The 2024 annual review was completed just before the Chinese New Year, I chieved good results in work, life, travel, and finances. In terms of health, there were no significant changes—it remained consistent just as bad as previous years.
💼 Do the Best at Work
My 5th Anniversary at Ant Group. The most important things—houses, cars, money, career, and marriage—are all resolved within these five years. But I’m from a young man eager to change the world to a middle-aged person who hopes to survive financially if laid off at any time.
Promoted to P9. Successfully promoted during the most challenging period, with only one person in the BU nominated for promotion. After joining as a P8 at 27 five years ago, I finally succeeded in getting promoted to P9 at the age of 32. Instead of happiness and excitement, I feel mostly gratitude towards the key people in my work life. This promotion has taught me that the alignment between hierarchy and role is crucial and that the rules for advancement in internet companies have changed in today’s era.
Achieved Excellent Results in Key Cybersecurity Projects. Headline risks have been significantly controlled, and multi-layered trustworthy security protection capabilities have been fully implemented; security metrics remain at a high level, with outstanding performance in multiple high-level practical drills. Key security projects for the group have passed external reviews. Anonymous satisfaction surveys among team members received high scores, far exceeding other teams, thereby boosting the overall score of the technical team.
Objective for 2025
- O1: From BU to BG, zero major security incidents, ensuring user data and funds safety.
- O2: Building a Valuable, Growing, Warm, Simple, Fair, and Just Cybersecurity Team.
📖 Condense the Valuable Knowledge
Systematically and Comprehensively Summarize Cybersecurity Experiences. In addition to refining the existing Cybersecurity Interview Guide, continuously attempt to summarize and consolidate knowledge in areas such as Cybersecurity Attack Techniques, Cybersecurity Defense Systems, and Cybersecurity Career Guide. With more intuitive and understandable structures and presentation methods, clearly define the ideal content you wish to write.
Starting from November, Monthly Reflection and Improvement. Using clear and understandable goals as categories, I will summarize every month’s progress in areas such as “Do the Best at Work”, “Condense the Valuable Knowledge”, “Learning and Practicing AI”, “The most Comfortable Life”, “Travel Around the World”, “Open Eyes to the World”, “Financial Freedom”, “Health and Strong Body”. Ensure that I am moving in the right direction, allocating time and resources towards these goals, recognizing both gains and shortcomings, and implementing improvements for the next month. I am confident these goals will soon be achieved.
Objective for 2025
- O1: Completed the final version of Alipay Cybersecurity Defense System and Cybersecurity Career Guide(CCG).
- O2: Completed monthly and annual reviews, continuously reflecting and improving.
🤖 Learning and Practicing AI
LLM is Now an Essential Part of My Daily Workflow. I’ve subscribed to ChatGPT to solve issues that other LLMs can’t handle well. I’ve experimented with Gemini, Copilot, Kimi, and Dounao. Additionally, I have locally installed Open WebUI + Ollama to run variants of Qwen, Llama, DeepSeek, and Gemma for translation, text generation, and basic question-answering tasks. I also use Comfy UI + Stable Diffusion on my local machine for image generation and processing, primarily for blog post images.
Objective for 2025
- O1: Implementing various common business scenarios using LLMs, for example, personal copilot, banner generation, and changing clothes.
- O2: Learning the newest security of LLMs and LLMs for security.
🏠 The Most Comfortable Life
The most Comfortable Workspace. In addition to my top-of-the-line MacBook Pro and four monitors, I recently purchased a Mac mini for use as a home server, at any time or anywhere, I can remotely control my home computer. I also got an ergonomic chair that is more comfortable than before. Additionally, I installed a pegboard wall to display various figurines and models. A separate desk serves as my hardware workbench where I learn about IoT-related knowledge. To prevent cat hair from getting into the workspace, I installed glass doors in the room. I also set up an air conditioning system with fresh air ventilation, an air purifier, and a heater to maintain the air quality and temperature at the most comfortable levels, ensuring no dust is present. I also installed a small refrigerator and a water dispenser on my desk so that I can easily access drinks and food at all times, ensuring adequate hydration throughout the day. All devices run automatically, allowing me to go straight into my workspace when I get home, and I even contemplate sleeping there every day.
Objective for 2025
- O1: The Happiest Life. From Comfortable Life to Happiness Life, it is not only about material possessions but also necessitates substantial spiritual enrichment with family and friends.
⛰️ Travel Around the World
Even without early retirement, I can still realize my dream of traveling the world.
I Build a Vehicle that Can Traverse Mountains, Cross Rough Terrain, and Accommodate Eating and Sleeping. The vehicle is equipped with factory-fitted front and rear metal bumpers and side steps, a 10,000-pound winch, nitrogen shocks, three differential locks, and an externally mounted spare tire. Additionally, I installed a stationary air conditioner, a 5.5 kWh lithium iron phosphate battery, on-the-go charging capabilities, and a 220V inverter for external power supply. I also added a CB radio and walkie-talkies. The rear seats were removed to create a large bed measuring 190 inches, with bags installed on the windows and a side tent mounted on the roof rack, along with shovels, recovery boards, and tables/chairs. This vehicle allows me to achieve my dream of traveling around the world, but currently, I can only camp overnight in the city outskirts.
Investigating a Variety of RV Options and Early Retirement Ways of Life. As I mentioned before, my customized vehicle already meets most of my travel needs. However, in remote areas like Tibet and Xinjiang, accommodation can be poor or nonexistent, making an RV essential for long-term nomadic living. My close friend had the same idea as me, but he already bought two RVs and quit his job to put it into action. I have looked into trailer RVs, class B motorhomes, class C motorhomes, and truck-based RVs. The one that best fits my needs is the trailer RV, and I am currently preparing to get a C6 driver’s license. Moreover, I have subscribed to numerous channels of F.I.R.E practitioners, travel bloggers, off-road bloggers, and rural cottage bloggers to learn about their lifestyles.
This Year, I have Traveled to a Different Place Almost Every Month. My trips included several long road trips, such as the Yunnan north-to-south loop, Guizhou loop drive, Neimenggu loop drive, and Fujian self-drive trip. I visited numerous cities including Chongqing, Jiujiang, Nanjing, Huzhou, Phuket, Lugu Lake, Dali, Lijiang, Xishuangbanna, Chengdu, Panzhihua, Guiyang, Jiaxing, Guangzhou, Xining, Qiqihar, Harbin, Qingdao, Hulunbeier, Aershan, Tongxiang, Moganshan, Shishi, Xiamen, and Shenzhen.
Objective for 2025
- O1: I plan to visit all the places in China that I haven’t been to yet. Priority destinations include Lasa, Tibet; Guilin, Guangxi; Changsha Hunan; Taiyuan, Shanxi; and Tianjin.
- O2: I plan to continue exploring popular international destinations, prioritizing Seoul, South Korea; Tokyo, Japan; Los Angeles, USA; and Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam.
👀 Open Eyes to the World
English
Completed Duolingo’s 365-Day Streak. After more than a year of practice, my English skills—reading, listening, writing, and speaking—have improved. I can read cybersecurity-related articles without needing translation, but still struggle with man professional terms on Twitter and news platforms. Watching American TV shows, I only understand common sentences. My writing is good enough to complete monthly summaries independently, though there are issues with pronunciation for many words.
Books
Preparing for the Master of Engineering Management at Zhejiang University. I enrolled in a training class, planning to thoroughly review math, English, and logic for the national unified exam to obtain a part-time master’s degree. However, my work suddenly became extremely busy, and considering the need to study at school for over a year after being admitted, I decided to give up.
In 2024, I spent a total of 158 hours reading, an increase of one hundred hours compared to last year. My focus was primarily on books related to history and economics.
Movies
“You think you scare me? Bring it, bitch!” – Carl Gallagher
“I tried to be normal once. Worst two minutes of my life.” – Ian Gallagher
“I believe the answer to that question, like the answer to most questions, is fuck you!” – Lip Gallagher
Objective for 2025
- O1: Can read Twitter, foreign news, English books, and watch American TV shows without difficulty in English.
💰 Financial Freedom
Reducing Costs
After resolving the most expensive things—houses, renovations, cars, and marriage—in previous years, this year has seen a significant reduction in major expenses. My monthly spending is now almost negligible, and my savings are growing rapidly.
This year’s expenses, in descending order, are as follows:
- Repaying 50% of the mortgage for my large house ahead of schedule.
- Dining and entertainment expenses.
- Travel expenses (airfare, hotel, car rental, etc.).
- Taxes owed.
- Vehicle-related expenses (interest-free installments, fuel, insurance, transportation, etc.).
- Fixed living expenses (property management fees, utilities, phone bills).
- Red envelopes.
- Digital products.
Increasing Revenue
This year’s major changes have been in my financial investments
- I successfully traded Tesla stock on the US market dozens of times with short-term buy-low-sell-high strategies, including one full-position trade that gained an 80% return.
- My Hong Kong IPO subscriptions generated a yield rate of 24.82%, with a success rate of 92.86% and a hit rate of 43.75%.
- I have maintained a consistent investment strategy in the Nasdaq 100 Index with regular contributions, resulting in an 18% yield.
- I incurred losses in A-shares due to speculative trading without understanding the market dynamics.
Besides the above, my primary income comes from salary, including base salary, annual bonus, stock dividends, option buybacks, tax refunds for top talent, patent earnings, and other referral-based income. Additionally, I have rental income.
Based on this trend, achieving financial freedom won’t take long.
Objective for 2025
- O1: Continuously reduce fixed expenses and strictly control large expenses.
- O2: Maximize income through high-certainty methods to increase by 800,000.
🏃 Health and Strong Body
The Malignant Bladder Cancer in My Grandmother Has Been Cured. My grandmother started bleeding from her urine in February, but she didn’t tell anyone. When the situation became severe, my uncles took her to a county hospital for an examination. The doctor said that a cystoscopy was needed to determine if the tumor was malignant or benign. Upon hearing this, my uncles thought it was too risky and too dangerous because of her age, so they took her to a town clinic where she received saline drips and medications to stop the bleeding.
In early May, when I learned about her condition, I felt like she was just waiting for death to come, so I immediately went back home and took my grandmother to Hangzhou for further examination at Zhejiang Fist Hospital. She was diagnosed with a malignant tumor, and after discussing the consequences with the doctors, I called an emergency family meeting and convinced everyone to support the surgery.
In late May, she successfully underwent surgery and was discharged from the hospital. Though it’s been less than a month, I feel like I’ve run to the hospital countless times, filled out endless forms, and stayed up through too many sleepless nights. Following her discharge, she underwent two months of follow-up examinations and recuperation and is now largely able to take care of herself.
My grandmother is a kind and devoted Buddhist, and I spent a significant portion of my childhood living with her. A large part of who I am today comes from her teachings, especially her lessons in kindness. When the time comes to repay her kindness, I will do so without hesitation. This is the second time I have encountered a family member with cancer. I have properly configured insurance coverage and take responsibility for your health. Life is short and unpredictable, so live in the moment.
Weight Roll Coaster. By following a strict diet and regular exercise routine, my weight dropped from 81.3kg in January to 76.43kg in June (a loss of nearly 5kg or about 10 pounds), but by December it had returned to 80kg.
Health Data Analysis. Compared to the first half of the year, my workouts in the second half increased significantly and need to be maintained. However, my daily walking (3 kilometers/d), steps (4,279 steps/d), and climbing stairs (11 floors/d) are still below average. My sleep quality has been consistently good, with an average of 8.5 hours per night. In November, I spent more time outdoors, which improved my sleep duration and time in daylight. While I wash my hands twice a day, the duration is relatively short. My resting heart rate remains stable at 68 beats per minute, within the normal range. However, I failed to meet my goals for standing, moving, and exercising in most months, so I need to adjust my habits.
Gout Flares Up Frequently This Year. As I age, my metabolic function declines, and with less exercise, more stress, and poor dietary control, gout has recurred multiple times this year. My quality of life has been severely affected, so I need to prioritize it as the most important issue.
Objective for 2025
- O: BMI decreased to a health level of 22 (weight dropped from 80kg to 70kg), blood uric acid levels back to normal (from over 600 to below 420)
Wishing everyone a Happy Chinese New Year! May we all achieve our goals by this time next year! 🎆
By Feei
January 25, 2025
At home in Hangzhou
