Difficult things keeps happening around me… (well, I don’t mean to overlook good things either but this is just…)

Yesterday a good friend passed away. It just came out of no where and I was at a loss of words when I was phoned. It’s very difficult to accept because for most of us, we’ve just spoken and seen to him just days ago, joked and laughed together. There was even a biking trip in planning…

This friend is a cheerful person, despite his often cynical but funny comments, and I always feel that he has such a good heart filled with kindness, especially after seeing his family and hearing from them about him and how he treats his nieces. He’s a great guy!

That’s when I think about what life all means (and by no means do I claim I understand). I think that everyone of us came into this world without a purpose and meaning. No meaning is given to us and we are a void at that point. However, it is with our hands, our time, our hearts, our thoughts, our daily act that we begin to carve meaning into it. And when we think about meaning, just as a meaning of a vocabulary, it provides people with a definition. As for life, the meaning is no different. Only that, what our lives mean to someone, could be a definition like vocabulary, a thought, or certain feelings and emotions. And most importantly, we create that “meaning” ourselves with our own hands, action, and choices.

With this friend passing away, it reminds me how life is too short, and we need to work on that meaning that we want our own lives to represent without hesitation. Right now, I’d like to think about celebrating how my friend has lived, rather than mourning for loss and drown in sadness… he has provided meanings to all friends, colleagues, and families.

Rest in peace, my friend… We will miss you dearly…

I talked about finding the “why”, finding the motivation as the first step to focus on in taking action to reach a goal. It provides the drive and passion for reaching that certain goal and completing those propositions. With that in mind, I will discuss three intertwined points in order to have an attack plan that draw the fine line between success and failure for you. If you can do the following, you have the basics of discipline down.

Learning Habit – Make something a part of yourself
Often time when you will think about learning or trying something. You consciously or sub-consciously also associate the fact that it is just something extra. The idea that it’s something exra leads you to think that it is not “as important” or dispensable even, which is very very bad. Take for example, you would like to become healthier and thus, need to exercise (and include a balance diet). When you consider it extra instead of a requirement, you will most likely just continue to go home and sit in front of TV. Instead of thinking it as something extra that needs to be done after work, you need to consider it as a required part of your life. Humans ARE animals and thus, daily activities should involve a certain amount of movement to sustain livelihood, just like breathing/sleeping is a part of us. It is not something extra that we can stop doing.

Another example can be that you want to improve your communication skill and for that, it involes becoming a better listener, which involves understanding people and not just hearing words. So instead of practicing and learning tips and tricks on listening to keywords and doing feedbacks, you need to make the principle of always trying to understand other people a part of you. By making the best effort to keep that as a habit, only then you become so natural at it and thus allow you to become good in communication.

Learning a habit takes time, it’s like learning a new sport where we have to drill certain movements into our muscles. Make it a requirement as a part of your being and have patience for yourself to learn it as a habit.

Being Persistent – Focus on the end and don’t give up
As previously discussed, learning a habit is by no means an easy task, nor is reaching a certain long-term goal any easier. They usually involve an extensive amount of time that will take steps after steps to get to it. The beginnning is especially a tough step, which is the reason we need the “why”. Heck, I’ve always doubted myself in learning piano in such an “old” age, but staying persistent and continue to practice is the only way I can get where I want, albeit the frustration and feeling like a failure sometimes. By focusing on the end, I will not give up. You will owe it to your persistence to reach most goals.

Fear Not – Let go, trust, and just be in the moment
This relates to the last point very much. As how I would doubt myself in my piano skill quest, I can feel fear creeps up on me that actually holds me back from practicing at times. It is very strange but that is what fear does to us. “Where is the end? I don’t see all the steps that take me to the goal.” With many possible failed steps in our path to reach a goal, staying persistent is one thing. One thing that will back up the persistence is to let go of the fear and just be in the moment of taking the step, trust that a new step will be revealed, which is somewhat analogous to having the end in mind and having persistence to kee you going. Trust in “the end” and don’t let fear steer you away from reaching it (but this is not saying we don’t take advice from otehrs).

The ideas I talked about is a little difficult to articulate, so you can somehow grasp them and make use of them.

With all the talks about personal improvement and taking control of personal finance, one may wonder how on earth can we consistently stay disciplined and not to be distracted by seeking momentary pleasure and a hedonistic lifestyle. Or just take some other easy way out. To which, I quote and I believe…

When there is a will, there is a way.

This applies to all scenarios in life. Sometimes you face problems in life. Sometimes you want to get rid of a bad habit. Sometimes you have a dream yet accomplished. Sometimes you have a hobby you want to pick up. When you encounter all these scenarios, and you frequently would think, “How should I go about this?” But you also frequently skip a most important initial step.

Find Out Why, Realize the Motivation, Dig Up Your Desire

People often start themselves off in the wrong foot by losing focus and asking the wrong questions. It is not really about how, fundamentally. It is about why. You need to ask yourself why you want to do that certain things first. You NEED to clarify to ourselves the reasons behind the action. You need to find that flaming desire inside, light it up, and pour gasoline on it, by crystalizing the why. ONCE you are able to grasp the why, the how will come more naturally because you will keep trying and you can follow through with much less difficult because there is a driving force behind the action.

You must think clearly about and define the “why” because sometimes you think you know but the idea is only vague in you mind and not certain, if you don’t spend time trying to grasp it. When you know precisely why, you become more passionate, energized, driven, and willing to understand and follow through with the how. If the why does not exist or is not a crystalized thought, it is likely you will not be able to finish what you are trying to do.

Like I said, this applies to all aspects in life. Some examples…

• Want to get rid of bad habit? Find out why. (ex. mal-effect on health, dislike by closed-ones…)
• Want to have your finance under control or save money? Find out why. (ex. retiring early and luxuriously, buying a house…)
• Want to learn something? Find out why. (ex. current job sucks and must have a career change, or just want to feel better about myself! etc.)

I think you know what I am trying to get at by now. It is the main step in the process to make up your mind and commit to do something 100%. So next time you are trying to decide if you want to do something or you face a delimma. Ask yourself why and find that desire inside yourself first. If you can’t, then maybe you should not be doing it. If you can, the how gets a lot easier knowing why.

As you can see, this blog has a new look! I think the new theme provides a cleaner look to the site and should make it easier for readers to concentrate on the entries and also to find their ways around. I try to stay away from all the fancy themes and images, and hence, less tiring for readers’ eyes, as I believe a blog is more about readership compared to those fun fancy web applications out there.

My goal is to provide the best experience to all of you visitors of the blog, just as my constant strive to improve myself.

Therefore, I would love to hear any thoughts on your mind :)

This topic spins off nicely from my last one suggesting people to worry about others so much as to make decisions under that influence.

Quoting the articule Don’t Worry. Be Happy:

You know who’s responsible for that financial angst you’re suffering – that uncomfortable feeling that you should be earning, and spending, more, only you can’t? No, not your stingy employer or the IRS, but worse. People who are theoretically on your side: your friends, co-workers, and neighbors.

And I’d say, people not just compare themselve with their peers financially that leads to great stress. They also compare on fame, status, or any other statistics they can come by. Even worse, sometimes they compare themselves with the wrong targets, such as celebrities.

It’s pretty easy to put an end to this. Think about with more than 6 billions people on earth, when will we finish if we try to compare ourselves with everyone? Of course we will long be dead before we are done :) Each one of us is born with different backgrounds, places, and times. With all the existing variables, there is definitely no same result. What I’m saying is that we cannot lose ourselves in chasing all these other people materialistically, financially, or on fame. It’s almost like chasing shadows, which can never be caught.

We have to reach an agreement within oureslves that we are not here to become like others. We are here to be ourselves. And with our own abilities and our own hands, we will improve ourselves in ways we direct ourselves toward and reach goals of which we identify ourselves. Again, aim for tomorrow’s ourselves becoming better than todays’.

Like running on a track, if we keep looking back or sideways of what others are doing, we will only run slower.