New Year's Resolution

I know it is a little bit too late to say this, but I am going to say this anyway: HAPPY NEW YEAR 2013 to you all !!! May this year brings you a lot of joy, prosperity, and health. God bless you, my friend.

Anyway, new year is always identical with resolution and resolution is identical with dreams. I have resolution for this year, which is to update my blog with one article each month! (My God, please help me do this). What about you? What is your resolution this year? What is your dream? It could be you want to get a new job. Or maybe you plan to lose some weight? Or maybe you plan to start a new business? It could be anything. However, time flies. Most of us will not realize until December comes. And then we start to panic because our January's resolution gone with the wind.

1. Start with a Small Step

Two guys went for a fishing. One big guy and one small guy. They started to fish at the same time, they were looking for fish because they want to have dinner. After few hours, the big guy successfully caught a fish. A small one.

The big guy said, "Argh, this fish is too small. I have a big stomach, I will not be satisfied with this."

So he throw it away.

Not long after that, the small guy caught a small fish, and he said, "Oh! A small fish! Thank You Lord, now I have something to eat for dinner." He put the fish in a bucket and put the bait back in the water.

It happened for hours after hours until dinner time came. The small guy's bucket filled with a lot of fishes, even though they were the small ones. The big guy's bucket was empty! Because he was busy trying to find a big fish!

The point is, that is what we do in our daily life. We try to find a big fish and we do not pay enough attention for the small ones. What is your resolution? Take a small step, my friend.

A friend of mine, on 2011 he said that he wanted to quit his job and started his own restaurant. A big one with a lot of variety of foods, Japanese, Korean, Indonesian, American, etc. He wanted to hire some chefs from outside the country. Yet it never happened. A few months later he said that he wanted to do another business, which is importing furnitures from China because furnitures were so cheap in there and he could gain a lot of profit by selling back it here. He had the money and he said he could get millions dollar of profit. Up until now, none of his plan were done.

Big is good. There is nothing wrong by planning to do something big. But your first step is even more important. You want to lose weight, then walk in the morning for 30 minutes or go to the gym. You do not have to buy those 1 million rupiah shoes but you never made it to the gym. You want to quit cigarette  then replace it with bubble gum or some candies to take your attention away. You want to start a new business, then start it with small business. Just like people said, “When you do something small, you made small mistakes. When you jump straight into something big, you made big mistakes.”

So, what is your dream? What is your first step?

2. Plant Now, Harvest Later

I have a friend who is a heavy smoker. In January, he said one day to me that he wants to quit. I said, "Oh good! Do it, mate!"

He said, "I will! Do not worry about it. I will not touch it anymore. I will put it away."

After a few months, I saw him, smoking by himself. He said, "Martin, I can not quit now. I have so many problems in the office. I can not quit."

Two months after that, I saw him again with a cigarette in his hand, this time he said, "I will quit later, I just can not quit now. The fact is I still have a lot of problems with my family which make my head going crazy! You know when everything calms down , I will quit! You know I will and you know I can. I will throw it away and I will burn it down. No more cigarettes!"

In December end, near Christmas day, I ran into him again and he had not quit yet.

It did not surprise me. Because he simply never started. He waited for perfect conditions to start. I believe that imperfect condition is the the perfect moment. If you want to be a singer, then now is your perfect moment. If you want to be a guitar player, then now is your perfect moment. If you want to start a new business, then now is your perfect time!

Another example is this, my friend who is a woman said to me that she was so fed up with her boss.

“Martin, I’m sick with my job! I have had enough with my boss!”

“Hmmm.. so what are you going to do? Quit?

“Of course! I don’t have any reason to stay.”

“Okay.. What are you going to do after that?”

“I am going to start my own online shop!”

“Okay.. What kind of shop?”

“Handbag shop!”

“Do you have the name for this shop?”

“Yes!”

“Do you know where to get the handbags?”

“Yes!”

“Do you know the distributor? The price?”

“Yes! Yes!”

“Do you have any market share? Will you sell it on facebook? Will you sell it on twitter?”

“Yes! Yes! Yes!”

“Alright that’s great! Then when are you going to start?”

“Hmmm.. maybe 3 or 4 years later after I’m getting married.”

After getting married she thought it would be a perfect condition , a perfect moment. But again, perfect condition was created by you. Yes , YOU !!! If you wait, most likely you will find another excuse not to do something you want.

European’s bear, they go for hunting in summer. Why? Because they do not want to be starving in winter. They stock and pile up their foods, when winter comes, they are hiding, hibernating, and not starving. They already ‘plant’ in the summer, so they do not panic in winter.

Country with different seasons such as European countries, US, and Australia, people in that countries, prepare for winter in the summer. In summer, they put discount on coat, jacket, and everything you need for winter. So they stock up and pile up, come winter everything is prepared!

Once upon a time, there were 2 farmers; farmer A and farmer B. Farmer A said, “Hey let’s fill this field with corn seeds!”

“Agree!” Farmer B answered.

“Wait , wait , wait B... Look at the sky! There are so many birds. Nah I don’t feel like it. There won’t be any chances we could grow these seeds in a condition like this. Let’s wait for next month!”

“No, A! Give me the seeds. I will plant it now!”

Farmer A gave the seeds to B, “Do whatever you want!”

Short story, B started to spread the seeds on the field. Of course some of the seeds were eaten by the birds. But B never gave up, he kept on trying to push the birds away. Day in, day out he never gave up! He always put himself on the field. On the contrary, A was busy too. But he was busy with newspaper and television! He tried to find out about everything from the news. He was so worried about weather, plagued, fertilizer’s price, etc.

After a few months, came harvest time. B had corns to harvest! He sold it and got money. While A got nothing and bite his nail. Simply, because he wait for everything to be perfect! And perfect condition will never came! I read this once in a newspaper : “There’s always something wrong even in a place you thought was right.”

I remember when I was about to release my first hand-writing, I was so afraid. I was so afraid about my friends response, my family response, and people response in general. I was so afraid with my English. I was so afraid with my grammar. Yet, I kept on writing. Am I perfect now? No. Not at all, but I decided to do it anyway. Back then, I was so afraid to swim. I was afraid that I would be drown if I went into the swimming pool. Yet, I swim now. I was so afraid to drive a car back then. I could not see other cars behind me, I could not park, but I kept on driving and now I can drive! I remember when I got my guitar for my birthday’s gift, I was afraid to play it. I was afraid that I am going to sound absurd (which I was!) but I never stopped there. I kept on practising and now I am sound better!

So, when are you going to start?

3. 1000 Failures = 1 Success

Michael Jordan is a legend. A legend in a basketball game. He used to play for Chicago Bulls. Even for those of you who do not like basketball, maybe you heard his name because he was so famous.

Anyway, do you know how he could became a legend? He trained so hard! That is true. He trained with his eyes closed while doing free throws. It was true that his training made him a legend. But, there is something else, he became a legend because he failed many times! Let me give you the statistics:

·        He missed more than 9.000 shots in his career!

·        He lost almost 300 games in his entire career!

·        26 times his friend trusted him to do the winning shot and he missed!

He said: “I failed over and over and over again, and that is why I succeed. I can accept failure, everyone fails at something. But I can't accept not trying.”

Colonel Sanders offered his recipe into more than 1.000 restaurants before finally there was one restaurant who wanted to use it. If he gave up at 999 times of trying than we will not be able to eat KFC these days.

Thomas Alfa Edison failed 10.000 times, well some people said he failed 1.000 times and his lab even burnt down. But, he never quit. Imagine if he was a quitter. We will live in a dark today.

What is your dream? Do you have the will to start it all over again?

When I was in Australia, I went to church on Sunday for Mass. Well, ninety or ninety-five percent of the church filled with old people (no offence). Nothing wrong with the old people though. However, it made me thinking, it also reminded me about dream. All of us will grow old. I will be old one day. My hair turns white, my skin wrinkles, my eyes will not cooperate so well with me anymore, my ears will not hear so good anymore. When I looked at those old people, maybe they were thinking: “I wish I was a singer.”; “I wish I was a book writer.”; “I wish I was a football player.”; “I wish I was a doctor.”; “I wish I was a swimmer.” I thought that how sad there were so many songs never sung, so many books never written, so many goals never scored, so many business never started. All those dreams just grow old and die and gone away with us when we leave this world. Friends, all of us will grow old, but for our dreams, we have a choice to let it grow old or grow up. Do not let your dreams grow old and die and you buried it away with you.

God bless you as always :)

-M-