Lu-Hai Liang

It’s come to my attention that some of you came under the impression, based on my previous post, that I had moved to China. I did write that one intentionally vague, so I’ll make it clear. My new base is Bangkok, Thailand.

The thing I have enjoyed most since moving here has been attending book events, believe it or not.

I went to the Bangkok literary festival at Kunsthalle, over near Hua Lamphong where I happened to stumble upon a gorgeous plate of crispy fried belly pork, with the most unctuous white fat, atop a bed of ramen, before heading there. (The dish is pictured below.)

I went to a private book club, examining thirst, hosted by my friend, the lovely and sublimely talented Pim Wangtechawat, and two editions of a more public reading club that has surprised me with how enjoyable it is to read en masse and then discuss the books we’re reading. The literary scene in Bangkok is burgeoning and I predict it will grow handsomely given the grassroots happenings occurring.

The second-most enjoyable is being more active — going to yoga classes, walking around, sports clubs, exploring. Being more physically active, and out and about, is always a plus.

Sometimes, I’ll be riding the BTS, Bangkok’s metal sky train, looking around at everyone, being a weirdo, and I’ll think to myself, “my god, I live here now”. Truly, it is a kind of luxury to be mobile in this way: an international cosmopolite, a writer abroad.

It is not all paradise.

Both times I’ve joined a badminton group to play mixed doubles I’ve been drenched in sweat, sitting in front of the fan in between games, feeling like I might keel over and die during games, such is the heat and humidity.

The noise and traffic pollution of parts of Bangkok is bad. I look forward to the EV revolution sweeping these parts. Apparently, big cities in China, like Beijing and Shanghai, are noticeably calmer and cleaner now due to electric vehicles, with their softly whining electric motors.

It’s intriguing the way the mind changes once it inhabits a new city. For the curious, the adventurers, the philosophers, diplomats and artists, it is as sure a process as it was for those sailing around the Mediterranean ports and harbours millennia ago.

The age when Greek philosophy, as goods and ideas and poetry were being traded, arriving at increasingly prosperous port cities, was born. (A book I’m currently reading is How to Be: Life Lessons from the Early Greeks, by Adam Nicholson, which has been fascinating.)

Bangkok is a stimulating place. Almost overwhelmingly so. There are layers here. Parts and puzzles I’m still figuring out. Week by week a little more is revealed. But it’s not only the city and its people you’re learning, it’s also yourself.

So I’m expanding, not contracting, not diminishing. The opposite, one hopes. Jean-Paul Sartre proclaimed that God is dead and that man’s meaning is self-created. Perhaps discovery is my meaning, or one of them.

Bit by bit, you discover more about the world, and one of the biggest discoveries is that your own mind has capacities and extraordinarily deep wisdom buried in there. As one old Buddhist once said, Buddhahood exists within us all.

I’ve recently attuned to just how important mindset is, listening to a venerable researcher by the name of Ellen Langer. A professor of psychology at Harvard University, Langer has conducted some famous experiments.

One experiment involved old guys and making them talk and think like they were much younger, which apparently made them noticeably younger looking, with improved hearing and other markers, within the space of a week, compared to a control group, all by just changing their mindset.

On a podcast, Langer spoke about how fatigue is a mindset. She gave the example of someone who’d spent all day Word processing, so that he felt very tired at the end of the day, only to sit down to play the piano, and feel much better.

She gave the example of telling one set of participants to do 100 jumping jacks, who would feed back that they’d feel tired around the 60-mark. Another set of people, they told to perform 200 jumping jacks. And guess what? The number of jumping jacks when they’d feel tired was significantly higher. This is astonishing.

Consider it for a moment. Just by changing the goal, from 100 to 200, the rate at which fatigue set in was significantly different. No other condition changed. This is a mind-blowing result.

Langer herself is clearly an outstanding person, with an impressive mindset. She told a story about how her house burnt down. In an almost throwaway line, she said something like, “I’d already lost all my things, I thought, I may as well not throw away my sanity, too”.

That was just a small example of how Langer has a strong mind. Of someone who reflexively looks on the bright side, gets on with things, and doesn’t dwell on the small fry. Most things are inconveniences rather than tragedies is another one of her lines.

Listening to her talk, and the powerful, evidence-based learnings she’s discovered about mindset and mindfulness, has inspired me to carry out my own experiments with mindset. I won’t go into them, but it’ll be interesting to try.

The one about fatigue was especially pertinent. Because it’s true, no matter how tired you feel, the body usually does, always, have more gas in the tank. The benefits of mindfulness and awareness are powerful. It is never too late to harness those powers.

Until next time!