Of sofas

Sofas are more than just servants.
They are a witness to a family successes and failures, achievements and disappointments, sickness and in health.
I am posting here for posterity measures my old vs new sofa..

2011 Reflections

As customary, I would like to reflect on the material blessings we have had on the past 4 Decembers of my life.

- Church: 3 Years serving as a leader in our community.
- Family:New tech gadgets - mac mini, ipod,
- Family:Sports engagement called triathlon! Completed 4 events this year, 2 triathlon, a 10K run and a duathlon!
- Family:Travel as a family to US Chicago before Christmas.
- Family: Improvement of the interior of my house with new TV, new set up box, new sofa and new Blu Ray player.
- Family:New aircon set up for my car.
- Family: 3rd place for my basketball team!
- Work: contibuted to the success of China plant set up.

For 2012?
1. Church:planning for a movie from our service.
2. Family: learn a new language online!
3. Family: participate in 4 events.
4. Work: integration of new company we bought!

But unlike most reflections,what I would do now is to look back at my thoughts every december for the last 4 years and determine if there is any trend or pattern. Here they are:

1. Why is there a countdown service at the church? And does it matter?
2. On the importance of leaders behavior -both on and off work - seeing is believing.
3. Certainty in an uncertain time - of the turbulent 2008 that saw the demise and collapse of the biggest bank in history.
4. Social duty (2nd career) of the highest order - on this years assignment at our religious order!
5. Does accumulation of wealth need to be heralded?

And the global tragedy this year that has somehow shaped people view the trend:
1. Japan earthquake:
2. Thailand Flood!
3. Philippines Flood!

Is this the world we will see because of 2012?

Rich Leaders

Becoming rich should be every persons dream.

Not just materially but physically, emotionally and of course spiritually.

And to hammer home the point, we watched as a family a segment in TLC channel entitled 'Worlds Richest". The idea is for them to at least observe, learn and apply what they see as the peculiarities of rich people.

I pointed out to my boys that to the untrained eyes, buying antiques to adorn ones home is a bad idea. Who would want to sit, lie down or dine in an old wooden and creaky objects anyway. But when I explained that the reason is more of investing rather than buying (burning) money because the value of the antique appreciates in value in 5, 10 years time, their eyes opened wide.

Which reminds me - if you give a poor man 1 mil dollar, with his exposure, experience, wants and desires, he would instantly buy items left and right until the 1M is spent.

On the contrary - if you give a rich man 1mil dollar, he/she would instantly think of ways to plant the money (invest) and then reap the benefits at a later stage in their lives.

One should strive for planting money.

But before that, one must tame off ones desires, cultivate wise spending and practice at the very early stage in life.

Leaders after all lead the way. And when you are rich, and an exemplary leader at that - people would listen more, and follow your lead.

Thoughts?

Writing a Memoir

I learned of something new today - that writing a memoir has to be made at ANY time in a persons life. I used to think memoirs are reserved for those accomplished lot.

Having worked overseas for 10+ years now, played different roles, engaged in different cultures, dealt with different nationalities, exposed to different cultural sensitivities and being a religious leader and devoted father to 2 boys, I have had my strings of accomplishments (not boasting of course).

I therefore believe future generations can at least peek at what their great grandfather has achieves, this thoughts, frustrations and the like.

Perils of Leadership

To those who have experienced leading a group of men into uncharted waters and territories can identify with what I am about to share.

Leading in the unknown, one must :

1. Trust one's instinct and gut feel. The butterfly in ones stomach is a good indicator for knowing what works and what does not work.

2. Do not show fear to your men. Fear immobilizes them.

3. Show courage and boldness. Men follow boldness, not title. Men will come to the rescue if they see their leader in trouble.

4. Welcome danger. The test of your leadership is when men encounter danger. The behavior exhibited by the leader shall be the behavior your people will exhibit. People can read body language. If one shirks, people can see. If one succumbs, people will judge.

5. Push forward, No matter what happens. Push forward, not backward. Retreat shows weakness. Pushing forward despite the perils will mark your legacy as a legend.

6. Beat the odds, no matter what. People who have achieved larger than life status are people who have beaten odds, people who have overcome trials and testings.

7. Plan B is for cowards. And cowards have no following.

Ultimately, if one aspires to leadership but does not perspire to face the perils, the one is simply an admin. A manager. A diplomat. A liason officer. A messenger not decision maker.

People will follow those who see as larger than life. People will show loyalty to someone who they see worthy to follow.

In the end, men dont care what you say until they see that you care.

45 Lessons Life Taught Me

Found on Triathlete Blog. Apparently written by Regina Brett, 90 years old. This is something we should all read at least once a week!!!!!

"To celebrate growing older, I once wrote the 45 lessons life taught me. It is the most requested column I've ever written.

1. Life isn't fair, but it's still good.

2. When in doubt, just take the next small step.

3. Life is too short to waste time hating anyone. Change the way you think.

4. Your job won't take care of you when you are sick. Your friends and family will. Stay in touch.

5. Pay off your credit cards every month.

6. You don't have to win every argument. Agree to disagree.

7. Cry with someone. It's more healing than crying alone.

8. Release your children when they become adults, it’s their life now.

9. Save for retirement starting with your first paycheck.

10. When it comes to chocolate, resistance is futile.

11. Make peace with your past so it won't screw up the present.

12. It's OK to let your children see you cry.

13. Don't compare your life to others. You have no idea what their journey is all about.

14. If a relationship has to be a secret, you shouldn't be in it.

15. Everything can change in the blink of an eye.

16. Take a deep breath It calms the mind.

17. Get rid of anything that isn't useful, beautiful or joyful.

18. Whatever doesn't kill you really does make you stronger.

19. It's never too late to have a happy childhood. But the second one is up to you and no one else.

20. When it comes to going after what you love in life, don't take no for an answer.

21. Burn the candles, use the nice sheets, wear the fancy lingerie. Don't save it for a special occasion. Today is special.

22. Just because you believe you are right, doesn't mean you are. Keep an open mind.

23. Be eccentric now. Don't wait for old age to wear purple.

24. The most important sex organ is the brain.

25. No one is in charge of your happiness but you.

26. Frame every so-called disaster with these words 'In five years, will this matter?'

27. Always choose life.

28. Forgive everyone everything.

29. What other people think of you is none of your business.

30. Time heals almost everything. Give time time.

31. However good or bad a situation is, it will change.

32. Don't take yourself so seriously. No one else does.

33. Believe in miracles.

34. Your job is to love your children, not choose who they should love.

35. Don't audit life. Show up and make the most of it now.

36. Growing old beats the alternative -- dying young.

37. Your children get only one childhood.

38. All that truly matters in the end is that you loved.

39. Get outside every day. Miracles are waiting everywhere.

40. If we all threw our problems in a pile and saw everyone else's, we'd grab ours back.

41. Envy is a waste of time. You already have all you need.

42. The best is yet to come...

43. No matter how you feel, get up, dress up and show up.

44. Yield.

45. Life isn't tied with a bow, but it's still a gift.

IN MEMORIAM

STEVE JOB'S SPEECH!

I am honored to be with you today at your commencement from one of the finest universities in the world.

I never graduated from college. Truth be told, this is the closest I’ve ever gotten to a college graduation.

Today I want to tell you three stories from my life. That’s it. No big deal. Just three stories.

The first story is about connecting the dots.

I dropped out of Reed College after the first 6 months, but then stayed around as a drop-in for another 18 months or so before I really quit. So why did I drop out?
It started before I was born. My biological mother was a young, unwed college graduate student, and she decided to put me up for adoption. She felt very strongly that I should be adopted by college graduates, so everything was all set for me to be adopted at birth by a lawyer and his wife.
Except that when I popped out they decided at the last minute that they really wanted a girl.
So my parents, who were on a waiting list, got a call in the middle of the night asking: “We have an unexpected baby boy; do you want him?” They said: “Of course.”
My biological mother later found out that my mother had never graduated from college and that my father had never graduated from high school. She refused to sign the final adoption papers. She only relented a few months later when my parents promised that I would someday go to college.
And 17 years later I did go to college. But I naively chose a college that was almost as expensive as Stanford, and all of my working-class parents’ savings were being spent on my college tuition. After six months, I couldn’t see the value in it.
I had no idea what I wanted to do with my life and no idea how college was going to help me figure it out. And here I was spending all of the money my parents had saved their entire life. So I decided to drop out and trust that it would all work out OK.
It was pretty scary at the time, but looking back it was one of the best decisions I ever made. The minute I dropped out I could stop taking the required classes that didn’t interest me, and begin dropping in on the ones that looked interesting.
It wasn’t all romantic. I didn’t have a dorm room, so I slept on the floor in friends’ rooms, I returned coke bottles for the 5¢ deposits to buy food with, and I would walk the 7 miles across town every Sunday night to get one good meal a week at the Hare Krishna temple. I loved it. And much of what I stumbled into by following my curiosity and intuition turned out to be priceless later on. Let me give you one example:
Reed College at that time offered perhaps the best calligraphy instruction in the country.
Throughout the campus every poster, every label on every drawer, was beautifully hand calligraphed. Because I had dropped out and didn’t have to take the normal classes, I decided to take a calligraphy class to learn how to do this.
I learned about serif and san serif typefaces, about varying the amount of space between different letter combinations, about what makes great typography great. It was beautiful, historical, artistically subtle in a way that science can’t capture, and I found it fascinating.
None of this had even a hope of any practical application in my life. But ten years later, when we were designing the first Macintosh computer, it all came back to me. And we designed it all into the Mac.
It was the first computer with beautiful typography. If I had never dropped in on that single course in college, the Mac would have never had multiple typefaces or proportionally spaced fonts. And since Windows just copied the Mac, it’s likely that no personal computer would have them.
If I had never dropped out, I would have never dropped in on this calligraphy class, and personal computers might not have the wonderful typography that they do. Of course it was impossible to connect the dots looking forward when I was in college. But it was very, very clear looking backwards ten years later.
Again, you can’t connect the dots looking forward; you can only connect them looking backwards. So you have to trust that the dots will somehow connect in your future.
You have to trust in something — your gut, destiny, life, karma, whatever. This approach has never let me down, and it has made all the difference in my life.


My second story is about love and loss.
I was lucky — I found what I loved to do early in life. Woz and I started Apple in my parents garage when I was 20. We worked hard, and in 10 years Apple had grown from just the two of us in a garage into a $2 billion company with over 4000 employees.
We had just released our finest creation — the Macintosh — a year earlier, and I had just turned 30. And then I got fired. How can you get fired from a company you started? Well, as Apple grew we hired someone who I thought was very talented to run the company with me, and for the first year or so things went well.
But then our visions of the future began to diverge and eventually we had a falling out. When we did, our Board of Directors sided with him. So at 30 I was out. And very publicly out. What had been the focus of my entire adult life was gone, and it was devastating.
I really didn’t know what to do for a few months. I felt that I had let the previous generation of entrepreneurs down – that I had dropped the baton as it was being passed to me.
I met with David Packard and Bob Noyce and tried to apologize for screwing up so badly. I was a very public failure, and I even thought about running away from the valley.
But something slowly began to dawn on me — I still loved what I did. The turn of events at Apple had not changed that one bit. I had been rejected, but I was still in love. And so I decided to start over.
I didn’t see it then, but it turned out that getting fired from Apple was the best thing that could have ever happened to me. The heaviness of being successful was replaced by the lightness of being a beginner again, less sure about everything. It freed me to enter one of the most creative periods of my life.
During the next five years, I started a company named NeXT, another company named Pixar, and fell in love with an amazing woman who would become my wife. Pixar went on to create the worlds first computer animated feature film, Toy Story, and is now the most successful animation studio in the world.
In a remarkable turn of events, Apple bought NeXT, I returned to Apple, and the technology we developed at NeXT is at the heart of Apple’s current renaissance. And Laurene and I have a wonderful family together.
I’m pretty sure none of this would have happened if I hadn’t been fired from Apple. It was awful tasting medicine, but I guess the patient needed it. Sometimes life hits you in the head with a brick.
Don’t lose faith. I’m convinced that the only thing that kept me going was that I loved what I did. You’ve got to find what you love. And that is as true for your work as it is for your lovers.
Your work is going to fill a large part of your life, and the only way to be truly satisfied is to do what you believe is great work. And the only way to do great work is to love what you do. If you haven’t found it yet, keep looking. Don’t settle.
As with all matters of the heart, you’ll know when you find it. And, like any great relationship, it just gets better and better as the years roll on. So keep looking until you find it. Don’t settle.


My third story is about death.
When I was 17, I read a quote that went something like: “If you live each day as if it was your last, someday you’ll most certainly be right.”
It made an impression on me, and since then, for the past 33 years, I have looked in the mirror every morning and asked myself: “If today were the last day of my life, would I want to do what I am about to do today?” And whenever the answer has been “No” for too many days in a row, I know I need to change something.
Remembering that I’ll be dead soon is the most important tool I’ve ever encountered to help me make the big choices in life. Because almost everything — all external expectations, all pride, all fear of embarrassment or failure – these things just fall away in the face of death, leaving only what is truly important.
Remembering that you are going to die is the best way I know to avoid the trap of thinking you have something to lose. You are already naked. There is no reason not to follow your heart.
About a year ago I was diagnosed with cancer. I had a scan at 7:30 in the morning, and it clearly showed a tumor on my pancreas.
I didn’t even know what a pancreas was. The doctors told me this was almost certainly a type of cancer that is incurable, and that I should expect to live no longer than three to six months.
My doctor advised me to go home and get my affairs in order, which is doctor’s code for prepare to die. It means to try to tell your kids everything you thought you’d have the next 10 years to tell them in just a few months. It means to make sure everything is buttoned up so that it will be as easy as possible for your family. It means to say your goodbyes.
I lived with that diagnosis all day. Later that evening I had a biopsy, where they stuck an endoscope down my throat, through my stomach and into my intestines, put a needle into my pancreas and got a few cells from the tumor.
I was sedated, but my wife, who was there, told me that when they viewed the cells under a microscope the doctors started crying because it turned out to be a very rare form of pancreatic cancer that is curable with surgery. I had the surgery and I’m fine now.


This was the closest I’ve been to facing death, and I hope it’s the closest I get for a few more decades. Having lived through it, I can now say this to you with a bit more certainty than when death was a useful but purely intellectual concept:

No one wants to die. Even people who want to go to heaven don’t want to die to get there. And yet death is the destination we all share. No one has ever escaped it. And that is as it should be, because Death is very likely the single best invention of Life.

It is Life’s change agent. It clears out the old to make way for the new. Right now the new is you, but someday not too long from now, you will gradually become the old and be cleared away. Sorry to be so dramatic, but it is quite true.

Your time is limited, so don’t waste it living someone else’s life. Don’t be trapped by dogma — which is living with the results of other people’s thinking.

Don’t let the noise of others’ opinions drown out your own inner voice. And most important, have the courage to follow your heart and intuition.

They somehow already know what you truly want to become. Everything else is secondary.
When I was young, there was an amazing publication called The Whole Earth Catalog, which was one of the bibles of my generation. It was created by a fellow named Stewart Brand not far from here in Menlo Park, and he brought it to life with his poetic touch. This was in the late 1960′s, before personal computers and desktop publishing, so it was all made with typewriters, scissors, and polaroid cameras.


It was sort of like Google in paperback form, 35 years before Google came along: it was idealistic, and overflowing with neat tools and great notions.
Stewart and his team put out several issues of The Whole Earth Catalog, and then when it had run its course, they put out a final issue. It was the mid-1970s, and I was your age.

On the back cover of their final issue was a photograph of an early morning country road, the kind you might find yourself hitchhiking on if you were so adventurous.
Beneath it were the words:


“Stay Hungry. Stay Foolish.” It was their farewell message as they signed off. Stay Hungry. Stay Foolish.

And I have always wished that for myself. And now, as you graduate to begin anew, I wish that for you.

Stay Hungry. Stay Foolish.

Thank you all very much.

TOP 5 Regrets people have on their deathbeds

FOUND THIS ARTICLE WORTH Mentioning!

1. I wish I’d had the courage to live a life true to myself, not the life others expected of me.

Ware said that this was the most common regret of all. It’s easy to let our dreams slip by due to circumstances or decisions that we’ve made. These choices mark the divide between living a fulfilled life or one that is full of regrets.

It’s important that we aim to achieve at least some of our dreams along the way. We often put off trying for our dreams due to a myriad of reasons. Before we know it, we would have lost our health and therefore, our chance to attain them.

If your dream is to start a business, get to it. If it’s to learn how to dance or try skydiving, book a class. If you want to make music, pick up a guitar.

Don’t put it off any longer.

2. I wish I didn’t work so hard.

In between having ends meet and aiming for a luxurious lifestyle, it’s easy to see why we get caught up with our work.

Ware said that this was a common regret of male patients who didn’t manage to spend enough time with their family.

It’s easy to get caught up in the rat race, but remember to set aside some time for the important things in life. Most importantly, you will have to understand why you do what you do. Is it for your own personal achievement, for family, or for a higher calling?

3. I wish I’d had the courage to express my feelings.

Hands up anyone who has suppressed their feelings in order to avoid potential embarrassment or argument.

Avoiding arguments is good for a harmonious life, but the problem comes when we take it too far. When we blindly follow the opinions of someone more assertive just to avoid arguments, we’re shortchanging ourselves.

While it’s understandable that we use Twitter and blogging to rant about things we are unhappy with, do remember that talking about it face-to-face is always a more sincere option.

So if an issue is major enough, try approaching the person for an honest and frank chat. We’re not saying that the talk will be smooth sailing, but your relationships will emerge stronger and healthier.

4. I wish I had stayed in touch with my friends.

It’s easy to lose touch with good friends. A busy lifestyle can take away time from the ones you love. This is where technology comes in.

With services like Facebook, WhatsApp and Yahoo! Messenger, it’s easy to keep tabs on old friends. Talking to friends is so effortless today that we have no reason to let staying in touch with friends take a backseat.

At the end of the day though, nothing beats chatting over a cup of coffee. So always remember to occasionally take things offline and catch up with your friends the old fashioned way.

5. I wish that I had let myself be happier.

‘Many don't realize until the end that happiness is a choice’, said Ware in her blog post.

This is very true. Happiness is something that we choose for ourselves. Many get upset over the circumstances in their lives. What they do not realize is that they can choose to face difficulties with a smile.

Take a moment and enjoy life. If difficulties come your way, remember that pain is inevitable but wallowing in misery is always optional.

Choose to be happy.

Travelogue-My hometown

Family is really getting excited for my hometown trip.
1. June 4th - arrive midnight and will be fetched by family members!
2. June 5th - nostalgic trip down to my hometown, school, relatives, friends.
3. June 6th - hit the road to the North. We are going to where a former president had lived. Visit his masouleum and the famous Malacanang of the north. Paoay lake. Fort Ilocandia.
4. June 7th - rest. Prepare for Manila trip.
5. June 8th - early morning travel to manila. Rest and massage at SM?
6. June 9th - travel to QC, my old university. Watch PBA game?
7. June 10th - travel to Tagaytay. Meet churchmates in Tagaytay?
8. June 11th - early morning travel to Subic. Rest at hotel.
9. June 12th - road to Bataan, Mt Samat, Old nuclear power plant.
10. June 13th - rest at Holiday Inn clark.
11. June 14th - back to my adopted country.

Rule#2

#2: Know what a team is and how it works. It is made up of dynamic personalities.

APPLICATION: Find out what motivates my people. Know who's the influencer, the indirect leader and who's opinion matters most.

#2 Set an example/standards:

APPLICATION: Work hard, play hard. Question everything. Mold ones character. Be a person of integrity.

Rule#1 of Management - My daily rule application

Rule #1
Managing your team : People can manage themselves if you let them. What you need to be concentrating on is the real job of management - the strategy.

APPLICATION: I went to look into how my overall global strategy. I have also trained China team. I realized these efforts are all Quadrant II areas citing Steven Covey's 7 habits.

Managing yourself: Get it done/work hard. Genius is 1% inspiration and 99% perspiration.

APPLICATION: I have to spend until 10:30 pm last night to tackle training with my supplier. Beyond that I have to be at the sending off dinner with one of my leaders at church!

Who do you admire?

I must admit I was getting a little 'emo' when I joined my youngest son for 1 on 1 the past 2 weeks. For one thing, gone are the days when all I do is talk to him about 'games, fun events and other 'kids' stuff.

Now the tone is more serious. The conversation is revolving around his officership in the Natl cadet corps, his exercise routine to strengthen his body, even life and some history about our family.

I am prepared to handling kids during our early part of our life. But now that I am raising teens, my learning curve has to happen fast in order to model the way.

I remember when I was a teen that the common theme is to look for role model or 'idol' or even 'heroes' outside of the family. I asked my son last night. I asked him straight, 'so who do you admire in the family?. He said, without batting an eyelash.

Mom! I asked, why? Because she's smart, works hard and takes care of me. I was inwardly elated to hear of such comment! At least I now know my youngest does not have to look 'outside' of the family to look for people to admire.

It's now my turn to work harder in what I do so I too would elicit the same admiration from my boys. Its easier said than done, though...

My Hometown

I am getting nostalgic as of late as my wife and kids make mental preparations to go back to my hometown in 3 weeks time. I am reminded of where I came from, and what this means to me.

Having this 1 day break from work-family-ministry (not in that order of course) life cycle allows me to somehow reflect on where am I and where I am heading in the journey called LIFE.

For one thing, being introduced to the life changing principles of Christ and HIS WORD is the foundation of everything I do now. Serving in a church ministry together with tireless leaders who have unshakable commitment and deep faith to the living GOD is something I cannot thank GOD more than enough.

I also remember the work organization that I belong to for honing my leadership and managerial skills in a top notch global environment. One lesson I learned is that no matter how diverse a global culture we live in, deep inside our being, we all long for the same basic human need - the desire to be loved (recognized), cared for, nurtured and led.

But in all these, I shall always be indebted for the free education in a public institution that has shaped and molded me during my formative years. I know I shall one day give back to the many nameless and faceless Juan de la cruz folks who toiled so hard to earn a penny so I could enjoy a free and world class education.

And even if I am out of my homeland for many years, and no matter where my job and where I will be in the future, I shall always be 100% Filipino and 100% Servant leader of a Living GOD!

My prayer is that I live up to what my founding fathers have sacrificed their lives for. After all, one martyr once said " The Filipino is worth dying for".

May I carry the message for the benefit of the next generations to come. Mabuhay Ka Pinoy!

Lyrics from Ako ay Pilipino

=================

Ako ay Pilipino

Ang dugo’y maharlika

Likas sa aking puso

Adhikaing kay ganda

Sa Pilipinas na aking bayan

Lantay na Perlas ng Silanganan

Wari’y natipon ang kayamanan mg maykapal

Bigay sa ‘king talino

Sa mabuti lang laan

Sa aking katutubo

Ang maging mapagmahal

Ako ay Pilipino

Ako ay Pilipino

Isang Bansa, sang diwa

Ang minimithi ko

Sa bayan ko’t bandila

laan buhay ko’t diwa

Ako ay Pilipino

Pilipinong totoo

Ako ay Pilipino

Ako ay Pilipino

Taas noo, kahit kanino

Ang Pilipino ay …Ako

Back to Basics

How do we go back to basics if we don't have the basics to go back to.

3 Key Leadership Principles

There are at least 3 principles in leadership I have learned over the years:

1. Leadership is a journey. Take people to a whole new land. A new experience. Get them to
thinking that where they are right now is not good. Paint a bleak picture of today and a rosy picture of tomorrow, or what is out there. Of course your personality comes into play how you can do this, esp if obstacles are in the path. And in all of this, do it with all honesty and candor. People hate liars and phony characters.

2. Leadership is about movitation (the heart). Its not enough to give them a good reason (head), but even more important engage their emotions. Remember, people buy on emotion and justify on reason. Study the people you lead and understand what makes them tick, each one of them:)

3. Leadership is caring. People don't care what you say (or where you're taking them) if they don't see that you care. This is basic human interaction process. Be sincere. Don't care for the sake of caring, people can see it. Be genuine too. Voice out your emotion. If you're angry show it. If you like it praise. This way people see your vulnerability and will respect you for that.

Contract

My son and I had a deal. He promised that if he is on the top 5 of his class that I award him with 70 bucks for his effort (1H2011).

To reinforce the importance of this deal and mimic the real world, I had to assemble a quick contract and we both signed the agreement inside a moviehouse (while watching Rango::).

Hope that he learns his lesson and that I am setting a good example for him to follow one day.

Updates

I looked at my post and it read January 17! Wow, it felt like its been ages since I updated my blog. Lets 'look back' and find out what happened over the course of 2 months.

February saw my inlaws, parent and brother in law, coming to town. The whole mid week of Feb was spent picking them up, touring SGP and of course lots of fellowship! Before this time was church work monitoring the couples night out.

March saw me celebrating my birthday with my parents in law. One memorable event took place at the dinner party where we celebrated. Just my being a 'hero' in saving the day with my kids, I almost ruined the dinner with a brief spat with the owner/manager who stubbornly refuse to let us take photo. I told her its my birthday for Christ sake! Even then, she came away with funny stories about how a woman who barge into her resto and turning out the person was in fact from a competitor.

Can't ask for more...

vision

Create a vision so great that if God is not in it, it will doom to fail.

ambiguity

Leaders don't avoid ambiguity. They thrive on it! After all, if everything is so crystal clear, then we don't need to communicate.

Breakthrough

Looking back at my life/trail, what breakthrough contributions have I made to society? Is being a leader in my company or in my religious or adequate? The web defines breakthrough as follows. So the question is - have I contributed a breakthrough act/event?

Breakthrough. 1. an offensive thrust that penetrates and carries beyond a defensive line in warfare.2. an act or instance of breaking through an obstacle breakthrough agreement. 3. a sudden advance especially in knowledge or techniquebreakthrough. 4. a person's first notable success.

I remember the poem:

I am only one, but still I am one.

I cannot do everything, but still I can do something;

and because I cannot do everything,

I will not refuse to do something that I can do.

Tools for my Journey - HALFTIME

I am still clueless where I got this urge and bug for reading.

Maybe from my parents, who are both professionals in their own craft. Maybe from the lack of reading material when I was growing up. Inside of my heart and head, I simply could not recall the time this passion kicked in.

But, look at the books, journals that I have amassed so far in my 37 years of existence.

The questions are:

1. Have I become a better servant of a living God?

2. Have i contributed to society?

3. Have I made the lives of those around me better?

4. Have I become a good role model for my kids?

5. Have I become a better man?

6. Have I achieved what I dreamt of as a kid?

I dont know. I am still midway in my life. Like in any sporting event, there is a halftime huddle where the coach and the players re-examine their game strategy, the opponents, the adjustments to be made in order to win the battle.

Maybe its time for me to do the same? Thoughts!

2011 Goal

In order to streamline and make effective blogging process for 2011, I am classifying my thought process under 3 different areas, all of which can be summarized in the workinprogress blog.

1.God focused: pastoratwork - chronicle journey of a bivocational pastor.

2.Family focused: triathlete novice - chronicle health benefits of exercise. rex regis-chronical business thoughts. parenting pastors - chronical parental thoughts.

3.Work focused: quality engineering in logistics - chronical work related problems, solutions, trends and emerging processes.

Join me as I traverse life armed with only an line trail..