Thursday 31 May 2012

A Simple Gesture



Mark was walking home from school one day when he noticed that the boy ahead of him had tripped and dropped all the books he was carrying, along with two sweaters, a baseball bat, a glove and a small tape recorder. Mark knelt down and helped the boy pick up the scattered articles.
since they were going the same way, he helped to carry part of the burden. As they walked, Mark discovered the boy's name was Bill, that he loved video games, baseball and history, that he was having a lot of trouble with his other subjects and that he had just broken up with his girlfriend.
Mark went home after dropping Bill at his house. They continued to see each other around school, had lunch together once or twice, then both graduated from junior high school. They ended up in the same high school, where they had brief contacts over the years. Finally the long-awaited senior year came. Three weeks before graduation, Bill asked Mark if they could talk.
Bill reminded him of the day years ago when they had first met. "Do you ever wonder why I was carrying so many things home that day?" asked Bill. "You see, I cleaned out my locker because I didn't want to leave a mess for anyone else. I had stored away some of my mother's sleeping pills and I was going home to commit suicide. But after we spent some time together talking and laughing, I realized that if I had killed myself, I would have missed that time and so many others that might follow. So you see, Mark, when you picked up my books that day, you did a lot more. You saved my life."

By John W. Schlatter



This story tells us something about life.
We are always too busy chasing after our financial and career goals or whatever objectives that we want to achieve.Too often we forgot about the simple things in life.
We underestimate that the smallest act of caring,honest compliments,kind words, sincere praises,a listening ear,a friendly touch and a warm smile to someone can mean a lot and has the power to turn a life around.
Instead, we took for granted the people around us like our love ones,family members,friends and working colleagues.We seldom learn to appreciate or feel grateful to them until 'disaster' strikes.Only then, we felt sorry and regretful and sometimes it may be too late.
We often heard about people telling how much they care and love their life partners only when their relationships or marriages are in serious trouble.We also heard how much people missed their parents only after their parents are not in this world anymore.We never learned how to value and appreciate what we have until we lose them.We should show more care,concern and love for people around us now,instead of feeling remorseful for not having done so when they are no more with us.
Before I end this posting here is a quote from Albert Schweitzer and a nice video clip of the song "Always On My Mind" by Willie Nelson.

" LIFE BECOMES HARDER FOR US WHEN WE LIVE FOR OTHERS,BUT IT ALSO BECOMES RICHER AND HAPPIER".









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Wednesday 30 May 2012

Marketeer fights off abductors

PETALING JAYA: An Internet marketeer had a close shave with a couple of would-be rapists when she was abducted from the car park of The Curve shopping mall here.
However, the feisty Chin Xin-Ci put up a fight and jumped out of the moving car just as it was exiting the car park.
Recounting the harrowing experience on her Facebook account, she wrote that she was loading her shopping bags onto the backseat of her boyfriend's car when the incident took place at about 5.20pm on Sunday.
She was on her own that day.
“Suddenly, the rear car door was slammed against my back and a meat cleaver was pressed against my throat,” she wrote.
“A man covered my mouth with his hand and whispered to me not to scream. He then shoved me onto the floor of the backseat and waved the cleaver at me, ordering me not to scream.”
Close shave: Chin was robbed and nearly abducted from The Curve’s car park on Sunday evening. (insert) Chin was fortunate just to have some scratches and bruises. — Pix taken from Chin’s blog


According to her posting, which has gone viral on Twitter and Facebook, a second man appeared and took her car keys while demanding for the parking ticket.
“I told them they could take everything, just to let me go. But at that point they didn't even ask for money. Instead, one of the men started to make sexual advances.
“Then it hit me: Oh my God. Oh my God. This is really happening. I'm being kidnapped and I think I know what they want',” she wrote.
Waiting for a chance to make her escape, she said she was aware that the car would slow down as it moved out from the car park.
She managed to open the door but one of the suspects pulled her back in.
However, she put up a fight with the two suspects before making a run for it.
The ordeal from the moment she left the parking ticket payment machine to her escape took just about four minutes “but it felt like a long nightmare”, she wrote.
She also tweeted that she was fortunate to just have some scratches and bruises although she lost almost all her belongings, including her cellphone.
Meanwhile, The Curve centre manager Jazmi Kamarudin said they would cooperate with the police as well as offer support to Chin.
“We have also provided our CCTV footage to assist the police with their investigation.
“As this is an ongoing investigation, we are unable to share any details.
“We sincerely regret that this incident took place despite our numerous safety efforts,” Jazmi said in a statement yesterday.
Police confirmed that a report had been lodged and that the case had been classified as robbery.
Other Twitter users also expressed their concern about the incident.
( The above news was reported in The Stars newspaper )




It is so disturbing to read about news like this in our mainstream media.Only two months ago, we read about the case of 12 year old Nayati Shamelin being kidnapped, and his family paid RM300K in ransom to secure his release.And now, we have the above reported case quite similiar to last time Canny Ong's case.
Infact there are few similiarities between Canny Ong's case ( happened in 2003 ) and this case.Both happened in a shopping mall parking lot,both victims in the IT line and both young and beautiful ( Canny was 28 that time ) and both were  alone when the incident happened.The only difference was  this time the victim made a daring escape and came out alive, or else there will be another tragic news.
 After the Canny Ong's incident,it was reported that shopping malls should be properly equipped with CCTV especially at secluded car park areas and security personnel should be visible at parking lots and exit areas as some form of countermeasures.It was also mentioned that security guard will also escort single ladies to their car when there is a need.
I do not know whether the shopping mall mentioned in this case has implemented any of these actions or not. I  hope that the police can come out with some positive lead soon and bring the perpetrators into custody as soon as possible.


"AT THE END OF THE DAY, THE GOALS ARE SIMPLE: SAFETY AND SECURITY".
...JODI RELL

Tuesday 29 May 2012

Anger

The "Angry Bird" game played on mobile phone and computer has been so popular and addictive,and now we even have Angry Bird 2 game.We also have Angry Gran which is also a popular game well accepted in countries like Britain,Austria,Indonesia,Pakistan,Greece and Finland.
I thought these games are for kids but I was wrong when I see adults and even much older people getting addicted to them.Perhaps these games has the appeal because of the word "angry" and people played the game as a form of emotional relief or to unwind themselves after a long stressful day at work.


                                                                                        


ANGRY BIRD



ANGRY GRAN 

Since we are talking about these 'angry games', let me also talk about the topic on ANGER.
Anger is normal and infact a healthy emotion.It is a fact of life that everyone does get angry with things or people at times, and it is just a matter of how they managed their anger only.
People usually gets angry because something or someone obstructs their needs or desires.Or it can be sometimes people perceived certain threats and felt annoyed and disturbed when someone said something not to their liking.
There are three types of reactions when people gets angry; they either confront the anger, internalised their anger or they redirect their anger to other people.Confronting anger in an assertive and 'productive' way is the best approach.Internalised anger means keeping the anger inside ourselves and it may become a grudge on something or someone later.Redirect anger on someone else like family members and our staffs is also not a good way of managing our anger.
Experts always say that when we are angry, take a deep breadth and count to 10.I agreed with this method and I always use this approach when I am angry with something.What happens when we do this deep breathing and counting to 10 is we provide a 'timeout' for our anger and it will 'cool' us down.Then we will feel calmer and our mind will become clearer to deal with the source of anger.
Another effective way of dealing with anger is to stick with the "I" statement when we are angry and talking to the person who arouse our anger.By focussing on the "I", we are actually telling the person our feelings and reasons for being angry.It is better than  to use the word "YOU" which sounds more like blaming the other person.It will make the other person angry also when they try to defend themselves.Of course, we must approach this in an assertive and positive way without being too emotional and think before we speak.
Replacing anger thoughts by doing other things to divert away this negative feeling is also an effective way.I guess this is one of the reason why the 'Angry Bird' and 'Angry Gran' games are so popular.By engrossing on these games, we are actually clearing away the anger thoughts.The beauty about anger is, if we can "cool down" before we react to it, we can suppress it.
So next time before we become angry with someone or something, follow the above suggestions on how to deal with anger.Always remember to pause a while and think before we speak, when we are angry.

"ANGER IS A SHORT MADNESS".........HORACE









 

Sunday 27 May 2012

Creativity


Few weeks ago two young Malaysian entrepreneurs created the "Kaw Kaw burger" that took the town by storm and their burger becomes so popular that people even posted the news in facebook and twitter.People has been queing up to buy the burger and business has been exceptional good.This burger is different from the usual ones because they are grilled burgers instead of the normal cooking type.Incase you have missed this news, you can refer to the link below:




Picture of the " Kaw Kaw" burger
The meat are grilled instead of conventional cooking method.









Is this a CREATIVE idea? I say YES because no one has sell grilled burger before and it is a first in the market.This idea look so simple and I am quite sure many have thought of it before but no one dare to put this idea into ACTION.Now that these two entrepreneurs has started this 'craze', I am sure many burger sellers will copy their idea soon.
The word Creativity has been overused and even "abused" at times.We heard of Creative Art, Creative Painting, Creative Marketing, Creative Music,Creative Cooking and even Creative Marriage and Creative Divorce.
Creativity is the ability to come out with something that is new, original and often unique.Sometimes we can only say something is Creative until we see it and people accept it.If the ideas work and produce the desired results, it is Creativity.If it doesn't, no one will talk about it.
People with creative ideas usually have knowledge about the subject or they spend a lot of time accumulating and mastering important information on what they want to do.They think a lot and think deeply into their subject and sometimes even think in "Incubation".They also have perseverance in what they want to do but the most important thing is they have a strong BELIEF that their ideas will work and they are determine to put those ideas into ACTION.The grilled burger idea may look very simple but I am sure the two enrepreneurs has done a lot of researches and deep thinking before they decided to start this business.They have also guts and strong belief that their idea will work.
In working life, bosses like to tell their subordinates  to "Think outside the box" inorder to be creative.But the problem is sometimes when such ideas are presented to them,they shot it down before even giving it a thought or discussion,because they do not believe that the ideas will work.Creative ideas at work, no matter how funny or silly needs to be brainstormed and if  bosses are 'creative' enough they are able to arrange conducive and productive brainstorming meetings with open mind to discuss the ideas.But sad to say, we don't see many such bosses around nowadays.Most of them prefer to have 'blame storming' instead of brainstorming session.




"AN IDEA THAT IS DEVELOPED AND PUT INTO ACTION IS MORE IMPORTANT THAN AN IDEA THAT EXISTS ONLY AS AN IDEA" .............EDWARD DE BONO

Friday 25 May 2012

Happiness-Final Part

The Law of Attraction says we will attract into our life whatever we focus on.If we have gloomy thoughts in our mind,we will be surrounded with a feeling of gloom.If we think that we are a failure and living in poverty,our mind will create an atmosphere of failure and poverty.
To be happy,we must always have positive thoughts and train ourselves to weed out negative thoughts.We need to be pro active.Whenever a negative thought 'tries' to come into our mind, we must pause for a while, think and then rephrase that negative thought into a positive or happy thought.
The best way to have positive thought and be happy is to laugh.If you dont know how to laugh and find it difficult to laugh,then learn how to laugh or try to fake laughter.Expert says our body doesn't know the difference between real laughter and fake laughter.So we can fake laughter until we get it.
When we laugh, we exercise our facial muscle and it is like a massage from the inside out.It also reduce bodily or mental pains and we become more hopeful and optimistic .This is because when we laugh our body create endorphins, a chemical that make us in high spirit.
Learn to laugh at ourselves.Laugh at our own mistakes, laugh at the traffic jam and laugh at our worries.Ha Ha Ha keep laughing until it becomes real.First thing in the morning, look infront of the mirror and laugh out loud.
If you think this is ridiculous, just watch the video clip below.There are now people making money teaching people how to laugh.There are many laughter clubs,laughter clinics and laughter therapies been set up which people pay money to learn how to laugh.Instead of spending money and learn from them,we can practice this ourselves and make it a habit to laugh every morning, whether fake or real laughter.Try it, we have nothing to lose by laughing,furthermore it is contagious and it makes other people happy too.If we do this sufficient number of times, it will become  a habit pattern,although at first we may feel ackward.When we have the habit of laughing,positive and happy thoughts will always be with us.We will become joyful and people around us will become comfortable and happy and like to be with us.
Before I end my posting here is a quote by Mahatma Gandhi

"HAPPINESS IS WHEN WHAT YOU THINK,WHAT YOU SAY AND WHAT YOU DO IS IN HARMONY"

Have a happy weekend and remember first thing in the morning tomorrow,look at yourself infront of the mirror and laugh out Ha Ha Ha a few times.







Thursday 24 May 2012

Happiness-Part 2

In my previous posting,I talked about worries,fears and other negative thoughts which makes us unhappy.This morning, I came across a nice quote by a person name Shantideva.It goes like this ""If you can solve your problem, then what is the need of worrying? If you cannot solve it, then what is the use of worrying?"
Happiness is a state of mind.It is nothing technical and it is not a skill that need to be acquired.Happiness does not always depend on external factors,it is governed by our mental attitude.Happiness,infact is a decision.There are some people who are always happy and positive in life,despite facing certain unfavourable situations and limitations.They dont depend on others to be happy and they focus on what they have and they strive to do better,instead of blaming life is unfair to them.
Some people think that they will only be happy if they are rich,own a big house and a nice car.Some even think that they will be happy if they were to be like someone else.They compare themselves with others and they feel inferior about themselves.It is a grave mistake if we compare ourselves with others.It is better to compare where we are now and what we are capable of becoming and set reasonable life goals so that we can work towards a better life for ourselves.
People often relate success to financial achievement.They always think that the rich and famous are alway successful but they do not realize that these people do have their own problems.We have always read news about the rich and famous committed suicide, sufferring from diseases and having family and marriage breakdown.Success is not defined by how rich or how famous we are.These people may be financially successful but they lead an unbalance life.They do not have inner peace, what they are lacking are balance and harmony in life, between the body,mind and the soul.
To be happy in life we must have something to live for, having a purpose in life.Happiness is an emotion and we feel happy when we accomplished something.It is a form of reward for having set our goals and then getting what we want.As mentioned earlier,what we should strive for is balance and harmony in life.Besides financial goals,we should also not neglect other areas like mental,health,family, social and spiritual goals.By setting these goals,we have have a clearer direction  which will take us on a journey to attain "success" as defined by attaining the balance and harmony in life.We must set goals based on reasonable expectations and they need not be complicated goals for a start.
Some examples are as follows:

Mental goals: Reading motivational books, attending seminars or self improvement courses.
Health goals: Exercise program,diet and nutrition control.
Emotional goals: Anger management, develop courage, becoming more understanding.
Financial goals: Improve income,saving and investment.
Family goals: Quality time with family members
Social goals: Meeting long lost friends,knows other better,meeting people we like .

Setting these goal will be meaningless if we dont plan them properly and act on them with certain timeline.However, it is inevitable that we will always face problems in whatever goals we want to achieve.Being happy doesn't mean that we have no problems in life but to have mental strengths to focus on solutions to our problems.We might be worry about failures or not not able to achieve what we want in life, but we can take comfort that every steps and actions that we take we are actually moving closer to what we want.Failure is nothing but a sign that tell us that there is a better way of doing things.Soichiro Honda said this:

"MANY PEOPLE DREAM OF SUCCESS.TO ME,SUCCESS CAN BE ACHIEVED ONLY THROUGH REPEATED FAILURE AND INTROSPECTION.INFACT,SUCCESS REPRESENTS THE 1 PERCENT OF YOUR WORK THAT RESULTS FROM 99 PERCENT THAT IS CALLED FAILURE"

I will continue on my next posting.







Wednesday 23 May 2012

My First Posting-Happiness Part 1

I created this blog a year ago but had never taken any initiative to start writing any articles or posting.I had too many excuses not to write, I don't know what to write and how to write etc etc etc.
I finally took the first step to start writting when one of my friends advised me not to bother so much about what to write as long as it is something which I feel comfortable to write about or something which I feel I would like to share with others.A good blogger is not necessary a professional writer and as long as people understand what we write,any grammar and vocabulary mistakes should not be a concern.
With his encouragement,my 'journey' into the blogging world begins and I am happy that finally I have fulfilled something that I had wanted to do for a long time.Since I am an avid fan of motivational and inspirational books, I will start my first posting on the topic about HAPPINESS.


 Human beings can design tall buildings,build bridges, rockets and can even send people to the moon.Doctors and Scientists have even discovered breakthrough in medical researches and created new vaccines that can cure onced uncurable diseases.And yet, most people don't know how to become happy even though happiness is nothing technical like rocket sciences and happiness is just a state of mind.How ironic ! Maybe, we are living in a stressful world where we are often bombarded by the media with scary messages about energy, economy,pollution,murders,nuclear war,doomsday and etc.We feel disturbed, concerned and anxious and that affected our behaviour and outlook for the future.
When we have negative thoughts, our mind will be having mental pictures of the things that we do not want.This will haunt us day and night if we do not know how to manage these thoughts.
There are certain things in life which we have no control of, so why waste time worrying about those things that will  make us feel miserable? Infact a lot of things that we worry about in life may never even going to happen at all.
Life of course is not always bed of roses.We do experienced some disturbing thoughts at times also, like fear of losing a job or someone close, fear of business failure,worry about examinations, worry about not enough money etc etc etc.In situation like this, we have to accept what it is and face it squarely.Acceptance does not mean just remaining as what and where we are.Acceptance means realising that we must take actions to move to a higher level instead of complaining and blaming others.Instead of worrying about the darkness, we might as well light a candle.To turn things around, we must first 'make peace' with the situation, come out with action plans and strategies and have faith in ourselves to overcome the challenges in life.Hold your head high, face the problems or challenges and say " I will bigger than you.You cannot defeat me".Easier said than done right? hahaha.
If we still think life has been unfair to us, just watch the video clip below and see how this person instead of blaming and complaining about his handicap, he chose to "accept" his situation and do something to move to a higher level.
I will continue Part 2 in my next posting.Before I end ,here is a quote from Andrew Matthews

THE HAPPIEST PERSON DON'T BOTHER WHETHER LIFE IS FAIR.THEY JUST CONCENTRATE ON WHAT THEY HAVE.