Deathbed

The other night, I've watched a tv show until midnight and it is called "Tuesdays With Morrie". It was an eye-opener and I believe this show will surely enlightens and awakens some people's purpose in life.

Morrie is a professor and an old man who fully live his life and lots of time, see the good in people and circumstances. He always gave wonderful wisdom of life to the students around him. Unfortunately, he was struck by a disease (I forgot what is it called...) and the virus is attacking his whole body from bottom up. But before he died, he met up with one of his students, a sport journalist, who was extremely dedicated to his work until he take life for granted and was in a dilemma on his life compass. After 19 years of not seeing each other, Morrie somehow help this man to look at life differently and to cherish what really matters instead of speeding through the journey all the time!

The whole show talked about how to live a life that we truly wanted and bless the people around us. Very often, we are after glamorous careers, great ambitions, make more money, get a big house and if possible, drive a Ferrari! But Morrie talked about how often that we stop and look at what we are after and says, "Wait a minute, is that what I really want in the first place?"

To make it more interesting, Morrie organized a "living funeral" for himself! What a great idea that breakthrough conventional pattern of dying! Yes, it is more meaningful to see our friends and family before we have our last breath and listen to what they have to say about us just before we die. What's the point of letting people compliment and praise you and you are not around to enjoy it.

I wish there are more tv shows that add values to us instead of negative dramas for whole year long.

Luckily, these are some of Morrie's quotes that I managed to jot it down while watching this show;

1. Never make money by using people.
2. Love always win.
3. Love is the only rational act, just let it come in.
4. We must love one another or die.
5. When we learn to die, we learn to live.
6. Forgive everybody everything.
7. Death ends life but not relationship.

Hope some of these quotes do give you a second thought and help you to discover your life compass.

Imagine that you are dying soon (well, everybody dies....it is not a touch-wood thing!), what do you really want to do and who do you want to be on your bedside during your last breath?

Life is a Process of Buying & Selling

In my opinion, life is not just about winning or losing and if we view it from another angle, it consists of buying and selling. If our metaphor of life is all about winning, we might think of ways to "assassinate" someone's position, self-esteem or values. It is all about stepping down or destroying others in the name of victory! When someone wins, it is simply because you position yourself as a seller and you successfully find a buyer.

Everyday, we try pushing or suggesting our ideas or thoughts to someone hoping to influence his or her views. On the other hand, we might be persuaded to accept the other party's opinion. Then we bounced back with our arguments. Vice-versa, we got hit back by the other's view followed by our "attack" again. The process goes on until someone is willing to buy an idea, thought or opinion and it settle down.

Suddenly we change topics and here we go again. Maybe this time the Buyer becomes a Seller and vice-versa. Try to picture these situations;

• You sell the idea to your friend on buying a Vios but ended up buying a City.
• You've sold the idea of leaving your current company but bought the suggestion of staying back.
• Someone sells you some bad thoughts about your superior but you rejected the "purchase" and in return selling back what you think about that superior to shut that person up. Hence the seller of bad thoughts eventually bought your good thoughts.
• You are being sold of the idea of being happy is more important than money. Do you buy this or you have other thoughts to sell it back?
• Your future boss doesn't buy the idea of giving you such a high salary but you continue magnifying its pain of not having you or the joy of having you in the company. Eventually, you've got what you want and your boss enjoy your talent. Transaction closed!

When I look at life as a continuous transactions of buying and selling instead of winning and losing, I may leave myself with rooms of empathy, care and respect. If I flip it through, I might see only Victors or Victims and may treat myself as a Carnivore, wanting to win all the time or a Herbivore, who lost most of the time.

Why not be an Omnivore!!

Tick, tick, tick....

Now is 2nd of June. Pass this month, 1/2 of 2011 will be gone....

Changes in jobs, my son's height, Japan's geographical area, government's strategies, the number of wrinkles my father has, our education systems, inflation, the car that I'm driving, the number of blockbuster movies....etc...basically changes happen everyday!

Do you feel in certain months or years, time flies? And in some other months or years, time is slowing down? I think it depends on the Changes and the Emotions that we went through. Perhaps time is just a moving events of emotions? Is that what people call quality time or quantity time?

When we have directions, we felt the world stops spinning.
When we are lost, we felt the time is ticking.

No matter what, we still have another 6 months to go!

If focused-planning can't work, perhaps can try flexible-planning?
If systems can't work, maybe trying different strategies will help?
If using our strengths still can't achieve what we want, we may try look for our talents instead?

What about reading additional books?
Making new friends in different expertise?
Attending seminars or courses?
Finding someone to look up to?
Embark on a short vacation?
Google more?
Trying a different scope of work?

So far, are you satisfied with the journey?
Are you sitting in an economy class, business class or first class of your life?

Working harder doesn't necessarily get us what we want. Or else, tonnes of factory workers would be achieving their dreams!

All of us have our own speed and rhythm of managing our life. Instead of comparing with others, why not find our Life Rhythm, Working Rhythm and Emotional Rhythm and ride on with this beat to achieve what we want.

Try it!

Mr. Honda

Most of us drove or sit in a Honda car before, but do you know that Mr. Honda is one of the most persistent man ever.

In 1938, Mr. Honda had a little workshop and he developed a special piston ring concept and thought of selling it to Toyota Corporation. He is so passionate and dedicated in his work until he slept in his own workshop and pawned his wife's jewelleries to continue in his business research!

Finally, he completed the piston ring technology and presented it to Toyota. You know what.....he got rejected! It was due to the reason that certain standards were not met.

Then Mr. Honda continued to study for another 2 years to deepen his knowledge. After another 2 years, he eventually got a contract with Toyota.

We would thought Mr. Honda lived happily ever after.......

But at that time, Japanese government was gearing up for war and it was really hard to get concrete to build factory. Did Mr. Honda quit? No, he created his own concrete, then built his factory & get the job done!
What a true winner!

But....another bad episode happened!
During the war, the factory was bombed twice, destroying major portion of the factory.
Mr. Honda didn't dwell on it. Together with his team, he picked up gas cans that the US fighter had discarded and positively said, "This is a gift from President Truman!" Now he used that as the raw materials for the manufacturing process.
Talking about innovation, creativity & persistency, we can't beat Mr. Honda....!

What we didn't know was after the war, it followed by an earthquake!!
Most of us would have quit but not Mr. Honda.
Challenges after challenges, he persisted until he secured a long deal with Toyota.

But after the war, there was petrol shortage. Therefore, Mr. Honda couldn't drive his car to even buy food as he used to. Instead of putting himself in the corner facing dilemma, he thought of ways to go above it or under it or around it.....and finally he had a breakthrough!
He attached a motor to his bicycle to get around......
The neighbours saw it, like it and of course asked Mr. Honda to install it to their bicycles as well and they called it "MOTOR RIDE". The so-called "business" was so good until it ran out of motors!

Guess what? Mr. Honda set up a small factory producing motors. But, he has no capital....
Therefore, he appealed to almost 18,000 bicycle shops for his great invention and finally got 5000 of them to pay an upfront capital to fund his factory. Then he found out another problem.....the motor was too big & bulky!
He re-designed and created a scaled-down version of it and called it the Super Cub, exported it to baby boomers in US and ....... THE REST IS .....HISTORY....!!!

Anyone felt tired reading it? Not to mention the person experiencing it and solving endless problems & challenges that got in the way.

Now, when you see a Honda on the road......what do you really see? A CAR or a DREAM?

Life Labels

How do we live our life depends very much on the labels given by our ownself.
External labelling by peers, families, spouse & colleagues do affect our internal labelling if we are not strong enough.

Here are some thoughts about how some people viewed & labelled life...

LIFE IS ....
1) Hard - definitely this labelling is affecting one's mindset to continuously "struggle" in life.
2) A Game - this is a good one! When we lose a game, we can always re-start another game, discover new strategies & go through new levels. It is not Game Over yet.
3) About Winning or Losing - this is to remind us to be competitive and result oriented. But be careful not to practise it to the extreme of exploiting others to get what we want.
4) A Gift - this label is going to remind us to live with Gratitude, by focusing on what we have and be thankful.
5) A Discovery - this an Explorer's label; treating every situation and moment as an education and full of "mysteries"!
6) A Challenge - it is all about taking risk, being adventurous, keep going forward and not looking back.
7) A Journey - this is to understand life has its season; the ups & downs. Timing is everything. We are not going to reach and stop but keep moving.
8) A Dream - this is a good one, to remind us to Imagine and Visualize! Our daily job requires most of our Left-Brain hemisphere. It is good to exercise the Right hemisphere from time to time.
9) About Love - sacrifice, commitment and give; these are the 3 words that attached with this label. This is a reminder of money is not the only thing in life but families and friends are.
10) About Freedom - it is a good label to drive us to do what we want and what we passionate about.

Well, at different levels of life, we tend to "install" different labels to drive us forward or to bounce back from low-points or to remind us on life appreciation.
Keep this note, it might be useful along your journey of life.....