Everything is funny… at the end.

If you live in New York City, you probably have seen the big posters in subways featuring Anna Wintour’s leadership class on MasterClass. I was once very curious to sign up but life got carried away… or rather too many in-person workshops/meetups I was already attending pre-quarantine.

Now that everything is digital, a friend of mine asked me if I wanna join MasterClass with her so we got the buy-1-get-1-free deal. Since the cost wasn’t bad and I got a quarantine learning buddy, I thought why not?

Right after I registered, to my surprise, the first class that caught my attention wasn’t Anna Wintour’s class on leadership but it was David Sedaris’ class on storytelling and humor. Without having a second thought, I immediately hit the play button and started watching his class. After all, we all could use some humor during this crazy time we live in.

David’s class is very easy to follow. It feels like a conversation he simply carries with his friends and families. As a writer, he talks about what he sees, when he writes, and how he thinks. It’s the way he approaches life and somehow I resonate with him deeply. One episode of the class he talks about how he rarely says no to a new experience (same here!!). He also talks about if you think by looking at your computer or phone all day long you will get to experience life, you’re wrong. I feel the same way about this statement he makes which is why I don’t think an experience can truly be simulated through AR/VR headsets. Yes, you can take people to a virtual reality but the actual experience of meeting people or traveling can never be simulated. The touch, the smell, the temperature, and perhaps a bad experience that occur during your journey in life, they cannot be simulated digitally.

The one biggest takeaway from David’s class for me is when he says everything is funny (or can be funny, can’t remember the exact wording). Basically, if you think about all of your life experiences, even if it’s a bad one, you might not enjoy it at the moment but you can always somehow laugh about it years later. When I say bad experience, it doesn’t mean that you laugh about an experience of someone passed away or a tragic terrorist attack. What I mean by that is all of your moments of frustration or anger, I guess these types of feelings are especially applicable during this time … if you think about how you will look back years down the road — it is going to be funny. You might laugh about how you argue with your spouse over who washes dishes or you might think about the days you wait in line to get into to Trader Joe’s to get your Ube ice cream.

Everything is funny… at the end. When you have moved on from that particular moment, when you can look back, when you can reflect, when you are ready to let go, you will smile and tell the story of your life. Sometimes I say to my husband, “remember the days we argued in our early 20s and I asked you to sleep in the dog house?”, guess what we laugh about those stays. Sometimes I say to my parents, “remember the days I used to skip school and you get a call from the principal?”, guess what we laugh about those memories. I guess, we have truly moved on from those days, so now everything sounds funny to us!

What is your story? I hope you find your life experience fulfilling once you start noticing your own stories are just as fun to tell as others you might have heard!