day, but they all provided me with a very special feeling.

1 - January:

My family at the SFO airport back in January 2023

My parents visited me from Vietnam. My younger brother also joined us in SF during his winter break. During their 2-week stay in the US, we toured San Francisco, Washington DC, New York, Boston, and Amherst.

2 - February:

Visited Las Vegas for the first time for a wedding and celebrated our 1-year anniversary with my girlfriend. Also accepted an offer to join Twelve Labs during this trip (thank you, Soyoung!).
Had a lovely dinner at Cultivar to celebrate Valentine’s Day.
Did 2 demos for Twelve Labs within 2 days of joining the company.

We posed for a photobooth at a wedding in Las Vegas in February 2023

3 - March:

Published my first article on the Twelve Labs blog.
Interviewed a string of interesting guests for Datacast.
Had the first Boba Guys team adventure.

4 - April:

Practiced pitching Twelve Labs at Radical Ventures’ AI Founders event.
Dined at Cote Ouest Bistro with my girlfriend.
Did a fun team event at Escape Game.
Attended the NAB Show in Las Vegas (also met my uncle who traveled there for work).
Sponsored LLM Bootcamp by FSDL in South San Francisco.

Me at the LLM Bootcamp in South SF in April 2023

5 - May:

Visited Santa Barbara with my girlfriend.
Watched “The Book of Mormon” show at the Orpheum Theatre.
Hosted the first webinar session of Multimodal Weekly for Twelve Labs.

We were at the town called Solvang during our Santa Barbara trip in May 2023

6 - June:

Attended multiple SF #TechWeek events.
Had fun at the “Under The Sea” prom at the California Academy of Sciences.
Took a ramen-making class at The Story of Ramen.
Tried pottery painting at Earthfire Arts Studio.
Attended Databricks’ Data and AI Summit in San Francisco.
Joined a dinner hosted by Costanoa Ventures for data leaders.

7 - July:

This is a pic at the Star Wars theme park in my Disneyland trip in July 2023

Visited Disneyland in Anaheim.

Spent a few days in Seattle and Eugene to see my extended family visiting from Vietnam.
Saw the “Barbie” movie (I never saw “Oppenheimer”).

8 - August:

Moved to a new office.
Dined at Absinthe Brasserie & Bar.
Saw 4 La Liga teams play soccer at the Oracle Park stadium.
Opened a joint bank account with my girlfriend.
Hosted the first meetup at the Twelve Labs office with the GenAI Collective.

The GenAI Collective meetup in our office in August 2023

9 - September:

Dinner with my girlfriend’s mom at Palmyra.
Moved into a new apartment in Mission Bay with my girlfriend.
Attended Oracle Cloud World in Las Vegas (Mystere Cirque du Soleil was the highlight).
Went to a wedding in Half Moon Bay.

I did a product demo during Oracle Cloud World in September 2023

10 - October:

Did a product demo at the Twilio X Metaphor API exploration showcase.
Joined the Denison in San Francisco event at St. Francis Yacht Club.
Organized the first major hackathon for Twelve Labs at SHACK15.
Dined at Chou Chou Bistro to celebrate my 29th birthday.
Promoted the launch of Twelve Labs’ Pegasus-1 model.

The Multimodal AI hackathon at SHACK 15 in October 2023

11 - November:

Spoke at the AGI Buzz conference in Celo Center.
Organized a small hackathon at UC Berkeley.
Celebrated Thanksgiving with a lovely home dinner.
Joined a dinner hosted by Redpoint Ventures for DevRel leaders.
Spoke at an AI Camp event in the GitHub office.

12 - December:

Spent 10 days in Seoul for a company retreat (the highlight was authentic Korean food).
Went back to Vietnam and traveled across Hanoi, Sapa, Hoi An, and Ha Long Bay with my family and my girlfriend. Got the H1-B visa stamp on my passport.

A pic from “Hang Sung Sot” in Ha Long Bay in December 2023

What steps have I taken to maximize my well-being?

Taking care of my well-being is essential for good physical and mental health.

Physical exercises: I played a lot of pickup soccer this year across different venues in San Francisco (Golden Gate Park, Presidio, Beach Chalet, The Mission, and Mission Bay). I also tried out boxing at Rumble over 2 months and committed to boot camp-style exercises (pilates, barre, HIIT) at a studio called TruFusion. Since moving to Avalon Mission Bay last September, I have weight-lifted 2-3 times a week in the apartment gym (using an app called Muscle Booster).
Sleep Optimization: I continued to rely on the Oura ring to track my sleep quality, heart rate variability, and calories burned. I also bought a high-quality mattress and controllable bed frame from Mattress Firm for our bedroom apartment.
Mental Health: I engaged in illuminating conversations with colleagues and professional contacts regularly, listened to uplifting podcast content, and spent a good chunk of time outdoors.
Emotional Health: My girlfriend has been a wonderful emotional partner for me to share feelings and express sensitivity.
Intellectual Exploration: By way of working at Twelve Labs, I have to constantly keep up-to-date with new trends in Generative AI, Multimodal AI, and Video Understanding. Book-reading-wise, I started reading more biographies, as well as economics/finance and complex science books.
Travel: Even though work was intense this year, I had memorable trips to Las Vegas (3 times), Santa Barbara, Disneyland, Portland, Seoul, and Vietnam (multiple cities).
Fun & Creativity: I went through a couple of fun dates in fine-dining restaurants with my girlfriend. Since moving to Avalon, we have been decorating our new apartment together with new furniture and wall decor.

The Royal Palace with my colleagues during the Seoul trip

What are my personal accomplishments?

These are the milestones, successes, and victories that mattered to me the most:

Adjusting My Adaptation State: You can’t optimize your way to a new state. Transformation adaptations require me to create something new. I have transformed myself this year to be a 0-to-1 startup strategist, a thoughtful digital community builder, and a loving romantic partner.
Making Knowledge Compression Less Relevant: Doing more with corrective feedback eliminates the information loss commonly present in knowledge compression. The resulting knowledge is steep because it is always constructed from the source. I have deliberately sought feedback to improve my health (Oura, Muscle Booster) and relationships (ritual coffee dates with my girlfriend, 1:1 conversations with close friends). In a professional context, working in person has been a major productivity hack as I can give and seek feedback to my colleagues recursively.
Handling Skill Diffusion Efficiently: The combination of better tools and successful outcomes results in a positive feedback loop that creates a formalized skill base. I have found good tools and mental models in my quest to acquire new skills - including building rapport with strangers, forming a fitness habit that works, and identifying high-quality technical content.
Building For Opportunity Redundancy: Redundant opportunities exist momentarily, but repeat in some fashion again under the right conditions. Being able to access opportunities multiple times gives people a chance to adapt. I am building for opportunity redundancy in my life by “re-negotiating my identity” to be physically resilient, emotionally literate, and ideologically flexible.
Mapping My Knowledge of Environments: This exercise gives me a better sense of how to interpret my current and future environments. I am defining the consequences of my actions across environments I am involved with - technique-building (any physical activities and habits), single competition (finance, friendships, and career), and cooperative competition (romantic relationship, community building).

What have I achieved professionally?

I have zoned in the 3 pillars of a meaningful career this year:

Autonomy: Choosing and proposing initiatives that support my professional growth (related to Developer Experience), while contributing to Twelve Labs’ business goals.
Mastery: Building up expertise in the foundation models and Generative AI ecosystem via thought-leadership content and event participation.
Purpose: Educating AI practitioners on Multimodal AI and video understanding by way of community building via Discord.

Part 2: Knowledge Gained

My top 5 life lessons

These personal lessons helped me stay in control of my life, build resilience, and center myself.

Start from first principles: Think like a scientist, cut through all the conventional thinking, and start only with scientific facts.
Ask calibrated questions: A question that starts with “Why” can put the other party on the defensive almost instantaneously. Instead, start with the less threatening “What” and “How” questions. They help someone shape their thoughts more effectively.
Celebrate being objective, not right: Take the need for self-validation and direct it to the goal of being objective and rational. Congratulate myself when I’ve evaluated an argument as dispassionately and fairly as possible (instead of congratulating myself on simply being right).
Have interesting conversations: Ask questions that draw out the strongest, most unique qualities in a person. Be naive & humble and use the word “wait” to slow down the conversation and allow the other party to flesh out their ideas.
Be precise in how to approach life: Approach personal and professional life with an equal amount of rigor and precision.

My top 5 career lessons

These professional lessons helped me deal with the stress and navigate through roadblocks.

Playing the long game requires moves that don’t map to traditional measures of productivity: Curiosity is the fuel I need to play the long game. I’m content being in the muck and gaining satisfaction from learning something new (not just ticking off to-do items). Rather than seeking a positive outcome, I’m exploring all options to satiate my own interests. Playing the long game is a test of my fortitude, my ability to persevere, and just how genuine my interests are.
Prompt clarity with questions: The perfect question is the key to clarity. It unlocks truth and opens minds. It is distilled by having empathy for the struggles of my colleagues/users/customers and ignoring sunk costs & past assumptions to get at the root of a problem. When building something new, focus on asking the right questions instead of having the right answers.
Accept the burden of processing uncertainty: No matter what my creative endeavor is, uncertainty will be lingering around every corner. There is simply no way around uncertainty and the angst it will cause for me and my team. Strive to continually process it rather than let it cripple me, to accept the burden without surrendering my attention.
Short-circuit my reward system: Lower the bar for how I define a “win.” Celebrate anything I can, from gaining a new Discord member to starting the draft of a new blog post. Make the most of the period in my journey when I must create my own rewards out of necessity. Milestones that are directly correlated with progress are more effective motivators than anything else.
The only ”sustainable competitive advantage” in one’s career is self-awareness: Self-awareness is about preserving sound judgment and keeping relatable & realistic. I’m probably many decisions away from success, but always one decision away from failure. Clarity matters. The more aware I am of myself and my surroundings, the more data I have to inform my decisions, and the more competitive I will be.

What challenges did I face?

These are the tough situations and roadblocks I have faced over the past 12 months and the struggles encountered along the way.

Experiencing a layoff: I was laid off from my previous startup Superb AI in January 2023. It also came right at a time when my parents and brother were visiting for our US trip. Needless to say, it was a very stressful time for me since I only had a 60-day grace period to find a new employer as an H1-B visa holder. Thankfully, with strong discipline and support from my professional network, I was able to quickly find a new opportunity with Twelve Labs within a month.
Not investing enough time in my podcast: Due to the intense workload at Twelve Labs, I wasn’t able to spend much time releasing new episodes for Datacast. I’m still processing old recordings from late 2022 & early 2023; hopefully, I can release them soon. (Sorry to all the guests whose interviews I haven’t released yet!)
Prioritizing reading time: Due to the same reason as above, my reading time was quite limited throughout the year. Thankfully, I was able to get back to my reading habit during the recent holiday break.
Getting a minor finger injury: I suffered ligament damage in my left middle and left ring fingers while playing soccer back in September. Thankfully, there wasn’t any fracture, and my fingers were able to recover organically with time.

Reading books during a cruise towards Ha Long Bay

What am I willing to leave behind?

The transition from the prior year to the new one is an excellent time to release anything that may have been good for me in the past but is no longer relevant or healthy now.

Seeking Wealth: Wealth is having assets that earn while I sleep. I must own equity to gain financial freedom. I want to let go of projects that I am not extremely excited about so that I have the time for the highest-valued project in front of me.
Seeking Happiness: The smaller I make my ego, the easier it will be to see reality and un-condition myself. Happiness is the absence of “thin” mimetic desires. Often, I have personal and professional desires that constrain my happiness. As my sum of preferences gets larger, my mood for certain people, activities, and objects is controlled by such habitual reactions. I want to let go of any pre-existing limiting beliefs & assumptions about people (based on their backgrounds and demeanors), any habits acted out of obligation rather than interest (going to too many AI events in SF), and desires about talented professionals seen in my space (massively-funded AI startups).
Seeking Success: Who I work with and what I work on is most important. Success means escaping competition through authenticity. I am still in the process of finding the 1% that matters and seeking knowledge that comes easily to me. I want to let go of patterns that do not enable me to practice and display my craft.

Part 3: Vision and Clarity

Health and Well-Being

This is about setting goals that will help me stay healthy and feel good. It might be the single most important area in my goal-setting since everything else in my life depends on my continued good health and mental well-being.

Get healthy sleep consistently: Since moving into the new apartment last September, my sleep quality has also increased a lot thanks to a new bed. Here are a few things that work for me: (1) Avoid caffeine after 2 PM, (2) Avoid heavy alcoholic drinks before bed, (3) Avoid large meals and beverages late at night, 4) Don’t exercise 2-3 hours before bedtime, and (5) Expose to sunlight as soon as I can after waking up. Here are a few things that I want to do more to improve my sleep quality even further: (1) Maintain a dark, cool, and gadget-free bedroom, (2) Take a hot bath before bed, and (3) Read before bed.
Invest in my mental well-being: A foundation of mental wealth is stress management. For stress management, I want to do more gratitude journaling, meditation, cold showers, and physical to-do lists. I also want to talk things out with friends who are good listeners and offer others a space to share with an open mind.
Engage in physical activities: Physical exercises can change our cells’ ability to take up and utilize glucose and increase our metabolic fitness. Here is the list of activities I have been doing regularly: yoga, weightlifting, interval biking, casual hiking, and soccer. I also want to try out interval swimming and a marathon in 2024.

Self-Growth

Each day offers many opportunities for learning and self-development because life is a work in progress. Here are the goals that will inspire me to get outside my comfort zone:

Optimize my content diet: This means taking an honest look at the content I consume daily and eliminating the unnecessary or harmful ones. This also means going down intellectual rabbit holes by following my curiosity, embracing serendipity, and seeing where that takes me. I also want to arrange my physical environments to encourage new ideas, surround myself with books and other objects that inspire new trains of thought, and go off the beaten path by consuming unfashionable things.
Clarify my thinking: I want to avoid becoming a slave to my beliefs by knowing the best arguments against them. Skepticism and intellectual humility are not signs of weakness but strength. I want to adopt a scout mindset by contemplating moments when I’ve changed my mind before, divorcing my beliefs from myself so that it hurts less when they’ve attached, celebrating objectivity as an end in itself, and avoiding giving other people labels when arguing with them. Beliefs can be best seen as grayscale (not black or white), so let’s treat them like puzzles.
Take risks in times of uncertainty: When dealing with risky situations (in work or life), I remind myself to relax under stress by slowing my breathing, re-conceive stress as a challenge to enjoy overcoming, and focus on one task at a time. Specifically in the work context, make reversible decisions quickly and irreversible decisions slowly. In my day-to-day, I want to take lots of small risks regularly to build anti-fragility.

Giving and Contributing

Even if our lives are hectic, we can find the time to be kind, compassionate, and tolerant toward others. This costs nothing, and the mental benefits are huge.

Build an engaged community: At Twelve Labs, I’m building a Discord community called Multimodal Minds for practitioners interested in Multimodal AI (with 1,000+ members). I want to foster its growth by overseeing its members, forging goodwill, and creating moments of serendipity.
Get a driver’s license: This will help me fully immerse in the US culture and support others if they need a driver. Additionally, it will present a new learning challenge for me to tackle.
Adopt a dog: My girlfriend has always wanted a dog since we started dating. Moreover, a dog will be a new companion and give me a sense of responsibility.

Love and Romance

In a lantern shop during our trip to Hoi An

Romantic relationships are not only important for companionship and procreation. Happy romantic relationships can help us become better versions of ourselves. I have had a romantic partner for 2 years now, and loving relationships are always works in progress. Here are some tested advice for improving the chances of relationship success and satisfaction:

Do novel and exciting things with my partner often.
Say positive things to and about my partner at least 5 times more often than I say negative things.
Spend each week writing about why my relationship is better than some others I know about.
Qualify every criticism of my partner with a review of one or two of their positive qualities.
Stare into each other’s eyes more often.

Creativity and Learning

These are specific skills and knowledge I want to learn:

Learn a new language: Learning a foreign language is a fluid process - I’m building a lot of different skills that meld into each other. The more vocabulary I learn, the easier it will be to speak about a wide variety of topics. The more I practice speaking, the easier it will be to watch foreign TV and movies. I want to learn Korean this year, mostly since many of my colleagues at Twelve Labs are Korean.
Work on my dance moves: Movement combinations increase memory, order, and sequencing skills. Creating dances also increases self-esteem. Dance burns calories, strengthens muscles, improves balance, increases flexibility, and gives the heart a good workout. Through the creative process of dancing, I am encouraged to use my imagination, collaborate with others to solve my problems, and discover multiple solutions to challenges.
Dive back into video and photography editing: I used to take video and photography very seriously (see my vlogs from studying abroad and my pictures from traveling), so I want to do that this year. Taking time out from my busy day to take a few photographs can be enjoyable and relaxing. Indulging in longer photography sessions on weekends or during vacations can be terrifically therapeutic. Narrowing the attention of my thoughts to the creative process of photography brings a whole new dimension to the experience.

Spiritual

Working on our spiritual selves isn’t necessarily about religion. Spirituality encompasses our beliefs and values, is intrinsically linked with self-awareness, and can be a wonderful journey of self-discovery. These are spiritual practices I would like to begin or maintain:

Master mental toughness: Seek self-accountability via honesty combined with a focus on practical remedies. Stress test myself through regular manufactured hardships. Make friends with pain and personify it. Self-distancing (via using an alter-ego) can help me be more objective about my situation.
Develop a mindfulness practice and the habit of gratitude: When not in flow, step outside me and pay attention to how I am behaving, how my emotions are functioning, and how my current actions work toward my goals. Savor the good moments throughout each day. Spend time thinking about happy memories. At the beginning of each day, write down 3 things I am grateful for.
Embrace solitude: Solitude can mean introspection, the concentration of focused work, and sustained reading. It also means deep friendship of intimate conversations or long uninterrupted talks with one other person.

Recreation

About to get into a soccer game during the weekend

We need recreation to refresh our bodies and minds. These are activities that bring me enjoyment, amusement, pleasure, and fun.

Play soccer regularly: Soccer improves my footwork (changing directions quickly while running, making unique foot movements, powering up and down leg muscles), boosts my fitness and cardio (increasing stamina), and helps me learn to anticipate (looking where the ball is going, analyzing other players, reacting quickly to any situation, keeping my cool, better conserving my energy, and making explosive attacks the more effective).
Explore new recreational sports: Indoor rock climbing strengthens muscles while being low impact, improves flexibility, challenges the cardiovascular system, combats chronic disease, and develops better hand-eye coordination. Swimming keeps the heart rate up, tones muscles, builds endurance, and provides an all-over body workout. Cycling is low impact, increases stamina/strength/aerobic fitness, and can be as intense as I want.
Go to live jazz events: Jazz stimulates a calming effect on my body, signaling my central nervous system to lower my heart rate. Jazz listeners tend to have a high intellect - the learning capacity to memorize tunes, exercise creative thinking skills, and use intellect to engage with the music.

Happiness

Happiness to me means high self-esteem and optimism towards life. I want to set myself up for success by doing things I know I can succeed at, again and again, to keep my confidence high and have process (learning) goals rather than product (outcome) goals. I also want to be in a community that is great for fostering positivity. Here is my simple roadmap to happiness:

Improve my empathy: Empathy is a valuable skill that can enhance my relationships, communication, and overall understanding of others. (1) Practice active listening by giving others my full attention, maintaining eye contact, and trying to understand their perspective without judging. (2) Ask open-ended questions to encourage others to share their thoughts & feelings and allow for deeper conversations. (3) Cultivate self-awareness by reflecting on my own emotions, biases, and assumptions, and recognize how they might influence my understanding of others. (4) Learn about different cultures & perspectives to broaden my understanding of diverse experiences and help me relate to others with more empathy and sensitivity.
Improve my conscientiousness: Conscientiousness is a personality trait associated with being organized, responsible, and diligent. (1) Set clear goals and prioritize by breaking my goals into smaller, manageable tasks and prioritizing them based on their importance and deadlines. (2) Establish routines and habits by creating a daily or weekly schedule that includes specific times for work, exercise, self-care, etc. (3) Enhance my sense of accountability by recognizing the impact of my choices & commitments on myself & others and holding myself accountable for meeting deadlines and fulfilling obligations.
Avoid consumerism: Consumerism is a social and economic order that encourages the acquisition of goods and services in ever-increasing amounts. (1) Avoid impulse buying by taking time to evaluate whether the item is a genuine necessity or if it’s driven by momentary desire. (2) Practice minimalism by decluttering & simplifying my living space, focusing on quality over quantity, and prioritizing experiences over material possessions. (3) Limit my exposure to advertising by unsubscribing from marketing emails, reducing screen time, and being mindful of the media I consume. (4) Engage in alternative activities that bring me joy and fulfillment by spending time with loved ones and connecting with nature.

Financial and Investments

When it comes to personal finance, I am a big fan of Ramit Sethi. I read his book a few years ago, listened to his podcast regularly, and watched his Netflix show last year. My priority in this area is to come up with my conscious spending plan:

Categorize my current spending: 4 typical categories are fixed costs (what I need to live), important investments (what future I need to live), savings goals (what I want for the future), and guilt-free spending (what I want). By allocating my money in this way, I make sure all the important costs are taken care of first without leaving out the fun stuff.
Set up my automated system: First off, decide what percentage of my take-home income I want to put into each category. A good rule of thumb is 50% for needs (e.g. rent, utilities, groceries), 20% for savings (e.g. Roth IRA, savings goals), and 30% for wants (the things I feel guilty about spending money on). Secondly, split my money up into each category when my paycheck comes in. A simple way to do this is to set up regular transfers from my checking account to my savings account.
Keep track: I use the budgeting app Mint to track my spending and ensure I’m staying within the parameters I set earlier.

Professional and Career

Establish thought leadership: Write more technical content around research, engineering, and product initiatives at Twelve Labs. Double down on my podcast production function with high-quality guests and in-depth conversations with well-thought-out questions.
Make professional conversations hyper-productive: Keep in mind the entire flow of each conversation (both the past and the future) to harness and direct it. Always know my goal. Do not say what comes directly to my mind. Paraphrase. Zoom in & out and make it explicit. Train my brain to stop trying to show off in conversation and pay attention to “why” things are said. Remain at the conversation level and meta-conversation level to analyze where the conversation is coming from and where it’s going.
Become a more effective leader: The most effective leaders flip the pyramid and lead from the bottom up, not the top down. Ideas, values, and strategies can come from anyone in the organization. I want to focus on perfecting systems instead of outcomes. Systems-based thinking forces me to get out of autopilot, investigate the processes that run my life, and set my sights on actions within my control.

Adventure and Travel

Adventure and travel goals are meant to inspire me to try something bold and adventurous and experience life to the fullest.

Spend 2 weeks in Europe to celebrate my 30th birthday: To celebrate the end of my “Defining Decade,” I want to plan a 2-week trip to Europe in mid-October with my girlfriend. I traveled extensively across Europe back in the spring of 2016 during my study abroad year, so I am excited to revisit this continent again. Here are a few cities currently on my list: Edinburgh (Scotland), Dublin (Ireland), Bruges & Ghent (Belgium), Reykjavik (Iceland), Split & Dubrovnik (Croatia), Bergen (Norway), Salzburg (Austria), Porto (Portugal), Riga (Latvia), Tallinn (Estonia), Zurich & Bern (Switzerland), and Sofia (Bulgaria).
Plan for regular weekend getaways in the Bay Area with my girlfriend: The Bay Area and its adjacent areas offer so much nature and adventure that I’d like to take more advantage of - Santa Cruz, Point Reyes & Tomales Bay, Napa & Sonoma Wine County, Healdsburg, Big Sur & Carmel-by-the-Sea, Mendocino Coast, Lake Tahoe & Mammoth Lakes, Paso Robles, San Luis Obispo & San Simeon & Marro Bay, Stinson Beach & Muir Beach, Monterey, Bodega Bay, Sausalito, Half Moon Bay, and Yosemite National Park.
Travel within the US during the holidays: Here are a few destinations on my list - Salt Lake City and Zion National Park (Utah), Phoenix and Grand Canyon National Park (Arizona), Albuquerque & Santa Fe (New Mexico), Yellowstone National Park (Wyoming), and Rocky Mountain National Park (Colorado).

Conclusion

As an avid reader, I want to round up my review with the list of books that I read this year:

Behave (by Robert Sapolsky)
Attention Factory (by Matthew Brennan)
The Spotify Play (by Sven Carlsson and Jonas Leijonhufvud)
The Beginning of Infinity (by David Deutsch)
Mistakes Were Made, But Not By Me (by Carol Tavris and Elliot Aronson)
Crossing The Chasm (by Geoffrey Moore)
The Dream Machine (by Mitchell Waldrop)
How The Mind Works (by Steven Pinker)
The Origin of Wealth (by Eric Breinhocker)
Competing Against Luck (by Clayton Christensen)
Consilience (by Edward Wilson)
The Status Game (by Will Storr)
Play Bigger (by Al Ramadan, Dave Peterson, Christopher Lochhead, and Kevin Maney)
The Man Who Solved The Market (by Gregory Zuckerman)
The Inner Game of Tennis (by Timothy Gallwey)
Tribe (by Sebastian Junger)
Same as Ever (by Morgan Housel)
Hidden Genius (by Polina Marinova Pompliano)
The Upside of Stress (by Kelly McGonigal)
From Strength to Strength (by Arthur Brooks)
The Good Life (by Robert Waldinger and March Schulz)
Empires of Light (by Jill Jonnes)
The Science of Fear (by Dan Gardner)
A Man For All Markets (by Edward Thorp)
The Vital Question (by Nick Lane)

Happy 2024!