Glass half full

Today is a little bit different. Less negativity and a lot more to thank for. Sometimes optimism can be achieved by a simple change in perspective. You've probably heard the glass half full cliche and I won't bother repeating it. How do I apply it in practice?

For starters I compared my situation to a year ago. Instead of being overly attached to an imaginary desired future state I started taking stock of my situation. Some refer to this as "counting your blessings" . Whatever works for you. But I did my sums , tallied my assets and I realised how much better off I am compared to a lot of people.

1. For starters, I've saved enough in my retirement account to pay off 2 years worth of mortgage. I'm not going to pay down of course. Paying down reduces the interest but leaves you in a much more vulnerable situation.

2. I'm 15k ahead in my insurance payments which means I can afford to draw down on my policy's cash value for a whopping 4 years to keep it alive should I fall behind on my payments. I don't have to worry too much about critical illnesses for now.

3. In addition to all the above I've saved up a tidy sum to pay for household expenses for at least the next 2 years, should I lose my job for whatever reason.

4. This really should be no. 1 on the list.  I have my good health to thank for. Millions of the rich but sick will pay any price to get back their health. So let's all be thankful for this gift we still enjoy.

5. My spouse also some savings to tide us through should we need it.

6. We are Australian PRs and we have access to a public healthcare system. Many Singaporeans (not all) are still trying to get into the lucky country to enjoy all that space Australia offers. NZ and OZ are my retirement goals.

So at the ripe age of 33 I've still got a pretty full tank in me to save up for retirement. Ill readily admit that my current job made no. 3 possible within a short span of just 1.5 years. It's a miserable job I'm ready to leave the minute something better comes along, knowing I'm pretty well covered from head to toe anyway.

Letting Go

I grew up in a traditional family. Was taught hard work equals success and have acquired many life experiences that taught me, rightly or wrongly, that money buys happiness. That seems true for the first few years when I was recruited by a big consulting practice. It was prestigious and I was making a lot more than my cousin's. My self worth was based around my earning potential and my unhappiness mainly stemmed from falling behind my peers, whether perceived or real. It was a terrible way to live. I made many mistakes trying to catch up, including taking up a job I had very little passion for in order to outearn my peers and reach personal financial milestones. These very drivers of my past successes have slowly grown into my nightmares. I am no longer able to live in the present because every decision I make is subconsciously weighed around how it affects my future desired state of financial well being. It is just as what the Dala Lamei said, some people live in the future and do not enjoy the present. They live thinking they will live forever and spend all their energies chasing after money thinking it will buy happiness, with the irony that they are in fact giving up the very thing they desire in the process. I know money does not buy happiness. It's a simple message and not a particularly profound one. But it is a difficult one, especially for someone like me who lived an entire childhood wishing i had at least some of the things my peers played with. 
(My parents were good honest folks who struggled to provide and gave up much for my well being. They were undoubtedly the heroes of my life. Their story was an entire generation sacrificed for the betterment of the next.)

I am going to take some steps towards letting go of my wrong beliefs.

Till next time.

Fear

What is it about humans that we all seen to think we are very special? I always thought and pained at being ordinary. But if everyone is special then nobody would be ordinary right? What defines ordinary? And what defines special? I spent the entire first half of my life trying to fit in, to blend in to the crowd, to live up to expectations , fear of falling behind because I would rather be leading the pack. We all want to be ahead of the pack and in doing so define ourselves as special and which satisfies some inner need to be noticed, to be praised, or to be approved. It is frightening to be left behind. And perhaps the root reason why I am always measuring myself against the rest is because I fear being left behind. It is an unsettling feeling. It makes me nervous. It makes me nervous because I think I'm not good at fending for myself. And whenever I get left behind I try to catch up...Sometimes desperately.

Why do we fear being left behind? Is it a natural human reflex? I am not very good at philosophy so I'd guess it's because primitive humans as hunter gatherers have always bunched together  to hunt their mightier foes. Left alone, we feel powerless. Modern society is not all that dissimilar. The family concept has persevered through the ages, civilisation is very much the epitome of humans coming together for self defense, food and shelter.

The whole problem of why I feel the need to keep up, to be defined as normal is probably a whole lot more complex. But the starting point of how I should live my life from hence forth could lie in accepting that we are all alone and to conquer that feeling of being left behind is to embrace it. Learn to fend for myself, to understand that people won't always be around to lend a hand, and that you are really much more resilient and resourceful than you think you can be.

The wrong move

There are some decisions in life you may never recover from , such as a bad career move that can leave you years behind financially , should you choose to backtrack. This happened to me and there wasn't a day I did not look back and regret on the decision.

The last couple of months an opportunity came up that potentially could unwind all of that. Help me reverse the mistake . But it turned out to be a pipe dream . I feel lost. Trapped in a miserable job. Not a day goes by when I don't feel absolutely  horrible. I feel robbed of my future. I feel at this moment the roads in life open to me all lead to one shit conclusion. There are no easy roads to rest my weary legs. The soles of my feet still blistered and bleeding from the last 4 years. How much more should I take before I break free of this prison?

The tyranny of expectations

You can be your own prison. Or rather, you can imprison yourself with your own set of expectations. Very often I feel entrapped by my expectations of myself, and on many occasions upset when people do not meet my expectations of them. How do form humans form expectatiins? I won't say all expectations are bad. Having expectations prepares us ahead of what may be a nasty surprise. But all too often it seems my expectations are trapping me. When I feel things aren't going the way they should or I'm not at where I think i should be at my age, I get very upset. I've always felt I should have x amount of money by 35, a condo , car etc. Are my expectations robbing me of something better? We have all heard of the old adage that life is not about possessions but what does that really mean? I've heard Ajahn Brahm mention that to truly live is to practice mindgulness. To focus on the present rather than the past.

Living nightmare coming to an end?

Work in Singapore can be exhausting. And work under a female boss (especially the kiasi type) can be excruciatingly exhausting. Physically and emotionally. In the past few days I've experienced something like what a patient will experience after battling a very serious cancer. There's a period of recovery before the patient can be fully back to 100%. I feel I'm at that recovery stage, knowing this nightmare is going to end very soon. (But can never be soon enough). But I'm honestly quite amazed that I've come so far and survived so long. This is one of the worst jobs in the world paired up with one of the worst bosses in the world. A deadly combination I suspect had shaved a couple of years off my lifespan. There're about 2 months to go before I can officially hand in my termination but already I can't wait. Praying it turns out well. I'm very desperate to leave this place.

Is Australia a better place?

I've always been dreaming about moving to down under, even though I know it is going to be difficult to find jobs. A lot of my friends have advised me not to. The ones who knew better kept quiet. In any case I'm thankful I got my PR visa 1 year before they raised the qualifying tally to 70 points. I would almost certainly not qualify now.

Purpose of economic development

I doubt many Singaporeans have actually thought about what the economy means to Singaporeans and the purpose of it. Most of us would agree (myself included ) that the economy is important and it is more important to put food in the fridge before we talk about freedom of speech, space or the ideals about human rights. But Singapore today has gone past all of these basic concerns and beyond ensuring our livelihood must lie a greater purpose than just surviving. It is my opinion that being Singaporean means much more. It's about resilience, independence , the history we've built since the 1960s. Above all its about the kampung spirit that galvanised us into a collective motion that laid the foundations of our success today. Sadly, we have completely lost sight of that.