Nick HutchisonFounder and CEO, BookThinkers

Check out this amazing story from Matt Higgins about his tattoo artist Burning The Boats!⛵️🔥

12 Jan 2024 · 1 min

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1:01

In this spoken anecdote, the narrator recounts meeting a Korean tattoo artist named Lo (also referred to as Dr. Lowe). Lo explains that in Korea, tattooing is illegal and socially unacceptable, with expectations to become a doctor. Defying his parents and cultural norms, Lo dropped out of college, declared he had "burned the boats," and fully committed to moving to the United States to pursue a career as a tattoo artist. After relocating, his tattoo work gained significant success, eventually earning his parents' pride. Inspired by Lo's decisive commitment, the narrator decided to rewrite the introduction of his own book, shifting the focus from himself to Lo's story as a powerful example of embracing a bold doctrine and following one's passion.

Chapters

I go to meet the tattoo artist and I meet this guy. His name is Lo and I come in and he's Korean and he's emotional and I'm like, oh, why are you so emotional? He's like, I have been repeating this phrase my entire life, the Korean version. I'm like, get it? Why? Because my art is to be a tattoo artist, but in Korea it's illegal and I struggle with this. And my parents were like, you can't be a tattoo artist. It's embarrassing. It's not— in Korea you have to be a doctor, right? So, but I was in college and then he's like, I dropped out and I told my parents I have burned the boats. I must fully commit and I'm going to move to the United States and I'm going to be a tattoo artist. And he came here and then eventually his beautiful Beautiful art became very successful. Obviously, his parents are proud of him, and I'm like, "This is amazing." I was like, "The guy who embraced the doctrine and actually burned the boats is the one who's going to go ahead and do a tattoo." And then I was like, "Okay, now I'm being called." I was like, "I need to rewrite the book and make the intro no longer about me, but I need to make about him." So I rewrote the book, and I made the intro of the book now about Dr. Lowe. And so it's about this guy who burned the boats from Korea is now the beginning of the book, you know, throughout Asia.