Focus - on knowing why I am here and what I need to do.

Scenic route to progress

I adapted the following phrase after reading the MX papers in Sydney today:

"If the option is slogging in Singapore, getting increasingly disillusioned or going overseas, having an experience and developing my skills, why not go overseas?"

Unexamined Life

Whoever said the unexamined life is not worth living apparently never intended to go into book publishing, where there is almost no research and where much of the conventional wisdom is a pastiche of folklore, myth and wishful thinking.

-- Edwin McDowell, "Publishing: And They All Said It Wouldn't Sell", New York Times, February 6, 1989

Criticism

Here's an anonymous quote to keep in mind:

"Criticism, in a way, is a compliment;
it shows you did something too important for the critics to ignore."

Cee-Lo - Kung Fu Fighting (feat. Jack Black)

----------------------------------

I know what's forward for me is exciting and I am doing the right thing. But somehow 'nervousness’ creeps in from time to time.
Love the ‘Kung Fu Fighting’ remix featured in ‘Kung Fu Panda’ - it reminds me to
‘Always Believe’
& gives me the inspiration & courage to continue the path that I have chosen.

----------------------------------

Oogway: There are no accidents.
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Po: Maybe I should just quit and go back to making noodles.

Oogway:

Quit, don't quit? Noodles, don't noodles? You are too concerned about what was and what will be. There is a saying: yesterday is history, tomorrow is a mystery, but today is a gift. That is why it is called the "present."

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Oogway:

My friend, the panda will never fulfill his destiny, nor you yours until you let go of the illusion of control.

Shifu: Illusion?

Oogway: Yes. [points at peach tree]
Look at this tree, Shifu: I cannot make it blossom when it suits me nor make it bear fruit before its time.

Shifu:

But there are things we *can* control: I can control when the fruit will fall, I can control where to plant the seed: that is no illusion, Master!

Oogway:

Ah, yes. But no matter what you do, that seed will grow to be a peach tree. You may wish for an apple or an orange, but you will get a peach.

Shifu: But a peach cannot defeat Tai Lung!

Oogway: Maybe it can, if you are willing to guide, to nurture it, to believe in it.

Shifu: But how? How? I need your help, master.

Oogway: No, you just need to believe. Promise me, Shifu, promise me you will believe.

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Po: You never believed that! From the first moment I got here, you've been trying to get rid of me! [Shifu knocks him to the ground]

Shifu: Yes! I was! But now I ask you to trust in your master as I have come to trust in mine.

Po: You're not my master. And I'm not the Dragon Warrior.

Shifu: Then why didn't you quit? You knew I was trying to get rid of you, yet you stayed!

Po: Yeah, I stayed. I stayed because everytime you threw a brick at my head or said I smelled; it hurt, but it could never hurt more than everyday of my life just being me. I stayed because I thought if anyone can change me, can make me not me, it was you! The greatest kung fu teacher in all of China!

Shifu: I can change you! I can turn you into the Dragon Warrior! And I will!

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Po: But dad, didn't you ever, I don't know, want to do something else? Something besides noodles?

Mr. Ping: Actually, when I was young and crazy, I thought about running away and learning how to make tofu.

Po: So why didn't you?

Mr. Ping: Oh, because it was a stupid dream; can you imagine *me* making tofu? [laughs airily]

Mr. Ping: No: we all have our place in this world: mine is here, and yours is...

Po: I know: here.

Mr. Ping: [throws Po bowls of soup to catch] No, it's at tables two, five, seven and twelve. Service with a smile!

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Cee-Lo - Kung Fu Fighting (feat. Jack Black) Lyrics:

Hoh-hoh-hoah
Oh-hoh-hoh-hoah
Oh-hoh-hoh-hoah
Oh-hoh-hoh-hoah

Coz everybody is Kung Fu Fighting
Your mind becomes fast as lightning
Although the future is a little bit frightening
It's the book of your life that you're writing

You're a diamond in the rough, a brilliant ball of clay
You could be a work of art, if you just go all the way
Now what would it take to break, I believe that you can bend
Not only do you have to fight, but you have got to win

Coz everybody is Kung Fu Fighting
Your mind becomes fast as lightning
Although the future is a little bit frightening
It's the book of your life that you're writing

Oooooouuhhh

You are a natural, why is it so hard to see ?
Maybe it's just because you keep on looking at me
The journey's a lonely one, so much more than we know
But sometimes you've got to go, go on and be your own hero

Coz everybody is Kung Fu Fighting
Your mind becomes fast as lightning
Although the future is a little bit frightening
It's the book of your life that you're writing

Hoh-hoh-hoah
Oh-hoh-hoh-hoah
Oh-hoh-hoh-hoah
Oh-hoh-hoh-hoah

Coz everybody is Kung Fu Fighting
Your mind becomes fast as lightning
Although the future is a little bit frighteningIt's the book of your life that you're writing.

'Decisive' or 'Impulsive' ? I suppose it doesn't really matter... ...

I would term it as 'decisive' wherever my decision turned out to be a pleasant experience; 'impulsive' if the experience was a 'rocky' one.

Be it a good or bad experience, I never regret any decision I made. I learned and grown to be mature - from the results of my decisions.

Dreams ('Impossible Princess' Album) - Kylie Minogue

To have any man but to love only one
To wake with the moon and sleep with the sun
To be a sinner a saint, a lover and friend
To know a beginning but never an end
To fly in the ocean, swim in the skies
Believer in truth, defendant of lies
To be of purest love, the deepest pain
To be lost and found again and again and again
These are the dreams
Of an impossible princess
To know the power of wealth and poverty
To taste every moment and try everything
To be hailed as a hero, branded a fool
Believe in the sacred and break every rule
To give into pleasure with no boundaries
Living in chaos and harmony
To feel the touch of a man, a woman's caress
To know the limits of torture and tenderness
These are the dreams
Of an impossible princess
Man and woman boy and girl
They want to escape this world
(Nothing's what it seems)
These are the dreams of an impossible princess
It's a way of dealing with all the feeling
Keep believing in dreams

Written: Kylie Minogue/ Steve Anderson/ David Seaman