Summary – 10 lines you can say to yourself after a failure

I am not perfect. Even though I write a personal development blog, it doesn’t mean that I am the most developed person on the planet. We will always be in the process to be slightly better everyday. That’s exactly what this blog is all about

Personal development is just like life. It doesn’t matter whether you will end up a prime minister or a clerk, what matter is how you get there. And along this journey, some mistakes are bound to happen.

I confess that I procrastinate once in a while (Ok, maybe a lot), I sometimes manage my finance poorly (bought an external drive when I don’t actually need it). My point is, despite my articles that describe how to combat procrastinate and good financial tips, I can still make mistake and I can sometimes fail to follow my own advice.

This is where it becomes a problem. For the average guy like us, each failure can have some effect like depression, stress etc. How then can we effectively come back from a failure. For example, how can I remanage my finance after an out of control shopping spree? Should I start back from zero? Or is there any other way?

These are some suggestion on how to make that come back; a few examples of lines you can say to yourself to reset your life after a failure.

1) Behold! My experiment on making mistakes has completed. Procrastination really takes about half of your life.

10) Get up and just do something

Conclusion

We all fail ourselves at some point in life. We have two options. Making the come back easier or harder for us. The answer should be obvious – Always aim to make things easier for you.

– I wonder –
What do you say to yourself after a failure?

————– Personal Note ———–
I have a friend who diet. And whenever she failed to follow her diet and ate fatty food, she would literally torture herself by vomitting it all out. She would then be upset and depressed with the failure that even a stranger will be able to see it in her face.

Believe me, nothing good can come from this self torture. So stop it already.

Photo Credit – Hamed Masoumi

Summary – Spoon-Feeding Effect of Reading

For the record, I love reading. Always have and always will. There’s no substitute to reading. It is the only portal to knowledge. If you want knowledge and wisdom, reading is the way to go. I’m not debating this so rest assured that you are not going to read about the benefit of reading today.

However, there is one side effect of reading that you really must know. If I can name it, I will call it Spoon-Feeding Effect of Reading. It is when you read a book, and you just believe and absorb everything you just read without ever drawing any conclusion from it.

For example, John is reading a book about politics. As we all know, the political stand of the author will always be mirrored in a book about politics. John had absorbed everything he read from the book that he is now an exact clone of the author when it comes to political stand.

This is one of the side effect of reading that you must know before attempting to read anything. You must never absorb everything the author wrote and make it your opinion.

You may ask, “what harm can this do?”. Well quite a lot actually. You could end up with these effects.

• No creativity – How creative can you be if you are nodding to everything the author gave you.

• Non-critical mind – You will need critical mind, when it comes to making good decision or brainstorming.

• Lazier mind – The mind is like any other muscle in your body. You exercise them, it gets stronger. Vice versa.

• No individuality – Have you ever met a person, and you notice immediately that he is different from the rest of us. He stands out naturally. That is because he is not a clone of anyone.

Reading will always be the best way to learn. But you should also know the best way to read. What you should consider when reading a book are as follows:

• Read the book.

• Try to grasp the message in the book.

• Search your mind for your own opinion about the topic at hand.

• Compare notes between the message and yours. The author can’t be always right and he can’t also be always wrong.

• Draw your own conclusion to the matter.

You may find these steps very simple, but you will be surprised to know that almost all readers fail to practise them. It is always easier to take the author’s word for it.

Conclusion

Books and blogs are usually written by smart people. And the readers are usually very keen to learn more about the subject from these smart people. What better way to be smarter than to learn it from smart people. You just need to make it a habit to develop your own conclusion from anything you read.

Your conclusion can be wrong. It can also turn out to be a smarter approach. What ever it is, it will always be yours. Nothing beats that.

– I wonder –
Besides fiction, what other types of books do you read?

———— Personal Note —————
I remember when I was a child, people often asked what my hobby was? I will then answered almost immediately, “Reading”. I guess reading was just the easiest answer or maybe I knew that people will stop asking when you answered “Reading”.

Photo Credit – Lin Pernille

There are thousands of tips in the internet about how to sleep. This article will be another addition to the vast collection. But what makes this article different from the rest?

The techniques described here are taken fully from my experience. And I can guarantee you that it works, at least for me. I have no problem taking power nap for as short as 10 minutes and I will feel refreshed immediately after that as if I have slept for 3 hours. This is how I do it.

1) Put up “Do Not Disturb” sign

Whenever I want to take a nap, I always make sure that there will be nothing disturbing me. My cell phone will be set to silent, The Mrs will be informed so that she will take care of everything when I’m taking the nap. In short, you are not supposed to wake up before 10 minutes in a nap.

2) Say “I want to sleep” in three level

First, I will say it out loud. Of course, do not be too loud. You don’t want to ruin the moment. Level number 2 is in the mind. I will think about the phrase in my mind. Level 3 is actually still in the mind but I convince myself that it is another deeper level (The Subconcious Mind). With that said, I will close my eyes.

Our mind is one of the most amazing object in the universe. You want something, you ask for it, and the mind will give it to you. The problem with most people, is that they don’t really want to sleep. They are still thinking about matters at work, or worse – figuring out why they cannot sleep. If you want to think about a problem, make a special session for it – a thinking session at another place another time. Taking a nap or sleep must always be a sacred place where we can find peace with ourself.

Don’t get me wrong, solving problem while sleeping is actually recommended. But all you need to do is to explain to your mind the summary of your problem, and sleep on it. (11 Missing Steps of Problem Solving You Probably Don’t Know)

3) Enjoy the show

Have you ever sit on a couch, watching commercial on television but you are not paying attention? You can see the commercial, hear the music but if people ask you to explain it, you will have no idea what you have been watching.

This is exactly what you should do when you close your eyes. Let go of your mind remote control. What ever your mind flashes to you, just watch it come and go. Do not pay attention to it and never try to control the images.

Believe me, this works everytime for me. I will fall asleep without even knowing when.

Conclusion

The secret to sleeping is actually to let go of your concious mind and let subconcious mind take over.

• Step 1 will ensure that there will be no external interference in the process.
• Step 2 will trigger subconcious mind to take over.
• Step 3 will help letting go of your subconcious mind.

– I wonder –
What do you do to help you sleep?

———– Personal Note ————
One of my brother is even more amazing. He can fall asleep in mere seconds. I know because I can hear him snore seconds after we pause our conversation. It’s either he is that amazing or I am amazingly boring. I refuse to believe the latter.

Photo Credit – Mayr

Today I wrote two entries – My 3 Secrets To Fall Asleep In 10 Minutes Top and this personal rant.

For readers who were actually following my quest for Wimax, it is with great pleasure for me to announce that Alor Setar in Kedah is now covered by wimax. This is good news for me because I am a Kedahan. The bad news is that I am currently not working in Kedah. Well, at least, whenever I go back home to Kedah, I know for certain that it is now covered.

For the benefit of everyone reading (who is interested), I’m going to update the wimax coverage here in this post. Since I always visited the site checking for new coverage, I might as well put up a post to update it here. (Last Updated on 12/12/08)

Kedah

• Alor Setar

Johor

• Johor Bharu
• Taman Setia, JB
• Taman Suria, JB

Selangor

• Subang Jaya
• Sunway
• USJ
• Shah Alam
• Klang
• Paramount Garden
• Bandar Utama
• Sunway Damansara
• Petaling Jaya

Kuala Lumpur

• KLCC
• Setapak
• Gombak Jaya
• Sentul
• Kampung Baru
• Segambut
• Bangsar Baru
• Chan Sow Lin
• Taman Maluri
• Pandan Jaya

This list will be updated at least once a week if there is any update in the official wimax coverage