Tuesday, February 24, 2009

Satisfaction

I have learned, that if one advances confidently in the direction of his dreams, and endeavors to live the life he has imagined, he will meet with a success unexpected in common hours.
- Henry David Thoreau


This morning I was chatting with someone on Yahoo Messenger. I was talking about the 4Life Research business opportunity and how it could help people like me, freelancers to supplement our income. The problem of being a freelancer is that there are times when jobs are short in supply and during these times, we don’t earn anything. We eat up our savings just to survive until the next job comes along.

During these times, we find that we have a lot of free time. I spend a lot of that free time on Facebook playing scrabble with my friends, especially fellow freelancers, and chatting. So considering that I have a lot of free time on my hands, joining the 4Life Research business opportunity is a good thing for me. It keeps me busy and I get to do something to supplement my income.

Anyway, as I was chatting with this friend about the business, she asked me, “When will you be satisfied with your life?” I just blurted out a response without actually thinking about it. My initial response was when I can spend time with a loved one, watching tv together, doing things together, and not having to worry about any major problems, especially financial problems.

Then, as I was showering, I remembered where I got that image. It’s from the movie “Notting Hill” featuring Hugh Grant and Julia Roberts. Right at the end of the movie, there was this scene where they were sitting on a bench in a park, kids playing around them, he was reading a book while she was going through a magazine. It was as if they didn’t have a worry in the world. I’d be satisfied with that.

And when I thought real hard about it, I realized I’m on the right track to achieving that. I realized that no other business would be able to give me that kind of freedom. I could work for someone for 30 years, rising in rank and salary, and still will never achieve that. Network Marketing is the only business that could help me achieve that.

When the going gets tough...


When things go wrong,
as they sometimes will,


When the road your trudging
Seems all uphill,

When the funds are low

And the debts are high,

And you want to smile,

but you have to sigh,

When care is pressing you down a bit,

Rest if you must, but don't you quit.

Life is queer with it's twists an turns,

As everyone of us must sometimes learn,

And many a failure turns about,

When he might have won had he stuck it out,

Don't give up though the pace seems slow,
You may succeed with another blow.

Success is failure turned inside out,
The silver tint of the clouds of doubt,

And you can never tell how close you are,

It may be near when it seems so far,

So stick to the fight when you're hardest hit,

It's when things seem worst that you cannot quit.

-Unknown Author

I took this poem from a blog in multiply.com. This blog has some very inspirational posts in it and if you're interested to read more, click on the link below:


Sunday, February 22, 2009

Missed Opportunities

“When one door closes another door opens; but we so often look so long and so regretfully upon the closed door, that we do not see the ones which open for us.”
– Alexander Graham Bell

I often spend time looking back at the opportunities that I was given in the past. All those career decisions that I made, the ones that if I decided another way, would have put me in a totally different position compared to the one I am in now.

To be honest, I regret making some of the decisions that I made in the past.. When I look back, I look at the turning points in my life. There weren’t that many opportunities in my past, which could have made me a different person, but I guess I made the wrong choice in all of them.

Another thing I realized, that while I was looking back at all these missed opportunities, I missed other opportunities. I spent too much time wallowing in self-pity for missing a golden opportunity, that I didn’t see another one presenting itself in front of me.

Now, I no longer want to look back as often as I did. What happened in the past is in the past. True, things could have been different. But there’s no point regretting the past. Learn from it. Learn from your mistakes. Don’t discard any opportunity just because you thought at that time, it wasn’t a good idea or it wasn’t for you. You will never know until you try. There are so many opportunities waiting for you out there. Grab one and go with it.



This is the opportunity I took. Click here to check it out

Thursday, February 19, 2009

If I have been of service, if I have glimpsed more of the nature and essence of ultimate good, if I am inspired to reach wider horizons of thought and action, if I am at peace with myself, it has been a successful day.
- Alex Noble

A week ago, I was at this mamak stall talking to a prospect about the business I was doing, the 4Life Research Business. There was a slight lull in the conversation and I started to look around. I saw a lot of people, different races, different ages, some were single and were hanging out with their friends while others came with their spouses and kids.

I looked at this table next to mine, there were 3 people at that table. They were probably in their mid 20's and were sitting there playing cards while chatting. I think they were waiting for a fourth friend to join them. At another table, a young couple was sitting down having dinner while trying to feed their child (Not easy, been there. I used to take turns eating).

After surveying my surroundings, I looked at my prospect and I said to him, "Most of the people here, will probably still be here in 2 years time. They'll be doing the same thing, work 9 to 5, and come to this mamak to just hanging out". Then I asked him "Where are you going to be in 2 years time?"

He looked a bit stumped. He didn't really know what how to answer that question. So I told him where I thought I was going to be in 2 years time.

"I will come back to this mamak from time to time. I have friends who like to hangout here. But I won't be working 9 to 5. I won't be slaving myself just to make someone else rich. I will be financially independent. I'm going to work this business for 2 years. What I know, after 2 years, I will earn enough from this business for me to live comfortably, buy whatever I want, eat in fancy restaurants, travel whenever and wherever I want. I won't have to worry about money anymore as I will be earning a considerable residual income from the business that I'm doing now. That is where I'm going to be"

So where are you going to be in 2 years time?

Tuesday, February 17, 2009

Haven't been in the right frame of mind...

It is said an Eastern monarch once charged his wise men to invent him a sentence to be ever in view, and which should be true and appropriate in all times and situations. They presented him the words: "And this, too, shall pass away."
- Abraham Lincoln


The title says it all. I haven't really been in the right frame of mind lately. I haven't been able to do much over the last few days. Of course I still look the same, I still talk the same way, I smile whenever I greet anyone, but somehow, I don't feel the same.

I would usually be able to get over this kind of mood pretty quickly. I just need to find the source of the mood. But this time around, it seems different. It's like a combination of a million different things which have been bothering me over the last few days. And I can't pinpoint exactly which one is putting me in this moods.

Anyway, I didn't really have much to say about the business. I just wanted to write. To just ramble away and hopefully in all these ramblings, whatever it is that's bothering me will come up to the surface. So far, as I guess you can see, nothing. Since I don't really have a point to make, then I'll just sign off here. And hopefully more contemplation will eventually reveal the root of this mood.

P.s: I put the quote up there just in case reading it makes me feel better.

Thursday, February 12, 2009

Just some words of encouragement

"The harder the conflict, the more glorious the triumph. What we obtain too cheap, we esteem too lightly; it is dearness only that gives everything its value. I love the man that can smile in trouble, that can gather strength from distress and grow brave by reflection. 'Tis the business of little minds to shrink; but he whose heart is firm, and whose conscience approves his conduct, will pursue his principles unto death." - Victor Frankl

I don't really have much to say today. I just found the quote above and I thought it would be nice to put it on my blog. I find this quote to be a combination of inspirational and comforting. "The harder the conflict, the more glorious the triumph" I find that sentence to be quite inspiring. And "I love the man that can smile in trouble, that can gather strength from distress and grow brave by reflection". I find that comforting.

Anyway, just to let you know, I signed up my first downline this week. He's an old friend from school and called me out of the blue to ask me to bring him the forms, he wanted to join the business. I was very very shocked. No pitch, no presentation, he just joined on the spot. I guess that's going to be the easiest sign up I will ever get.

Since I don't really have much to say, let me just leave you with another inspirational video. Another on from The Secret:

Tuesday, February 10, 2009

Going to get a bit hectic....

Yesterday I got a call from a friend of mine, well more like a business partner. Once in a while this friend calls me up and tells me that I've got to prepare some sort of proposal or presentation paper for an event. This time he's telling me that I have to get the presentation ready by Friday.

That's pretty short notice. I've worked miracles before and done papers overnight, but usually I've had time to think things through before I even start writing the paper or preparing the presentation. This one doesn't really give me much time. But since I'm broke and have a tonne of outstanding bills to pay, I can't really say no. So looks like I'm going to have to work more miracles and come up with a presentation to impress a client in 2 days (Less than 2 actually).

So I guess I had better get a move on. And because of this, I'm going to have to neglect this blog for the next couple of days. But, I'm going to leave you with this video. It's a very uplifting and inspiring video which I watch very morning to give me that extra bit of inspiration. Enjoy....

Monday, February 9, 2009

A Great Outing

I just got back from a camping trip (Okay, not just. I got back last night). The last time I went camping was about 14 years ago. That time I had to go. I had no choice. I was just hired to join one of the subsidiaries for the Renong Group as a Management Trainee and they sent the 12 of us to the Outward Bound School in Lumut.

Most of the time we slept in the hostel, but on 2 occasions, we had to camp out under the stars (The stars were actually barely visible as we were camped under the trees on the beach on 1 occasion, and in the middle of the jungle on the other). On the 2nd occasion, we were taken to the middle of a jungle, and each of us was given a location to camp which was a fair distance from each other. So we spent the night beyond hearing range of each other as if we were alone in the middle of the jungle.

Needless to say, none of us managed to get much sleep that night. I have this strong objection of sharing a tent with a snake so I ended up sleeping on the ground a bit further away from the tent. That was an experience I would never forget and I swore to myself I would never go camping again.

So when the invitation came through Facebook to go on a camping trip, I was full of dread. I started to get flashbacks of almost walking into my tent to find a snake nicely curled up on my sleeping bag. But then, after talking to some of my friends who wanted to go, they managed to persuade me. What could happen in the middle of a campsite full of more than 30 people?


So on Saturday 7th February, I left the comfort of a nice warm bed at the ridiculous hour of 6.30 a.m. to pick up my friends, Juliana, Alfie and his wife, Shasha to head for Ulu Slim up in Perak. We joined up with some of the other members of the group at the Petronas Service Station off tthe Middle Ring Road 2 near Taman Melawati and picked up some old clothes to be donated to the “Orang Asli” near the camp site.

We then headed off to meet the rest of the gang at the Rawang R&R on the North South Highway. From there it was a 45 minute trip to Tanjung Malim, then another 45 minutes to Sungai Gapis (We would have gotten there sooner except for 1 of the cars had a tire blow up along the way). This was to be our first destination. Our camp site was at another location but the organizers felt that we should visit the waterfalls at this location first.

Before we headed for the waterfalls, we stopped by the “Orang Asli” village to pay our respects to the chieftain or “Tok Batin”. He wasn’t around at that time so we decided to head for the waterfalls first and meet up with him on the way back to donate some of the old clothes we had brought. We drove halfway to the waterfalls and had to leave our cars behind as we had to cross a stream.

Once we left our cars, crossed the stream, it was an uphill walk to the waterfalls. It was a pretty steep climb, but it didn’t bother me much. I was perched on top of a pick-up truck all the way up the hill. We had to leave the truck as we got near to the waterfalls. It was a short walk from there and the climb up was well worth it. The waterfalls were absolutely breathtaking.

If it wasn’t for the fact that we were running short of time (We still had to get to our camp site), I think maybe some of us might have taken a dip in the cold mountain waters. But we could only stay there for 30 minutes and we had to make our way down, back to the cars, and head for our campsite.

It didn’t take long before we reached this other village (Sorry, I can’t remember the name). We left our cars parked at one of the villager’s house, and headed out to our campsite in 4 x 4 vehicles. We were told that we could probably drive our own cars, but it wasn’t advisable. If it rained, we would have a lot of difficulty trying to drive out as the road could be very slippery.

From the village, it was a 30 minute ride in the 4 x 4 vehicle up to the camp site. The trip was quite an eventful trip as the road was very bumpy and we kept bouncing around in the 4 x 4 vehicle. But all the aches caused by bouncing around went away as soon as we got to the camp site.


The camp site was located next to a stream where the water was crystal clear but fast flowing. I thought about taking a dip in the water immediately after I got to the camp site. But then I was told to pitch up our tents first as it was getting pretty dark. So after I finished pitching up the tent, and helping Alfie to pitch up his tent as well, we all decided to take a dip.


The water was so cold. But it was great. You just had to be careful because of the very strong current, one slip and you could probably end up 100 meters downstream. After the swim, I took a short nap. It was a pretty exhausting day and there were still some activities in the evening.

I woke up just in time for dinner and the food was excellent. After dinner, the “Orang Asli” from one of the nearby villages came over and gave a performance of their traditional dance, the “Sewang”. All in all, it was a pretty enjoyable day. I was so looking forward to the next day.

I woke up quite early on Sunday and decided to go out and look around the camp site. I knew something wasn’t right. I wasn’t feeling too good so I decided to go back to sleep. I woke up again around 9.00 and felt that something was definitely wrong. My eyes had been constantly watery since 6.00 in the morning. I had gotten an eye infection.

The last time I had a similar infection, I couldn’t leave my room for 4 days. My eyes became very sensitive to brightness and would immediately become watery. I knew this was going to be a lousy day. I had already missed breakfast so I changed and took a dip in the waters. I didn’t stay very long as the brightness was making my eyes water so I went back to my tent and stayed inside. I fell asleep until lunch and during lunch, I decided to wear my sunglasses for the rest of the day. It helped a bit, but on occasion, my eyes would still become watery and I would have difficulty trying to keep them open.

Anyway, like I said, the last time I had a similar infection; it took me 4 days before I could leave my room, and a whole week before I could drive. This time, I was up and about today. I went out to meet a prospect together with Juliana and the accompanied her to meet Imran, a fellow Platinum Networker and his prospect earlier this afternoon. And I did all the driving. There were moments when I was a bit uncomfortable, but still, it didn’t take me a whole week before I could drive around.

I guess taking 4Life Transfer Factor Plus does help. Within 1 day, I’m already up and about. Compare that with the 7 days I had to spend at home at the end of 2007 because of a similar infection.

Thursday, February 5, 2009

The Perfect Business

I've been staring at this blank page for over an hour now. For the past one 1 hour or so, I've been contemplating quite a number of things. I couldn't decide what to write in this post, so I've decided to post a video instead.

This video is about the network marketing business. The speaker is Robert Kiyosaki, a successful entrepreneur, investor and best selling author of Rich Dad, Poor Dad. He calls the network marketing business as the perfect business. Watch the video and you will see why this is the perfect business opportunity for me and maybe it is for you too.

Tuesday, February 3, 2009

It's going to be a bumpy ride...

As I was driving to the Platinum Forum (This is like a training session for Platinum Networkers) yesterday evening, I switched on the radio just to listen to some music and alleviate the boredom of driving in KL traffic. I heard on the new that Honda Malaysia (the car manufacturer) announced they were going to cut their staff salary by a staggering 50%.

When I read the papers later on in the evening, I found more of the same thing. Some of the manufacturers in Penang are considering on cutting their staff salaries by 25%. You add on the comment by the Human Resource Minister a couple of months back that 5000 workers in the electronics sector would likely lose their jobs in the first quarter of this year, it looks like we'll be going through some though times.

Some people might say that given the current circumstances, a 25% pay cut is okay. All you have to do is to cut back on your expenditure, no more overseas holidays, no more extensive shopping trips, no more branded clothes, buy local instead and many other excuses just to make themselves feel better.

But trust me, I've been through it before. It's not that easy. You get used to a certain lifestyle and you feel like everything has become a necessity. You feel like you can't live without your evening "teh tarik" with you colleagues after work. You absolutely have to have your daily "roti canai" or "nasi lemak" at the mamak stall. So how do you cut back on your ependiture?

You can't. You just borrow more to get through the tough times. You max out your credit cards, and when that isn't enough, you apply for new ones. Eventually, you end up taking cash advances from one credit card to pay for another. After a while, it starts to become a habit. You think that borrowing from banks will help you get through the difficult times and you end up being in debts up to your nose. Then once you relaize your mistake, it's too late. You've already got a huge pile of debts.

I went through all that before. So today, I decided to ask myself, am I ready to face what could be another very difficult period ahead of me? I spent the first 10 minutes after I woke up this morning contemplating this, and I have to say, I AM READY.

I don't know about anyone else but for me, I am taking positive action. Rather than sit back, worry and wait for the impact of the potential economic recession to hit me, and believe me, it will hit me just as it will hit everyone else, I've decided to take the offensive.

That's one of the reasons I joined the 4Life Research business. It will help me weather the storm, assist me through what is going to be a very difficult time and prepare me for a much brighter future.

So I guess the question I am asking you is "Are You Ready?"

Sunday, February 1, 2009

It was a great win....

"Knowing is not enough; we must apply. Willing is not enough; we must do." - Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

I haven’t really done much about my 4Life Research business over the weekend. I’ve just been looking over my strategy and trying to iron out all the potential problems that I might encounter. I know I will face a lot of problems over the next few months, but after giving it a lot of thought, I’ve decided to cross that bridge when I come to it.

What I actually did instead was to watch lots of football. Since I joined 4Life Research, I haven’t really had the opportunity to watch football much as I’ve been busy going around talking to people about the product. So, last weekend, I decided I should get back to one of my favorite weekend past time activities, hanging around at mamak stalls for hours while watching football (Ok, so last night I wasn’t at a mamak stall with my regular Nescafe tarik. I was at the Ship sipping The ‘O’ chilled instead).

I’ve been a supporter of Liverpool since I was 12. That was way back during the gory days of Liverpool when they won almost every trophy they were competing in. Nowadays, it’s pretty much a struggle. This season is probably the best chance they have of picking up the Premier League trophy in a long time.

Anyway, I was watching the Liverpool vs Chelsea game last night. For a Liverpool fan, it was a great game. I thought the best we could get out of it was a draw and we’d end up being 4 points behind Man U. But Torres came up with the goods at the end and we ended up 2 goal winners.

One of the things that struck me throughout the game was how much we under rate Jamie Carragher’s contribution in the Liverpool line up. He is the core of the Liverpool defence. He provides the strength and intelligence to the back four. He marshals the defence the way a general would direct an attack on opposing forces. But the most important thing, he represents the heart and soul of the club.

Then it dawned upon me that he is to Liverpool what Transfer Factors are to our immune system. It provides our immune system with the intelligence to react whenever our body is under threat from external factors. It tells our immune system when to react, how to react and when to rest. It is the heart and soul of our immune system.

I guess the biggest difference in this analogy between Carragher and what he does for Liverpool and transfer factor and what it does for our immune system is that everyone in the footballing world knows about Carragher and a lot of people realize his importance to the club. As for transfer factors, not many people know of its existence and even less know about it’s importance.