Being Thrown Out Of The Frying Pan And Into The Fire

Being Thrown Out Of The Frying Pan And Into The Fire

You and me will agree that being in that frying pan alone will be an ordeal because we could end up TOAST.  But can we agree farther that Being Thrown Out Of The Frying Pan And Into The Fire will be the 'mother of all ordeals'?  Even the multiplier effect of the intensity of that 'HEAT' where we get directly exposed is already unfathomable.  Let's simplify things.  What if you were fighting gangs all by yourself but it was a 'cat and mouse' tiff as you were smart enough even when ON THE RUN.  Not until you would realize that being on the frying pan is not the end because Being Thrown Out Of The Frying Pan And Into The Fire💎💎💎

Looking back, I've been into the frying pan countless times in the past.  And for me to downplay those ordeals will make me a sheer hypocrite because the SURVIVAL RATE is considerably on the low given that during those situations, all the CARDS ARE STACKED against you.  And as you slip and slip down the line, your remaining hopes continue to flicker and dwindle until you up with a single coin where you will end up with just two options, of flipping that solitary coin.  Unfortunately, there is a fair chance that HEADS YOU LOSE and TAIL YOU [still] LOSE📗📙📘

Comparing things apples to apples, having a tiff or even a heated fight within your family makes you [STILL] better off versus a worst case scenario when and where either family member has already WALKED AWAY [and probably having BURNED THE BRIDGES] by then.  At that point, that becomes analogous to Being Thrown Out Of The Frying Pan And Into The Fire📌📌📌

You might get back at me and ask, HAVE I BEEN Thrown Out Of The Frying Pan And Into The Fire?  Nein. Nada.  Het.  Tidak.  Otherwise, I won't be right here on my laptop, spending a luxury of my personal 'off time' for my deep-seated passion to blog and write.  In case you want to push me farther and throw a hypothetical question WHAT IF I was Thrown Into The Fire?  Good grief.  IF I may play my 'Nostradamus' card, I'll sadly admit I'm non-existential IF that I ever ended up that path💊💊💊

All is NOT lost though once you end up Being Thrown Out Of The Frying Pan And Into The Fire.  So how?  RUN RUN RUN for your life.  This is NOT the end-of-the line for you but the insight we're picking up today is, summon anything and everything within yourself and will yourself out because Being Thrown Out Of The Frying Pan And Into The Fire💎💎💎

Choose Your Battles

Choose Your Battles

Hey Hey Hey, if we are fully armed, can we just go out there, pick on anyone and expect to remain unbruised and end up as the last man standing?  No sirrrrrs.  Even history tells us that the generals from way way back.  Napoleon, the great French general who was heavily bemedalled and decorated with so many battles won found his ill-fated invasion of Russia as the final nail on his coffin as the sheer size and climate of Russia decimated Napoleon's forces.  If only he heard that we got to  Choose Your Battles💎💎💎

Knowing what battles to fight [or which ones you should either avoid or leave behind, or worst, even walk away in the middle of the skirmish] remains the most critical to success.  If and when we find ourself fighting too many battles [on too many fronts], trust me, you and me will end up heavily drained whether emotionally, mentally or even physically.  What then worsens things is that the quality of life and even our performance whether at work or in our business will be impacted.  Who says fighting too many battles will NOT take its toll on us❓❓❓

So HOW do we CHOOSE OUR BATTLES?  Thinking that you have to fight a battle that actually belongs to someone else is a very easy mistake to make.  Sometimes we do get involved in another person's battle without even meaning to.  Alternatively, we might be the kind of person who likes to 'stick it up' on behalf your timid colleagues.  If at all, RESIST falling into that trap💊💊💊

Then, down the line, let's ask ourselves, WHAT DIFFERENCE WILL WINNING THIS BATTLE MAKE IN OUR LONG TERM? To answer that question, step back and look at the BIG PICTURE because that might mean your strategy.  OR your relationship with your boss at work.  OR might mean the direction of your career [which you DON'T want to get derailed].  When you consider all the possible outcomes, assess how will they affect the BIG PICTURE❎❎❎

Then flip the coin and ask yourself, WHAT IF YOU LOSE that battle?  This is the way to go, assess things both ways.  An evaluation of the downsides is NOT a reason to avoid going to that battle BUT instead weighing the downsides against the upsides in a clear-headed fashion will help us down the road to identify if IS IT REALLY WORTH FIGHTING THAT BATTLE?  Then if you DON'T fight that battle, will you ever live with yourself afterwards?  Point is, whichever tack you take, you should NOT be remorseful or regretful at all in the future. Do Choose Your Battles in life📗📘📙

No Perfect Time BUT Now

No Perfect Time BUT Now

Everything AS IN everything starts with an IDEA.  From that time that seed of an IDEA pops-up, that's when each of us will be plotting our own respective paths.  NO common tracks for all.  NO super highways for us to cruise akin to the F1 races.  NO flight plans similar to those supersonic plans. IDEAs will then take their own ways to germinate.  So when is the perfect time for that IDEA?  No Perfect Time BUT Now

Surely, each of us went through those episodes in our life where we thought we should NOT be trigger-happy, where we expected that waiting will lead us to that PERFECT TIME, where we were made to believe that the probability of success conversely increases with the actual time elapsed, where we were blinded by our incorrect choices of role models who led us to that ill-advised move of NOT moving, NOT taking action, NOT lifting our finger, NOT starting off what needs to be started, NOT kickstarting things, NOT igniting the engine so we can shift its gear to a full throttle.  Unfortunately, we all ended up on that wrong path in each of our past, even at least as an outlier❗❗❗

Oh, this is an unfortunate REFRAIN we keep hearing over and over again and sadly, sometimes, it is ME, YOU or US blurting out those 'NOT READY YET' pull-ups simply because we felt quite good enough cloistered in our respective comfort zones and WRONGLY thinking that the PERFECT TIME will eventually come to unfold.  Instead, we WRONGLY thought that all we need to do is/was to stretch our patience thinly because many of us were framed by that mindset that eventually, things will ripen, things will mature before our SUCCESS will come into fruition❎❎❎

Yes folks, this is the blunt question we should confront ourselves IF and WHEN we end up in that predicament.  IF NOT NOW, WHEN? The pitfall here most of us suffered in the past is that we [wrongly] thought it's always a proven formula for success if we let things evolve and take its own course because pushing hard will doom us to fail💎💎💎

BUT hey hey hey, while you are buying time and simply twiddling your fingers and getting fidgety, WHAT IS IN IT FOR YOU?  Very sadly, I did bear witness to numerous dismal failures of people whom I know either closely or first hand.  And if they have a commonality at all, they all FAILED because they kept buying TIME and waiting for TIME to ripened.  DON'T look far but that dreaded pandemic was cataclysmic because the first batch of fatalities and failures were those who were 'caught with their pants down', those who were waiting for the PERFECT TIME,  But hey dude, let's spread this out as a gospel truth, that there is NO PERFECT TIME BUT NOW, c'mon📌📌📌

Wife Knows Best

Wife Knows Best

Stumbled across the Quora.com post by Rebecca on 08.25.2023, to quote:  JIM HAD AN AWFUL DAY FISHING ON THE LAKE, NOT CATCHING EVEN ONE.  ON HIS WAY HOME, HE STOPPED BY THE SUPERMARKET AND ORDERED FOUR CATFISH AND TOLD THE FISH SALESMAN:  PICK FOUR LARGE ONES AND THROW THEM AT ME.  THE SALESMAN ASKED, WHY SHOULD I THROW IT TO YOU?  BECAUSE I WANT TO TELL MY WIFE I CAUGHT THEM.  THE SALESMAN SAID, OH OK BUT... I SUGGEST YOU TAKE THE ORANGE TROUT.  WHY?  BECAUSE YOUR WIFE CAME IN EARLIER TODAY AND SAID THAT IF YOU CAME BY, I SHOULD TELL YOU TO TAKE ORANGE TROUT.  THAT'S WHAT SHE WANTS FOR SUPPER.  Oh Oh Oh...... Wife Knows Best⏳⏳⏳

So, do we agree on that Wife Knows Best? Me thinks, NOT just conditionally YES but absolutely YES.  But of course, right?  When you spend your non-work and non-business life with your spouse/partner, it is a given that everything, lock, stock and barrel will be mutual and common for couples.  BUT heard of couples who purportedly endured and lived together for many decades but in reality, living their OWN SEPARATE LIVES❓❓❓

I remember when I resided in India for almost a year, living and breathing like a typical Indian.  And getting privy even with sneak previews of their private lives, like one of my male colleagues in my project had a prospective bride.  And the bride's family reserved a hotel function room for the formal 'meet up' between the two families.  Lo and behold, the prospective bride's credentials was presented by her family, like a convent-bred, legitimate scion from the middle class, graduating from a top notch university.  Being very new and unfamiliar [at that time] to the Indian culture, that was an 'eye opening' experience for me then❗❗❗

Fast forwarding today, how come we still here HAPPY WIFE, HAPPY LIFE? BUT to correct the off-track and unfair interpretation of this favorite one-liner, it will be the worst disservice to all wives if this meant that wives are material-centric?  NO sirrrrrrs. On the contrary, if a wife leads a HAPPY LIFE, that kind of positively reflects back to the fact that Wife Knows Best is more telling because it [very likely] implies that we have a wife at hand a wife who Knows Best in its totality📌📌📌

So, you might get back to me and question me why I seem to be beating around the bush.  So how can we all align so that Wife Knows Best?  As heard quite a thousand times, IT TAKES TWO TO TANGO.  No single superman OR superwoman can carry the weight in your married life.  Instead, consistently calibrate so that Wife Knows Best✅✅✅

Why Humility Pays Off

Why Humility Pays Off

Is it true that Humility Pays Off?  Really? WHY?  HOW?  Let me share this joke from Quora.com courtesy of Dale Bishop's post on August 17th.  Three men were sitting in the same row of the Boeing 767 waiting for their long haul flight to take off.  As the airplane got airborne, , the guy on the left blurted "Admiral, U.S. Navy, Retired, married, two sons'.  The guy on the right blurted: 'Admiral, U.S. Navy Retired, married, two sons, both surgeons'.  The guy in the middle humbly and meekly said: 'Chief Petty Officer, U.S. Navy.  Retired, never been married, two sons, both Admirals' ✅✅✅

That's NOT to say we should NOT display our own confidence as a leader, whether in school OR at the workplace OR out there in the market but it's just that we need to temper our confidence with HUMILITY.  Yet, as we all aspire to be leaders [YESSSSS, admit it folks, everyone of us is nursing that hope to be a leader in our own way], we all need to come to terms as to how much essential is HUMILITY for us to reach that zenith of effective leadership📗📘📙

So WHY exactly?  Experts have embarked on studies which led to the same conclusions that proves how impactful HUMILITY is.  Primero, it does allow us to LEARN as most successful people learn from their own mistakes to improve their performance and even teach others.  HUMILITY comes into the picture because it is an essential foundation to be able to admit that we're NOT perfect and that we will benefit from reflecting on WHAT we should do differently, all because of HUMILITY📌📌📌

Further, if there is anything HUMILITY proves, it does prove that we DON'T KNOW IT ALL.  And this is one very envied hallmark of a LEADER.  Someone who admits his lapses and inadequacies and in the process, even picks up lessons and improves himself along the way.  Now, here comes a positive spin of that 'DOMINO EFFECT' when HUMILITY tends to create 'ENDLESS POSSIBILITIES'.  By admitting our shortfalls and inadequacies, that opens up opportunities for us to LEARN, even providing us with better perspectives in life📌📌📌

Down the road, HUMILITY will effortlessly magnify your strengths and pluses.  HOW?  WHY?  Being that genuinely and authentically HUMBLE will go a long way to 'humanize' a leader and thereby strengthen trust and build confidence and even loyalty, whether it's at the workplace, at the marketplace OR even at home.  And let's face it, without HUMILITY, it will be undoubtedly difficult to step into the vulnerability we need to succeed once we're surrounded with uncertainty.  Remember those three guys seating next to each other. HUMILITY prevailed over there❗❗❗

It's About Teamwork, period

It's About Teamworkl, period

Our thread today is About Team[workl], period BUT the problem is this word TEAMWORK has been one of the most common, normal and usual word we ever come across in our daily life such that it hardly carries a weight [EXCEPT in competitive sports].  But hey, TEAMWORK is an essential part of accomplishing our responsibilities and goals.  Truthfully, NOTHING would ever get done without TEAMWORK.  When we work together, we can get things done faster and more accurately💎💎💎

Even we parents can and SHOULD teach our children [even at the early age] to SUCCEED.  And yes, it's true, every child has different strengths and skills, allowing children to practice TEAMWORK gives them a chance to develop and appreciate their special talents.  So HOW?  Allow me to take a leaf from what I can cull from my experiences in the past💊💊💊

Primero, seriously consider TEAMBUILDING.  Without breaching data privacy, in our organization, TEAMBUILDING is aggressively positioned as one of the TOP priorities even more than twelve years ago.  At one point, all managers all flew by air for two hours to hie away to Shangri-la at a TOP tourist destination in the south📌📌📌

BTW, deep-diving into our life, TEAMWORK is best manifesting CONSULTING with your partner/spouse in practically every decision-making that may impact or may have ramifications in our family situation, and that includes FINANCIALS.  A common pitfall of many couples, one partner is calling the shots while his/her partner/spouse remains clueless.  WAIT till things will explode RIGHT IN THE FACE, making the other clueless partner/spouse as ignorant as ever.  BUT that is just unfair because once the ramifications will kick-in, it will impact NOT just your partner/spouse but likely, it will impact your family at the very least.  YET, this major MISS is being shoved and pushed down under the carpets to keep it out of sight, UNFORTUNATELY✅✅✅

I would avoid touching on TEAMWORK within competitive sports because that's a given.  BUT allow me to harp over and over again that even as you age, and even as you and your partner/spouse see your children grow and have their own families, you can be darn proud that you WALKED THE TALK when it comes about TEAMWORK within the confines of our family life.  So, please, I'm egging you on, please DON'T give TEAMWORK a lip service❗❗❗

Reading The TEA LEAVES

Reading The TEA LEAVES

Reading The TEA LEAVES is something I heavily hesitate to venture or explore simply because 'Teaf Leaf Reading' a.k.a. TASSEOLOGY is a fortune-telling method that uses tea residue on the bottom of the cup to predict what the future will bring [to the tea drinker].  Then, after drinking the tea, the residue on the bottom of the cup forms different shapes or symbols , each of which have distinct meanings and many ways to interpret them📌📌📌

To clear up a possible confusion that we are venturing into 'Tea Leaf Reading', NO sirrrrrrs, we WON'T.  Having said this, what we're harping is that in life, there are multiple instances when and where we tend to be in that 'Tea Leaf Reading' scenario.  If you're still a student in school, surely when you receive a failing grade in a subject, you WON'T get flabbergasted.  WHY?  Because expectedly, you should have taken the initiative to do 'Tea Leaf Reading' of your situation in school.  It's the same thing in the workplace.  WHY will you get shocked when you receive an HR Memo regarding a specific policy breach💊💊💊

In your relationships with your partner/spouse and even within your immediate family, once someone gives you the 'cold shoulder' the past days and weeks, would you attribute that to just 'mood swings'?  Genuine issues run deeper way beyond the surface and similar to the way the Tea Leaves will form at the bottom of the cup, genuine and real issues are buried deep down there.  Similarly in life, the most difficult issues we need to resolve could be buried deep beneath way beyond the surface and it requires more than just token effort to unearth such burning issues yet cloaked💎💎💎

So, here we are, egging everyone of us to seriously consider taking initiatives that run similar and analogous to Tea Leaf Reading because the reality is, we need to get into the realization that this is a DIY [Do It Yourself] solution that has no clear-cut formula to follow❎❎❎

In the workplace, our technical jargon for this is PREDICTIVE information, something that is akin to forecasting but based on a sheer combination of facts and assumptions.  Imagine your life ahead WHERE you just DON'T care less, WHERE you're fine with WYSIWYG [What You See Is What You Get].  But if it's NOT worth Reading The Tea Leaves, what else is worth❓❓❓

Sad When Bias Impacts Our Decision-making

Sad When Bias Impacts Our Decision-making

More than a year ago, U.S. Judge Penney Azcarate rejected all of Amber Heard's claims in her $50 Million defamation suit against Johnny Depp.  We all know that Johnny Depp ended up the 'runaway winner', including in the amounts of punitive damages the court slapped on Ms Head.  But NOT to question that judicial ruling, nevertheless, that led me to reopen my thoughts When Bias Impacts Our Decision-making [and BTW, this has got nothing to do with the defamation case]📌📌📌

As each day we all unconsciously make decisions that can cause immediate results or long-term impacts at either our personal or professional levels, this led me to revisit that jargon tagged as 'MENTAL SHORTCUTS' which is a.k.a. BIASES as it may present possible challenges OR obstacles when it comes to formulating the best decision💎💎💎

Without us endeavoring to get into the turf of psychologists, me thinks that it makes sense for us to reduce our UNCONSCIOUS BIAS by getting on the basic fundamentals of the largest types of BIAS.  Let's start with SIMILARITY BIAS which means that we prefer things that are like us over things that are different than us.  Likely, YOU and me went through that in the past💊💊💊

Coming close to the heels is that EXPEDIENCE BIAS which happens when we prefer to act quickly rather than take the needed time to receive clarity and crystal-clear understanding.  Just like when we're interviewing a job applicant, we could be relying solely on one data point straight from the job applicant's resume, which is NOT right❗❗❗

The third bias has been more predominant given that recent pandemic that forced us all to continue our pursuits virtually, so to speak.  So, DISTANCE BIAS is that instinct to prioritize things that are NEARBY [such as physical space or time].  This could appear when individuals look to the guidance of those currently present in a meeting, rather than those working remotely.  Indeed, it is SAD WHEN BIAS IMPACTS OUR DECISION-MAKING❎❎❎

What Separates DOERs From DREAMERs

What Separates DOERs From DREAMERs

While Steve Jobs has long left behind everything in life, Apple's co-founder continues to make a lasting impact which may probably last for many generations to come.  And in his trailblazing successes in life, he did identify one very 'UNCOMMON' habit found in most successful people and that's really What Separates DOERs From DREAMERs💎💎💎

To quote Steve Jobs, 'MOST PEOPLE NEVER PICK UP THE PHONE AND CALL.  MOST PEOPLE NEVER ASK AND THAT IS WHAT SEPARATES THE PEOPLE WHO DO THINGS FROM THE PEOPLE WHO JUST DREAM ABOUT THEM'.  Remarkably, Jobs did share that at age of 12, he mustered that unusual courage to call up none other than BILL HEWLETT, the co-founder of Hewlett Packard.  And his ask was, 'I WANT TO BUILD A FREQUENCY COUNTER AND I WAS WONDERING IF YOU HAVE ANY SPARE PARTS I COULD HAVE📌📌📌

Amused at that unutual 'boldness' of a 12-year old lad, HEWLETT laughed and gave Jobs the spare parts.  How did Steve Jobs react?  He said 'I WAS IN HEAVEN'.  So, that single phone call impacted Job's life and taught him one of the greatest lessons in his brilliant career which is, 'BE WILLING TO ASK FOR SOMETHING YOU WANT'.  In so many businesses today, though, FEAR keeps people from being open to ask for what they want❗❗❗

There is that startling research study published by HBR [Harvard Business Review] that 75 to 90 percent of all the help people at work give to one another starts with making an ASK.  The sad part is that many of us [and that includes my poor moi many years ago] refrain from asking for what we need.  But to a fault, let us be aware that when working in a corporate environment, NOT ASKING may prevail because its executive and managers do NOT encourage it [but again, the fault starts from us, NOT from our managers at work]💊💊💊

Consequently, what this means is that NOTHING ENDS UP HAPPENING [most of the time].  The question is, does the environment we are IN foster that 'freedom' for employees to do the ASK?  Let's think about it, to ASK is not too much to ASK for, right?  But ASKING or NOT ASKING may lead you to become either the DOER or simply the perennial DREAMER❎❎❎

What Has The 'SHORTEST SHELF LIFE'?

What Has The 'SHORTEST SHELF LIFE'?

No sirrrrrs, this poster is NOT mine.  I grabbed this unmarked poster because it did lead me to ask myself as to What Has The 'SHORTEST SHELF LIFE'?  Oh Oh, we all know that fresh produce has the shortest shelf life but on the other hand, you might know that there are methods to extend the FRESHNESS of such fresh produce, thus extending their SHELF LIFE.  But our thread today is figuring out what has the shortest SHELF LIFE in our life [and that excludes the fresh produce]⏳⏳⏳

It is a given that our physical appearance affects our personality.  That debate as to whether a person's personality was more influenced by their genetics or their environment has raged for years.  Now, the question arises as to how much people's nature influences.  The most promising source for understanding how people's natural or existing traits can affect the responses lies in the examination of the traits with which people are born, most notably, the physical appearance💎💎💎

Much the same way people's PERSONALITY affects how others treat those people, so too does appearance.  In some sense, certain elements of appearance [and that includes hygiene and selection of clothes] are also functions of PERSONALITY but for the most part, physical appearance, as something one inherits genetically, is independent of PERSONALITY📌📌📌

Now, what's imperative for us to be more aware that our physical appearance has a very limited SHELF LIFE, if NOT the shortest one.   But having said this, it just makes sense that our awareness of the very limited SHELF LIFE of our physical appearance should be sufficient to let us consider giving more impetus to our non-physical aspects in life✅✅✅

If we can be 'BEST UNTIL' only up to a certain date, this should give us that urgency to give more impetus to our roles and responsibilities in life, to be filial in our relationships with our loved ones including our families and relatives and to 'WALK THE TALK' in our pursuits, be it at our workplace or even in our commercial forays.  That physical aspect, can we relegate that to the backdrop please❓❓❓