On weekends, I usually listen to jazz. The rhythm wraps around me like silk, playing push and pull, teasing like it doesn’t care, and then suddenly tightening my stomach with tension out of nowhere — that dangerous kind of charm.

Every time I go to New York, I always stop by MoMA, 4th floor, to see Van Gogh’s Starry Night. The calm moon floating in the quiet dark sky... but inside that calmness, those wild, rough brush strokes shaking everything up. That chaos and storm sitting quietly in the background. I feel like jazz is kind of like that too.

Jazz feels like freedom expressed within rules. The music sheet, the notes, the beat — they’re just small flags stuck in the middle of a wide ocean like Miami Beach. Flags that mark the bare minimum border to not lose life. Inside that space, or sometimes crossing that line and coming back again and again, the players swim however they want like living creatures. Depending on the mood of the day, the weather, the waves, the sounds swimming together, and the vibe shared with the other players — jazz gets played in a new way every single time.

Between the piano, the contrabass, and the trumpet — talking with the trembling air, the glance of an eye, or a small smile — I fall into that world and come back out, over and over again. And in that moment, the only thing that reminds me time is passing in the real world is the ice cube slowly melting in my whiskey glass.

Maybe the reason freedom feels so beautiful is exactly because there’s rules. Freedom within a frame — like creativity blooming inside a strict Michelin star kitchen. Like the perfect rhythm an F1 driver has to find while fighting in a world where even a tiny mistake isn’t allowed. Running an investment firm requires people to have own investment philosophy inside a world full of protocols and “rules not to break.”

Freedom calls us — like the sirens calling out to Odysseus’ men.

Even in daily life — waiting for that sweet Friday evening after work, a teenage kid not listening to their parents, students skipping class and shouting for freedom on the street — behind all that desire and energy, there’s always a frame called “rules.”

As someone running an investment firm, I know the more teammates we have, the harder this question gets — how to find that perfect balance between freedom and order. Maybe I can’t give jazz-like freedom to everyone. But at least, I want to keep trying with my partner to design that stage, where everyone’s freedom can flow into creativity in a healthy way.

During weekdays, when I need to focus, I usually listen to classical, binaural beats, ambient, or alpha frequency music — sounds that help me calm down and focus inward. But on weekends, jazz feels different.

Jazz lets me splash paint however I want on a blank canvas, makes me draw, spill, mess around — and opens my eyes again to the beauty of the world outside my monitor, like palm trees.

And that feeling — that freedom — feels as sweet as my favorite Hokkaido Royce chocolate.