Knowing

Have you ever stopped to think about the good things that has happened in your life and wondered if it were ever planned or premeditated?



Now, here's what I learned from a well known CEO. Someone who gets featured in magazines and newspapers. Grab a piece of paper and start listing all the achievements in your life. I am going to assume you are able to list down at least 10 things.



Once you have listed them, take a read through and there is a high likelihood that you'll notice that about 60% more of the items listed had happened without you planning for it.



Of course I don't mean you should just leave everything to chance but it goes to show that not everything needs planning. Sometimes. Just sometimes, gold does fall in your arms.



So.... Sometimes, going with the flow is simply the solution to a good ending. Planning is good but too much planning and you end up doing a lot procrastination only with little action.



Hence, getting on our feet running instead should be the kick start to whatever you do. Then as you run your life's marathon, planning in between will point you in he right direction.



Success isn't about planning it out. It's about doing it and doing it with conviction.

Best regards, Micky

No pain no gain...

Not everyone agrees with the statement, "no pain no gain". I guess it really depends on the circumstance and the level of pain.

Recently, I had one hell of an experience after having injuring my knee for the 5th or 6th time. One of the risks that comes with playing squash as a favourite sport. Thankfully this time it wasn't as serious as before. Last time I had a torn hamstring that left me walking with crutches for a good 4 weeks. This time around I had an inflamed ligament. Walking wasn't a problem but certain angles really hurt.



Thinking the ligament was painful was a very wrong thing to do. The treatment I had to undergo was a lot more painful. A month of physiotherapy and another month of rehabilitation workout at the gym.



The pain is one thing. But what I gained was very meaningful and I learned a lot. All this while I thought I had been strengthening my knee well enough but I never knew strengthening major muscle sets isn't sufficient because even minor muscle sets mattered when it came to explosiveness, movement and stability.



Plus, when we think of strengthening our muscles, the first thing you think of is pumping iron. Surprise, surprise even simple free weight exercises could be pivotal to muscle strengthening.



At the gym, my trainer worked with me to build myself back up bit by bit. Also, despite all the iron pumping, it's when we are resting after exercising that our muscles build up and not during exercise.



I could go on and on about the stuff I learned throughout the recovery period. But the point I want to bring about is the fact that sometimes getting hurt isn't all that bad. There are still things you can learn, improve and impart to others.



So.... Sometimes it is true that no pain is no gain :0)



Best regards, Micky

Everyone wants to save someone

It was a long day for Hank. He had just spent almost 20 hours in the operating theater working on a patient would was brought in on extremely short notice for heart complications. But the patient wasn't just any patient. It was his own brother who suddenly had cardiac arrest while he was halfway running a marathon. A marathon that meant a lot to him because it was a marathon that he trained for for almost a year. Hank fought the full 20 hours trying to bring his brother back. He didn't want to give up, he couldn't give up on his only brother, Jimmy.

As Hank operated on Jimmy, in the back of his head it was as if a video cam was playing back all the good time Hank and Jimmy shared. Jimmy's first birthday, first toy, first bicycle and all the other rainbows of life he and Jimmy shared. Hank fought back tears throughout the ordeal. Jimmy was his only family left after their parents passed away in a fatal car crash 3 years ago. Hank had lost his parents, he wasn't going to lose his brother.

20 hours and eventually Jimmy must have decided to walk into the white light to be with their parents. Hank sat slumped in the outpatient waiting area with his operating mask hanging from his neck, hands covering his face, weeping for having failed to save his only family left. Wrecked and hard broken were probably understatements of Hank's feelings.

After that ordeal, Hank started to lose himself in depression. Every morning dark circles were visible beneath his blood shot eyes. He hardly ate complete meals, he could hardly concentrate when patients consulted him. It reached a point so bad that certain days Hank just didn't show up to work and leaving his nurses in a pinch having to cancel all his appointments. Eventually one day when his nurse, Diana tried to reach Hank on his cellphone and house phone and no one answered, she decided to visit him at his home. She was going to let something this take her crush away.

When she got to Hank's home, she thanked God Hank left a spare key under the carpet and entered into his house which was pretty much in a mess. She called to Hank and got no response. That's when she decided to do a spot check of the entire house. As she reached into Hank's room, she heard running water and immediately went to check the bathroom. To her horror, she saw Hanks slumped next to the bathtub filled with blood. Hank had slit his wrist.

Diana immediately called the ambulance.

Three days later at the hospital, Hank is finally conscious after having lost so much blood. He opens his eyes to see Diana and realises he failed to kill himself. He looks at Diana and turns away not wanting her to see him this way.

After a brief moment of silence, he finally spoke.

"I wanted to join my family. There wasn't much reason for me to live anymore having no one around and having failed to save Jimmy."

"Hank, why did you become a doctor?"

"Save people. I wanted to save people."

"How are you going to save people if you are dead?"

"Doesn't matter anymore. I couldn't even save my brother for Christ sakes"

"Hank. You can't save everyone all the time. Even the best doctors in the world will tell you that. The result could have been the same had a different doctor worked on Jimmy."

"I tried my best! I tried!"

"I know Hank. Everyone wants to save someone. That includes you. But if you decided to take your own life, you'd have failed to achieve saving someone. Saving somone would also mean saving yourself first before you can save someone. Dying is easy. It's living that's difficult, Hank."

With the help of Diana, Hank eventually got out of depression and moved on to be a very established heart surgeon. Today, every time he speaks to a patient in dire conditions, he always says this:-

"Time is never on our side. God took millenias to create the universe that only allows us to live up to about a hundred years old. But you and I probably get only 75 years to live. Everyone wants to save someone, and I want to save you. Please don't give up on yourself because dying is easy, it's living that's difficult."