Archives for May 2020

Get out of your comfort zone or stay in the rut

I always thought that I would live and die a dentist. My mind works like a machine that is automated and systematic.

It is very much like what a dentist does in everyday work — —for example, when doing the filling, give anesthetic when required, wait for numbness, access and widen cavity carefully, remove caries, line with medication, build up the filling in layers if necessary, cure it, adjust and polish it.

For thirty-five years, I have been at dentistry and love it. Along the way, I also learned implants and more steps and systematic ways to carry out. So much so that, if I learn anything outside dentistry, I would list everything in order not to miss anything important. It works for me.

Dentistry is an art and a science. After all, aesthetics is a big thing in dentistry and we are moving towards better and beautiful in a big way. I wanted to develop my sense of aesthetics and art further.

Recently, due to the Covid-19 crisis, I joined some coloring competition that was organized by the National newspaper agency, The Straits Times that would give away $5K to the five top winners. Other private companies jumped on the bandwagon such as BMW and a famous art gallery.

It was a challenge for me. My systematic mind could only think of coloring each figure in a specific color. I knew that I lacked creativity. I tried anyway since I had printed all the copies and wanted to use my new coloring pencils kit which I had bought on a whim a year ago.

I seemed happy with my effort and even secretly thought I might win. Until the announcement of results. I was shocked at how creative some people could be. It certainly took a lot of effort and thinking for them to come up with such marvelous art!. I also believe that they were blessed with an innate talent.

They have inspired me to be hardworking and persistent. To open my mind to stimulation around me so that I could uncover my creativity. I like to believe that we have potential in us that need to be excavated. Even if the potential is low, it can be developed. Through more exposure to others who are good at what they do. To have the tenacity to give your best and not give up.

It is torturous for me but I started to join workshops that would require creativity. Sure, where there were steps to follow, it was a no brainer for me. But when it came to selecting or creating images, putting a cover photo, creating a logo, I was lost.

Last year, I started to learn about website creation and then moved on to an e-commerce site. It was very difficult for me as there were many things new to me. I was outside of my comfort zone. I looked around me and my young classmates were all operating in a flow state. Everything came easy to them.

I struggled with the technical process of going digital with the laptop. I was not holding handpieces in my clinic. I tried to link webpages that were shoddily created and the result was a disaster. My classmates already had much basic knowledge with them and the workshop was about building more skills.

I had started on a blank slate and felt totally lost. But I refused to give up. Steps, steps I told myself. I listed all the steps as the instructor belted them out and hit the keys at the same time. Sometimes it was disastrous but a good soul next to me helped me to correct it. I was becoming a nuisance to him but heck, I was going to persist with this challenge.

At the end of the two-day full workshop, I produced an incoherent website. Fortunately, my notes were with me as a guide. Over the weeks, I continued to drop in at their office to meet up with their co-ordinator to work out the process while new classes were conducted by the instructor. I refused to fall out by the wayside.

It took me almost a year to revamp my website and e-commerce site again and again. I learned new things. I forced myself to learn to take good photos and produce images and picked up tips for good photography and relevant images.

I would take templates but had to modify them in order to use them commercially without penalty. I could source free pictures from some websites but I found out that having my own pictures would give my posting more ranking on google.

All life is an experiment. The more experiments you make the better—–Ralph Waldo Emerson

It almost requires a whole new mindset as I need to view my images from an artist’s point of view. It must evoke an emotion before people would want to read on about your post or your product. I came across a software that could test your creativity.

Now, I have two websites and one e-commerce website which I would continue to revitalize as time goes by to provide fresh content and feeling. I also had my first client, an accountant who was happy with my own works and signed up as a client. I created a simple website as requested by her and did it for a small fee.

I am very happy to take up challenges. Staying in my comfort zone means not feeling pain nor inconvenienced nor agitation from the unknown but my philosophy of life is always to stretch myself further.

Even if it takes time, I feel that one can only get better. If you work at something assiduously in a systematic manner and stretch your imagination by doing more work on the side, how can you not finally excel at what you want to achieve?

A mind that is stretched by a new experience will never go back to its old dimensions–Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr

Summer Lotus May 23 · 5 min read

The lockdown opened up many opportunities for me.

It is a lockdown on your movement not a lockdown on your life.

People reacted differently under such circumstances. It was very revealing when your basic freedom is taken away from you.

I was afraid of allowing certain things to happen to me; Losing my momentum on my daily goals, losing my fitness as yoga classes were canceled, losing my patience, losing my passion for life, losing my sanity, feeling bored, becoming lazy, and dull-witted, etcetera.

It is not my nature to let them happen as I would fight against these possibilities but still, the fear was in me. I sensed it out there. At the shops, I encountered some staff who were just matter of factly doing what they had to do and going through the motion with malaise and no sense of vitality in their eyes. It did not do good for the general state we are in.

Yet, I met salespeople who were enthusiastic and making the best out of the situation. Unlike the ‘walking dead’. One lady persuaded a friend and me to take a look at the lastest collagen drink in a pharmacy that was allowed to stay open. She gave a running commentary of its effectiveness down to its specific ingredients and dose.

For good measure, she threw in enough sample drinks for each main box to make the purchase more cost-effective. She nailed the deal as we agreed to buy. The joy was palpable on both ends and an otherwise lackluster day ended happily.

For many years now, the world has been going at breakneck speed to achieve more progress in our lives. The rich were getting richer, poor much poorer and there was no time for introspection. Everyone was too busy with progress, defined by themselves.

Back home, construction was ongoing for years. My overseas friends used to say Singapore is in a state of “Construction in progress”. It is the same in many countries. More luxurious apartments at sky-high prices, more housing flats with smaller spaces, more train stops, more retail malls with more of the same chains, more people, less time.

Covid-19 crisis threw a spanner in the works. In a short interval of under two months, a lot has changed for people all over the world and many countries cope with this crisis differently.

Fighting boredom on an individual basis is up to you. You could just sleep away, sip beer, watch Netflix endlessly but this is a precious nugget of time and not a small one. It could be a time for re-education, developing new skills and interests that could be your second career, unleash new ways to survive on your own, resist and change bad habits that have plagued you for years, and so on. Many personal gains to work on.

How has it changed me?

For many years, my leisure time was spent on things that do not make me grow with the times. Like going to many movies just to kill time without really being selective. Like going to the supermarket with no intention to buy anything and it did not burn enough calories anyway walking around in the mart. Like looking for things to fret.

It lacked purpose. Being in lockdown, I decided to work on things that were in limbo. Like improving my website design which I learned to make for my business but was not good enough. Like getting my e-commerce off the ground instead of leaving it online in a pathetic state just because it is buried in the cyberworld and the chance of being discovered is zilch.

I discovered writing and the medium was one platform I got started and was glad that I did. With time away from work as dentists were restricted to emergency treatments only, many of us turned to read to get information and that was how I stumbled upon the medium. It is a new lease of life as it tested my writing ability which I am still trying to convince myself that all of us have an innate ability to write if only we believe and get started.

When yoga lessons were suspended, I worked on some of the moves that would oil my joints and relieve muscle tension and found that they were good enough. I could end my membership, saved some money, and a lot of time. Yoga practice has become my daily ritual.

Walking around my estate also opened my eyes to what my neighbors did to their beautiful gardens and the facade of their spacious homes. Even their choice of lightings was a pleasant sight to behold. The estate is always undergoing changes as the world changes. New cafes, ice-cream parlors, quaint shops have sprung up over the months or years without my knowledge and I was missing the good life.

All these years, I have never paid much attention to Social media, digital marketing, reading, etc as my life was pretty routine. It was work, home, time for my elderly siblings, outings, some volunteer work, travel, and some interests like Toastmasters Club and yoga activities.

During the lockdown, I explored the world of digital marketing. That was a real eye-opener. I have extended the learning of my website which was the basic foundation, to dive into digital marketing which is a hot topic.

With Youtube, I discovered many instructors who generously shared their ideas and dreams. My website started to have a direction, my eCommerce website became functional (though digital marketing may monetize it if I apply correctly)and my creativity is piqued.

The lockdown reminds us to be mindful of certain consequences if we did not want a repeat. Good hygiene, proper social distancing are all good practices in today’s world. We also started to attend webinars and learn to host or join a meeting on zoom or teach a senior how to use zoom which would help family members and friends to keep each other in communication.

Life after Covid-19 is certainly going to be a better one. Taking life a little slower, learning steadily that every adversity can be overcome and that human beings can choose to be resilient if they want to.

the sweet life

How long we live is not as important as how sweet we lived it.

Summer Lotus May 21 · 6 min read

A very ordinary and carefree childhood in the 60s but a sweet life……

The good old days of the sixties in Singapore were rekindled when I was looking through my old albums to select, organize, and discard some old photos. My family has a common trait- we all love to take photos. Though we were not rich, we still manage to go to the studios to have a family portrait now and then. I am glad that we had photos to remind us of our past.

I come from a family of seven siblings and my oldest brother is about twenty years older than me so I must be an accidental child. I remembered sleeping between my parents back in the sixties due to the lack of space which accounts for me being the youngest child. My other four siblings slept in two double-deckers in the next room and two more slept on the living room floor close to the kitchen. The flat at Owen road has been demolished by now.

Singapore which was then a backwater had no natural resources other than the people. She was about to go through many social and political changes under our able founding father Mr. Lee Kuan Yew.

He was our role model, the epitome of intelligence and wisdom, and a symbol of what you can achieve with hard work and foresight. Ours was a meritocratic society and there was no free lunch so we became hardworking if we wanted the good life.

I would recall my childhood days and they seemed to appear in black and white unlike the colorful scenarios of modern Singapore. Oh yes, the photos were mostly in black and white then and most of them were developed and fixed in a make-shift box by my brother in a darkened room.

My dad was a teacher in a Mandarin-speaking school and my mother a housewife. Every day was routine as there were no hard and fast rules but certain rules were unspoken. I remembered my childhood as largely serene and sometimes mundane.

We were to study hard to the highest level that is affordable to our parents, look for a job, look for a mate to get married, have children, and then have our own nuclear family.

I have never heard of the word ‘tuition’. Free time after school was spent jumping around in the big drains, visiting the library but not necessarily reading. Sometimes I would loiter in the shops with my best mate looking at the “Barbie dolls”. I had sworn that one day, I would own them. I do not remember doing any homework assiduously as my twin children did, who were born in the 80s when the emphasis on good grades was heightened.

Our hobbies were all homemade. Paper dolls, outdoor games like rounders and hopscotch were popular. The game of five stones involved beans sewn in small pouches. To play this game, throw one stone in the air and swipe the rest off the ground, then in time to catch the first stone. Subsequently, you throw up two stones, grabbing the remaining three on the ground then catching the two in the air, and so on.

My brothers preferred to play with insects, catching spiders, butterflies, and so on. Their most innovative homemade toy was the tricycle made from planks of wood.

Weekends were routine. My dad would bring us, the last three of all the siblings (the rests have their dates) to the usual haunts- Esplanade which was a long walk overlooking Singapore River, Haw Par Villa formerly known as Tiger Balm Garden which had figures and displays showing the Chinese folklore, legends and mythology and the Singapore Botanic Gardens which is currently listed on the UNESCO world heritage.

Often my parents would bring us to the theatre on weekends. My favorite part was riding astride my father’s shoulders all the way home after the movies. Occasionally, my parents would go for their separate mahjong games while we would find some friends to play with. It was a sweet life.

In the sixties, we had Attap houses near my flat. They were made of thatched roofs while the walls were constructed from hardwood planks. The toilet was still the bucket system. Unfortunately, I did not explore much as I was told that there were many ‘bad guys’ living there. It was not true. It was simply a maze-like cluster of wooden houses and my mum did not want me to be lost in it.

In any case, where I lived was a flood-prone area. I remembered the ground floor residents were quite distraught each time the heavy rains poured and the flood rose. In knee-deep water, we all watched helplessly as waterlogged items floated out of their doors of the ground floor flats.

Despite the challenging living conditions, Singaporeans generally had happy and carefree lives as we were simple and hardworking. In the 60s, the government had good urban planning that transformed Singapore. Over the years and even now, they established housing estates for the majority of Singaporeans.

After school, it was playtime. Parents’ roles were very distinct — fathers worked and mothers keep the house and tended to the kids. Weekends were spent at the cinema, or the garden or strolling near the beach.

The most exciting event of the year was Lunar New Year. It was the time of the great feast. In my house, the food was simple but come to New Year, my mother would make sure that we would get to taste roast chicken, seafood, pork, a large homemade steamed egg cake, etc.

The house was filled with the aroma of her cooking. It was not preposterous to say that we eat roast chicken only once a year. After all, KFC only landed in Singapore in 1977, Mcdonalds in 1979.

Every Lunar New Year was ushered in by the sound of deafening firecrackers at the stroke of midnight. The following day, the grass and the road outside our flats were a carpet of red. The air had a smell of gun powder and that was the distinct smell of our festive, joyous season. We would dress in new clothes and shoes and looked forward to the red packets from seniors and relatives.

It was an exciting time. Firecrackers sounded everywhere, sparks would ignite before us. It gave us a sense of fear and also shock when some mischievous children or even adults threw crackers in our direction. Due to several injuries and also fire incidents, they were eventually banned in 1972.

in the 70s, many parts of Singapore had undergone redevelopment to build newer and taller Housing board flats. Eventually, we settled in Toa Payoh estate, once a big swamp which was converted into the first self-sufficient satellite town with the availability of amenities and facilities. Today, its sports centre and beautiful garden still exist.

The road to modernization picked up speed as more old flats and estates were developed to provide large public housing for the masses in Singapore. Singapore was focused on establishing a manufacturing industry and education.

The first color TV debuted in 1974 ( B/W TVs appeared in 1963)and thrilled many families. I will never forget the excitement my parents and siblings exhibited as we surrounded the TV and peered into the magic box.

Fast forward to modern Singapore and it has become a remarkable country of enviable progress and good repute. Singaporeans enjoy a high standard of living along with the high costs but opportunities are always there for those who strived hard in their studies and careers.

Despite these sweeping changes in a matter of 60 years, my carefree and sweet childhood days are forever mine to keep and I am grateful to be a Singaporean.

If you like this article, please let me know so that I can work on my second article which featured life in the 80s when I became a young adult.

The Answer Often Lies With Ourselves. Believe.

If you want to be known as a stickler, someone who insists on something unyieldingly or a stick in the mud, someone who avoids new activities, ideas, or attitudes, rather be known as one who has stick-to-itiveness.

Stick-to-itiveness is an informal word that means unwavering pertinacity, perseverance. Today, I decided to display this trait with my Lenovo desktop which was quite a new computer considering that I have used it for less than 30 times in the last four years.

2 years ago, the computer could not start and I had to engage the services of Lenovo. Through the phone, the technician was succinct with his instructions. I had the good mind to take down his instructions and work on the steps that he instructed. Step by step, I managed to bring the desktop back to the factory condition after I saved my data.

But this time, my Lenovo desktop flickered very badly for the last few days. Fortunately, I still had the instructions with me and decided to follow it to a T. It was very easy.

Unplug all cables and switch off the mains.

Switch on again and before the Lenovo logo comes on, tap the F2 key multiple times.

A dialog box would come up asking whether you would like to restore the computer.

Click yes and it asked if it is Ok to lose unsaved data (well, I could not save any data with a madly flickering screen so I would rather save the computer)

Next, it says to leave desktop alone while it was quick restoring.

Under 10 minutes, it was completed and it asked to reboot.

The desktop became functioning like brand-new!

“The three great essentials to achieve anything worthwhile are, first, hard work; second, stick-to-itiveness; third, common sense.”
― Thomas A. Edison

I am glad that I did not listen to others who asked me to bin the computer. I believe that “If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it”. In this case, it is not broken to me. I would not fix it by buying a new computer as suggested but try to fix it literally.

I feel that I have inspired myself. Suddenly, the great words of Sir Winston Churchill rang through my head, “ Never, never, never give up!”

The song, “ Never, never, never, never give up! from ‘Thomas & Friends sang in my heart. The lyrics of the song immediately resounded around me the way ‘Thomas & Friends’ characters did in https://youtube/53a3QBcELvE That’s how I felt.

Elevated and elated by a sense of achievement not so much by the fact that I have saved money not sending the desktop for repair or buying a new one but by the fact that we can solve problems if we try hard enough.

I feel a can-do attitude. In fact, in most obstacles that I faced these days, even if I do not solve them instantly, I often manage to find some solutions in the end.

Have patience and stick-to-itiveness in what we do.

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Originally published at https://summerlotus.com.sg. 

www.boundlessdelight.com