Tag: Robin Sharma

“Sometimes you have to get off track to discover a better track.”  #RobinSharma #ArtisanCoffeeHQ


Hey guys, What’s up?

Just had my Artisan Coffee flat white while talking to Alan about coffee, practice, giving back and other general points of life; which got the brain turning a little and got me thinking about today’s QOTD, got me looking back at the detours over the last few years, when life went Off Track.

How life isn’t always smooth sailing and that the ideal route isn’t the only route.

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“Sometimes you have to get off track to discover a better track.” -Robin Sharma-

I can definitely say, with much confidence, that leaving MUWCI (UWCMC) in 2010 and then having to take an Intermission from Monash Malaysia in 2012 counts as going off track.

Were these detours off track (amongst others) truly leading me to discover a better track?

At this present moment in life I’m going to say yes, although each time felt like a win for Fibro and pushed me to feeling like a failure, especially in 2012….

Anyway, with failure always comes the option to either give in or fight. And so I picked myself up each time, though not necessarily immediately, and Kept Moving Forward.

This lead to learning, growing and maturing much along the way; in mind, body and soul (as corny as it sounds).

Priorities changed and I discovered more about myself.

This is nowhere near what the ‘me’ 7 years ago would’ve envisioned.

So, is this the better track?

 I’ll never really know the answer but i’m going to say Yes:

Yes because I’m happy now because of who I am and not what i have.

Yes because the person I was then was a whole lot more Materialistic, Egoistic, Judgemental and Superficial and only would’ve gotten worse if i never fell.

Yes because the last few years have helped me develop and discover my passions, things that I might not have had time if things had gone the other way.

Yes because only through the recent hurdles and challenges did I learn what was truly important to me. (after being brainwashed and saturated by the images of the media driven, American Dream-esk, mainstream visions of a happy and successful life)

In a nutshell, I’m happy with the person I have grown into today but know that I can improve and develop more, but at my own pace and by my own benchmarks.

Now the question is, was this path meant to be or did I just make best with the hand that life dealt me? 😉

Straight From The Heart,
KMF
Roshan ‘Arkay’ Kanesan
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Being Busy Being Busy @CoffeaCoffeeMY


Busy Being Busy.jpgGood evening Ladies and Gents,

I’m back at Coffea today, with a Madonna Flat White next to me, my iPad in front of me and my thoughts bouncing around in my head.

Today’s posts is later than usual because my morning was a little difficult, had the worst morning to date for the year; pain, disorientation, stiffness, the works. My Fibro was not kind to me this morning, still feeling the effects now, especially Head wise, my head’s feeling foggy and really heavy, but that wasn’t going to stop me from posting today, though if my pain, muscle ache and stiffness didn’t get better i would have stayed at home and taken the ‘Day Off‘.

Anyway, on to today’s post.

“Being Busy Being Busy” Robin Sharma

“In the corporate world, I had been so busy being busy, I never had time to think about life. And yet reflection and contemplation are among the most important of all business skills. I’ve since realised that in this informations-led world we live in, ideas are the commodity of success and the most effective people are the most effective thinkers”
– Leadership Wisdom from the Monk Who Sold His Ferrari – The 8 Rituals of the Best Leaders by Robin Sharma –

As i mentioned earlier this week, or the end of last, i started reading again, and this quote popped right out at me, it describes quite accurately how i feel about this subject.

Generally, we are just too busy nowadays. Running around doing all sorts of things. And a lot just for the sake of doing something to help us feel like we’re not wasting our time.

At one point last year i used to think that being busy meant that i was being productive. I used to plan out my days so that they were filled with ‘things to do’ and once the day was done i wouldn’t feel like the day was wasted.

Then one day, i read something by Robin Sharma, not the quote above, in which he mentioned Being Busy Being Busy which shattered the illusion in which i was living in.

I thought back to some of those “productive” days that i had and really thought about them.

1. What did i achieve that day?
2. What did i really do?
3. Did i really do anything productive or really get anything done?
4. Did i stretched a task just so that I would use up more time?
5. How much of that time did i spend hanging out?

I realised coming home tired some how signalled to me that i had a busy day, which then signalled that it was a productive day, but now it’s a little different.

I realised that much of the time I was also busy being Distracted. Focus and a sense of direction was lacking.

Now before i go on, let me elaborate a little about my view on Productivity. Productivity isn’t the same thing for everyone, it’s all down to our own Personal Productivity.

Here’s an excerpt from me previous piece.

Personal productivity is getting things done that are important to you, that will help get you closer to where you want to be. It’s about not wasting your time, potential and life. Not all things that are considered productive may be productive to you, hence the importance of personal productivity. Look at reading, most people consider it a productive way to spend time, but I really don’t think that is true. Reading for entertainment is not generally productive, it’s entertainment and too much of it is a waste of time. Of course reading is the most productive of the entertainment mediums but if you want to be productive, there Erne other more effective ways. If you want to go into business, then read the biographies of great businessmen, “have a cup of tea with them”. Do not let the common perception of reading make it seem that all books are productive, plenty of them aren’t, especially now days. – Roshan ‘Arkay’ Kanesan

Being Busy is not necessarily Being Productive.

“Let’s stop glorifying over-work, and start congratulating smart work. The truly brilliant people in the world are those that elegantly balance a heavy-workload and the rest of their life. They’re also the most satisfied.

This industry is a race, but it’s not a sprint. It’s a marathon, one that I hope to be running for a very long time.” – Andrew Dumont

A good way to feel like the day hasn’t been wasted it to set daily goals. These goals are much better gauges of how productive a day has been. It’s not about how much time you spend doing it but about getting the result that’s in Alignment with the your Grand Scheme of Things (unless of course you’re goal is a specific time related goal – read 1 hour).

Focus on what matters to you, whether you want to be a footballer, business tycoon, a parent, or whether it is to live a healthy life, fun life,etc . Know what you want and make sure most of your actions are in line. Why do I say most? Well because we’ve got to have time to kick back and do others things so that life don’t become stale and monotonous. Anyway, in order to really know what you should be doing, you have to be aware of what you want, you need to achieve clarity of your desires. And that requires of lot of thinking and personal time. Only you can know what you truly want, what your goals, dreams and ambitions are. Of course there’s no harm “consulting” others for advice,either be conversing or reading about the people you respect, what I like to refer to as mentors. They will help provide additional knowledge, guidance and wisdom to help you achieve Clarity and Awareness. But REMEMBER, that doesn’t mean you need to follow them exactly and become a copy of them. Learn from them, don’t copy them. There are plenty of productivity sites with plenty of tips, you have to be able to see what you need and what will work and not try everything and anything you can read. Find a set that works for you’d and follow through on them and once you’re comfortable and consistent, then maybe you want to add-on and modify your current Personal Productivity M.O. The foundation of all this is knowing YOUR goals, dreams and ambitions. Only then will you when you are wasting time and when you are making the best use of it – Roshan ‘Arkay’ Kanesan

I’ve been incorporating this into my life nowadays, (though not all because i do have my Days Off and then there are days that the Fibromyalgia messes up my morning which makes my day a little more difficult – like today) and find that i feel way more satisfied with myself after a day of completed daily goals or even 80% completed daily goals because it’s all so much clearer to me.

I find that when i follow these things, i’m more satisfied with my days and weeks because i’m not just trying to fill up time. I guess you could relate it to Working Smart. I find that i don’t feel guilty about watching more TV or hanging out, if i find myself regularly completing my daily goals.

This concept of using daily goals also ties in to the concept of building momentum through Small Daily Improvements and Making Today Better Than Yesterday.

The best way to get started is to take sometime to think about how the last day and then the last week has been. Did it feel productive? Was the busyness of it all proportional to what was achieved? Do you feel satisfied?

Then get to making daily goals first thing in the morning, or better yet the night before before going to bed.

Now daily goals are just the beginning, in order to ensure that your more productive days are tying in to the Grand Scheme of Things. Scale things up by having:

1. Weekly Goals

2. Monthly Goals

3. Quarterly Goals

4. Annual Goals

5. 5 Year Goals

6. So on. (10 year, 15 year….)

This is a system that builds on each other, so we need to make sure the foundation and ground work is strong, you need to take the time to think.

The shorter term goals feed into the longer term goals and ensure that you are in line with your dreams. Keep in mind Personal Productivity.

So with something as simple as daily goals, what we are doing is breaking down the steps to achieve the Bigger Goals that will lead to our dreams.
I cannot emphasise how important it is to attain Clarity which requires us to take the time to think, to reflect.

Have great dreams but have simple, one-step-at-a-time goals to help you reach your dreams. Dreams are what you want, goals define and break down the steps to help you get there.

Sidenote: Before i sign off, i’d like to apologise if the writing seems messy and not as organised as the weeks before, Fibro made my mind feel messy & cluttered this week, especially today. I will work on making sure that next Friday’s post is more organised and clear.

Please do let me know what you think.

Straight From The Heart

Roshan ‘Arkay’ Kanesan

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The Productivity Serial Killer, Distraction @coffeacoffeemy


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Hello readers!

It’s been while, hope you guys are doing well. 😊

I’m back at Coffea Coffee today, didn’t realise how much I missed my Madonna Flat White until I took that first sip. If you haven’t tried this place out please do, I’ll be sitting a review of Coffea in due time to launch my cafe review section, Coffee@ ☕.

I’ve gotten back to reading Robin Sharma’s blog again, there’s some really get stuff there, a lot of which i try to apply and a lot of advise that has helped me. This week i read the 51 Ways Ordinary People Reached World-Class and i want to talk about Way #10

Don’t check your mobile when you’re meeting with another person. It’s rude. And rude people don’t reach world-class.

i’ve been trying my best to apply this over the week and i have to say that i have been particularly successful.

The mobile age has brought us so much, but at the same time it has taken away a few important things… number 1 being our Focus. With all sorts of gadgets buzzing and notification and messages coming in most of us are never really focused on what is at hand, and the sad state is that a lot of us (myself included) put priority on that message we get or that Facebook notification or that Tweet over Present Physical Company. We are so distracted, we say we are multi-taskig but really that’s just an excuse, we lack Focus.

As Robin puts it, We live i the Age of Dramatic Distraction.

Work and life now move faster than ever before. We live in The Age of Dramatic Distraction with emails and text messages and cell phones and Facebook notifications screaming for our attention. All this time spent on unimportant – but seemingly urgent – things are draining your energy, costing you money and ruining your peace of mind. Oh, it’s all messing up your health too.

 

Being busy isn’t being productive.

Multitasking doesn’t mean you’re getting more done.

It’s just means that you aren’t clear on what you want,

It means that you can’t focus.

Focus has become such a rare commodity, and we have to start protecting it and more than that, we need to strengthen it.

Focus is a vital to Productivity in what ever it i you want to do. It’s the difference between Excellence and Mediocrity.

This lack of Focus has created a world where great thoughts are killed midway by distraction or even if they do survive they aren’t allowed to grow because we do not spend enough time in solitude. I find that my best thoughts come when i spend some time alone, whether it is my morning Holy Hour or just an hour during the day where i separate myself from the world and think. If we don’t spend any time in solitude thinking how will we ever be clear on what we want and how to get there? And it is because of this lack of clarity that so many of us live i a daze, going through life one day at a time, being busy for the sake of feeling that we are being productive and moving forward with our lives but in truth we’re not.

Please don’t confuse activity with productivity. Many many people are simply busy being busy. – Robin Sharma

And the most dangerous of all Distractions is Entertainment. You have the old timer, TV and also the more notorious new kids on the block, mobile gaming (candy crush, angry birds etc). Not there’s nothing wrong with entertainment, these games to have stimulating effects on our minds but like all things it must be in moderation. Without moderation TV, console gaming and mobile gaming will numb our minds, will encourage procrastination and waste the days we’ve been given.

Here are some suggestion to help us grow our Focus, kill our Distractions and be more Productive.

1. Be in the present
when we are in the company of people;
let us not play with our phones,
let us not fiddle with our phones
let us not reply messages (if it was really important they should call you)
Focus on the people in front of us, and if we need to take or make a call, excuse ourselves and come back after. I had a great dinner with a friend the other day, we didn’t touch our phones for a good 2 hours (except when our parents called) and i had a great time. Such great conversation and stimulating thoughts were born or developed or expressed.

Focus on the physical present, the virtual present if there at out\r disposal, we are not slaves to it, it serves us.

2. Do Not Disturb Mode
when we want to work, let’s put our gadgets on Do Not Disturb and set them away. Work for a set time, say an hour, and then take a break. and then repeat. This is a great way to strengthen our focus and discipline. Start with a goal of 30 minutes at the beginning and then as the days progress, increase it. There will come a time when we will be able to work 4 hours without distraction and not eve feel it.

3. Solitude
spend time in solitude, just us and our thoughts. These are the times ideas are born, the time when dreams become reality. Spend time in absolute quiet, think about life, have a pen and paper to record ideas and thoughts, or use Evernote like i Do (but you the need to turn off notifications). Here maybe start with 15 minutes of Solitude ad progress from there. I can do about 30 to 45 minutes nowadays. No communication, no reading, no talking to anyone but ourselves. My aim is to be reach an our of Solitude daily, preferably the mornings.

4. Explain & Inform
Explain to the people we hangout most with about what we are trying to do. If they support us then we know they want us to grow and hence care of us, if they don’t support… then they might not understand the importance of focus or not care about us as much as we thought; this may call for a Friendship Reconsideration. The people that are closest to us will not only understand but support, and does who do not are those who will bring us down… keep them at arms length.

If you have ay other suggestion please feel free to comment below.

Hope that i’ve been helpful,

Straight From The Heart

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Notes on Q1 & Q2, Goals & Guidelines


Good Afternoon readers,

It’s feeling like quite the zoned out and blur day for me today, quite tired and all that jazz. Head’s feeling really fogged up. Hoping that my Costa Rica Tarrazu at Coffea will help clear things up 🙂 i’m having black coffee today, which is a first, and i have to say, it’s pretty good actually.

Anyway, it’s now the 4th of April, which means that we’re 4 days into the 2nd quarter of 2013.
It’s time to look back over the last 3 months and see how things stand.

Over the last 3 months i’ve done quite a bit of travelling (Macau, Kuala Terengganu, Penang, Perth), watched SHM, had quite an awesome Birthday week, got back to classes and made better friends at Monash, read quite a bit (Clash of Kings, Storm of Swords), got back to writing, started journaling again, got the ball rolling on waking up early & exercise and of course dealing with Round 1 2013.

Essentially it’s been a quarter of small daily improvements, a quarter of repairing the foundation and of moving forward and learning. I’m fairing much better with Round 1 2013 as compared to Round 1 2012, which is good. I’ve gained a better understanding of Fibromyalgia and am making a point to spread that awareness. So that other people understand and so that i don’t forget.

As for goals, i can say that i’ve missed quite. I made my goals not accounting for setbacks and well, life in general haha.

But that doesn’t mean i’m not going to set goals for Q2, however this time i’ll take what i’ve learnt from Q1 and use that to calibrate Q2 goals; Health, Academic, Personal Development, Social & Finances.

Q2 Goals & Guidelines include:
1) a book a week
2) 3 posts a week
3) wake up at 6am 4 times a week
4) morning exercise 5 times a week
5) Study lecture content before hand.
6) not going out after 7pm & sleep by 10pm – Sunday to Wednesday.
7) 1 vegetarian meal a day
8) journal during Holy Hour (which means daily)
9) 2 road trips
10) Cut monthly expenses (includes: transport, food, coffee, phone bills, etc) to 700.

Going to work on the Q2 Goals & Guidelines a little more, but the 10 above are the core elements.

Have you thoughts about how your last quarter has gone? Have you thought about how you want the next quarter to go?

Get cracking on your goals.

Start small and simple and build on that. Set some goals for the week and simple daily goals that will help you achieve the weekly goals. Always break things down into smaller manageable steps.

They all feed into each other.

Daily Goals build up to Weekly goals that build up to Monthly goals -> Quarterly goals -> Yearly goals -> 5 years -> 10 years

With goals and guidelines you build an awareness on what’s important, and that will be the difference.

By getting clear on what you want out of life, you heighten your awareness around what’s most important. With better awareness comes better choices. And with better choices you’ll see better results. Clarity breeds success.
Robin Sharma

I leave you with that to think about,

Straight From The Heart

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Dream Big But Start Small @ CoffeaCoffeeMY, Bangsar


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Good morning guys, it’s looking gloomy here in Bangsar, hopefully the day doesn’t remain this way, but even if it does, well at least it’ll be a cool day, yesterday was quite hot. I’m sitting here at my current Fav Coffee Spot, Coffea Coffee enjoying the lovely Madonna FlatWhite that they have prepared for me. The day has started of pretty well, lets hope the feeling can continue to resonate through the day.

Today I would like to focus on the topic of Dream Big but Start Small, something I got from one of Robin Sharma’s materials.

Life isn’t about skipping steps or having to rush (which is unfortunately what a lot of us seem to be doing, rushing through life), it’s about continuous improvement, or at least it is to me. There are steps that can be taken to reach a dream, the steps just adjust to the decree of the Dream, and as such steps can get more difficult as you go forward. The key however, is to continuously break the steps down as you move forward, while still keeping an eye on the Big Dream. There’s nothing wrong with dreaming big, everyone who Made-It, started somewhere, they didn’t just get to where they are now in a flash of light. They didn’t wait around and wish for things to happen either, they went out and happen to things, they broke things down and made long-term goals and took the steps necessary. All lasting success is build upon the foundation of long-term planning, starting small, building momentum and patience (I talked about patience in my last blog post).

Now the most important thing about starting small is that you actually get started, the broken-down steps make it so that the dream doesn’t look daunting or intimidating, it looks achievable. As you keep on going, you will find that it will in fact get easier, or if not you have more energy and enthusiasm to face the world, this is simply because as you Keep Moving Forward, taking down one step or mini-step or even micro-step, you will build up Momentum, and the this further helps to propel you forward, as I’m sure you have experienced before.

Now the thing about momentum is that life will throw a Wrench in the works and send you back to Momentum Zero (the point where there is no momentum whether because you are starting new or because of the Wrench) and you’ll have to rebuild the momentum again and though you might feel frustrated (or angry or upset etc), Brace The Storm, don’t lose hope and don’t give up. Build the momentum again, get to Peak Momentum and when the Wrench comes at you again and you find yourself at Momentum Zero, do the before mentioned again. Keep repeating this and, as with all things, you will find that the time from Momentum Zero to Peak Momentum will shorten with every repetition, but only if you focus and don’t give up that is. You’ll grow tougher and lengthen your Peak Momentum Life as you will have learnt to deal with previous Wrenches and as such, it would now take bigger Wrenches to sway you off course.

This is not something that will come to you automatically, you have to be conscious and aware of this, keep a Momentum Record if you think it will help, so that you can see how your momentum is doing, what your Peak Momentum Life is and how it has either grown or diminished. This is not a straightforward process, but it will be worth it. Focus, Be Conscious & Keep Moving Forward.

Straight From The Heart

Other Related Posts:
1) Getting to Greatness without Burning Out

2) Small daily improvements lead to stunning results

3) Keeping The Momentum

4) Better Than Yesterday, Always

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Personal Productivity


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Good evening people,

I’m trying out this place called Artisan Coffee Bar, and their coffee is pretty damn good. Having myself a Flat White.

I know it’s been a while, it’s been more difficult then I thought it would be to get back into the swing of things. But ill get there. In my previous post ‘Better Than Yesterday, Always.’ I mentioned that it is essential to Keep Moving Forward and making today better based upon your own personal productivity. Now what is Personal Productivity?

Productivity isn’t the same for everyone, certain things that may be productive to one person may not be universal. Yes there are some general productivity tips that are more universal than others such as always educating oneself, exercise, being healthy and the lessons from people like Sharma, Branson etc (not all of course, but you’ll fine most of them are very applicable and useful).

Personal productivity getting things done that are important to you, that will help get you closer to where you want to be. It’s about not wasting your time, potential and life. Not all things that are considered productive may be productive to you, hence the importance of personal productivity. Look at reading, most people consider it a productive way to spend time, but I really don’t think that is true. Reading for entertainment is not generally productive, it’s entertainment and too much of it is a waste of time. Of course reading is the most productive of the entertainment mediums but if you want to be productive, there Erne other more effective ways. If you want to go into business, then read the biographies of great businessmen, “have a cup of tea with them”. Do not let the common perception of reading make it seem that all books are productive, plenty of them aren’t, especially now days.

Focus on what matters to you, whether you want to be a footballer, business tycoon, a parent, or whether it is to live a healthy life, fun life,etc . Know what you want and make sure most of your actions are in line. Why do I say most? Well because we’ve got to have time to kick back and do others things so that life don’t become stale and monotonous. Anyway, in order to really know what you should be doing, you have to be aware of what you want, you need to achieve clarity of your desires. And that requires of lot of thinking and personal time. Only you can know what you truly want, what your goals, dreams and ambitions are. Of course there’s no harm “consulting” others for advice,either be conversing or reading about the people you respect, what I like to refer to as mentors. They will help provide additional knowledge, guidance and wisdom to help you achieve Clarity and Awareness. But REMEMBER, that doesn’t mean you need to follow them exactly and become a copy of them. Learn from them, don’t copy them.
There are plenty of productivity sites with plenty of tips, you have to be able to see what you need and what will work and not try everything and anything you can read. Find a set that works for you’d and follow through on them and once you’re comfortable and consistent, then maybe you want to add-on and modify your current Personal Productivity M.O.

The foundation of all this is knowing YOUR goals, dreams and ambitions. Only then will you when you are wasting time and when you are making the best use of it.

Straight From The Heart

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Of Living Now & Anticipation


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Im sitting here in this Starbucks, my Caffe Latte on my right and my iPad right in front of me, thinking about how long I haven’t blogged and how blogging right now would just make my morning even better.
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Good Morning dear readers, it’s been a while since I last took to the iPad and opened up my WordPress app to share my thoughts with you. I’ve been in a bit of a rut, waking up late, wasting too much of my time on unnecessary unproductive things, but today I have snapped out of it, thanks to my Holy Hour yesterday afternoon that got me feeling good, aware and driven. My Holy Hour is such a important tool in my life, I have to make sure I keep it up, because when I don’t, everything just goes out of sync, priorities get disorientated and my mind gets cluttered. But enough about that, that is the past and I will learn from them and Keep Moving Forward.

Right now I’m enjoying this very moment, not thinking about the last or looking forward to the future in Anticipation, but just sitting here in this black arm chair, in this tastefully designed Starbucks sipping on my caffe latte, breathing in the moment, savouring my coffee.

Enjoying the moment, I think I wrote about this before, but anyway let me write about it again.

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If you visited my Facebook FanPage recently, you would have seen a quote from the current book I’m reading:

“the only moment we ever live is the present moment. It is the only one we ever have to be happy.” John A. Schindler

How right is that. Read it again and let it sink in. The only moment we can do something about is this very moment. Not the moment before this, or the moment after, this moment. So don’t waste time, try your level best to enjoy it.

The biggest threat and detriment to enjoying the present moment is Anticipation. The anticipation of something coming up that you are looking forward to or the classic,”I can’t wait to go to high school,” when you’re in middle school or “I can’t wait to go to university!”, when you’re in high school and so on. Stop wanting to fast forward through life all the time and enjoy what you can from the present phase of life you are in. Every phase has its benefits, so stop looking at the negatives. Stop being so glass half-empty. There’s always a Silver Lining.

Yes please plan ahead, plan that event you want to do, or plan for they concert you want to go for, but in the mean time, before that very exciting event happens, don’t let the anticipation to get to that future moment kill all the time in-between. The most valuable commodity in life is time, so don’t waste it living in fast forward or sleep-walking. Be aware of what you are doing at all times, at all moment and try your very best to enjoy each moment or at the very least live each moment, really live.

Put more living in your days.

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A suggestion, the next time you are walking, take a look around. Observe the people, the scenery, the sky, the plants etc, really observe and maybe, just maybe you’ll be able to see beauty and colour of all of it, to really see it and enjoy every bit of it.

To round up, enjoy the moment, don’t fret about the past because there really is nothing you can do about it but learn from it and plan ahead but don’t live life in fast-forward because of the Anticipation of getting to that next moment, or that next event or that next phase in your life.

“love what you have, and then go for heat you want. Enjoy the climb up the mountain, but never take your eyes of the summit”Robin Sharma

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6 Things To Do to Feel Like a Champion


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Good evening guys, I’ve been feeling pretty damn good over the last few days, feeling like a Champion. In this piece I’m going to talk about 6 things that you can do to feel like a champions or start your day of feeling awesome and like a champion.

Number 1

Get up off the couch and get some exercise. Get your blood pumping, get some endorphins released. I’m not asking you to go do some intense exercise, but do something, just get started and soon you’ll start looking forward to your exercise time because of feel good after effect. Start by scheduling and accomplishing two 15 minute walks a day. you’ve just got to get passed the initial barrier, get passed the Pull of Laziness, that urge to sit down on the couch and watch tv instead of breaking a sweat doing something healthy.

Number 2

Almost all of us have smart phones now, so let’s put them to good use. Set up a playlist on your music player and get the tunes pumping. Name it Good Feeling, Feeling Good or Feel Good, whatever tickles your fancy. The name isn’t important, it’s the tracks in the playlist that matter. They’ve got to be songs so get you in the right mood to go forth and conquer the day, play them in them in the morning, or whenever you’re not feeling good. Music has a way of tapping into our subconscious and our emotions, so the type of music we listen to is of the utmost importance.

Here are a couple of songs that I think are must haves on the list.

1. Michael Buble’s Feeling Good
2. Flo Rida’s Good Feeling
3. Hans Zimmer’s Zoosters Breakout from Madagascar
4. Hans Zimmer’s Molossus from Batman Begins
5. Showtek & Tiesto’s Hell Yeah! (this is probably going to be very much dependent on you)

Or put in music that triggers happy memories. For me, whenever I listen to Linkin Park, I’m reminded of the concert of their i saw when I was 12, and specific songs bring back specific feelings and emotions. Use that, tap into it, hack your brain.

Number 3

Spend time with some family and/or friends. I know this one is pretty obvious, but it truly is funny how so many of us don’t to it. We neglect some of the most important people in our life’s because we’re so busy being distracted (this is a topic for another post). Go do something fun with them, don’t waste time witting around doing nothing and staring at the ceiling together, yes you’re spending time but wt this juncture you’re all really not helping each others mood. Go do something new, exciting. Explore new sights within your area, your town, your city. Go play a fun board game, nothing too competitive, remember the aim is feel good champion not Winner Champion. Try out Meeples in Ss15 Subang or Kota Damansara. AS MUCH AS ALL THIS IS FUN AND WILL MAKE YOU FEEL GOOD, MAKE SURE IT’S IN BALANCE. DON’T DO EXTREMES.

Number 4

Start having a Holy Hour, or if you already have one, don’t neglect it. No this isn’t something spiritual or religious, it’s just something I learnt from reading Robin Sharma’s book. Take an hour for yourself everyday, either first thing in the morning or just before you go to bed. Use this hours for you, replenish your spirit. Within this hour, spend sometime listening to the good feeling playlist, spend some time reading, spend some time journaling and writing, spend some time dreaming and spend some time on your goals and assessing how far you’ve come and how far you’ve got to go. Look into yourself, think about what you can do better and how far you’ve come, look back and smile just don’t get stuck looking back.

Number 5

Create a photo album, call it whatever you want or you could just use the same name as your iTunes (Music) playlist. This album will be a collection of your happiest moments, the times you felt great. The times you felt most at peace, whatever make you feel happy. Look through them when you feel down, if you want look through them while listening to your feel good playlist. Make sure you set a specific amount of time because you don’t want to get caught trying to relive those memories in your head, you don’t want to spend 3 hours looking through them. Spend 15 minutes every few days, or use a few minutes of your Holy Hour. Don’t put in anything they brings back negative or emo memories, this isn’t an emo session, it’s a FEEL GOOD session.

Number 6

watch something funny, I don’t know whether I should be encouraging this because we tend to go overboard with this. My all-time favourite is Friends, I can watch Friend over and over wishing and still laugh my heart out. Comedies are about 24 minutes, so stick to one episode, 2 AT THE VERY MOST. I know it feels good to watch more, but what you’re really doing is wasting time and distracting yourself if you overdose ( more than 2 episodes daily). Have a selection of your fan courier episodes and pick one to watch when you’re feeling low. For that one episode, put everything away, your books, your phone and just focus on the show and enjoy it. Enjoy every second of it. Laughter is the best way to counter low moods, follow this with exercise and then the other things live listed and you’ve got yourself a Champion start to the today, or at least for me it’s so. Remember to always put yourself on the clock when it comes to tv, I generally believe that we shouldn’t exceed more then an hour of tv a day, it not easy at first but it will get easier over time.

These are the things I use, helpfully they are beneficial to you and that you feel the same way.

Straight From The Heart

Deep Work


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Good Morning/Good Afternoon guys,

Thanks for joining me today. My plan of waking up early crashed and burnt, but I’ll try again tomorrow. The body aches were quite bad this morning, but hey, life’s like that, ups and downs. I had a helluva weekend and now it’s time to pay the piper. I am at Starbucks Monash, just sitting, thinking and sipping. My phone is on silent in a corner as I focus on the task at hand, as I focus on thinking and writing. I have initiated Ghost Protocol so that I may concentrate and do some ‘Deep Work’ as Robin Sharma calls it.

Too many of us get distracted whilst we are trying to focus on the task at hand, and though many would like to blame technology and social media for this, they are not to blame, we are. If we cannot concentrate on a task, if we get distracted by a message or a FB notification or a tweet, it’s not your phones fault, or Facebook’s fault or Twitter’s fault, it’s yours. Turn on airplane mode if you have too, put your phone on silent and tuck it under a pillow. Have some discipline.

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Put aside a chunk of time to do some deep work or thinking, go Ghost Protocol. We all need A Room of One’s Own. Set some time aside, put your phone away and just get to work, do some deep, quality work, and when your done, you’ll be happy that you did it. You won’t regret not replying the message from a friend asking you to hangout, as long as you’ve made full use of that 1 or 2 or 3 hour chuck to do some deep work full of quality. And hey, don’t beat yourself up if you don’t make it a full session without getting distracted, you don’t get to genius without first being a beginner and making mistakes. Just make sure you Keep Moving Forward , small daily improvements will lead to stunning results over time.

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So what are you waiting for, go forth and do some deep work. Start small and Keep Moving Forward. Go start with 30 minutes without distractions and when you succeed in keeping 100% concentrated for that chunk of time, increase it, keep improving. And then one day, you’ll be able to put in 3/4 hours of full force deep work and then, you’ll realise that your productivity and quality has reached a whole new level of genius, simply because you got rid of distractions for a chunk of time and kept making small daily improvements.

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We all make mistakes in this journey we call life, don’t let it stop you.

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So Keep Moving Forward, go Ghost Protocol when you need to and most importantly, make sure you take responsibility and accountability for your life.

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Straight From The Heart

Reference Points


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Good Morning everyone, as you can see I’m at Starbucks, but not my regular one. Today’s Soy Café Mocha is much better than yesterday’s unfortunately I forgot my tumbler, oh well.

So today, I’m going to write bout reference points. Life is all about that. How you do what you do when you do it is based upon this principle, that we have reference points. The below is an excerpt from one of Robin Sharma’s books. It depicts this principle pretty damn well.

“Lance Armstrong is a great reference point on persistence. My father is a great reference point on integrity. My mother is an excellent reference point on kindness. My kids are superb reference points on what unconditional love an boundless curiosity looks like. Richard Branson is a spectacular reference point on living a full-out life. Madonna is a greet reference point on reinvention. Peter Drucker was a wonderful reference point on the importance of lifelong learning. Nelson Mendela is a brilliant reference point on courage and humanitarianism.” Robin Sharma

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Many of us, as we grew up, faced this dilemma, after an exam our parents would say look at the people who scored better while we say, “but look I did better then etc etc.” and on the other hand when I would mention that my friend has this toy or this fancy gadget, they would go the other way and say look a the kids on the street. So yea, how happy you are will definitely depend on what your outlook on life is.

Pick good reference points to drive you to the life you want to have, they don’t have to be people like Mandela, they can be the people in by our life, your mum, your dad, your aunt, your boss. This reference points will help keep you focused on what you want in life, where your want to go and how you want to live. What type of person you want to become. It will shape your look on how your life is, how good it is or how bad it is, it all depends on the reference points you pick.

If you are going through a tough time, read about Lance and maybe he will help you find the strength you need, if you don’t think you’ll be able to achieve your dreams, read about Branson and maybe he will help you clarify your vision and ignite your spirit and self belief. When you find that your little cousin is annoying you, think about your parents and the patience they had raising you.

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Reference points are so damn important. And whether you know it or not, have already have them, no it’s whether you are happy with your current reference points. These will set the standards that you will live by. The person you will strive to be, the principles you will live by, the things you will do and most importantly, it will determine your happiness.

Straight From The Heart

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