Lee sees making art as his compass in life, a major influence of his thought process. Since childhood, he used drawing to aid in thinking. During high school, under the mentorship of a RISD alumna, the late Ms. Barbara Hughes, Lee used his visualization ability to master the subjects studied in science and to absorb additional skills in art. In college, he earned a Bachelor of Fine Art and another for Architecture. Lee continues to gain unconventional comprehension of life by making visual works. The acts of drawing and constructing allow him to decipher abstract ideas and phenomena that he would vaguely grasp when exposed to them solely through written and spoken language, but when he can sensually perceive them, his understanding is magnified. Perhaps it is because Lee started to learn his primary language, English, at the age of eight that he never developed sufficient trust in the written/spoken word and grew to rely on that which is visual and tangible instead. The process of thinking through making became his way of exploring ideas rationally and intuitively.