more about lucy!

Lucy's Personal Story

I was born in Minnesota and lived in a mostly Chinese community before moving to New York when I was in the first grade. I spent the rest of my childhood growing up in Chappaqua: a very small town located in Westchester county. The main difference between my birth town in Minnesota and Chappaqua was the distribution of race in the community. The Asian population where I lived was only around 10% while the white population filled the other 90% and so culturally, I could not relate to many of my peers. Living in a pretty liberal area, none of my classmates were outright racist but they tended to be indifferent and ignorant (which honestly felt worse) and often would commit microaggressions targeted at my intelligence or appearance. Due to this, I largely rejected portions of my culture as a Chinese American and tried to become as "white-washed" as possible in order to fit in better with my classmates. Now that I'm older and much more appreciative of my culture, I feel as though I have missed out on many opportunities to embrace the cultural aspects of my identity. My Mandarin skills have deteriorated as well, somehow being worse now than when I was 6 years old. I feel like this is something important to mention because it's made me quite sensitive about the way I am perceived and can come across but self-love and self-confidence is something that I am really working on! Additionally, because of this regret, I now really want to take the time to appreciate both my culture and other Asian cultures that I turned a blind eye to when I was younger. One of the reasons KPL interested me so much was because it is an Asian interest sorority; I finally have a chance to be surrounded by people who can better understand my struggles, culture, and perspectives as a Chinese American. I hope to better embrace portions of my culture that were lost to me previously with the support and help of the KPL sisters!

Lucy's Hobbies, Passions & Interests

reading
playing video games
listening to music

A few of my hobbies include reading, playing video games, and listening to music. One of my favorite books is The Silent Patient by Alex Michaelides and I recommend it to pretty much anyone and everyone that asks me for a book recommendation. I have trouble reading nonfiction works and tend to stick to two types of fiction novels: ones with "literary merit" and YA fantasy novels. While I enjoy the complexity and thoughtfulness of novels like No Longer Human and Crime and Punishment, I also really love reading more simple novels that make me feel like I'm watching a movie. A few of my favorite fantasy YA novels include The Cinder Chronicles and Sorcery of Thorns (which I bought in the first place because the cover was so pretty). Another one of my hobbies is playing video games, specifically League of Legends. I got into the game at the end of my freshman year of high school and mostly played with friends before falling to the ranked hole. I've devoted way too much of my time to the game and while I don't want to go cold turkey just yet, I do hope to allocate some of the time I spend playing league towards my other interests like reading and maybe picking up another hobby that's more relaxing. Lastly, I spend a lot of time listening to music, especially when I walk. I listen to a lot of k-pop and would consider myself a stan of quite a few groups! I used to just listen but now I'm much more familiar with specific groups and their members. At the moment, I'm really into Seventeen, IVE, and The Boyz but I do also enjoy a wide variety of other artists' music. My respective biases are Jeonghan, Wonyoung, and Sunwoo in those groups! I also listen to beabadoobee, Clairo, and Laufey. Everyone needs to listen to Laufey's new album right now!! It is an absolute masterpiece.

Lucy's Personality

I would describe myself as someone who comes across as shy at first but warms up very quickly. I can be a bit reserved or seem unapproachable at first but once the conversation gets started and we find any sort of common ground, I end up talking very comfortably even if we've only known each other for very little time. I also think that once I warm up to someone, it is very hard for me to go back to seeing them as a stranger. Even with my high school friends, despite seeing them after a whole 6 months or more has gone by, the conversations we have feel very familiar and are never awkward despite the time separating our interactions. I would also describe myself as someone sensitive; I feel emotions very strongly for both myself and other people. I'm the kind of person that bawls her eyes out when I see a sad TikTok slideshow on my FYP. I consider this both a strength and a weakness–it makes me very empathetic and able to understand how other people feel in a variety of situations but it also means that I can sometimes overreact or see a small action as overtly negative. Thankfully, to counteract the latter part, I am someone who is more thoughtful and does not say the first thing that comes to mind. When I do feel overly negative or upset, I always take the time to disengage myself and then look at the situation again when I feel less emotional.

Lucy's Sense of Humor

I'm someone that laughs really easily and tends to find humor in most jokes, whether or not they're good. If a joke is good, I'll laugh because it's funny. If a joke is bad, I'll laugh because the idea that it was supposed to be funny is funny. I think random humor and deadpan humor are my favorite kinds but I'll also enjoy a dad joke here and there!

Lucy's Proudest Moment

My proudest moment was “gaveling” at a debate tournament. I started debating my freshman year of high school as part of a club and really enjoyed it for a multitude of reasons. As someone who loves to talk but is a bit afraid of public speaking, it was a really great way for me to do something slightly out of my comfort zone but still have fun with it. Although I was also extremely nervous before my speeches, once I got up to the stand and began talking, the six minutes flew by easily. Another reason I really enjoyed debating was because the format of my league was more team-oriented. I joined the club with two of my closest friends and throughout all four years, we stuck together as a team. To be honest, we didn’t see much success at first. Our league housed a bunch of schools that were pretty competitive and held debate programs throughout middle school while I was a full on novice. Despite this, I still had a great time at all tournaments no matter my win-loss ratio. At the end, it was always satisfying to have spent the time debating and working together on cases and speeches. My hard work in the club paid off and I received a leadership position my junior year. After that, my main purpose within the club was to teach the incoming freshmen how to debate. I always felt a bit insecure about my position: never had my team ever won a speaker award or a team award at any of the tournaments. Junior year was in the midst of Covid and all of our tournaments were online. This also meant that it was much easier for freshmen to sit in on rounds: they would simply join the breakout room and listen to all of the speeches. I felt much more pressure than before in this situation since I was meant to be a leading figure in the club as well as having the pressure of more eyes on me. Somehow, due to a mix of preparation, skill, and luck, my team ended up performing very well throughout this tourney in particular. My team placed third overall and I “gaveled”, or got the top aggregate speaker score. I think this was my proudest moment because all of my efforts finally came to fruition. Even before I scored well, I still knew that I did my best and had a good time, but this was a more tangible form of proof that everything I had worked for paid off. It was very satisfying to win with the same friends that I had begun debating with years ago and it’s a moment I still think back to once in a while now.

Lucy's Perfect Day

The perfect day starts with the perfect night before as in a good eight hour sleep in a well air-conditioned room underneath three different blankets. After naturally waking up at around 10:00 A.M. I would probably scroll on Tiktok for half an hour. Finally, I would get up and get ready for my favorite thing to do: train down to New York City with friends and shop around. After meeting up with my friends at the train station, we would spend the hour-long ride sharing music with each other until I found a song that I love and would listen on repeat for the next few weeks until I get tired of it. After we finally made it to Grand Central, we would stop by the Magnolia Bakery and get some of their banana pudding. Then we would walk a few blocks to K-Town and shop around for Korean skincare, makeup, and most importantly: albums. We would head to a nearby cafe after and open our albums up to squeal about the PCs before spending a few hours sipping boba and talking about how our lives have been. I'm a big believer in having high quality friendships: I still stay in touch with all of my highschool friends and part of a perfect day is catching up with them and talking about how our college experiences have been! At the end, we would get a nice dinner together, take pictures of the food, and then train back home on a full stomach. I love rides of all sorts and I would take the time to relax and recharge my social battery by quietly listening to music and looking out the window. Then, I would say goodbye to my friends and we would promise to hang out again soon before heading home and showing my sister a haul of the items I purchased. Finally, I would watch some Youtube in bed and relax before heading to sleep again.

Values, goals, challenges!

Top Values/ Principles

who do you look up to?

Academic/ Career/ Life Goals

My top value/principle is to treat everyone with kindness and respect no matter how I am feeling at the moment. I'm a big believer in the idea that a very small act of kindness can have a great impact and vice versa: one person in a bad mood can spread that bad mood very easily to many others and the effect compounds. As someone who worked a job in retail, I have dealt with many customers who were extremely rude for seemingly no reason having to do with me. Because of this, I try to make sure that when someone else treats me poorly, I do not let it spoil my mood and how I interact with others. I strongly believe that it's very important to let the small stuff roll off your shoulders and go on with your day as usual instead of letting someone else's actions ruin your mood and potentially how you interact with others. Any compounded mean-ness ends when it reaches me!

I really look up to my younger sister. We’re only three years apart but were never super close until after I went to college and then was back home for the summer. We ended up bonding much more during that time period and I learned a lot about my sister that I didn’t know before. She’s currently heading into her junior year of high school and is under a lot of pressure to perform well. One of the things I really admire about her is her work ethic. She does all of her work on time and she isn’t afraid to reach out to other people. She’s self-studied for a bunch of AP courses and interned at a laboratory over her sophomore summer simply because, as a person, she’s super motivated. I think that there are a lot of things we can learn from each other and one of the things I hope to learn from her as we’ve gotten closer is how she stays so motivated and finds time for everything in her life. It’s slightly hard for me to imagine that my little sister is somehow now so grown up and is a complex being of her own but I’ve really grown to appreciate her more now because of it. She’s become someone I really do look up to.

My academic and career goals are similar, which is to find something that I am passionate about and will enjoy doing in the future. I think that when it comes to classwork, I will do all of it but rarely do I have any sort of feeling of satisfaction over the work or the concepts I learn. I hope to find some career that I will genuinely enjoy as much as one can enjoy a job. As for a dream job, I just would like to find something where I can keep my work life separate from my regular life. I see videos of people working over 100 hours a week in Investment Banking and just watching the TikTok makes me feel tired! As someone who gets stressed easily, I would want a job where the divide between when I’m on the clock and off of it is very clear. When it comes to life goals, I think ultimately I will just pursue whatever makes me and those around me happy. I’m a strong believer that the most important motivator for life is happiness. My dream lifestyle would include eating healthier foods, maybe doing pilates everyday, and living a very clean and minimalistic lifestyle.

3 areas for Personal Growth

Approach to conflict

Dealing with stress and/or frustration

The first area I want to focus on is becoming more assertive. Like I’ve hinted at, I can be a bit passive which I always saw as a better solution because there was never any active conflict. However, a lot of tensions ended up boiling under the surface and I now see the importance of direct communication. This is something I am working on with my friendships at the moment. The second thing I want to improve about myself is my work ethic: I think that it’s gotten a lot better since freshman year, but I really want to make sure I do things with the right motivation. I tend to do my work just because I know it is required and am now trying to take everything slower and “smell the roses” instead of rushing through everything. I procrastinate and then rush so a part of this area of improvement is having better time management. I think that overall, this will make my college experience much more enjoyable. Lastly, I mentioned that I play League of Legends and while it is fun, I dedicate too much time to it and in order to improve my mindset and happiness, I am trying to play much less or only with friends to not only enjoy the game more but also real life outside of the Summoners Rift.

If it's an active conflict, I always first try to disengage from the situation so that I can process my emotions and the conflict at hand before having any sort of discussion with the other involved party. After taking the time to think about the situation and what my perspective is, I will then have an in-person discussion with the person. I try to avoid texting or calling because it can sometimes be hard to express genuinity through those mediums. During the in-person meeting, I will first ask them about their perspective on the conflict and then tell them how I feel about it. Through a calmer discussion away from the heat of the active conflict, I hope to come to a resolution through compromise and seeing each other's perspectives. However, I acknowledge that not everything can be solved through mediation and if the conflict is unresolvable, I will not push it and give it more time before discussing a potential resolution again sometime in the future.

I think it largely depends on the type of stress but I mainly utilize two methods: talking with other people and crying. If I'm feeling stressed about my schoolwork, I will normally vent to a friend or my parents in order to get my emotions out and also receive some form of advice on how I should proceed. However, if it's stress over a friendship due to some unresolved conflict, I will usually end up asking the friend directly about it as I absolutely hate tension and feeling like something is off but not knowing exactly what. Many times, the stress I feel over a friendship is a misunderstanding or due to my overthinking so I've gotten accustomed to simply asking the friend to clear things up to avoid unnecessary stress. If I am just overall stressed or frustrated, I will cry. I feel like holding in my emotions often makes me feel much worse and that after crying and releasing the stress/frustration I feel, I feel much more relieved and try to approach the issue causing the stress rather than ignoring it.

Communication

I would describe my communication style as slightly passive. I am trying hard to work on this but I used to be someone who wouldn’t reach out much and wait for the other person to start a conversation but now I am stepping out of my comfort zone more. Even when discussing important topics, I can sometimes hold back on my opinions if I fear that they won’t be well received but this is also something I am trying to change as real feedback is important when it comes to discussions. As for communication mediums, I really like iMessenger and don’t mind Instagram DMs. I can hold a conversation over text for a really long time and tend to text in shorter, sporadic messages over larger paragraphs. As for phone calls, I don’t really like them as much as I can’t multitask as well because I really have to focus on what the other person is saying. From others, for communication styles, I really do hope for direct communication as I think it’s important to talk about things but not in a super aggressive way. As for communication mediums, I don’t really mind which ones. I hope that other people can communicate to me if there is any sort of conflict and I will try to do the same as well.

Personalities or characteristics

What qualities do you value or appreciate most in a person?

I think that I can generally get along with personalities of all sorts but I tend to get along the easiest with people who warm up quickly like me. When I have a conversation, a fear of mine is that I’ll come off as overbearing–especially if the other person doesn’t really talk much or have a lot to say. I feel like unless I’m super comfortable with someone, silence in situations is very awkward and so I’ll always try to fill it up with small talk. That’s why I feel as though I might get along better with chatty people and good conversationalists. I don’t think there are any personalities that I clash with more but there are some characteristics that I try to avoid in others when it comes to making friends. Mainly, I’m not a big fan of people who are overly blunt when it comes to telling someone something. I think that honesty is very important but there are ways to phrase something so that it comes across as constructive or helpful rather than just hurtful. Other than that, there isn’t anything in particular that I clash with personality-wise

The qualities I value/appreciate most in a person is assertiveness and confidence. I get anxious talking to service workers and will often stay away from interacting with them. Even if I get the wrong order, I’ll often just keep quiet and eat whatever I get. I always greatly appreciate it when my friend is willing to speak up for me in these kinds of situations; whether that be through telling the waiter that my order was wrong or asking for a cup of ice at Starbucks, I am always very thankful. On that same note, I really value patience and people who are considerate. I know that talking to the service workers isn’t anything scary and is something that I should be able to do, but I feel a lot of gratitude towards my friends that are willing to not question it or call me strange and simply ask for me.

Getting to know lucy
as a pnm!

Why do you want to join Kappa Phi Lambda?

What are you looking for in a big sister?

What do you hope to gain from being a part of Kappa Phi Lambda?

What kind of support do you hope to receive from your line sisters, Active Sisters, Alum, etc.?

Do you have any goals you would like to accomplish as a PNM or future Sister?

What do you hope to contribute to Kappa Phi Lambda?

How would you want to use your platform as a Sister of Kappa Phi Lambda?

Are you more of a leader or follower? Why?

What are some of your strengths? Weaknesses?

I want to join Kappa Phi Lambda because of the strong sense of sisterhood and community I sensed during rush. Coming to college, I not only wanted to make close friends, but I also wanted to meet individuals that are talented, smart, and passionate. KPL seems like the perfect place to meet all of these sorts of people while growing a strong bond that will last a lifetime beyond my years of college. Also, like I sort of mentioned before, I really love the fact that it is an Asian interest group as I feel I will be surrounded by people who understand my struggles to a greater extent. I really am also interested in learning more about different Asian cultures and since cultural diversity is one of KPL’s pillars, I’m sure that I will be able to learn a lot as a sister.

Of course, I hope to gain really strong relationships with both my line sisters and the Active Sisters. I think that a big part of being part of an organization like this is really making the most of it and getting close with the Sisters. I know that KPL is very involved with service and cultural diversity and watching the Blackpink performance was such a fun experience. I hope to gain more confidence through doing public performances like that one and have a generally good time with the Sisters practicing and following through with the performances. Additionally, I hope to gain experience when it comes to service and more skills talking to other people. All of the KPL Sisters have been so friendly to me and as a member, I would hope to learn people skills and be able to communicate well and have a good conversation with anyone I meet.

The qualities that I look for in a Big Sister are honesty and thoughtfulness. I hope to find a Big Sister that I can talk to about my life and what has been going on and get genuine advice on any issues that I may be struggling with and vice versa where I will actively listen about what's going on in their life as well. I am someone who really likes having long conversations that can touch on any topic that arises and so I would like to foster and maintain a relationship with my Big Sister by getting dinner with them and just talking about whatever may come up! Because of that, another quality I hope they possess is being a good conversationalist and someone who enjoys talking for longer periods of time as well. I’m someone that doesn’t feel much awkwardness even after talking with someone I haven’t seen for months so I wouldn’t mind if my Big Sister was very busy. As long as we can catch up once in a while and have a good conversation, I feel as though there is still a good friendship and bond there. I really hope to form something genuine!

I hope that my line sisters and I can support each other by actively participating and getting involved through the New Member Process. I hope to bond very closely with all of them and form a strong support system so we can depend on each other through the New Member Process as well as afterwards. I hope to meet the Active Sisters and get closer to them as well. The type of support I hope they provide is mainly in answering questions and helping me move along the New Member Process smoothly. I hope that everyone can be friendly as well since it is a little bit intimidating going through all of this! I also understand that Active Sisters and Alum are very busy with their own lives as well but I hope that they can offer their support through the process. From Alum, if any Alum visits, I hope to have a nice conversation but other than that, I don’t have any expectations of support.

The main goal I would like to accomplish as a PNM or future Sister is to find and be a part of a super strong support system. Among the three pillars of Sisterhood, Service, and Cultural Diversity, the one that I am the most passionate about is Sisterhood. I really hope to form strong bonds with not only my line sisters but the Active Sisters and potentially any visiting Alums as well. Additionally, I would love to get involved with more service projects and general events! I saw the fundraisers and the selling of stickers during this rush which was super cute and I hope to be more involved in those sort of events as a way to meet more people as well and work on being more friendly.

Sort of in line with my goals, I hope to be a part of that strong support system and be a reliable and trustworthy Sister that could help others when they need it the most. Additionally, I do a lot of work with kids when it comes to volunteering. I know that KPPL does a lot of service events and I hope to be more involved with that by either helping to think of possible service projects or by actively participating in those service projects. I would also hope to come across as a very genuine and nice person in general; as a member, I understand that my actions would reflect on the organization and will work hard to become a very respectable member that KPL can be proud of.

As a Sister of Kappa Phi Lambda, I would hope to use my platform to spread some of the core values I hold. For instance, I talked before about how being kind is one of the most integral parts to my mindset and I would hope to spread that sort of mindset to others. Additionally, I want to spread awareness on different Asian cultures and help other individuals become more familiar with a wide range of cultures as well as emphasizing the importance of service. I think that having a larger platform also comes with a lot of responsibility and one of the most important things is also remaining authentic so I would try to present myself as truly genuine when spreading these ideals! I hope to work in tandem with the other sisters and use our platforms to better the communities we belong to, including CMU.

I would consider myself more of a leader when it comes to schoolwork. I tend to just fall into the position of delegating tasks and making sure everything moves smoothly. I am more assertive and willing to share my perspective, especially when it’s a smaller group project. I’ll also talk to my members typically and, if they can’t do a portion of the work, I’ll help them fill it out. Academically, I would say that I am a leader. However, when it comes to more social and casual settings, I do gravitate towards a follower role. I’m not a picky person and tend to go along with whatever the group wants to do and in this case, I tend to hate making decisions. One of my friends always jokes that it’s terrible asking me where I want to eat or what I want to do because my answer is almost always “anywhere and anything”. In more social situations, I would consider myself a follower because of this as I just try to be amicable.

I am very empathetic and can understand other peoples’ emotions very well. When I am having issues with someone, we almost always work it out because I can usually understand their perspective and motivations which allows for a better conversation and mutual understanding. Additionally, this has made me a good mediator when it comes to other people’s fights. Within my friend group, I am somewhat of a mediator. I also can get pretty much any task done very well and quickly as long as I am in a quieter setting and am not disturbed and I absolutely hate breaking promises so I always make sure that if I agree to something, I will follow up with it. One of my weaknesses is that I care too much about what other people think. I always understand that I shouldn’t let what other people say impact how I view myself but when I hear something unsavory, I tend to have a negative reaction that I simply cannot control. I am still working on my self-image and am not yet at a stage where I can just shake off negativity without reacting to it or just blindly believing what is said. Another weakness of mine is that I am pretty addiction prone. This has mainly surfaced in my gaming addiction but I also tend to have short term likes that I get pretty obsessed over. At the moment, I am working to stop these sort of short-term dopamine rushes to become a generally less addictive person.