Happy Holidays!

A holiday message from Jhemon Lee and AsianConnections.com!

I hope you enjoyed my series of networking columns this past year. I'm looking forward to presenting you next with a smorgasbord of topics in 2004, drawn from the many good seminars and conferences Ive had the privilege of attending these past couple of years.

No matter what your religion is, and even if December is simply a splendid exercise in crass commercialization like it is for me, the holidays are a terrific time for reflection and reassessment. For me, this year wasnt terribly different from 2002, but thats OK, since 2002 wasnt a bad year. I did get to deliver a keynote speech for the first time at the 10th Annual Asian Pacific American Medical Student Association (www.apamsa.org), which was a fun experience.

What are you thankful for? Certainly family, friends and loved ones, and perhaps career and financial success, but dont forget to count simpler things: food, health, shelter and safety. You may take them for granted, but others do not. While you consider this, also consider reaching out and helping others. It could be a donation to a charity, or volunteering for a toy drive or a soup kitchen, but it could really just be as simple as helping a lost passerby with directions, or saying hi to a long lost friend or estranged family member.

New Years is a time for resolutions. I dont know about you, but mine are typically too expansive or too daunting, so I never seem to get the satisfaction of actually fulfilling them. For 2004, instead of one grandiose resolution, Im going to have a short list of resolutions sure, a couple of them will be grandiose, since its still important to challenge myself, but others will be simple and easily doable, so that way I get to preserve my self-esteem by checking off at least some of this years goals. One of which will be to write my columns at AsianConnections.com more frequently. Lets see if I can fulfill this particular resolution - see you in 2004!

Happy Holidays!
Jhemon