Looking back... What ifs...

OK. I'm starting to ramble more as I'm get more tired from doing my work. Ramblings are like little break times that I take.

I just had this sudden thought of how my life would have been if I had really gone to Stanford. Those of you who might have known me for long enough might know that one thing that I've never really been able to let go is the thought of what if I've chosen to go to Stanford instead of staying here in Singapore and going to NUS. It's not that I regret the decision or what, but as I tell pple sometimes, it's obvious how pple in the corporate world still seem to prefer pple who have studied overseas compared to those who studied locally. And I would have been able to complete my studies in a shorter time. And it's not like I wasn't able to go to Stanford.

Looking back, if I had gone to Stanford, I might have gotten a Masters degree rather than an Honours degree in 4 years. Or I could have finished my degree in 3 years and would be working now. The earnings of 1 year lost. I might have enjoyed higher prestige, coming out from Stanford instead of NUS. Many working people I've met still feel that NUS graduates can't think as well as overseas students. Due to the focus on technical knowledge but not enough on critical thinking? I don't know.

However, if I had gone to Stanford, a lot of things would be so different. I wouldn't have enjoyed all the things that I had done with Gladys, since we would see so much less of each other. I would have not made a lot of the friendships that I now value so much. I wouldn't have gone to UBC on the exchange programme and met the friends that now I still keep in contact with.

Life's full of decisions and paths. And when you decide to take on one path, you lose out on the experience that you might have gotten if you had chosen another path, but you would have also gained experience that you wouldn't have gotten otherwise. There are just so many "what-ifs" that we can't experience.