Positive Countdown

Summary – The Positive Countdown Technique
Tick Tock Tick Tock

Everyone knows the importance of time. It is so important that time is one of the most discussed subject since well, the beginning of time. Brilliant people have actually come up with a lot of time management tips to maximize the usage of time. A few that immediately come to mind is the use of scheduling, 80/20 Rule, etc.

Personally, I don’t think it matters how much time we have, what matters is what we do with the time we have. You can be 1000 years old (like some of the fictional characters in movies) but if all you did was watching television all day long, you are then no better than a 30 years old who has make his first million.

I’m sure by now we can all agree that time is very important to us. But why is it that what we do everyday doesn’t show that we truly value time? We still wake up very late every weekend just to “recover some lost sleep” (which by the way we never lost). We still don’t know what to achieve with our life and we are already 30 years old.

The Positive Countdown

We have to admit that we are not really giving time the appreciation it deserve. In this desperate time, I have to resort to an ancient technique that may help us appreciate time better. A technique I personally call “The Positive Countdown”.

Assuming you are 30 years old. And assuming you will live until you are 75 years old. That means you only have about 45 years to do everything you want to do, and accomplish everything you can accomplish. That’s 16,425 days.

Now convert that days to Dollar. You are now left with $16,425 to spend. That’s not much money, don’t you agree? We really can’t do much with it.

The next step is to write that amount of money on your whiteboard and every day when you wake up just minus one from the board. Memorize the amount and think how will you spend your $1 of the day.

Anything you do that day must be worthy and that you will have no regret losing one day of your life to it.

The Idea Behind This Technique

  • We will usually get our boost of motivation when we know that the deadline is near.
  • We can see money, we can’t see time. We appreciate money, we apparently don’t appreciate time. So by thinking of time in term of money, hopefully we will be able to associate that feeling of losing money to losing time.
  • The technique is named Positive Countdown because, there are two ways to observe death, positive and negative way. A negative person will look at death in such a way, that there’s no point of doing anything since we are all going to die anyway. A positive person will look at it differently by planning the best way to live his life.
  • For the technique to work, you must constantly be reminded of how much money you now have, and what you are going to do with your $1 of the day.

– I wonder –
Any other techniques to make us value time more?

———– Personal Note ———–
I wrote an article as a guest contributor to Lifehack.org. Tell me what do you think 🙂

Photo Credit – Michael Fillion


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The Secret To Infinite Energy To Do Anything

Summary – Newton’s First Law of Thermodynamics
Let me share you a secret. A secret about a technique that if done correctly, you can literally find energy to do anything you want. You can finish up your work, and still have the energy to play with your children (We all know this require infinite amount of energy). And after the children went to bed, you can continue doing your other chores with the energy as if you just woke up from bed.

Interested? Now if only you can wired $20 for the secret to my bank account, I will email you the secret.

I’m just kidding. But don’t you think this unlimited energy is worth all the money in the world. I do. I sometimes feel so tired at work, it doesn’t make any sense since my work does not require me to do a lot of physically demanding things. And how many times have you seen a construction worker that works almost 15 hours daily doing heavy lifting most of the time, and still they can come back tomorrow for more work.

The fact is this energy comes from the mind. We all know this. Now let me share with you the correct way to harness this power.

I’m referring to the first law of thermodynamics – The Conservation of Energy. According to Newton, energy cannot be created and destroyed. It can only be transfered from one form of energy to another.

Obviously Newton was referring to the actual energy like heat, electrical, solar etc. I am just extending the law to cover our mind energy. First a disclaimer, this is just a personal application of the theory. You should never use this concept in real life physics examination.

The Mistake We Did
That said, this is what we usually do, We are feeling very tired after an 8 hour of work, the children at home are waiting to play with you. It’s the only time they see you all day so we can’t really blame them. When we reached home, we make a mistake of trying to create energy. We try to summon any energy left in our body to just entertain them. And according to Newton’s First Law, this is not possible. And that is why we will feel even more tired after that.

The Secret Is…
The secret to unlimited amount of energy is actually to transfer them from one form of energy to another. How else do you think that construction workers gain their energy. They kept reminding themselves that the money is for their family back home, and that if they didn’t work, they will not be able to provide education for their children. They are actually drawing their energy from their responsibility and love for family. And that is why they will still have the energy to entertain their children when they go back after work. They are at the time drawing the energy from the happiness brought by the children’s smile and laughter.

Just like singers getting their energy from the crowd, or a father carrying his sick children to the hospitals on foot. These are all real evidence that such energy transfer really exist. We just need to apply it in our life and voila, you are going to be amazed with the things you do.

So will everyone else.

– I wonder –
Where else can we find our source of energy to be transfered?

———- Personal Note ———–
This is my new source of energy. My 3-months old Zafirah.

Zafirah

Photo Credit – Suchitraprints


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I wrote two entries today The Secret to Infinite Energy In Life and this personal rant. 🙂 Maybe you can read the first entry first for more energy for this one.

This is another entry to complement my quest for a better internet connection. For those readers from Malaysia, I just heard that P1 has officially launched their Wimax services. Now everyone can subscribe to them (provided you are in their coverage area of course) and experience first hand the speed of a wimax connection. These are some of the points I can summarize from their website.

Bad News

  • Currently the coverage is only to KL and Selangor. I hope they will fulfill their promise to cover the whole west side of Malaysia by year end.
  • The modem itself is RM999. That is rather expensive for the average person like me.

Good News

  • You will get the modem FREE if you subscribe to it within the launch promotion (20/8/08 to 30/09/08). If you ever want to subscribe, this will be the best time.
  • The monthly charges is relatively cheap. They are as low as RM 49 per month for a 400kbps. I’m currently using GPRS connection, paying RM90 for a 40Kbps. You can see right why I’m posting this.
  • They are other promotional discounts for 1.2Mbps and 2.4Mbps subscribers.
  • 15 Days Service Satisfaction Guarantee. If you are not satisfied with the service, you can opt to unsubscribe.
  • I just noticed that they have a nationwide option in the package. I think this just prove that nationwide coverage is just around the corner. Please God make the corner nearer.

For those who are in the coverage areas, I don’t see any reason why you shouldn’t try wimax. It is relatively cheap, faster, wireless, comes with a guarantee, and above all, the modem is now FREE

I envy you

More information on the package at P1.com.my

Update – I found this advertisement posted on Youtube. I think this is a not yet aired advertisement of the service. If only everything is wireless 🙂


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Creating A Shortcut In Your Thinking Process

Summary – When the mind thinks too much, choose the best obvious solution.
A common sense question, two guys were in Malaysia. Both of them need to go to Japan. The first guy took a flight to the west, making stops at India, Africa, USA and finally crosssed the Pacific Ocean to Japan. Another took a flight straight to Japan. Assuming both of them departed at the same time, who will reach Japan first?

Obvious isn’t it? Of course it’s the guy who took the flight straight to Japan. We don’t even need to explain why. We are actually more curious as to why the first guy travelled around the world to reach Japan..

Taking the longer way to reach a destination easily reached via another way is laughable. But why are we doing the same thing with our mind?

If we are told to take out the garbage. Why are we making so much effort to procrastinate it, or to avoid doing it. We told ourselves that we are going to do it when we are going out later, but when it’s time to go out, we tried to forget the task. After a week, the garbage was starting to smell and then only we took it out.

In the end, we still need to do it because nobody else is living with us. Why can’t we just take it out when the task first appear.

However, this article is NOT about procrastination. It’s about our way of thinking that we need to review. We tend to think the more complex way in every situation. Allow me to elaborate via these examples :

Example 1 – You miss your boyfriend. You want to hear his voice.

  • The complex mind will say – If I call him, he will think I’m desperate. But if I didn’t call him, he may think that I’m no longer interested with him. When is the last time I call him? Oh my God, it’s only yesterday. Am I calling him every day now? What’s wrong with me?
  • The simple mind will say – I know that in the end, I just want to hear his voice. (kring kring Hi I miss you.)

Example 2 – A teacher is asking a question. You think you know the answer.

  • The complex mind will say – What if I’m wrong? people will laugh at me, thinking I’m stupid. What if from that time on, when people look at me, they will start laughing. I will ruin my whole school life if I answered the question. But if I didn’t answer the question, how can I learn? Hm If I did answer it, and it turns out I’m correct, people will see I’m not just a pretty face. Or maybe they will think of me as a show off.
  • The simple mind will say – I know the answer, I should then answer the question. (The answer is D sir.)

Example 3 – Your supervisor just resigned. And you really want his position.

  • The complex mind will say – Should I apply? Isn’t this kind of promotion is internal, and the human resource will make their own decision on who will be qualified. I have been an assistant for some time, they should know that the best person for the job is me. But.. I wonder if my fellow colleague will think of me as self promoting if I applied for the position.
  • The simple mind will say – There’s a vacancy, I’m qualified and I want it. What am I still doing here (Hello, I have an appointment with the manager of human resource)

/end examples

The mind is naturally that way. You can’t change this. It will always wander around aimlessly. It’s your job though to know how to control it. Never try to stop thinking either. That will bring you more harm than good. It’s just that sometimes, when we notice that we are thinking too much, stop everything and just choose the best obvious solution.

Just like the guy flying to Japan. It’s so obvious, it can’t be wrong.

– I wonder –
Which are you? The complex mind or the simple mind?

———– Personal Note ————
It was my anniversary last Monday. Happy anniversary my dear mrs. 🙂 Thank you for the gift

Photo Credit – tetraconz


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