We do not need perfection, but we do need completeness!

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Dear Readers,

Thank you for coming here!

Life is fair. When you stop giving a fuck about something, you will get time and energy for something else.

So I had time to catch up with friends again.

It is nice to get updated on their lives and work. Furthermore, I get answers to some of my questions I have been struggling with.

Last but not least, I get inspired.

One of them told me this during a chat:

We do not need perfection, but we do need completeness!

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What does this mean?

Perfection means we live in a perfect world where everything turns out perfect for us.

Completeness, on the other hand, means we get to experience all sorts of things, incidents and feelings.

It includes both perfection and imperfection. (No one can challenge the MECE-ness of this statement. Haha!)

That means things may turn out perfect from time to time. 

More importantly, that means we will surely experience hurt, frustration and now knowing what to do, etc etc

Otherwise, completeness is not achieved.

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A life that is incomplete is a life wasted, at least to some extent. 

And only after we have experienced them all, can we say our lives are complete!

Therefore, with that in mind, let’s expect and welcome all the positive and negative things in life and focus on the experiences.

 

Till next time!

My Market Transactions — Wk34 2022

 

Photo by Micheile Henderson on Unsplash

Dear Readers,

Thank you for coming here!

Transaction for past week: Nil

 

Again, I am warming up. But it seems that the warm up will continue. I am just not sure about the market now.

Have a great week!!!

Random Thoughts — Life Approaches

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Dear Readers,

Thank you for coming here!

There are so many ways one can live his/her life, especially now where basic needs are met for the majority of people.

While feeling happy and lucky about the freedom to choose, many of us cannot help wondering which approach would be best.

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Take me for example.

I always know that I am not the self-motivated or self-disciplined type. So I try my best to surround myself with better people so that I feel the pressure to keep making efforts.

That was really the reason why I got into consulting.

That was also the reason why I have not settled when I could.

This approach yields benefits for sure.

By large, I believe I am much better off, compared to if I had settled before, not only financially, but also in terms of personal growth.

This approach also comes with draw-backs, of course.

I could not find my own pace since I am always playing catch-up. Therefore, I am never really confident or relaxed or happy.

Also I could not build up enough expertise in any area since once I get comfortable with an area, I am already looking for the next “opportunity” or “Challenge”.

The draw-backs might prove fatal in the long term due to lack of confidence/happiness and irreplaceable core skills.

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I wish I could live my life twice and compare my current approach with the one where I just settle.

But that is maybe the beauty of life. After all, life would be so boring if we knew what exactly would happen.

Therefore:

1. Play along and try our best, because that is within our power to control
2. Do not dwell too much on the outcomes, because that is out of our control

 

Till next time!

Monthly Net-Worth Update — Aug 2022

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Dear Readers,

Thank you for coming here!

Here is the snapshot of our Total Net-Worth for Aug 2022.

 

Net-Worth increase from last month: 5K SGD, -0.41KG Gold

My stock portfolio dropped again, eating up almost all our salary income.

The increase was really just CPF and some interests.

And we are worth less Gold because the price increased by more than 3%.

Photo by 金 运 on Unsplash

Investment: -16.04% annualized return, incl. dividend

More hard work is needed to make up the loss.

 

Till next time!

My Market Transactions — Wk33 2022

 

Photo by Micheile Henderson on Unsplash

Dear Readers,

Thank you for coming here!

Transaction for past week: Nil

 

Again, I am warming up.

Have a great week!!!

We become what we choose to focus on

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Dear Readers,

Thank you for coming here!

We become what we choose to focus on.

We can choose to focus on living a even more relaxing life;

We can choose to focus on making more money;

We can choose to focus on building something for the World and leaving our mark;

We can choose to focus on everyday life;

We can choose to focus on our emotions;

… …

Whatever we choose to focus on draws our attention, time and energy and we will get closer to it.

And it is a matter of time before we talk, smell, walk and shit like that specific type.

Photo by Chaitanya Tvs on Unsplash

It could be hard to choose what to focus on.

We might struggle between what we really want (assuming we know, which is a big IF) and what we are required of (like providing for family) or even what we are expected of (like success as society/culture defines it).

Once we have chosen what to focus on, it could be hard to stick to it.

A lot of factors are at play here too.

But one helpful way is to get into a circle with similar focus.

In the circle, we get the right atmosphere to stick to our focus and we might get help when needed.

All that makes it easier for us to stick to it and sometimes can be the difference between making it through and giving up half way.

Photo by Mohamed Nohassi on Unsplash

I choose to focus on breakthroughs. 

Breakthroughs in Career: holding positions I have never held before and delivering ever growing scopes and responsibilities

Breakthroughs in Financial Freedom: building a growing portfolio to achieve financial freedom

Breakthroughs in Family: raising a happy family and responsible kids.

If you have similar focus or choose to have similar focus, follow me and I will continue sharing my progresses and thoughts along the way!

 

Till next time!

“You do not go from being you to being me, without your ass being kicked a lot, all the time!”

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Dear Readers,

Thank you for coming here!

I watched the movie “The Adam Project”. 

The movie is just another typical pop-corn show. Watching it once is enough.

But there is a line in the movie that I really like:

You do not go from being you to being me, without your ass being kicked a lot, all the time!

This is what 40-ish Adam told 8-year old Adam when the latter blamed the former for not helping him against those school bullies.

40-ish Adam is strong and brave enough to do crazy things, like giving up everything to save his wife.

8-year old Adam is small in size, sad and has to suffer from school bullies.

Photo by Ben White on Unsplash

There is a lot of truth in the line.

People do not improve drastically unless they were put through hardship.

Simply put, No pain, no gain.

Many people would rather not experience the pain. That is totally understandable.

But life is bitch. The pain will happen to us sooner or later.

All we can do is make sure we do not suffer for nothing.

If we are going to get our asses kicked, we just make sure we grow stronger each time that happens.

 

Till next time!

My Market Transactions — Wk32 2022

Photo by Micheile Henderson on Unsplash

Dear Readers,

Thank you for coming here!

Transaction for past week: Nil

 

Again, I am warming up.

Have a great week!!!

Running and a Grandpa

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Dear Readers,

Thank you for coming here!

After so many years and so many tries, I finally brought myself to some running.

I started in the neighborhood park in a sunny afternoon around 4pm.

I did my warm-up and started running.

Right after I started, I passed by a Grandpa who was walking while swinging his arms in the same park.

After a short while of running, I had to stop, which was expected because I had not run or done any exercise for so long.

So I stopped running and started walking.

Photo by Isaac Wendland on Unsplash

Shortly after, I noticed some footsteps behind me. I turned around and saw the Grandpa I just passed by.

He was still walking while swinging his arms. 

He has caught up with just walking in his own pace, feeling relaxed, while I was breathing heavily and sweating all over and had to consciously remind myself to walk faster.

In case you are wondering, he could not have taken any shortcut. I was pretty much running in a straight line.

Photo by Steven Lelham on Unsplash

So the take-away is that life is a Marathon, not a sprint. We all need to find our pace and stick to it and then time will be on our side.

And time always works magic!

 

Till next time!

Happy 57th Birthday!

Photo by Max Oh on Unsplash

 

Enjoy the break, everybody :)

 

Photo by Rogan Yeoh on Unsplash

 

My Market Transactions — Wk31 2022

 

 

 

Photo by Micheile Henderson on Unsplash

Dear Readers,

Thank you for coming here!

Transaction for past week: Nil

 

Again, I am warming up.

Have a great week!!!

OMG! Youtube Ads!

Photo by Szabo Viktor on Unsplash

Dear Readers,

Thank you for coming here!

Oh My Gosh! The ads are putting Youtube right at the edge of being unusable to me.

Two unskippable ads upfront + frequent ads during the video + ever repeating ads banner at the bottom…

I just had to switch it off.

The experiences reminded me nothing but the TV experiences when I was young.

In China, TV programs are free and some small stations (usually at the county-level) just bombarded audiences with ads to break even. Sometimes, we had to watch 1-hour ads for 5 mins of the show, to the point I could not even recognize the show.

People gave them up the first chance they got and before long these county-level stations were all closed down by “Policy”.

Having experienced that, I for sure wont put myself in that situation again.

Luckily, I have more options than I did back then.

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For Youtube, I completely understand it is profit seeking. This is not only Youtube, but also the millions of Youtubers. In my opinion, they probably should have done this a long time back.

As an average user, I know I can get rid of the ads by paying a little money. But why would I do that? I am trying to cut down screen time any way.

So in that sense, this could be good for average users, slowing the progress of us completely turning into data source for the algorithms.

 

Till next time!

$5 noodles vs $500 red wine

From Author

 

Dear Readers,

Thank you for coming here!

$5 instant noodles and $500 red wine do not usually mix.

As a matter of fact, their mix is only made possible under rare and specific situations, which cannot be expected to repeat.

Now that we cannot have them both, the question is which one we choose and at what price.

That is a choice that is more important to some than others.

That is a choice that is more difficult to some than others.

The importance and difficulty of that choice even changes to the same person in his/her different stages of life.

Nevertheless, it is still a choice that many will need to make.

I am at the cross road.

Photo by Mike Enerio on Unsplash

Till next time!