Live Life With No Regrets!

You are the CEO of your own company. You have a staff size of 1. What is your company direction? What are your orders?

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I would recommend to anyone to read a one motivational or biographical book each month. As Norman Vincent Peale said, "Encouragement is like food, we need it everyday!"

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I once attended a time management seminar in church and one of the definitions of time is that "time is a measure of change."

Strange. So, if something doesn't change, does that mean time has stopped?

But that's an interesting premise.

If you don't change, does that mean time has moved for you? If you live 70 years yet didn't change for the last 20 years, does that mean you've only lived a 50 year life diluted over 70 years?

Therefore, a person can live a 70 year lifetime within the timespan of 33 if he has changed enough things, himself and the world around him. And a person can live a "short life" of 30 years over 70 if he never changed for the last 40.

A tagline in one of the Command & Conquer songs I listen to during jogging is: "If we want to live in a different world, we must take action."

Most change in our lives must be initiated by us. Yes, our parents, bosses can change the external things like home, or school, the economy may buoy our fortunes up. But change in our attitudes, our perceptions, whether we love people more... these are changes that only we can make for ourselves. No one can make us a better lover, a better friend, a better boss, a better salesperson, a better programmer, a better student, a better entrepreneur, a better strategist, a better Christian, gain a better body, etc. We have to make that change ourselves.

In order to direct change, we must have a direction. We must have a goal of how and in what way we want to change. We must have a vision.

That is why goals are important. Goals are directional markers for us in life. Life is dynamic. Chronological time is always flowing, goals direct our attention and effort and focus our energies towards creating change in our lives.

The greeks had two words for time, chronos and kairos. Chronos is chronological time, the ticking of the clock. Kairos are moments of change. E.g. Jacob becoming Israel. Moses from shepherd to leader.

Some change is big, almost like a transfiguration. Some change is done in bite sized pieces. Welcome both types.

Change is difficult. Change can be uncomfortable. But if we want to live in a better world, a different world from what we know of, we must have change.

If we don't change... we are diluting our lifetimes. In the end, we may only live a 30 year lifetime in a 70 year old body.

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A lot of us esteem other people and encourage them to pursue their own dreams. However, when it comes to our own dreams we seem to put them on the shelf.

We don't esteem ourselves enough. We don't think that we are important enough. We don't think our dreams are worthy enough to pursue.

Love ourselves. When we love ourselves, our own hopes and dreams we learn to love others even more. The commandment of Jesus is to love others as we love ourselves. The more we learn to love and esteem our own worth, the more we can esteem others worth.

It may be a small dream to open a hot dog stand. When we learn to love our own dreams we can love others dream to open a tuition centre or a bakery.

It isn't selfishness, it isn't pride. It's believing that we are created by a God worthy to do great things. Jesus himself said that we will go on to do even greater things than He did on this earth.

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What is the difference between a rebellion and a revolution?

A revolution is a successful rebellion.

What is the difference between a stalker and a persistent suitor?

Can it be that a persistent suitor is a successful stalker?

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You should do only fun things in life...

If you find what you are doing isn't fun there are 2 things you can do:
1. Make it fun.
2. Stop doing it and find something that is fun.

If you find that you're not having fun doing it and you can't make it fun, then you should stop doing it and start doing something else that is fun.

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If anyone one over 50 starts telling you "I'm too old for already". Tell him/her how old Cliff is (born 1940, 67 this year) and how you can still be living productively till the end of your life.

The thing about Cliff is that he keeps on producing new stuff each year. Yes, his faithful fans still love him more for his hits like "Summer Holiday", "Young Ones", "Living Doll". But he is one of the only 2 artistes in the world to have a No. 1 hit each decade! (The other is Elvis).

We must have goals to lead us on in life. Once we have goals, we don't clutter our minds with our trivial problems and the baggage of yesteryear. Succesful people think about their goals all the time.

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Cliff Richard Concert at Genting
Originally uploaded by nicodemus_chan.

A good concert by that evergreen British warbler, Sir Cliff Richard! Treated my mum and sis to the concert and a nights stay at the Theme Park Hotel. Singing a mix of oldies and new ones in front of a sellout crowd with vips at front, he got them to sing along especially to oldies like "Young Ones", "Bachelor Boy" and "Summer Holiday".

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1. A mobile game.
2. An entertainment book for travelers.
3. A mind patterns book.
4. A board game.
5. A web service. (a couple of ideas here I have.)

So many goals? Besides physical, social, intellectual goals?

Well, it's better to have more goals than you can achieve in your lifetime than to have not enough goals at all.

There will still be more goals as you go by in life. When you have children, goals will be added, priorities changed. When you get retrenched or when you win a million dollars certain other goals will be forced upon us or more goals are realizable for us then.

We must know what we want in life rather than get blown about by the wind (trends, fads, frenzys).

Success in life, in a nutshell, is achieving your goals. Whatever it may be. But success isn't just a point in time, it is also a state of being.

When you have goals, then you will realize the value of time. Time isn't a resource in the sense of it being tangible, allocatable, dividable, etc. Any idiot can spend 16 hours in the office and yet not achieve his goals.

When you have goals, which are essentially a state change in terms of outlook, perspective, experience, achievement, etc. you realize then that a state change needs time. It is because we have more goals than we can achieve in our lifetime that we realize the value of time.

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Nobody knows everything. Not you, not your parents, not your teacher, not your boss, not the pricey consultants hired, not the advertisement agencies, not the salesman, not your doctor, not the judge, not the pastor, not the prime minister, not the UN, not professors, not the administrator.

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Meerkat
Originally uploaded by tim ellis.

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People pay other people to do things which they find that they are unable to do, or is difficult or is too tedious, or unenjoyable.

If there were such an activity that wasn't difficult or tedious but instead enjoyable, it would then be called a hobby. Which in turn, people who do it, pay for the privilege instead.

Then what is the difference between hobby and work? Not much I think. It just depends on the perspective you take.

The key then to earn money is to make people pay you for your hobby. Search for people who find your hobby difficult and unenjoyable. They will gladly pay you to do what you like best.

If you like watching movies, be a movie reviewer, or projectionist or movie buyer.
If you like watching movies, including the naughty bits, be a film censor.
If you like travelling be a pilot or flight attendant.
If you like being surrounded by beautiful people, be a flight attendant or fashion photographer.

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The joy and ecstasy of the Singapore fans as the penalty kick was taken by Mustafiq Fahrudin.

Is this the last goal to be scored at the Singapore National Stadium?

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31012007469
Originally uploaded by nicodemus_chan.

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The motivation for me to have picked up this book is because I'm taking my GRE exam tomorrow and I needed to know how to write graduate level essays. Not that you need to have perfect punctuation to score well in the GRE, but this was the perfect excuse and impetus for me to find out (among several things that have been bugging me for a long time):

1. How to use the semi-colon. ";"
2. How to use the comma at certain times.
3. Is it "Jesus's disciples" or "Jesus' disciples"?
4. Do you put the full stop in dialogue inside the quotation marks or outside of them?

Lynne Truss's book is a delightful read, weaving emotion and character into punctuation marks such as the comma (likening it to Babe the sheep-pig, or in this case, the sheep-comma), the boisterous apostrophe and the dutiful full-stop. Humourous situations are created with examples of poor punctuation making the book a breeze to read through in a week.

If you want to teach kids punctuation and not let it fall into a list of humdrum rules, you'd do well to use this as a textbook for secondary school kids.

Here are the notes for the things that often confound me:

The apostrophe:

1. For singular possessives: The boy's hat. The First Lord of the Admiralty's rather large front door.


2. For pluaral possessives (if it doesn't end in 's'): The children's playground. The women's movement.


3. For plural possesives (that do end with 's'): The boys' hats. The babies' bibs.


4. Time/Quantity indicator: In one week's time. Four yards' worth. Two weeks' notice.


5. Omission of Figures/Dates: In the summer of '68.


6. Omission of Letters: We can't go to Jo'burg. It's your turn.


7. Indicator of Non-Standard English: "Yer'd better 'ave the key."


8. Irish Names: O'Neill. O'Leary.


9. Plural of Letters: How many P's and L's are there in Philippines?


10. Plural of Words: What are the do's and don't's?

Special Rule: For modern names ending with 's', we put in the extra 's'. E.g. Keats's poems. St. Jame's square. Alexandra Dumas's The Three Musketeers.
Ancient names are special. Achilles' heel. Moses' tablets. Jesus' disciples.
However, proper names/brands are up to the namer to punctuate: St. James' park. (Newcastle United's playing ground). St Andrews.

Double possesives are allowed: "A friend of the footballer's." as well as "A friend of the footballer." Because you could never say "a friend of you" but "a friend of your's".

However, inanimate beings are excluded. "A friend of the British Museum".

Common Error: "It's" is the contraction for "it is" or "it has". If it can't be expanded that way, then it should be "its".

Humourous example: Pupil's entrance. (This school is trully selective indeed). Nude Reader's Wives. (A polygamous naked man.)

Still some questions need to be answered: What's the difference between: "its self" and "itself".

The Semicolon
They are optional in most cases. And some people never even use them.

But they convey meaning by joining related sentences together.

Only full sentences should be joined by the semicolon. (Though it can be abused sometimes to join fragments; rather worrying; I think.)

Linking words like "however", "also", "nevertheless", "consequently" and hence require a semicolon, not a comma.

It also provides an extra breath when reading, about twice the length of pause than a comma.

Between two related sentences where there is no conjunction such as "and" or "but", and where a comma would be ungrammatical.

I loved Opal Fruits; they are now called Starbust, of couse.

You could use a dash, but the semicolon suggests a connection between the two sentences whilst the dash has less of a direct connection.

It is used as a hint to the reader that the two sentences are related to the same one idea.

It is also used to put some sense when commas become too confusing.

Fares were offered to Corfu, the Greek island, Morocco, Elba, in the Mediterranean, and Paris. Margaret thought about it. She had been to Elba once and had found it dull, to Morocco, and found it too colourful.

Fares were offered to Corfu, the Greek island; Morocco; Elba, in the Mediterranean; and Paris. Margaret thought about it. She had been to Elba once and had found it dull; to Morocco, and found it too colourful.

The Comma

1. Used for lists. The colours of the rainbow are red, orange, yellow, green, blue, indigo and violet. The rule is, to use a comma when an "and" can be substituted for it. But make sure not to split adjectives from what they are describing. The endangered white rhino. (The rhino isn't white and endangered). My big fat Greek wedding. (The wedding isn't big AND fat AND Greek).


2. Used for joining; where words like "and", "or", "but", "while" and "yet" can be used.


3. Used for filling gaps. John had jet-black hair; Sally, white.


4. Before direct speech. He said, "Shut up!"


5. Setting of interjections. Blimey, what would we do without it?


6. In pairs; to mark out weak interjections. I am, of course, going nuts.


7. Finally, don't use it stupidly. The convict said the judge is mad. The convict, said the judge, is mad.

More confusing stuff
I never knew when writing dialogue, whether to put the terminator inside or outside the quotation marks.

Lynne says that it is a difference between American and British punctuation.

American is inside the quotes even at the end. Sophia asked him if he was "out of his senses". (British). Sophia asked him if he was "out of his senses." (American).

1. When a piece of dialogue is attributed at its end, conclude it with a comma inside the inverted commas. "You are out of your senses, Lord Fellamar," gasped Sophia.
2. When the dialogue is attributed at the start, conclude it with a full stop inside the inverted commas. He replied, "I'll never do it."
3. When the dialogue stands on its own, the full stop comes inside the inverted commas. "Let me do it."
4. When only a fragment is being quoted, put punctuation outside the inverted commas. She recognized the "effects of frenzy", and stopped.
5. When the quotation is a question or exclamation, it comes inside the inverted commas.
6. When the question is posed by the sentence, rather than the speaker, the question mark goes outside. Why didn't Sophia see at once that his lordship doted on her "to the highest degree of distraction"?
7. When the quoted speech is a full sentence requiring a full stop (or other terminal mark) of its own, and coincidentally comes at the end of the containing sentence, the mark inside the inverted commas serve for both.

The basic rule is straightforward and logical: when the punctuation relates to the quoted words it goes inside the inverted commas; when it related to the sentence, it goes outside. Unless you're American.

The dash is like a whisper, that follows the rhythm of the sentence. And as for the double dash versus the double commas – the double dash keeps the aside part of the train of thought.

Italics are used for:

1. For titles of books, newspapers, movies, etc.


2. Foreign phrases.


3. Emphasis of certain words.


4. Examples when writing about language.

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