That elusive piece of jigsaw puzzle

This is a blog that is very different from the rest of the blog that I usually write. It is still some thoughts but thoughts abt life, my life especially.

Too many things have happened in my life. Most of the things are something that I would love to have and have happened but the most important, the one that I placed the most value did not happen, I call it the 'elusive piece of jigsaw puzzle'. I find it appropriate to call it that. Why?

Well, have you ever try to piece together a jigsaw puzzle, like maybe a 500 pc one. While u are solving the puzzle, you are slowly completing the beautiful picture that the jigsaw puzzle is potraying. But alas, you are about to realise that the most important piece of jigsaw puzzle, the most critical piece has disappeared. You cannot complete the beautiful picture.

Assuming your Life is the beautiful picture that the jigsaw puzzle is potraying, but that 'elusive piece of jigsaw puzzle' is just not there to make the beautiful picture complete. Something that you hold dear just does not happen. Well Life can still go on, because you are still able to enjoy most of the picture, but not all of it. Only when that piece is found, your Life would be perfect.

Ever have such a feeling in your Life where everything is going well for you, except for that one particular thing that you o'so hold dear and wish it could be like other dept of Life? If you do, you are not the only one, if you don't congratulations, your Life is perfect at the moment!

But I have to admit Life has been fair to me, career/biz-wise, healthwise, socialwise has been great, just that 'elusive' piece of jigsaw puzzle missing. (I guess most of you who are close to me would know what is the 'elusive' part). Run into walls so many times, beginning to feel extremely tired although i have the "Never say die" attitude. Sigh! Just wish Life would be fair to me in this dept as well. I do not ask for much but still lack in this dept. (Of course there are still bare minimum that need to be met lah!)

Okay complaining done. Time to get back to Life. Cheers! :)

Deep Impact

Was talking to a friend on Fri, the conversation was a short one but it set me thinking about the my life. We were talking about the weekends and he was talking abt how busy his weekends are because of his church activities. But he find it to be spent meaningfully because he has make a meaningful impact on other people's life.

This set me thinking. No man is an island, everyday we will interact with people and during this interaction, we will definitely create an impact on those that we interact. Impact could be small or big depending on the factors. For example, if you relate a good experience you have in a particular restaurant to a close friend, do you think your experience would not affect his/her decision to go to the restaurant? And because of your relation of experience to your friend abt the restaurant, it would not affect the employer and employees of the restaurant??

This goes to show our behaviour, words that we speak does affect another person. For example, (most people would be able to relate to this experience) you scored a bad grade and you have to get your Dad to sign it. What is the difference between these two conversations to the kid

Conversation 1

"What happen to you?!?!? Why can't you do anything correct? Is it so difficult to score?"

Conversation 2

"What happend to you? Care to tell me why you have such a low grade? I believe you are able to achieve more than this. Let's work this out together and learn from your mistake! "

Well as can be seen, the first one is too harsh, completely tears away any confidence a kid has compare to the second conversation which is more encouraging.

Purpose of this blog is to show people that we make an impact on people whether we want it or not. People like people who make a positive impact on their lives and detest people who creates negative impacts. Need another example? Sure. Bosses who make your lives difficult, like him or detest him? But I am sure he makes the greatest impact in your life. No? How abt this, he decides what time you go to work, end your work, what you have in life like cars, travel, houses and even number of kids!

Better example, when you go to work in the morning, feeling that the day is going to be smooth throughout, you tell your colleague abt this great feeling and he has to spoil it for you by telling the tons of work you have not done and should be doing. I am sure you would stay away from him if he keeps on spoiling it for you.

Start your day and life the right way, start making a positive impact on another people lives.
Even if one does not show you his gratitude, no worries. I am sure you would feel absolute happiness and satisfying when you make a positive impact. Start doing it! The cheapest way is to wear a smile, cos smiling is contagious! :)

Cheers!

Consistency

Was going through my Sunday papers when I chanced upon this article.

The article is written by a famous female author in Taiwan. In this article she was talking abt her writing skills, how she hone it since she was 15 yrs old till, why it was a valuable skill to her and why she still keeps on writing, and trying other forms of writing like writing columns for newspaper and so on.

Well although I do want to hone up my writing skill (cos I want to publish some books), what i gather from the article is not how to tee up my writing skill but the keyword in the article is CONSISTENCY.

Now for those pple who reads a lot of self-help books and biographies of successful pple, the word 'consistency' should be very very familiar to you. But most of these self-help books talk abt successful pple have consistency in their performance. Definitely something that all pple can see and need not pointing out. But there is another place that needs consistency as well. And that is... consistently practising your skills.

A lot of pple say "Practice makes perfect". It defintely has its point there, but if you practice once a mth or bi mthly, I doubt you would make much progress. But if you consistently practice, say once everyday, or once every two days, now the effectiveness could be extremely tremendous.

Firstly, your body would be exposed to using the skill consistently and it would start 'automating' a lot of the process for you. For example, remember when you started to learn how to cycle, you keep on minding abt looking straight, lock elbow, and pedal. But once you have picked up cycling sufficiently, all you have to do is hop onto a bicycle, and presto, you can eat ice cream while cycling (just citing an example, I do not like sticky hands :P)

Secondly, with continuous exposure, you would find more efficient ways to go abt doing your practice, because basically, human are lazy and always finding ways to do more work with less effort.

So really, consistency is not only performance, but practice of skills as well. "But I have no time!" Stop whining and read my blog on Habits (5th Aug 2005)

Cheers!

Is water ever going to be free in Singapore??

Was reading the Sunday Times abt restaurants starting to charge for drinking water. Just some thoughts abt it.

Firstly, I can understand the plight of the restaurants. But I think charging for water is just a quick solution to abusers but it will costs a lot in the long term. It is like punishing the majority because of what the minority did. Such actions will irk most pple especially in humid Singapore where a glass of plain water has greater value compare to one in Austrailia or anywhere else.

Whether a restaurant will offer free plain water would definitely factor into my decision of patronising especially when I am a huge drinker of water. I would not mind paying more for food since offering plain water would add value to the food, I am eating. Imagine I am eating a super spicy meal and had to spend another buck to get plain water, to extinguish the fire in my tongue, sucks!!! If that money was already 'factored' into the meal, then I don't think I will mind. I will still patronise the place but will not order the spicy meal of cos!

Some restauranteurs claims that some extra hands will be hired to pour water, but I have seen restarants where the 'extra' hands really are 'extra' hands, idling around doing nothing to improve service.

At the end of the day, restauranteurs are making business decisions, but I must warn these pple that offering free drinking water is a 'clean' factor. Having it does not improve your business but without it, your business can suffer. A similar analogy is, having a degree now is a basic level pple should have, but having it does not provide distinct advantages.

I am sure there are other ways to curb the abuse of certain group of customers and improve the overall service level in Singapore. You definitely need time to review your service level, employee and training, service systems and come up with the suitable solution.

For example, cashiers can double up as drink pouring, or only pour when there customers require. (I as a customer do not mind asking a waiter for refill if there is a need cos the waiter also does not know when we are leaving) Or stop filling plain water once customers have finished their food(Why would they still need water since they have finish their food?) and many more.

Cheers!

Your Health is not Your Own Problem ALONE!!!!

Recently, one of my relatives was hospitalised because of certain heart problem. The whole episode caused some amount of panic in the family because he is the sole breadwinner.

This prompt me to think abt our current situations, youngsters abuse or taking for granted their health by drinking, eating all sorts of junk food, smoking, does not exercise and so on. Have they ever give a thought that their health, if they do not take care, is not only their problem alone? It is a family problem.

Imagine this, if you are face with health challenges, definitely your family will be affected. They can be emotionally, physically and worse financially strained, because they have to visit you or take special care of you, worry about whether you can recover or when you are undergoing a major operation and financially drained as we all know the exorbitant medical fees in Singapore.
I would advise those people whose family they hold dear, to start taking care of their health. I am sure you do not want to see any of your family feel sad because of the health challenges that you are unable to overcome due to the fact that you did not take care of it when you are young. Your own poor health would bring burden to your family members, a burden they cannot and should not refuse to carry.

Do not think that your health is your matter only. It can affect your immediate family members. Start an exercise regime, or better do the exercise regime with your family members, have a healthy diet and if there is a need, supplement your diet with supplements.

Wishing all who read this GREAT HEALTH and HAPPINESS! Cheers!