I started my day yesterday lazily. Very tyical routine, when suddenly a woman stopped me while I was riding my motorcycle to work. She is the teacher of the local kindergarten here.

Not that she is interested to know me, she actually wanted to tell me that there is a breaking and entering at the kindergarten last night.

I was shocked. What could the culprit possibly assume to find in a kindergarten? Money? Computer? guess what, the only thing missing were the stationery of the children – pencils, eraser, color pencils etc.. I’m not even sure if they can make money from that.

Another guess would be that they just feel like terrorizing someplace. And the kindergarten is unfortunately that someplace for the night. Can you believe this… people damaging other’s property simply because they feel like terrorizing?

Believe me, things will only get worse. The cuplrit possibly will upgrade their vandalism to other object, house or vehicles maybe.. and later on maybe on people and hence the raping or the mugging.

Now, we can’t change other people. But we can change ourselves. Make a conscious decision to avoid doing anything immoral, however little it is. All things bad started that way. An example, You make a habit of throwing rubbish everywhere. Soon, you will start thinking that the rubbish bin is of no use. It is better used as a mean of communication, and so you use that talent of yours to draw cryptic messages on the bin.

After a while, it seems that the cryptic message is just too cryptic, nobody understands it. So you changed them to a more familiar language, insult or cursing words.

That will lead to an angrier you, always cursing and swearing, and the thing you are most angry about is the rubbish bin. So you vandalise it, thinking that you are just making a good use to an unused bin.

You now eyed at other things… hm that kindergarten look interesting to vandalize, nobody will be harm, right?

/end example

It ALWAYs start with the most ridiculously small thing. What we can do is to stop right there. Stop throwing rubbish everywhere, Flush your toilet after use, Say thank you to the waitress attending to you etc.

It starts here

– I wonder –
What other small habits can we start right now?

I played a classic game of PACMAN today. Can I assume you are familiar with the game. It is a very complex (NOT) game of run and eat. I’m not even sure we are allowed to eat while running.

That is a very bad example and lesson to follow from the game. However there are some others that maybe useful to us. Lessons like –

1) Pacman’s mission are only two; to eat all the white dots and avoiding the chasing ghost. The same goes to us. In life there are generally only two ways to motivate people. The old stick and carrot. The bad things that may happen to us if we didn’t do, and the good things that happen if we did do.

So if you are searching for motivation, those two are definitely the first place to look for.

2) Running from the ghost is important, but the most important is to finish up the white dots. If not, pacman will only be running round and round endlessly.

We have a lot of goals in life, most of them are important. But there will always be one that is the most important. Identify this, and we will complete our life’s mission

3) Pacman is a very easy game. You should be able to remember the steps after a few try. And after a while, most probably you will be able to finish the game just by following your steps.

Some things in life, and I have to stress the word “SOME”, are very repetitive. After a while, you should be able to know the steps and whenever you meet the same condition, you will know what to do instantly.

Typical examples are like, how to do your job, or which attitude that you have which is not likable by people etc

4) Pacman is just a dot with a mouth, because that’s what he’s supposed to do, eat the white dot. The ghosts are given scary clothes and a pair of eye, because they need to follow pacman and scare him.

What we were given (the knowledge, experience, friends, jobs, whatever) are there for a reason. They are our assets. And assets must be cherished and used properly. How to use it properly.. that would be the one of the biggest question in life.

– I wonder –
I’m sure you played some computer games. Any lesson learnt from them?

————- Personal Note ———–
I used to be addicted to games. But I’m not into those first person game, (counterstrike etc). They make me dizzy. I prefer the adventure and RPG type :). One of my favorite all time game would be Planescape TormentAn RPG/adventure game about an immortal who had to find his identity and the true reason why he was being made an immortal

What’s your favorite computer game?

A little boy was doing his math homework.
He said to himself, “Two plus five, that son of a b**** is seven. Three plus six, that son of a b**** is nine….”

His mother heard what he was saying and gasped, “What are you doing?”
The little boy answered, “I’m doing my math homework, Mom.”

“And this is how your teacher taught you to do it?” the mother asked. “Yes,” he answered.

Infuriated, the mother asked the teacher the next day, “What are you teaching my son in math?”
The teacher replied, “Right now, we are learning addition.” The mother asked, “And are you teaching them to say two plus two, that son of a b**** is four?”

After the teacher stopped laughing, she answered, “What I taught them was, two plus two, THE SUM OF WHICH, is four.”

/end

Lesson learnt

• Be very careful when you speak to children. They may look like ignoring you but that their sharp ears are picking it all up.
• Teacher teaches, parent checks 🙂

It has been a practice here in LessonInLife.com for a casual Sunday, which generally means no heavy topic on Sunday.

Have a great weekend everyone

Life sure is beautiful, when you see it like that right? Only… most of the time beauty lies in the eyes of the beholder, Simply means, every people has a different definition of beauty. I’m sure you remember this classic story I’m about to rewrite 🙂

There was once a father, and son and a donkey. They were walking in the desert to go back to their home. The son was on the donkey and the father was walking.

They reached Village A. The villagers there looked at them and said, “That son is very inconsiderate, how could he ride comfortably on the donkey while his old father walks”. Hearing this, the father exchange place with his son, He was now on the donkey while the son was walking.

They reached village B. The villagers there looked at them and said, “That father sure is cruel. He make the son walks while he ride the donkey.” Hearing this, the father get off the donkey, and walk along side his son.

They reached village C. The villages there looked at them and laughingly said, “Those people are stupid. They have a donkey, and still they want to walk in this hot sun.” Again, hearing this, the two decided to both ride the donkey.

They reached village D. The villagers there looked at them and said, “Look at that, the two people are torturing the donkey. Poor donkey”

So the father said, “Come son, let’s carry the donkey instead”

/end story

Hehe I make that last one up. This is a very popular story. And hopefully you can see the message in it.

People will talk. There’s nothing we can do about it. There’s no way we can satisfy everyone. So what we can do, is to make sure we know what it is we are doing or what we stands for and hold on to that.

People can say you are beautiful, or you are ugly. But the most important thing is whether you think you are beautiful or ugly. As simple as that.

———– Personal Note ————–
On an unrelated matter, I had brought the mrs for a baby scan the other day. And I saw the baby for the first time, It was so exciting! 🙂 even though I’m not so sure what I saw from the scan but I definitely saw fingers hehe. According to the doctor, most probably it will be a baby girl. 🙂 YEY!!! It is the most beautiful thing I’ve ever seen.

Any suggestion for a baby girl name? (Serious question)