Where does success start first?

Recently I had a chance to talk to a primary school boy.
He was a smart kids, street smart I would say.
He has very good memory and he can predict what you gonna tell him rather fast.
By right, he should be doing well in whatever he does, right?

Yes, if he choose to believe he can first.
Unfortunately, when he showed me his recent exam results, he is far from being happy on what he had gotten.
Even though he is smarter than his elder brother, however, the results he delivered is far behind from his elder brother.

In fact, this little boy has spent more effort for his study lately.

While I have to spend some time to console him. I found something vital for this kid and probably most children.

This boy has a self-image of not being good enough and some how develop the habit of giving up too early.

I may not be sure how exactly he developed this self-image or habit.
My good guess will be the environment he was brought up or somebody of authority probably has told him something "not good enough" in his younger day.

Of course, his habit of reinforcing the non-supporting belief is not doing him any good.  Naturally, whatever he  studies, he will think it is hard.  Even though he has good memory, he tends to forget the things he studied, especially the subject he doesn't like.

Consequently, he will reinforce his non-supporting beliefs, especially the subject he thinks is hard.
The vicious cycle continues.

Of course, I taught him a simple trick to break the habit of non-supporting beliefs. Initially he was reluctant to do it because it sounds stupid to him, but I persisted.
Within, 10 minutes, it showed result to him on his fearful subject instantaneously, Chinese Language.  His confidence went up significantly and his body language told me that he felt good about himself.  Of course, his learnt all the difficult words within 15min.

He may think that is some special learning techniques.
However, it is just my method to help him break the non-supportive beliefs, refocus his attention on his success.  (In my previous post, I mentioned about success breeds success)

From this short experience, I realized that success needs to come from the mind and heart first.

Many people was looking for "The Secret" or "keys" to success, whether in academic, career, relationship, health or weight management.  No doubt that the know-how is important. However, having a supportive self-beliefs is far more important.  It is what we say to ourselves daily that matters.

I call it having the "heart and mind" to be successful first.

Responsibility

Finally, the recent activities of Singapore General Election has ended 1 hour ago with the official ending of the polling day. What will be the outcome is sometimes hard to be predicted.

Regardless of the result, the process is more awakening.

It was an interesting experience for me to read so many online articles, chat, facebook posting and blogging and etc for the past 9 days.

One bordering trend for me is that, it seems like most of the posting is about complaining, venting anger and raise hatred.

Many people had taken the opportunity to bombard the ruling party as if they have done nothing right. (All wrong but nothing right?)

It makes me feel like the whole society is full of people who like to complain or finding flaw only.

It takes me to ponder what had happened to this society? No doubt that there are many areas that can be improved but I think most of the view and opinion online are one-sided.

Isn't it irony that those people fighting for "justice" are only giving an "unjust" one-sided view?

There were very few praise (if any) for the government for anything they have done right. I am surprise to see so many bad comments attacking whatever the ruling party has uttered out.

Are you saying we are living in "hell" for the past 5 years? Does it means you are totally not happy with your living condition for the past five years?

Have you ever post a comment in facebook celebrating your joy/blessing/success/happy moment/ for the past 3 years? If yes, then we need to have a check and balance here.

I am also very surprised because it has been 5 years and suddenly now that so many people (and some self-professed "very human" or "guru") just digging the flaw of the policy within 9 days.

Where have you all gone for the past 4.5 years?

I may not know all the policies that have been passed over the last 5 years.

However, I think the government has done a good job to cushion the impact of financial crisis during 2008 - 2009.

It had helped many to save their job by spending huge amount on re-training and upgrading the skills of the existing work force, especially the middle age workers.

We all know the hard reality, it is harder for a middle age worker to find job once they lost their job. And those middle age workers could be the fathers or mothers of the current young voters.

I wonder has anybody say a "thank you for saving my job"? Or are they just pure complaining "no pay raise". Is this the ugly side of human-being?

Some people even dig out "sad" video to raise emotion and raise hatred towards the ruling party.

My questions to those "guru" or "supreme being" is "- As a "successful, financially well to do, morally high people, what have you done for the past five years to make things better?

IF you have done, my applause and respect to you. If you didn't, then what a hypocrisy we have here? Integrity is the essence of everything, isn't it?

Most importantly, looking forward, now that you have "dug" out so many sad stories of the society, as a better of resident, are you taking up your social responsibility to help others or are you just going to sit there do nothing, waiting for the authority to help those needy?

My wish for all residents here is, don't just sit there for the next five years, waiting for opportunity to in the limelight again. Do something fruitful besides using mouth.

I am glad that the GE activities had raised the awareness of the needy people in the society. My hope is, as a conscious resident, lets not forget our own social responsibility first. Don't wait for the authority to step in.

If we see somebody had an accident on the road, do we just wait for the police to come or do we step up and offer a helping hand first?

I hope we just don't stand behind the tree do nothing, except finding opportunity to complain if and when the police arrive late.

In my learning journey as an entrepreneur, one phrase I hold dearly is "For things to change, I must change first". Lets do our part as a conscious resident, volunteer ourselves first.

Don't wait. Please don't do nothing and wait for another 5 years.

What has this General Election got to do with success? Indeed, it has. "Responsibility" is the fundamental of all success. Lets not forget our "social responsibility" and be a successful and gracious resident.

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Tribute to Susan Boyle and other Talent in Britian Got Talent

As I watched Britain Got Talent semi final and final shows, I was amazed by the talented souls.
They put in their heart and souls, every bit of their energy and passion to their performance.
One of the great individual is Susan Boyle. She has inspired many people around the world.
In Singapore, her video on YouTube was shown to children in primary schools. This has shown that Susan is not just anybody but somebody.

Of course, fame normally invites cynics and critics on her too. (This should be viewed as a positive sign because it means that Susan Boyle is really Somebody. Most of the great individual in the world are not short of critics too. Welcome to the club, Susan!)

I think what Simon Cowell said to her at The Final was totally true. With her powerful voice and the perfect performance, she has silenced her critics. Irregardless the final poll outcome, I think Susan is a champion because she shown that she can overcome her own obstacle and pressure and be better. This is truely a champion spirit.

Would like to present the following quote to all the participants in Britian Got Talent for standing on the stage and letting their light shine, especially Susan. As you all let your own light shine, you unconsciously give other people permission to do the same.

Our Deepest Fear by Marianne Williamson
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Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate.
Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure.
It is our light, not our darkness that most frightens us.
We ask ourselves, Who am I to be brilliant, gorgeous, talented, fabulous?
Actually, who are you not to be?
You are a child of God.
Your playing small does not serve the world.
There is nothing enlightened about shrinking so that other people won't feel insecure around you.
We are all meant to shine, as children do.
We were born to make manifest the glory of God that is within us.
It's not just in some of us; it's in everyone. And as we let our own light shine, we unconsciously give other people permission to do the same.
As we are liberated from our own fear, our presence automatically liberates others

Get well soon Susan.

Watch Susan powerful performance...

Warrior of the light

I attended a training last October. It was a truely experiential warrior camp.
During the camp, it was like a mirror. To show who we really are when under high pressure or fear or even at difficult situation.

We learnt how to be a warrior of our life. A true warrior is not one who conquer other people but who conquer oneself to be a better person in life.

I realised that everyday, every moment there will be different challenges for us to take and decisions for us to make. If one person has clarity on what one wants to achieve or becoming, by keep focusing on that goal and keep persueing the goal, he or she will finally succeed.

Knowing the above statement is almost a common sense to many. However, practising it will take a change in mental toughness and cultivating such habit.

I recently conducted a workshop. However, my team and I did not spend much time for the publicity. The number of interested participant was unsually low even it was a couple of days before the workshop.
Knowing that calling off the workshop would be an easier way out then continue to try hard to make things happened. However, I put what I learnt from the warrior camp into this context. "A warrior do everything at 100%!" I decided to persist on making the workshop to continue.

My team member asked me, "are we going to continue with the workshop? Should we prepare for tomorrow"
My answer was, "if we give up this time, we can give up many times for the rest of our life".
It's just like in the movie, Glory Road, the coach Hutskin told the player, Shed, "we don't not back off from this defence box!"

Of course, by holding on the belief that the workshop will go on, we continue to make phone calls and confirmation of participants.
The next day, we finally make the workshop run pretty smoothly and in fact the result was 200% more than our original target.

If we would have cancel the workshop the night before the workshop, we wouldn't have chance to see fruitful results. I guess this "tough situation" that test our belief system will happen many many times in our life.

I come to the realisation that successful people is not somebody achieving great things overnight. But successful person has the habit of completing everything he started, no matter how small a thing. That includes keeping promises and be on time to appointment. This is what I think, a true warrior of the light.

With year 2009 just a few days ahead, it's time to really have a moment with myself and access what I have done over the year of 2008. It's good time to have clarity of the goals that I want to achieve in year 2009.

Many would expect tough challenges ahead in year 2009. However, I would ask myself what is the opportunity waiting for me.

Success through crisis

Recently I get to received an award for contributing in a business networking organisation. It's called Givers Gain Award.
I started to think, will I have a chance to get this award 2 years ago? Probably not.
Two years ago, the group I was attached with are still up and running with many zest.

However, over the last year, things started to change and the business network group I am associated with started to shrink to miserable size.

Many 'potential' star performers chose to leave the group or find a greener patch while there are a few of hard core low profile people like me chose to stay on and rebuild the team. I even had a senior advised me to give up and join another team. Of course, it was very tempting to join another established group to gain instant gratification.

However, I guess there are certain core qualities in each individual. The six of us chose to stay on and rebuild the team. We do not want to abondone our teamate just to find a greener patch elsewhere. That time, our energy was low, we were exhausting our contacts and every efforts we try to bringing new blood seems not bearing any result.

Will we see light at the end of the tunnel?

I guess success is really a self belief that makes us persevere. Do we believe that we have the capability to turn things around and be successful? Many people chose the easier path, quit.

Success is the ability to persevere until our time has come.

Deep down our heart we know what we capable to do. I still remember success guru, T. Harv Eker says that, "successful people have the habit of complete everything they start". Ya, I think that's the reason we chose to stick together and continue to persevere.

For all of us who stayed on and successfully rebuilding our team, I shall call them the true hero.

Only through crisis, a character is shown.
Only through crisis, we test our mental toughness.
Only through crisis we have clarity what we want.
Only through crisis, we define who we are and what we capable to do.
Only through crisis, we create success.


Crisis, is not a bad word after all!

p/s: I consider this is meaningful success to me and my teamate. Success breeds success!