Tiger Mothers, ERE and Achievement

[dgforthree]

I just read Battle Hymn of the Tiger Mother! Lol it reminded me of how achievement is something of a disease in society. People are so committed to being the best, they miss the joy of being mediocre. Lives, relationships, and mental health is routinely sacrificed for success - but success is so subjective - and most people don't agree on a definition (ergo the ERE crowd
Perfection is crazy, good enough is good enough! Especially in their spending habits for lessons, instruments, and parties, they went entirely overboard. Anybody read the book and have some thoughts?
Also, I thought about how ERE is an interesting mix of overachievers and underachievers. On the one hand, we overachieve in saving and becoming wealth, and then underachieve by dropping out of the rat race.
Maybe this should be two posts?

[George the original one]

Problem is that most people don't understand what "good enough" is, at least when it comes to managing money and/or relationships.
Children also need to find out what they're capable of. Sometimes that takes big pushes and, thinking of our teenage years, sometimes it takes restraint (who knew that I could get a pickup truck airborne 6' for a half block?).

[George the original one]

Yeah, could be two separate threads...
> On the one hand, we overachieve in saving and

> becoming wealth, and then underachieve by

> dropping out of the rat race.
Once you achieve financial indpendence, you will drop out of the rat race anyway, because the rat race is no longer important.
Whether that means just ignoring office politics and finding your own voice or pursuing something meaningful outside of the career is irrelevant.

[C40]

I wouldn't consider dropping out of the rat race or retiring to be underperforming.
A few months ago I saw a coworker out away from work, with her father. He had come to visit. He said he retired recently and said very proudly "Yeah. I won !!!"

[FrugalZen]

So this leads to an interesting question...
The "Tiger Mother" is an approximation of/writing about primarily women of Asian descent and ERE seems in direct conflict with a LOT of Asian values.
So out of curiosity how many of the readers/posters are/of Asian descent??

[bluepearl]

I am of chinese descent from HK. I haven't read the book, only the NYT articles and blog posts when the book first came out and caused a sensation.
Disclaimer. I did a bunch of lessons in music etc. when I was a kid, not very accomplished though. I love listening to classical music today, even though I hated practicing and wasn't a very good musician. My sister, who's much more accomplished than I am, refused to listen to classical music these days. This just shows how sick the whole training/ accomplishment route can be. The real reason for listening to/ appreciating the music is lost, behind too much practicing.
The savings part isn't too painful even though I am definitely not as frugal as my dad and grandparents...
The hard part is to explain to my parents that I want to "retire early". They were proud of my career achievements so far and think that a good professional high paid job at a prestigious company is the way to go... So I have to try to explain it under the guise of "I have enough money if I am frugal enough, wouldn't it be great if I can spend more time with you?"
To summarize, I have lived most of my life with others' expectation in mind, (I would say most "accomplished asian kids" probably share at least some of my feeling).
And now, it's time to live my life the exact way I envision it. Right now it's ER (minus the extreme part)...

[dot_com_vet]

Asian American household here, new baby, my wife just read that book.
In the end, I think our conclusion is that life should be a balance.
Yes, ERE is definitely in conflict with Asian values, though.

[jacob]

Yeah, it's kinda funny how achievement oriented pursuits can ruin the joy of them for life. I used to be a competitive swimmer (6x1.5 hours per week) and I used to breathe physics.
Over the past 20 years, I've been in the water maybe 3 times. When someone asks me what I think about < insert newest physics discovery > my thinking is "Huh? Don't know. Don't care."

[TheWanderingScholar]

@FrugalZen:
I'm of Filipino descent but yes it is going to awkward when I decide to go ERE and mom is kind of pushing me to have a successful career.

[acorn]

Ha, I don't know about other Asian cultures, but I don't think I've ever heard a HK Chinese person think they ever had enough money. As far as they are concerned there is never enough!
As for the Tiger Mom, well, I chalk it up to good intentions, but what a way to live your life. I disagree with her approach, but her kids seem to be fine and to each their own.
Yeah, Asian values aren't too compatible with ERE. I wonder though, will the younger middle class generation continual on the mad consumer drive they are currently on, or will they wake up? Jacob maybe you need to translate your book to Chinese!

[dgforthree]

Thanks for all the posts - I didn't know if this would be interesting to y'all.
My family is a typical American middle class, except for the part about achievement. I have a really tough time explaining why I'm not "being the best I can be" or "doing my best" at a career.
I think that many cultures (especially evidenced in "Battle Hymn" or American culture) of throwing out common sense in pursuit of "shoot-the-moon" goals instead of earning enough to be set for the rest of your life.

[palmera]

My situation is a bit unique. I'm from a family of immigrants (not Asian though)and my family more than others placed an emphasis on education. I was expected to go to college, get a 'practical' degree, get a decent paying job and start 'giving back' to my family, helping with sibling with tuition and parent with cash.
This combined with societal pressure made me snap and go for ERE full force.
Compared to others with a similar background though, I think I have it easy, an acquaintance in her 30s works as a director in a fortune 500 company and has to give half of each paycheck to her parents. Weird. Maybe she'll get it back when she gets married?

[magecanuck]

terrific book... made me proud of my mom who always opened doors to new opportunities for learning/bettering myself (her free time often being the expense of the deal). amy chua took parenting to the extreme in some cases, but her daughters are great success stories.
today i see too many teens with no direction in life, no values to build upon, and lackadaisical, apathetic and complacent 'care' givers.

[m741]

I'm emphatically against the 'Tiger Mom' idea. To be honest, it seems perverse to me. I know they probably think they have their kids' best interests at heart but mostly it seems like parents of this type want to (A) live vicariously through their children and (B) brag to other parents about how accomplished their kids are.
To me, the ideal parent is one who helps their child explore the world. That means reading with them, playing in a park, building dams in local streams with them, assembling legos and snowforts, and teaching them to think critically. Richard Feynman has some great stories about how his father taught him and that's the type of parent I'd like to be. Filling every waking hour with scheduled activities at a young age makes most people hate those activities when they grow up.
I'd prefer my kid to be curious, open-minded, and a very adaptive thinker but with few master-level skills, than be able to play violin but hate it and be really good at quickly solving math problems.

[Surio]

Found this:
http://campus.yahoo.com/news/yeduyahooi ... m-20111110