Mistakes, Failures, Decisions: The Crab Mayo Revelation #1

Focusing on selfish desires leads to collapse of a nation.

Was sharing my insights on personal issues in the ''MPV'' yesterday. Well being encouraged to blog out my thoughts once again! I'm glad I have such a faithful core group.

Liking crab-mayo (in sandwiches) myself, I never questioned why Penelope always eats the same thing - crab-mayo croissant during our pre-cell dinnertime at 'thousand golden'. Maybe we should have a variety of food then? Its boring to just eat the same thing and drink the same thing every time... Then again...As I was thinking about it, I realised something. It was like an epiphany - like the feeling of when the world floats around you and you have gained some deep insight through a simple thing.

I've read recently that one of the pitfalls for leaders and managers is their decision-making. And what you put into your mouth most of the time, is purely your own choice. So don't sue McDs for making you fat. With so many healthy choices available, the bulge on our tummies can only be blamed for making uninformed or unwise decisions. For me, I am not particular about food, but invariably I find myself only eating certain good food at certain places. Drinks, as well. Kie knows me so well that I usually choose to drink tehs, ice milo, green tea... at the usual kopi shops. And questioning the rest of the folks in the MPV, they too, agreed that they were more satisfied with their usual choice, than trying something new. Jean and Nerf mentioned about the 'diminishing law of marginal returns', Jean noticing that her boss after a nice lunch did not seem to be in a good mood whereas the kopi auntie had simple food court stuff and felt satisfied, perhaps more satisfied. In a world of variety, the simple decisions that we make - even deciding where and what to eat, can shave off minutes of time for ourselves. The way I see it, time is money...So, you decide to pay yourself right now. For me I usually don't take any time at all to decide what I want to eat since its usually bread or 2 variations from banquet. That leaves me with a free lunchtime to blog, read motivational articles and etc.

Many people are divided about this, they claim that it's 'stealing time' from your company (paying your time with $)...But I beg to differ. In my temp admin job nearly two years ago, the quality of time management that I practised... in my 9am-6pm job, I always finished my daily work at...3pm! And the rest of the time (I had to stay put) I rewarded myself with surfing and chatting on msn. Pay yourself with the time you have, it's one of the best ways to survive. It also helped me in my one-year degree studies : I'm nocturnal, and utilising the weekend, I often start working on projects around 10PM, often finishing around 5AM. Then it's to school at 10, so I took a 3 hour nap before that. Basically my time clock was opposite from the rest, but it served me well. I found I could work for hours without interruptions during that period, especially as it was quiet at home with no one to bother me - internet connection was faster, too.

I don't often say "I'm busy", though I am, truly... but I also have large pockets of time which leave me quite bored if I am not rejuvenating. Honestly, when people tell me they are busy I find it quite funny, because to all aspects, I am busier than them, but I see more people, meet more friends, (earn more money probably) and have more free time then them. My Rich Dad is super busy, but he can always schedule you in, as long as you tell him a week in advance. =)

In a nutshell, my ''crab mayo'' revelation teaches me not to look at things only at the surface, and to do some introspective revelation on why am I acting up in certain ways. It's been said that the greatest baseball player of all time is Babe Ruth. Even here when we don't play baseball, we have heard about him. He has hit the most homeruns in his playing seasons, more than anyone in the world.

But what not many people know is that he has an almost equivalent number of failures (failing to hit), too.

I've made a couple of mistakes (admin!) in my work today...it is quite troublesome as I have to go back to the clients to re-sign something I've left out. Bummer. Plus the rain, it makes things worse, slows everything down. Manager keeps laughing at me... perhaps because she has made such mistakes in the past! Well, I could have blamed it on the lack of concentration, because it was truly rushed - both clients rushed in and out, being busy people. Or blamed it on the short time I had to view it... Whatever. I kept reminding myself today that the more mistakes I make today, the more successes I will have in the future. At the very least, I can learn more ''people skills'', like sincerely apologizing profusely to people, not something I enjoy doing much. I can also learn not to make the very same mistake again! (Both are different, by the way.) Initially I was beating myself over it because I had to rectify it (and being time-consuming), quite a bummer. But when I looked at it differently, I became calmer, walked more leisurely, and enjoyed my day a little bit more (only that my toes were wet and sad.) The way we view mistakes and failures are really important for us to succeed in having a better day, and in what we do. I guess everyone makes mistakes, but sometimes the way they react to it is a further mistake. Many relationship mistakes causes us to react within ourselves emotionally. "Why did I even consider going out with him?" "Why did I let him do that to me/vice versa..." I see so many females in church and lesser males, that is the norm actually. But, I realised most of the leaders are males and not females. Why? I don't believe there is a gender stereotype or 'glass ceiling' in The Church, especially since we came from a female-leadership background. But why are most of the leaders today males? ...

I believe the answer lies in our emotional state of well-being. From what I've seen, many females have a lot of mindsets they place upon themselves, believing they can not be a good leader. They also need time to resolve their 'sins' - For guys, I think they can be more focused, when they decide to step forth, not much can hold them back. I've seen more men than women fulfil their full time callings. I've seen more men than women rise up to be leaders in a short time. (Though, I've also observed the ones that rise up fast are not as good as the women who take their time, haha!) In reality most women think they have issues, problems they need to resolve before being leaders, thus needing a lot of encouragement. Of course, no one, when asked to be a leader or a manager, would respond YES! (Maybe except me) and be very enthusiatic about it. But, being a leader also means you can have emotional issues... It's just that you handle it very differently from the rest. You see potential in every person, and a learning experience in every situation. When people question you about your actions, you take it as they need clarification, and maybe it's in their job scope to question you. When people ask you about your leadership plans, it means they are thinking hard about how to help you as well, and they have spent their time thinking about you. So, help yourself by sharing what you possibly can, unless, of course, you totally do not value their opinion. People have said very silly things to me about being a leader/my leadership that is almost laughable, coming from their inexperience. But just take it as a learning curve, they have nothing against you anyways and would probably be glad to see you succeed.

I hope to see more young women taking initiatives for their lives as well. I read something very thought-provoking on a motivational blog, about goals.

It says that if we are not setting clear, concise goals, or we do not set goals at all (Remember your friend who says that he doesn't make any resolutions, it's his resolution NOT to!) that we would just spend our lives achieving the goals of others. The goal of your local fast food chain, of your banker, of your financial planner, of your friends and ... get the point. It's scary if we look at it this way. I'm determined now not to spend my life - I have only one, anyway, to achieve the goals of others.