Summary – The problem is to start

When I want to write an article here, there is always just one problem to it. It was to sit down and start.

Yesterday the mrs and I went to Tampin, about 50km from home just to browse for a thing or two. Basically just wanted to see Tampin :). Can you guess which process took the longest time? It was us getting ready to go. The journey was very smooth and we could get back with still some sunshine over our head.

It is apparent that in almost anything that we do, the most important steps is NOT researching how to do it, NOT how to do it. It’s when you are going to start. Don’t you agree?

If we can establish this as the key problem… and do something about it, I am quite confident that most of our work will be accomplished efficiently

Whenever there is work to do, just move your arm and do it. To start the work is actually the hardest thing to do. The rest will come naturally

When there is homework/assignment in front of us waiting to be done, it can only be done if we take the pen and do it. Simple… Thinking about what other activity can be done at the time will not finish the work, Reading blogs will not be helpful either.. (That’s what I’m doing most of the time hehe)

There’s a saying that “you fail to plan means that you plan to fail”. But I supposed an extension of that quote should be “but if your planning process take forever, it’s better that you fail. At least you learn something from it.”

A lengthy quote will never work. 🙂

– I wonder –
How to find the balance between planning carefully before doing a task and just start the task and plan along the way? Which do you agree?

————– Personal Note ————-
I went to Tampin to find myself and the mrs a red Baju Melayu for DaPocket’s wedding this February. However we didn’t find any… Not that we are looking very hard. We were just taking an evening drive 🙂

I just realized that the town is claimed by both state Negeri Sembilan and Melaka.

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Summary – Habit forming tips

It’s been 3 days of no updates here in LessonInLife and you know what, I actually felt like I lost something the entire time. I guess that’s how much I now enjoy blogging and your company. Thanx to all friends visitting.

With that I must admit that there is some truth to the phrase “Anything you did consistentlly for 40 days will become a habit.” Have you ever heard of such phrase? For example when I started blogging, I’ve gone through all the procrastination phase and fatigue. but I manage to follow my schedule of blogging and alhamdulillah, things are now getting easier and forgotting to blog is already an impossible things to do.

So can I ask, do you have anything to be made a habit? Maybe cycling, jogging or even solat? Well these tips may help a bit

• Choose one habit to work on.. Just one
• Write down the advantage of having it as a habit. The aim is to be a motivation for you to keep doing the habit. So try every methods you’re comfortable with, maybe motivational pictures or cycling partner.
• Schedule a specific time to do the habit. The reason we often forget, is because we don’t know when to actually do the habit. I personally will take about 30 minutes before I go to bed to post an article here. So whenever I’m going to bed, I will instantly remember to blog
• Just do it for 40 days.
• Keep track of how many days you have been following your plan. Remember, we aim to do it for 40 days

Secret tips

• #1 – Don’t be hard on yourself. If you miss a day, Don’t be stressed about it. Just continue the next day.
• #2 – There are only two things that will corrupt a habit and if you know these two, the better the chances you will succeed – Procrastination and Fatigue

– I wonder –
Have you ever succeeded maintaining a habit? Care to share your success story?

———— Personal Note ————
Why there isn’t any update in this blog for the past three days? Well to tell you the truth, I’ve bought my dream laptop last Friday and I’ve been very busy setting it up and transfering all files from my former pc.

I consider it a dream laptop not because of its specification. It is just a cheap low end one. It is because owning a laptop has always been a dream to me. InsyaAllah now I will be able to blog everyday… YEY!!!

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Summary –  The more we work, the more work we found

Wow.. 2 days of maintenance.. And still so much work to do. I have great plans for this blog. However unlike other pro-blogger, they dedicated all their time to blogging. I unfortunately still have a long way to go.

Isn’t it weird sometimes, when the more we work on a thing, the more work we found need to be done. For example, we were to service a car.. It should be a simple oil change, but when checked.. we found out that the tyre has already worn out, the balancing and allignment is all out.

Is the problem not there in the first place? of course no… the problem was definitely there before we want to do the servicing. But they were only detected after we do proper check.

So what should we do? Unfortunately… most people prefer to just ignore the problem by not going to do the servicing at all. This way, they feel like there is no problem with the car and everything will be ok. This is a typical reply – “Buat apa check kereta, nanti mesti jumpa banyak problem.. duit lagi”.. don’t you agree this is our Malaysian attitude?

Now.. is that even safe? logically, the problem will not disappear just because we choose to ignore it, that’s why the problem will worsen at the most critical time, and maybe.. I repeat maybe, that’s why we have so many accident case here in Malaysia

So what actually we should do? These are some ways that I think may help.

• Regular check must be scheduled. This is a must. Any problem arises must be jotted down and schedule the repair for that arising problem in other time

• Always prepare our mind to do a bit extra in anything we do, For example, servicing the car might only cause RM50, So prepare RM100 in hand everytime we service the car, should there is any extra repair.

• That money, if not used, must be put into a “tabung” specifically for car maintenance.

• Anything.. if seen in its big picture, will look big. So try to see it in pieces. For examples, the car has 12 problems. Maybe we can do one problem per month. Of course the most critical one first. It will not look difficult right?

• Plan ahead. Problem is often feel very heavy when you suddenly encounter it. Suddenly the foreman tell you that your car is going to explode in 2 weeks if your do not do the repair. Of course you will feel the burden. By planning ahead, you know exactly what to do and what to expect

• Knowledge knowledge knowledge… Your car may just have some wiring problem, but you change the whole lightbulb just because the foreman told you so. That is not very wise

The list is based on the example of a car. But truthfully, any problem and work is the same. The more work we do, the more work we usually found need to be done, Typical examples are like, studying (the more we study, the more we don’t know), getting to know your fiance (the more you try to figure him/her out, the more you feel clueless) etc. So try to adapt the list into other problems in hand.

Any other ways we can change that Elephant-sized problem to Mouse-sized problem?

—————- Personal Note ————-
My flu has still not recovered. It’s already two days. I guess it started when I have to dive into the river that day to check on a pipe. Heheh it was fun. Getting paid just to “Mandi Sungai” but the river is not that clear, it is more like a “Teh Tarik” sort of river.

I wonder whether there are any job that pay us RM10k for “mandi sungai”? 🙂

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Summary – Commitment is like “Bara Api”I guess it’s very true what our Prophet Muhammad said before. Generally translated as “Holding on to a commitment is like holding a burning-red stone (bara api)” The pain is not on the holding the stone, but on the time we can hold the stone.Hundreds of examples can be picked from Ramadhan, but the truth is.. thousands more can be seen from our everyday’s life.

• Exam week – any seconds pass by we are reminded automatically to grab a book and study, but when the exam is over, the sight of book itself is demoralizing (good ol times hehe)

• When the Department of Environment is coming the next week, I am able to work non-stop preparing all the documentation, and oversee the mill compliance (And not for just one day, for the whole one week…) but when nobody’s coming.. heh 🙂

So how do you hold on to that burning stone? Here’s a few ideas

» Read the rest of the entry..

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