Ben Blogs

Its been a full month since I last posted anything here. So much for trying to blog daily.

Anyway, you know how those career counselors try to understand your passions by asking you questions like

“What would you be doing, if money weren’t an issue?”

I could never  answer that. It’s usually something to do with music, but I can never be sure. I mean everyone loves to listen to music, right? That doesn’t necessarily mean that they should make a career out of it.

(Random: Going to iTunes to play an Eminem track now)

But there is another similar kind of question that I explore occasionally.

“What is your perfect day? A day that you could repeat everyday for the rest of your life?”

So here is whats perfect for me.

Comfortable sofa. Air conditioning. 50 inch HD TV. Surround speakers. Awesome movies. Girl/alcohol (optional)

And yes I’m pretty sure I could do this every day. I love watching movies. I notice that when I go to the cinemas, my palms will sweat with excitement. The anticipation of being disconnected form the world for 2 hours and exploring a story being told on screen.

Or do I love watching movies because I’m bored? Who knows. I’m not picky with the genre. I’m willing to watch anything. Anything except realistic gore like SAW. I hate it because unlike ghost stories, these kinda things might and can happen to you. Some physco might just decide to abduct me, hang me upside down, slit my heels to prevent me from running away and stick a torch blowtorch in my eye. Ugh.

But yes movies. I’ll go back and watch one today.

To be honest I am not sure if it was meant as a joke but it certainly sounded legit at that time.

After futsal one day, a couple of us went out for dinner. We asked a friend to consider working out, gain some mass and muscle. He’s a good player, but it would be great if he could be physically stronger on the court.

“No man, too late for that already” he said.

I was like what?! How can anyone at the age of 27 say its too late to go to the gym to muscle up?

There is no need to have a body like this (though age is still not an issue)

There has got to be way better excuses than that right?

I might think that is crazy for someone to use age  as an excuse for gym but to him it could have been perfectly justified.

That statement made me reflect on certain limiting beliefs I impose on myself. For fun lets take a look at one.

“Its too late to learn programming”

I do think that if I start now, I would have a intermediate knowledge of it in 5 years. I would be 31 years old. Not young, not old.

My mind tells me that I’m probably not willing to put in the hard work. That’s why I’m stalling. Some of the backing excuses I give with regards to this is actually quite hilarious.

1. I don’t know where to start. Those self learn books look boring and texty.

2. I not sure if I can see myself staying up all night typing code.

3. I don’t see myself as being great at logic/problem solving.

4. Ooo this is a good one – I have no time to learn it.

Yup. I hear you. All lame excuses.

But this is good because now I understand what it looks like from a different point of view.

I think for now I’ll give myself a pat on the back for being aware of all my crap.

#winning

Oh My God.

I am actually in the midst of reading this book - Switch: How to Change Things When Change Is Hard. But after only 20 pages in, I had to blog about something I read.

What I found fascinating was this statement: “Self-control is an exhaustible resource.”  The authors go on to explain the research to support that finding.  In other words, we expend energy when we exert self-control.

You can read about the experiment they conducted here. (There is a video as well. Watch it!)

When I quit smoking 2 years ago, I always felt that because I concentrated so much on trying not to smoke, I was slacking in other areas of my life.  In fact I can actually remember telling someone “I’ve used up all my self control”. I had this nagging feeling it was true though I probably thought it was bullshit.

But now there are studies to prove it!

Here’s a paragaph from the book summarizing the experiment.

“So when you hear people say that change is hard because people are lazy or resistant, that’s just flat wrong. In fact, the opposite is true: Change is hard because people wear themselves out. And that’s the second surprise about change: What looks like laziness is often exhaustion.”

Now, I am not writing this to justify anything. I haven’t even finished the book yet. I am just excited because this actually crossed my mind before and now I am reading it in a book!

Ok back to reading.

I had an interesting encounter with a taxi driver.

At first, I mistook him being irritated and rude. But it turns out, he was just getting things done with a sense of urgency.

Right of the bat, he offered to pick up another customers just as I got in.

“Ok, come in. It’s on the way (not really)”

Then, it was pedal mashing all the way.

Once, he misjudged the distance of the speed bump and couldn’t break in time.

“Sorry!” he exclaimed.

But from then on, he started chatting about how traffic sucked in the mornings, different types of customers, shortcuts, Sarawak politics, standard of living in PJ/KL, bad drivers, and shortcuts.

Yes shortcuts were his forte. He cut past multiple traffic bottlenecks leveraging his encyclopediac knowledge of small roads. It was amazing.

Initially I tried to study the roads he used so that I could use it in the future. But after awhile I realized that it was just futile. I’m was never really good with roads anyway.

When he dropped that lady off, she gleefully said

“Wow! I’m early for the first time. My colleagues are going to be so surprised. Plus it’s also 3 dollars cheaper than usual”

To which he muttered under his breath as she left

“Please, its all about time and money. You think I’m here to date you?”

He was very particular about time. He would honk cars in front of him what were driving slow. Once, he overtook a car that seemed to be crawling towards the green light.

” *Swear word* Why drive so slow! Stopping at the red light would cost you an additional 3 minutes. After 10am there won’t be as much customers to pick up. *swear word* ”

I wish I could converse in Cantonese proficiently. I think we would have had a great conversation. All I did was nod, agree and ask simple idiotic questions.

Nonetheless, here was a man lived by the expression - Time is Money

His world might be confined in the car but it did not let that stop him from pegging time as a valuable asset. I’d be first to admit that I waste a bucket load of time everyday.

We all wish we could do more in life. But are we really utilizing our time efficiently?

I am anxious. I fear that by 30 I’ve not accomplished anything worth mentioning.

So thank you Mr. Urgent-Taxi-Man for the wake up call.

Oh and before I forget.

Its worth noting that after dropping off an extra passenger and going slightly out of the way, he managed to get me to my destination with the same fare and time as if I were to take a direct route.

Now chew on that.

I take bus home from work everyday. Well almost.

I dread taking it. It is almost impossible to get a seat after 6pm. Not that mind standing. But for some reason, the conductor is willing to take as much people as the bus can fit. It can be quite uncomfortable standing next to someone with their armpits in my face.

But more people, more profit right.

The conductor probably doesn’t care. He is just doing his job. And his job is to collect the bus fare. Or perhaps the more he collects, the more commission he gets. Does he care whether your ride home is comfortable. No But could he?

Certainly.

Same goes to the driver. His job is to drive. It doesn’t matter how frequent hebrakes and accelerates even though people at the back might be swaying back and forth. Does he care whether you might fal? No. But could he?

Certainly.

Brands and companies can go on and on and preach about how much they care about YOU, the customer. But lets face it, the true challenge is making sure the employees of the company embrace it.

Because they are the ones out there creating real relationships with people. They are the ones actually come into contact with potential customers/clients.

I read somewhere that only 14% of people trust ads these days. That is a whopping 86% who don’t give a rats ass about what you print/say.

It’s important that all employees/staff understand and believe the message that the company is trying to portray. Become evangelists.

Thats far more powerful then spending money pushing unnecessary “values” into our head.

I had the opportunity of meeting Ian Mckee, CEO of Vocanic at the Digital Marketing conference I attended.

This is how they describe themselves:

Word of Mouth. Social Media. Influencers. Consumers in Control. It’s Our Expertise.We are the Social and Word of Mouth Media marketing people. We spend our lives online and exploring new ways to communicate for ourselves and our partners.

An amazing thing happened recently. I experienced the power of word of mouth marketing first hand.

Whenever I get a sore throat, I head over to 7-11 to buy myself a packet of Fisherman’s Friend. It did the job. But just as I went, I mentioned this to my colleague to which he instantly replied.

“Why that? Get the purple packet from Strepsils, its the best”

I didn’t think much of it but my throat was really hurting that day. So bad that I could see this pea sized ulcer in the back of my throat next to my tonsils.

But that was it. Just like that, I went to 7-11 and bought the purple pills. Was it a better product? Couldn’t tell the difference. In fact my last sore throat was so long ago that I barely remember what happened.

I think with all the buzz about social conversations today, we should not forget that real conversations are also happening out there. These conversations can be deal breakers for a consumer when they decide on a product.

So the question is, how can we turn online conversations to offline?

…Jump to paragraph 3, second Sentence. Write it in a post.

Sometimes we get discouraged and turn to inspirational writing, like stuff from Vince Lombardi: “Quitters never win and winners never quit.”

Hah! I got this line from The Dip by Seth Godin that is on my desk. (No kidding it was the nearest book)

You’ve probably heard that quote before and I used to think.. yeah that sounds about right. But read what Seth actually goes on to say immediately after that.

Bad advice. Winners quit all the time. They just quite the right stuff at the right time.

Interesting eh? Makes you look at things a a whole new perspective.

I was watching some Nike ads for Kobe and Lance Armstrong yesterday. Those guys are really dedicated. I read somewhere that Kobe had this workout called the  666 workout.

6 hours a day, 6 days a week, 6 months a year.

Now that’s thats some serious commitment! It’s no wonder that man has 5 championship rings.

Going back to the second half of the quote, it is essentially what The Dip is about. When to quit what and the importance of being the best in what you do. Being the best he says, doesn’t necessarily have to be in the world, but in context to your own world, here and now.

Too often do we equate quitting as failing therefore we have this mentality that quitting brands you as failure.

Which is what stops most people from trying anything. That fear of failing.

Try new stuff, quit often, but once you find something that leads you in the right path of being the best, go all the way and don’t look back.

I will be attending this conference from the 15th – 17th March 2011 and I am pretty excited about it!

I am looking forward to the workshop facilitated by Alex Hunter, former Head of Online Marketing  for the Virgin Group.

Live tweeting @benblogs

More information of the conference and the speakers here.

When I was a kid  I would always ask myself what super power I wanted if some genie offered me a choice.

I obsessed over the answer because I knew I had only one chance and I wanted to pick the best possible one.I had fancy ones like flying, super human strength, running at the speed of light, magnetism etc

But I knew I didn’t want something that would make me stand out. I didn’t want the government to lock me up in a cell and do test on me for the rest of my life. So it had to something discreet, yet beneficial.

As I grew older the powers I wanted kept changing. Then, it jumped back and forth between these 3.

1. The ability to read minds

Reading minds has always been my first choice. For some reason, I like to know what goes on in peoples mind and what makes them tick. Which prompted me to question my choice of career. Should I have studied Psychology instead?

2. The ability to see through things

Wanting the power of seeing through things comes and goes. I mean, the only reason why I think its so good is so that I can use it in the casino. Obviously it can also be used for other interesting scenarios.  *wink*

3. Teleportation

I have this love hate affair with teleportation. On one hand I think it would be just awesome to go any place I wish in a blink of an eye. Like how Hayden Christensen does it in Jumper. Rome today, Japan tomorrow. But then I would have to be all secretive and shit. I wouldn’t know if I could trust anyone enough to bring them on my trips. What if the word got out and some terrorist captures my family so that I work for them. Hiding their leaders, teleporting them away from danger.

So yeah, I think I will just stick to mind reading.

What powers did you wish you had?

I have been meaning to get  car for sometime now.

Nothing fancy. Something that gets me from point A to point B.

Having said that, isn’t life really about getting from point A to point B?

Point A – Birth

Point B – Death

I often pose this question rhetorically at people just for fun.

“What is the point of living if we all are going to die anyway?”

I think it annoys some people that there is a slight possibility that whatever you work for, all the struggles and sacrifices you make in life, are all for nothing.

But of course, depending on your culture, religions or beliefs we all find a way to make this work.

We all find a purpose in life. A reason to keep living.

I do think about this every now and then. But not that often. I would go crazy. After much deliberation I have settled for “to leave a legacy”

Notice I said “settled”. Oh well.

Whats yours?