Musings For The Mind

Take a stroll around the streets of KL these days and you'll know notice something quite peculiar. They're much more colourful. Why? Because there seems to be an abundance of flags strung up about in various places. Close your eyes and walk around for about 15 metres, you're bound to run into one these strategically placed party insignias.

So each flag is armed with their different agendas and 'manifestos' if you will. Naturally humans are different, and disagreements are all part and parcel of life. But what's unacceptable is when you hold a different opinion to your so called 'rivals,' and go overboard in terms of your support.

It's a sad scenario when you see people from all quarters publically resorting to personal attacks, and it always seems to be a case of who can dig up the most dirt on their opponents. Why can't we keep things on a rational and intellectual level? Is this the kind of message we'd like to send to future generations? The principle that if you're contesting anything, it's acceptable to do absolutely everything to win?

Yes, winning is important. But let's not indulge in any soul-blackening smear campaigns because in the end everyone's human, and we definitely wouldn’t want anyone airing our dirty laundry in public. I truly believe we’re all intelligent and reasonable enough to take a much more dignified route, without resorting to ‘dirty tactics’ when we pursue any of our goals.

Last I checked, among the hallmarks of a Malaysian citizen were; gentle, polite, gracious and patient.  Let’s keep it that way.

The activist is not the man who says the river is dirty. The activist is the man who cleans up the river.
Ross Perot

LIFE UPDATE

Hi korang, how are you? Im doing fine.. as long as I'm home, I'm fine hehe. Sekarang aku sudah pon kembali ke UiTM dan kini bergelar final year master studeent. Ohoi aku sudah menjadi senior tahu. Sila berikan tunduk hormat jikalau terserempak dimana-mana. Ohohoho 

Bagi yang bertanya bagaimana pelajaran aku, terima kasih sebab ambil berat pasal study aku. Sweet angat! Alhamdulillah, setakat ini aku pass semua exam..tak pernah resit/repeat lagi. Dont ask me how I do it, I just dont know how i survived that haha! Tapi exam cumalah sebahagian ujian kecil dalam kehidupan, masih banyak lagi ujian yang maha hebat menanti aku di kemudian hari. Setiap hari rasa palpitation, adakah aku mampu untuk mengharungi liku-liku kehidupan ini dengan tenang? Inshaallah, selagi aku usaha, berkat doa ibu bapa dan percaya dengan rezeki Allah, I have nothing to worry :)

Oh ya, cuti 2 minggu ini aku penuhi dengan aktiviti-aktiviti yang menarik. Selain melancong ke USS Singapore, aku penuhi juga dengan siap kan ABR aku yang dah ke laut tu. Banyak le pulak yang nak kena buat..aku ni macam blur blur lagi. Apapon, goodluck buat semua classmate aku EMBA B. Semoga kita sama-sama berjaya menjadi manusia yang berguna dan dapat grad ngan cemerlang. Manfaatkan masa yang ada! 

Sesungguhnya kerana masa, manusia kerugian. [Surah Al-'Asr 103:1-3]

Monday Musings for the Mind

Good Job! Great work! That was magnificent! I like your style!

You made a mistake. What is this rubbish? That’s awful. I hate it when you do that.

Now go on. Tell me which one of these two lines do you prefer? Unless you’re mentally disturbed, you’ll definitely go for the first one. That’s the magic of positive reinforcement. The thing about Asians is, we’ve been conditioned by a culture that prefers not to practice it.

We’re used to hearing about how badly we messed up, since we were little kids. It’s always something like “Ali! Kenapa ujian Sains dapat B?” or “Chong! Bila nak kemas bilik?Macam kena puting beliung je ni!” or “Rajen!Kenapa rambut macam budak samseng?”

Then as we grow older it continues, albeit in a different environment. “Ali! This report is rubbish, I don’t understand a single word!”

“Chong! You missed your deadline. You’re so incompetent! “

“Rajen! That’s the worst presentation I’ve ever seen!”

You see, put downs and criticisms flow through the Asian tongue like water flows through a river. It’s so natural. Almost like combing your hair. But when it comes to giving praise, there’s always a cat that comes out of nowhere and gets their tongue. Darn cat. Shouldn’t it be dead because of its curiousity or something?

Anyway, the reason we're always so quick to berate someone is at some point of our lives we were at the receiving end, and compliments were considered an unnecessary luxury. Therefore when a person actually deserves praise, we hold back because we're so used to dishing out negative comments, the positive ones have literally 'dried up' from our mental vocabulary.

Hence, let's not let that happen and we can start by complimenting someone today. Find something good about the person, and say it like you mean it!

Here’s to a positive 2013!

The praise that comes from love does not make us vain, but more humble. 

James M. Barrie

Monday Musings for the Mind

Do you know what it means to be meticulous? Taking into consideration every itsy bitsy detail, every time you do something worthwhile, regardless of what people think? It’s an underappreciated trait these days. Why? Because some people just find it annoying. Do you? Is it because of your refusal to adhere to other people’s high standards when it comes to quality?

About a month ago, there was a new mak cik cleaner who started coming around every morning to tidy up the office. As I was sitting at my desk checking my e-mails, I heard a soft voice : “Dik, tepi sikit nak lap meja.” I was caught by surprise. God bless this mak cik, I thought to myself. Never before have I encountered a cleaner who actually made the effort to tell me to go away, so she could do her job properly. I made the mistake of sitting back down right after she finished wiping, because she proceeded to shoo me away (again!) with the vacuum cleaner 5 minutes later.

That same week as I was exiting the toilet, I saw her standing outside near the door. She asked me "Ada orang dekat dalam ke dik?"  When I answered to the affirmative, she just stood there patiently while waiting for the person to come out, before she could proceed with her cleaning.

 I marveled at the dedication of this mak cik. Her line of work probably isn’t as ‘glamorous’ as ours and she earns much less, but her commitment can put most of us to shame.

What about us? Yes we greet our customers when they approach us. But do we smile and make them feel welcome? Or answer everything with a single word so we can sit back down and relax? Yes we answer enquiries on the phone. But is there a genuine tone of wanting to assist the caller? Or do we just put on our ‘I’m too busy for this crap’ voice so we can get back to Facebook?

If we had more people like this particular mak cik, the world would be a better place and any organisation would be flourishing with employees like her in it. So start being meticulous. It'll become second nature once you get the hang of it.

Meticulous planning will enable everything a man does to appear spontaneous.

Mark Caine