Skill Tree Development v1.2

The whole website is designed in gaming style for a reason. Actually, for a couple of reasons.

First, it reflects my current mantra: life is a game, and we get to choose our own main quest, side quests, and even the rules. This mindset is liberating, and it helps me focus on what truly matters. Beyond the metaphor, gamification offers real psychological utility. It is backed by empirical studies in psychology and proven in entrepreneurial design—see books such as Actionable Gamification: Beyond Points, Badges, and Leaderboards by Yu-kai Chou, For the Win by Kevin Werbach and Dan Hunter, and Reality Is Broken by Jane McGonigal. Recently (2026-05) I found Alex Hsu is also writing a book on the game mindset, which has been both heartening and inspiring.

Admittedly, the gaming aesthetic may make some clients or more conservative legal professionals frown. Even so, I choose to stay true to my mantra and forge my own path. I believe substance ultimately outweighs surface appearances—though I recognize that formality still has its place in law and human nature.

With that background covered, this skill tree will help you use me more effectively in your own life game (alongside the Long Game, the README, and my digital trainee Lia). Together, we can party up and tackle a side quest—or something even more fun.

This skill tree is admittedly a subjective art piece rather than a data-based assessment. I'm still thinking about either combining it with — or simply replacing it with — the more data-driven role-level chart in the Long Game. Either way, this is far from a complete portrait of who I am. Still, these six skills are the ones I believe carry the most practical value (or market value) for you right now:

1. Systems Thinking

I was practically born for this, and only recently have I fully realized it. From Charlie Munger’s latticework of mental models and Farnam Street, to Donella Meadows’ classic Thinking in Systems: A Primer, I’ve been thrilled to absorb these ideas—and I’ve now begun building my own framework on top of their insights.

To begin with, let's start with the opposite of systems thinking: the law of instrument. "When you're holding a hammer, everything looks like a nail." It has probably been very valuable to master one or two crafts to live a fulfilling life. However, the complexity of the modern world makes this path too narrow. If I attempt to solve my daily problems with mostly my legal expertise — legal reasoning and advocacy, litigation (and threat of litigation), negotiation with BATNA (best alternative to a negotiated agreement) — I'd be the opposite of well-equipped: the stereotypical lawyer everyone steers clear of at parties. By the same token, if I only live by the principle of economics and efficiency, I am going nowhere further.

Now we move to the other end of the spectrum - complex and uncertain mindset: I cannot capture everything in systems thinking even in one article, but I will still try to give you a gist of it in one paragraph with three key elements in systems thinking: (1) thinking in bets¹, (2) the whole is greater than the sum of the parts, and (3) feedback loops.

Professional poker players do not judge their performance by a specific game result. Instead, they ask whether the move is the most likely to win in that situation. This requires them to consistently adjust their thoughts and judgment based on new information. Similarly, we should regularly reconsider our portfolio and decisions: whether the underlying facts have changed for a particular investment, whether the assumption has proven wrong, or vice versa. This thinking in bets, or more academically speaking — Bayesian mindset — substantially improves my decision-making process in life and at work.

"The whole is greater than the sum of the parts" is often misattributed to Aristotle due to a translation error. Gestalt psychologist Kurt Koffka suggested a different version: "The whole is other than the sum of the parts," which shows how our human brains process information. Another related concept is emergence: Water — two hydrogen plus one oxygen — shows completely different features from hydrogen (highly flammable) and oxygen (supports combustion).

One of my favorite examples of emergence is from Morgan Housel.² A cold front from the north is not a big deal. A warm breeze from the south is cozy. Yet when the timing of both mixes in Missouri, they become a tornado that destroys everything it touches. We don't have crystal balls to tell the future — when and where emergence will appear — yet I'm glad a few men and women get the balls to try new things as pioneers and trailblazers, pushing our civilization forward. And as an individual, we can definitely connect our own unrelated, negligible dots and see what mini-emergence shows up.

Lastly, feedback loops. We humans have the tendency to think and believe there is a linear relationship in growth and success, or even a straightforward causation chain. That's how our brain is wired: we love the causation "why/because" structure³. Of course, with systems thinking, we now know "because" isn't the only determinant for getting our way. What matters more is that feedback loops give us a bird's-eye view of how we reach our destination. Sometimes we can take shortcuts, sometimes we need to detour, and sometimes we even have to give up our most profitable business line just to stay alive⁴—stubbornly defending your turf will only speed up your downfall.

Systems thinking only becomes powerful when applied. That's exactly what I'm doing—and if you find the world complex and fascinating, hold humility about human reason and knowledge, yet aren't satisfied by abstract religious explanations, welcome to systems thinking.

2. Execution: Get things done and shipped

As a systems thinker, I am aware of the danger of talking the talk, not walking the talk. Being a talker is annoying. I get it.

That’s likely why “high-agency” became such a buzzword in 2025: it describes hyper-ambitious, proactive people who act in a permissionless manner to achieve what they truly desire, not just what they need.

My understanding of level of execution: thinking → talking → writing → rebuttal & revisit → create something to get information feedback in the loop → create a flywheel to speed up the loop → hit the wall and see the physical, cultural, social-economic, legal constraints → overcome the constraints and upgrade or decisively self-correct.

I have been attempting to create my own flywheel to accelerate exponential growth—this website aiming to build my tribe is one of my efforts.

Of course, high-agency comes with pitfalls—occasional bouts of despair and perpetual dissatisfaction are my two biggest. I was recently reminded that I need to rest—point taken, though acting on it is still a work in progress.

In the gaming mindset, the solution is simple: embrace who you are, play your role to the fullest, and maximize your unique potential and talents. If occasional despair and perpetual dissatisfaction are the side effects of being highly productive and high-agency, then so be it.

I may find other remedies to speed up recovery, to better face the next bout of despair when it arrives, or keep practicing until I can hold both despair and hope in the same mind.

3. AI-Enhancement

This is how I can do the seemingly impossible. I'm still experimenting with all kinds of AI tools—honestly, AI is evolving so fast that I'm not really "learning AI tools," I'm using them to build and create. AI + execution = emergence.

Right now, I use Claude for my highest-priority tasks. I'm currently drafting an article titled "How I Write Smart Contracts and Legal Contracts with Claude," but it will only be finalized after my own smart contract is live on-chain. Finishing this year (2026) would already be a small miracle.

I also rely heavily on Gemini and NotebookLM to build and maintain this website, and to learn across every area of my life—from main quests to side quests. My current top priorities are finishing the PIF12 smart-contract testing, developing offline software that redacts sensitive information from legal contracts, and exploring more interesting open-source projects.

4. Communication

I love sharing my stories and ideas. Invitations to speak—whether as keynote, panelist, moderator, or even improv—are always welcome.

My biggest takeaway in communication is audience-focused, emotion-first. The hardest communication challenge is when you don’t truly know your audience. A great example is Shohei Ohtani: He initially wanted to jump straight to the U.S. minor leagues at the age of 18. It was Hokkaido Nippon-Ham Fighters (北海道日本火腿鬥士) that presented a detailed, persuasive argument that changed his mind. The 30-page document titled "The Path to Realizing Your Dream" (夢への道しるべ) . It started from what Ohtani wanted, not just what the team could offer, and successfully changed his mind to stay in Japan.

Another skill I’ve been deliberately practicing is rhythm—especially the strategic use of the pause. This is an undervalued element in communication. Pauses give the audience time to think, process, and let ideas sink in. I can’t emphasize this enough, which is why I’ve embedded Vinh Giang's video to drive this point home.

5. Legal:

You can't desire or even appreciate what you already own. That's human nature that makes a lot of us unhappy—me included. Ironically, after I spent decades financing and securing my law degree and honorably privileged to practice law, I want to take the label off. It's not a shame to practice law, but I don't like being labelled as such because this seems to cap my potential dancing with the world. There are much to explore and experience; legal world is fun and valuable but definitely not everything.

That said, I view legal skills and credential as a plus, not a box. Thus, my systems thinking equips me to help clients align their macro vision with micro precision. And whenever we navigate uncharted waters and get green lights from regulator, ship our deliverables, or get the deal done, that literally makes my year.

Combining with AI, legal work becomes much more fun and scalable. This was unimaginable before 2022, but it is reality now—a small firm of five may compete with a traditional 500-lawyer outfit. I hope law one day works like a computer tool: accessible to everyone, without anyone having to appeal to authority.

6. Crypto:

The 2017 HBR article "The Blockchain Will Do to the Financial System What the Internet Did to Media" nudged me into this crypto world. Of course, my ex-colleagues helped me consolidate the financial perspective and gain hands-on experiences in legal and compliance, along with my ongoing endeavors in helping founders and builders in the decentralized ecosystem worldwide.

I want to dive deeper and actually use blockchain to do something fun and useful (logically speaking, having fun itself is super useful and valuable, anyway). That's why I am starting the PIF12 project.

If you're new to this world, feel free to take a look at these great resources:
1. Variant Fund & a16z crypto
2. Guang-Yi's Crypto Compendium
3. The Crypto Legal Handbook

That's my take on skill tree v1.2. Looking forward to party up with you soon!

Update log:

• v1.2.1: May 11, 2026 (content sync with Chinese edition + minor expansions)

• v1.2: March 25, 2026

• v1.1: March 24, 2026

• v1: Feb 25, 2026

Last updated: 2026-05-11