Valorous Halcyon

Okay I lied. The first part of the title is not exactly my headline, but a term I casually adopted from a venerable author James Altucher. He wrote the book Choose Yourself and albeit I have yet to get my hand on it, I reckon it’s going to be mind-blowing. I definitely can’t wait to get one! Imagine ourselves lying on the floor, barely able to lift our heads, unsure of where and when to turn. James has thrived in the past by starting up so many companies, but hit rock bottom multiple times too. Every year is challenging for him, but he still continued to live each day clasping his Daily Practices (reading, writing, doing podcasts and inspiring others with his unique experience and brutally honest and creative ideas, BEING THANKFUL).  Just this week alone I have been pondering on the idea of happiness. Even during Sunday Service in church 5 days ago, my pastor talked about choosing happiness. How much more coincident can it get because I have been pondering the same though...

“Hey, how are you doing?” is one of the most common questions we ask others or people throw at us, whether we realize it or not. Ironically not many people are genuinely interested about how you are doing, but rather it serves just as a form of formality or conversation starter. Because we have been asked this question thousands of times, we subconsciously formed a default answer as well. “I’m fine / I’m doing great. Yourself?” becomes the default answer even when we don’t feel all that great at that point of time. What happens when we give a genuine answer? In other word, be our true self. For instance, when I don’t feel all that blissful and positive about life or simply being dissatisfied at my workplace, I say “ It is okay . I have been feeling tired at …xxx… and this boss has been squeezing me alive at work.” Some friends may be caught by surprises for giving them unconventional responses and become empathetic at our situations, but the rest would be like “Oh snap, I ...

As I walked towards the gate of my office after work, I saw this guy also walking towards the same direction with his friend. He’s my friend but his name seemed to vanish from my mind for a temporal moment, so for one whole minute I walked behind their back quietly. I hoped he never spotted me because I was ashamed of my wonky memory. When I finally managed to recall his name, he spotted me walking behind him and his friend. I couldn’t call out his name on time, so I just addressed him as “bro”. Hey Bro! How’s it going? The rest remain history. I believe I am not alone in this. I KNOW! I know. It sounds trivial. Not remembering other people’s names is a small matter and everyone does it, right? To be honest, yes it is. But if you come to think about it from a larger picture, this seemingly trivial matter has the capability to trickle into larger issues, and could be the one mammoth factor in determining one’s success in everything. Many business leaders and politicians kne...

The past weekend has been physically exacting for me, because I was irrational bold enough to join the Sports Day organized by my employer Bank Negara, knowing I was/am not much fitter than the majority population. Still I challenged myself. I knew the chance for me to win anything was extremely slim – close to 0%. I took the first step and stepped out of my comfort zone. I made an impulsive decision to sign up for 800m and 4x400m even before I had time to regret over my decision. I took the risk of embarrassing myself. The result? I managed to clock 2 minutes 47 seconds for my 800m run, attaining fourth place out of 6 runners. The runner who got third was not too far ahead of me, yet I had ran out of energy to sprint in my last 100m. Even more encouragingly, the other two runners in 5 th and 6 th places were physically fitter than me. For the first time in my life, I did not book the last spot in an athletic competition. It was a personal victory for me. I was extremel...

If you are a regular visitor of this blog, you may have noticed the reduced frequency of my post entries. Let me clarify, I have been writing an entry every weekday for the past 2.5 months, and it is my joy and privilege every time I write. But just last week, I realised this is not sustainable. I have a full time job but because I was still new and my team was pretty busy with their year-end project, I ended up having nothing much to do. Now work started to pile up and you can see where I might be heading next. Not only my time allocated for blogging will be significantly reduced, my one big concern is writer’s block. My friends have asked me how did I managed to get inspiration daily, to update a blog entry every weekday. My only answer is to spend about 2 hours to read, daily. Read books, blogs and email subscriptions. Read 200 books, 50 books is equivalent to having one mentor. Check out the books that can take your breaths away. Read books that can keep your attention s...

Motivational quotes are ubiquitous. Whilst I myself am an avid reader of motivational quotes, they may not be sufficient to pull someone back on track, assuming the person has access to it. Many people are not that fortunate. Imagine someone so dreadful of life or fell so deeply in financial debt, waiting for time to pass. No purpose of life whatsoever, time is just ticking before that person drifts into extreme depression and eventually jumps off the window of a city skyline, or one of the cliffs in Zermatt.  Why such pessimism? People who really need to be heard can't be heard, people who need help can't get one. The sad truth is they may not even have access to such motivational edification as they are engulfed by the horrendous reality of life, day in day out. People around them are too obsessed with themselves and barely able to notice their peculiar behaviour. Perhaps if we could practice a little more empathy, things could have been turned out differently. Li...

When I was relatively younger, I used to doubt myself. I had poor self-esteem purely out of the thought of myself being untalented. I was raw and inexperienced in whatever came my way. In everything I encountered at school, I stood by the sideline and watched the high flyers performed to their best abilities and won tournaments, one after another. Then I would envy them. I wished I could be just a little bit like them, being outstanding in fields of their choices.  And I bumped into this quote out of the blue, saying: "If others can do it, why can't I?" I paused. If others can do it, why can't you? There are so many people who have made histories, success stories are everywhere if you bother to look around. So many people have succeeded, why not myself? Many excellent students had attained straight A1's, what is stopping me from achieving the similar feat? What a powerful revelation! From that moment onwards, I started to gain courage, aim higher and str...

Many years ago I used to write New Year resolutions at the beginning of the year but only to regrettably see the excitement gradually being subsided by the end of February. At the end of the year, I may even be worse off compared to the start of the year. I believe most of us have encountered this at least once in our life. Because all the cool kids do it. Adults, growing teenagers, kids. Everyone does it, so we must follow! But let’s take a step back and ask ourselves, why bother making a New Year resolutions list if we never intended to follow it through? Lack of discipline is one thing. Deep inside we want to be one of the cool kids, and cool kids normally have all the bragging rights, and they are generally well accepted in our communities. At least we wanted to feel like we are accepted. But this is not my main point. This may not be your reason. Maybe you wholeheartedly wanted to do things differently as the New Year approaches, to improve every aspect of your life. Th...

Every day when I log on to Blogger and click on “Create a New Post”, a blank page appears. It is up to me how I want to smear it. Fresh page, white as snow, ready to be painted. I may not have anything particularly productive to write, but I can write. So I keep writing. I may be writing craps, which I am right now, but I still write. I have set this my personal conviction to write a post every weekday, so far I have been disciplined enough to cling on to this conviction. Your conviction may be on something else. Maybe you had promised yourself you will go exercise every evening. Or every morning. But you have been procrastinating. Don’t worry me too, many times. Then I realised I don’t have to dwell in the sense of guilt. I may have missed today’s gym session, but I can go tomorrow. There’s always a second chance. There’s always tomorrow. A better tomorrow. Don’t miss it! Everyone deserves a second chance. You deserve a second chance. But the problem with us is we tend ...

I did not have a good lifestyle, I was in bad shape and it felt horrible. My confidence level slumped to a rock bottom level I thought I would never be able to recover. Financially I was blessed enough to have had received the prestigious scholarship from my current employer, but being blessed with this amount of money doesn't mean I knew how to manage them. Imagine shoving RM470 to an eighteen-year-old kid and let him/her manage the money. But here I am. Having lived my three years of undergraduate study in London and shed off 10kg from my all time high of 85kg, concurrently able to accummulate some savings, here are 10 life hacks that have helped me, and I hope can help you as well to live better physically, mentally and financially. 1) Drink Water when you wake up  I am not going into too much technicality of how drinking water can help you once you wake up, but this is what I have been doing and it felt great! Not only it helps me to regain my consciousness quickly up...

Allowing things to happen is easier than not allowing, saying yes is easier than saying no. Although learning to say "No" is essential and we should all learn how to say "No" as we grow up, but the opposite always happen. We often not give permission more than giving permissions. Here are a seven things we should learn how to give permissions to: 1) Give permission to LIVE We don't give permission for ourselves to live. We get ourselves busy with works and other little things that we forget to live. How does that contradictory to living? Doesn't living sync with work and other little things in life? Not necessarily. Living doesn't only mean work although it could. Living means focusing your time and efforts on your top priorities. And your top priorities are things that will add the most values into your life and other people's life. It could be your loved ones, friends and family, your passion, your hobbies and interests outside work. All th...

You probaby have heard of 10,000 hours rule. It sounded convincing when I first heard of it, because who wouldn't be a Master after practicing the same thing over and over again, for 10,000 hours? Many of my teachers have said the same thing. One of my teacher-turn-trader resonated the same idea, 10,000 hours rule. Keep practicing the same task for 10,000 hours and you will truly master the particular task. But really to me who was somewhat skeptical, it forced me to rethink its effectiveness and its potential fallacy. "There's no shortcut!" That's what everyone is telling you, and maybe that's what you are going to tell me also. Fair enough, if that is what you have been told. Amateur traders have to trade 10,000 hours to be truly master the trading game, professional footballers have to practice the same type of drilling for 10,000 hours to make every accurate passing and play beautiful football. Alexis Sanchez would have practiced 10,000 hours to strike...

This post is written with a heavy heart. In just a couple of days, few people around me passed away. A manager in my department who had been battling with blood cancer courageously had put on a good fight. My cell group leader's dad passed away. My friend's teacher also passed away. Another friend's primary schoolmate's mom also just passed away. On the side note, my favourite football team Arsenal also lost to a weaker Greek side, Olympiacos 2-3 AT HOME, thus killing any real chance of qualifying out of group stage for Champions League this year (since the next two games are up against the Almighty Bayern Munich who have just trashed Dinamo Zagreb by 5-0). All in sudden, I am again reminded that life is too short. Too short to be sad and depressed. Too short to be frustrated and hold grudge against someone you have conflict with, or someone who has wronged you. Two days ago I've read about this from "Seven Things That Steal Your Joy" by Joyce Mey...