Goodbye & Thank You, Steve Jobs!

My idol and hero, Steve Jobs passed away today due to pancreatic cancer.  Above is a youtube video of his speech at Stanford University.  I would watch this video everytime I am feeling a bit slacking in my journey to achieve my goals.   Jobs is the mind behind Apple Computer and Pixar Studios.  He had set out on a journey to change the world.  And he did.  I love the story of him trying to lure John Sculley to leave Pepsi-Cola and join him.  When Sculley was a bit hesitant, Jobs told him: "Do you want to sell sugar water for the rest of your life, or do you want to come with me and change the world?"  In a way, from my humble point of view Steve Jobs left, after he got his job done here on Earth.  He left his legacy for all of us to benefit from and to learn from and to play with.  Perhaps it is a good time to reflect on our own lives and ask ourselves...what legacies are we building for the world.  Surely we don't think that God sent us here on Earth just for a free ride?  Indeed, I would like to always remind myself this question to help me carry on with my journey.  As Steve Jobs said: "Stay hungry, stay foolish."  I absolutely love this man.

Lessons from Frodo, Harry & Luke

During a bout of Harry Potter fever, after having viewed the concluding chapter of the series (JK Rowling is amazing!!), I found myself thinking... what is it that make the life of Harry Potter so magical, and ours...well, mine...so ordinary?  I was at my kitchen door looking out to the garden...seeing my ordinary fish pond, the palms, the grass, mango trees...and thinking to myself what a stark contrast the life I'm living compared to the exciting adventure of Frodo, Harry and Luke...chapter  after chapter -- saving the world and warding off evil and darkness. Where as my big challenge for today was to figure out what to cook for lunch.  (Oh, but just a note, that there is beauty in the mundane, and blessings in being bored...really.  I mean who wants to be pursuit by Sauron, Voldermont or Darth Vader every other day, right?)

Then, I pretend that I am 38 years old instead of 8, and try to figure out what is it about these fictional characters that uplifts me so,  to the extend that I and of course gazillion others around the world become avid fans.  Frodo, Harry & Luke have all chosen the path less taken.  They took it upon themselves to do what it right, instead of what is easy.  They all have a mission to complete.  They want to ensure the world is safe, when it would be easier just to save themselves. Isn't that the stuff that makes our hearts beat?  That's why we cheer them on.  Then, we go back to living our own "ordinary lives".  But that's just it.  We don't have to lead ordinary lives.  Azizi Ali's company slogan is "Life is too short to be ordinary".

I for one believe that everyone of us here was born with a mission to accomplish.   And God provide us with the tools we need to accomplish this mission.  We don't have magic wands, or light sabers but we certainly do have something special that nobody else have.  Some of us write beautiful songs, others have beautiful voices, some others have the charisma to influence, some are gifted with a loving heart, or athletic abilities.  And these are tools that we must use to serve the purpose we were sent on this Earth to do.  Now, isn't that exciting?  But just like Frodo, Harry and Luke, serving our purpose and completing our mission sometimes need us to follow the path less taken, and it requires stepping outside our comfort zone.  It is easier to follow the path paved with beautiful scented red roses, as opposed to the treacherous road to Mordor.  But sometimes, we have to go down to the valley before reaching the mountains of our dreams.

Today, I thank my lucky stars, as I now realised that there lies in front of me, two diverging roads:  One, is the familiar path leading to glory of cushy high paying corporate job, which is quite close to home and the other requires a long journey, no cushy benefits, but a chance to apprentice with a well-respected individual who can and is willing to help me carry out my mission (Just like Luke Sky Walker apprenticing with Obiwan or Yoda I would think).  So...do I go down an easy familiar path decked with roses, or do I go down the swamp of Dagobah to seek Yoda, who will help me defeat Lord Vader?

Yup, I now realised that living a life of magic and adventure is up to me.   Hasn't it been said that you can either see everything as if it is magic or as if it is not?  If I choose the see the magic, the magic will be shown to me.  So there I was still standing at the kitchen door, and suddenly noticing that there is a purple waterlily blooming in my fish pond, when it has not bloom for the past year.  Then, there was a loud thud under the mango tree.  My husband went to check and saw a huge ripe mango just fell from the tree, smooth and untainted by insect or squirrel bites.  So, there is magic, if we care enough to look.  And there is adventure, if we care enough to take the journey and become the real life heroes like Mother Teresa, Ghandi, Muhammad Yunus, Steve Jobs, Oprah or JK Rowling even.  I don't know about you, but I think I will put on my cape and grab my wand bright and early tomorrow, and get on with my adventure.  I hope you will choose the same.

If not now, when?

(Gambar illustrasi ni, terpaksa lah lukis sendiri, coz tak nak kacau copyright orang)

Many of us have dreams.  Those of us who have it written down and stick it up somewhere we can see everyday, would have more probability to achieve it compared to those who treated their dreams as some vague idea in their heads.  But regardless, what have we done today to achieve our dreams?  It doesn't matter if the dream is to be a bestselling author, a professional speaker, to build a dream bungalow, to own a holiday resort, to finally get slim and healthy or to get all our debts paid off.  Dreams will remain to be just dreams untill we take action to make it come true.  Of course, we will do it when...the children grow up, when...we have enough money, ...when we can find the time, after bulan puasa, after Hari Raya..after the school holidays.  But the question is if not now, when?  The hours, days and weeks, and months will pass and before we know it, it will our time to leave this earth...and what would we have accomplished? 

I like the story of Mark Victor Hansen and Jack Canfield, when they first put together the Chicken Soup for the Soul book, they wanted to be on the bestseller's list.  So someone, told them these magical words..."If there is a huge tree...but you keep on coming to this tree and whack it with an axe 5 times a day, every single day...don't you think one day, the tree is going to fall?"  Hansen and Canfield took the advice to heart and started to do 5 things everyday towards increasing sales of their book.  And the rest of the story...not only their first Chicken soup book is a bestseller...most of the subsequent Chicken soup books are bestsellers! 

So, ask ourselves, what 5 things we can do today to make our dreams come true.  What 5 things can we do today, with whatever resources we already have at hand, which will make our dreams come true?

From Fatness to Fitness

(image taken from:  fatburningtipsthatwork.com)

I had a conversation with my diet buddy this morning which was quite intriguing and triggers me to write this post.  Well, both of us have lost a considerable amount of weight over the past year, that friends whom we met would asked us how had we done it.  To be specific,  I had gone from overweight to ideal weight by shedding off 13 kilos in a period of about 6 months last year.  My diet buddy had gone from almost obese (I'm being kind) to near her ideal weight by shedding more than 22 kg and counting...in a period of 1 year.  When we see friends who were struggling with weight issues, we know that everybody can overcome this  because we have done it, and we are eager to share our own experience.  However, the most common question that people would ask us would be: "So, what supplements did you take?"  We all wish that there's a magical potion in a bottle that when we take it, it dissolves all of our misery...and not to mention fat.  Well, there's no such potion.  The only magic formula is us making the decision to start now, to make the changes needed for our lives to be healthier and better. 

There is a verse in the Quran that says, "God has given you shapes, and have made your shapes beautiful."  So, we only have ourselves to blame if we did not honor the Gift from God and allow our bodies to amass huge amount of fat and toxins.  We have to change ourselves internally in our hearts and our minds in order to see that change manifest on the outside.  To my diet buddy, it was accepting the fact that yes, she was obese, her matebolism was bit slower that others who can gobble a plate full of carbs and remain thin.  So, with that acceptance, she change her food choices, activities and habits which will be more suited towards achieving the kind of body she wants for herself.  And I'm telling you, she now look fabulous! And you can see she's glowing with pride and happiness.  The prime motivation for me is that I had come to a point that I was sick and tired, of being sick and tired with my bulging tummy, thighs that rubs each other when I walk and not to mention innocent comments of, "Wah...are you pregnant?"  So, I said to myself I would do anything!  I gave up sugar for 2 full months...and this is me, the sweet tooth hot choc and sugar donuts fanatic.  So, when friends whom I love and care about told me ohh...but I love sugar..., oh..but I had a c-section birth,...oh but I don't have time to excercise... I always encourage them politely.  But what I really wanted to tell them is, oh, c'mon...strip yourself and look in the mirror.  The reflection you see will find you the time to exercise, the humility to appreciate your fruits and veges and the strength to stave off sugar.  Just put in your mind how sweet it is to have the body you always wanted -- the one God have given you.  There's your magic potion, and it doesn't cost you a dime!

The 3 + 13 Steps to Riches

I'm writing this as a reminder to myself about the salient points of this book. The first edition of this book was first published in 1910, a year after that Wallace D. Wattles passed away.  A century later the book still change lives.  My own summary of the book entails that there are 3 steps to riches:

Step 1:  The first requisite to success is to become convinced that you can succeed.
Step 2:  Power-Consciousness

•  it is what you feel when you know that you can do a thing; you know HOW to do a thing. 
• Thus, you will approach the task in an absolutely successful frame of mind. 
• Your subconscious mind knows that you can. 

Step 3:  Make constructive use of what you have. 

• If you are only jumping half as far as you can, you will never fly. 
• It is law that by doing perfectly all that you can do now, you will become able to do later, things which you cannot do now. 
• If you put enough life into your business to more than fill it, the surplus will get you more business.

Intro:  Why be rich?  So that ..."You can render to God and humanity no greater service than to make the most of yourself."

1.  No thought of form can be impressed upon Original Susbstance without causing the creation of the form. 

• In essence: "What you think about, you bring about".

2.  Life is increasing. 

• It serves the purpose of the universe that your life experience an increase. 
• Be a creator, not a competitor.  
• You are going to get what you want but in a way that when you get it, every other man will have more than he has now. 
• You are advancing man, that you advance all who deal with you. 
• What I want for myself, I want for everybody.

3.  MUST give to every man more than you take away from him. 

• Give more in use value than you take from him in cash value.  Then, you are adding to the world with every business transaction.

4.  Be grateful: 

• The grateful mind is constantly fixed upon the best; therefore it tends to become the best; it takes the form or character of the best, and will receive the best. 
• Be grateful to all:  it will bring you into harmonious relations with the good in everything, and the good in everything will move towards you.
• The man who sincerely thank God for the things which as yet he owns only in imagination, has real faith.

 5.  Be clear and specific of what you want to do, to have or become. 

• Be definite and keep your mind towards it at all times. 
• All you need is to know what you want, and to want it badly enough so that it will stay in your thoughts.

6.  Have an invincible and unwavering faith that the thing is already yours; that it is at hand and you only to take posession of it.

• The answer to prayer is not according to your faith while you are talking, but according to your faith while you are working. 
• Think of all the things you have asked for in terms of actual present ownership.

7.  Use your will power only upon yourself. 

• Substance is more anxious to give you what you want than you are to get it.
• All charity only tends to perpetuate the wretchedness it aims to eradicate. 
• GET RICH:  that is the best way you can help the poor. 
• If you want to help the poor, demonstrate to them that they can become rich; prove it by getting rich yourself. 
• The poor does not need charity, they need inspiration. 

8.  Move forward, don't look back on your past troubles/poverty. 

• Put poverty behind you. 
• You can serve God and man in no more effective way than by getting rich; by the creative method.

9.  Must connect thought with personal action. 

• ACT NOW. 
• Have faith in your ability to meet any emergency when it arrives. 
• Act upon your present environment with all your heart, and with all your strength, and with all your mind. 
• But act without haste, worry or fear. 
• Go as fast as you can but never hurry.

10.  Be larger than your present place. 

• Do ALL you can do, where you are. 
• Make everyday a successful day. 
• Do, everyday, all that you can do that day and do each act in an efficient manner. 
• Use all you have and more will come to you. 

11.  Get into the right business -- in which you will use your strongest faculties.

• Go with the tide instead of swim against it. 
• It is true that you will do best in a business which you like and which is congenial to you. 
• Success, among others depend upon your posessing well-developed state faculties required for that business. 
• You CAN do what you WANT to do, and it is your RIGHT & PRIVILEGE.

12.  When an opportunity to be more than you are now is presented and you feel impelled towards it, TAKE IT. 

• It will be the first step towards a greater opportunity to be all that you want to be. 
• DO NOT wait for an opportunity to be all that you want it to be.

13.  Your riches will be in exact propotion to:

•  the definiteness of your vision,
• the fixity of your purpose,
• the steadiness of your faith
• and the depth of your gratitude.

Here's how much FREE will cost you

Who doesn't like free things, right?  Free vacation, free medical coverage, free lunch.  Well, believe it or not there are many people who would be begging you to take this free offers, if only you promise you'll let go of your calculators, and switch off your brain.

Here's my story and I'm sure its yours too.  OK, so I received this phone call from a telemarketer, who's promoting a health package for credit card users from bank ABC (haven't we all?).  I usually would just end the conversation politely saying I'm not interested, I've got all the coverage I need, thank you. 

But this time, I chose to listen, as I happen to have sometime to kill.  So, this telemarketer said that ABC company is offering FREE health coverage, hospitalisation and all the works.  It's FREE, ok, so I don't have to pay anything.  So, I listened on, waiting for the catch.  Now, here's the catch...I will get these free medical coverage if I start a savings programme of about RM200 a month.  The money is all mine, and at the end of 15 years, I will be able to withdraw all the money back.  All RM36,000 of it, he said. (RM200 x 12 months x 15 years)  Even if I had claimed any converage within that period of 15 years, my money will still be intact.  So, do I believe that they will be so kind as to give me all my money back and provide me with free health coverage?  Of course, they will.  It makes perfect business sense to them.  And here's why:  (Time to bring out that calculator!)

Say for example, you put in the same amount to your own unit trust investment account, let's say ASB.  ASB provides on average about 8% return every year and it is compounding every year.  At the end of the 15th year, you will actually get about RM65,000 in your investment account, instead of RM36,000 that the ABC company would be so happy to return to you.  In other words, your RM36,000 has  generated  RM29,000 profit for you in the period of 15 years.

So....by putting the money into ABC company's savings programme,  you will get back your RM36,000 after 15 years, and the ABC company will have made RM29,000 or more (depending on where they invest the money) for themselves.  So, in layman terms, you are NOT getting FREE health coverage, it is company ABC, that will be getting FREE money from your so-called savings. 

So, I said thank you but NO thank you, I do not intend to give you my money.   It's true what they say...if you do not know what to do with your money....there are tonnes of people who know exactly what to do with the money (Actually, I'm the one who said that in my book, from Deadbroke to Cash Rich).  So, before you say yes to any FREE deals or "you-can-get-all-your-money-back" deals...just pull out your calculator and switch on your brain.

Bagel from Wisconsin

I have been looking for bagels in Malaysia for 16 years, ever since I come home after my graduation from UW-Madison in US.  I missed the crisp outside and chewy inside of a toasted bagel.  Suddenly yesterday, I found them in the frozen section of Cold Storage.  For 16 years, I have always been eyeing the bakery sections and it had never occured to me that I should look at the frozen section.  Yesterday I did.  The voice inside me said, "Hey. why don't  you check out the frozen section..you may never know.." I obeyed, and voila!  Bagels...!! And believe it or not, these bagels come from University Avenue, Madison, Wisconsin.  Wow!  Maybe it has been waiting for me to find it for 16 years...!  But I have never really shopped in Cold Storage, I mean too high class, right?  Anyway so, it reinforces the notion that when you step out from your comfort zone once in a while, and do something different for a change, you may find things you never have before and see things in a whole new way. And hey, it always pays to listen to the voice inside you.  Hooray to the simple pleasures of life!

Me in Herworld

I am so happy and delighted to be featured in the HerWorld magazine July 2011, as an author for my money management book, from Deadbroke to Cash Rich.  Coincidentally, July is my birthday month...so what a wonderful brithday present.  Of course, there's no such thing as coincidentally....it is all Allah's Plan and Allah's Love and Mercy.  Thank you, God the Creator of the Universe!

This is a piece of cake, literally!



This is Cake Boss, Buddy Valastro with his creation the life size Nascar cake.  Cake Boss and Cake Off on TLC is my favourite past time while folding the clothes during weekends.  I love that these guys stretch what we previously define as cake -- in terms of design, size, ingredients and functionality.  The only problem is of course, watching these programs makes me hungry! Oh, well...

So, What's Our Excuse?

Yup!  You're seeing right.  This nice looking young man has no arms, no legs and yet he is living a wonderful life.  If you search him on youtube, you can see videos of him swimming, driving his own boat and mmm...surfing.  Yes...surfing!!  Nick Vujicic, is a professional motivator and speaker from Australia.  I was astounded when I saw his book on the shelves at Kinokuniya.  The first thought which ran through my mind was, "So, what is MY excuse?!"  I have so much that I want to accomplish and yet so many excuses as to why it can't be done.  I have so much fear as to how things will turn out -- given the profession cross-road that I'm facing in my life right now. Actually I've decided which road to take.  And seeing this guy, and reading his book, just says to me that right here, right now, I am not entitled to any excuses whatsoever.  You just go for it, girl!

Let me share a quote from his backcover:  "I do believe that my life has no limits.  I want you to feel the same way about your life, no matter what your challanges may be.  As we begin our journey together, please take a moment to think about any limitations you've placed on your life or that you've allowed others to place on it.  Now think about what it would be like to be free of those limitations.  What would your life be if anything were possible?" (By, Nick Vujicic, Life Without Limits)