What's On My Mind
“This was fun”
The skill to build relationships, as well as awareness of one’s actions, can lead to a stable business in an industry.
That’s how my friend was able to find success in the construction industry. He started as a draftsperson and now he is the owner of two companies that provides him with an income to live a comfortable life.
I found that to be inspiring. But rewind back 20+ years ago, no one would’ve taught he’d be where he is today. In terms of academic ranking, he was ranked 99 out of 99 students. He almost didn’t graduate from high school probably because due to his laziness. But he was able to turn his life around – the classic storyline of a hero’s journey.
Who can predict what they’re going to be in the next 20 years anyway?
None of us did. Twenty years ago, we (my friends in the Philippines) were all poor performers. The goofing around and all that was obviously not something our parents would be proud of. But that goofing around is what brought us the funniest memories we can talk about today, which, gave us about 4.5 hours of “video-chat entertainment”.
We rarely talk. It must have been years since. Everyone is busy pursuing their dreams. However, when we do talk, it feels like it was yesterday. You’d know because the immature version of you, you thought you’ve outgrown resurfaces. You talk differently. You say offensive things you don’t see yourself saying today. It was funny and awkward how we talked about things we did to each other. Things that could break that friendship in an instant. But the past is past. We all moved on – and the friendship stayed.
I’m not sure when I’m gonna see them again.
But I know they’ll be there I need them.
A Year Ago This Week
- I wrote the exam for my insurance license.
- I talked about keeping friends who are not scared to tell you the truth regardless if that truth could hurt your sensitive feelings.
- [Side Note] My friends in the Philippines taught me how to take harsh criticisms and hard to swallow truths. It benefited me a lot today.
- I started working on a new MSPaint series.
- [Side Note] But I stopped working on it. Higher priority projects came up.
[read here]
Weekly Update
Personal Projects
I continue to learn about design from The Futur on Youtube.
I am now applying what I’m learning on my website.
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I’m now reading a book on metaphors. Why? It helps me explain things better…
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I’m also almost done practicing the presentation for selling insurance. It took me less than 30 minutes to present the whole thing.
The goal is to present it as fast as possible as people’s attention is scarce but at the same time, ensure they understood at least the basic idea of the presentation.
There is that careful balance you want to strike. The skill to do a presentation not only helps me on my journey in the insurance industry but would also help me at work.
However, prospects didn’t sign up for a session just yet. But I will nudge them to book an appointment and get them to gauge how well I can do a presentation.
Routine
I did not miss a day of “Happy Body” workout this week. But I missed a day of running on the treadmill.
It’s been a week to develop new mindsets:
- Use “I don’t feel like doing this…” as a trigger to get me to take action.
- “You are either 100% in or you’re out” to force me to stop the urge to multitask.
- “Value is measured by the impact of your work, not by the time invested”. I always catch myself thinking I should spend more time doing this or that so that I can deliver the value it deserves. But that becomes easily a waste of time if the extra time invested did not make a big difference to the whole project.
Finance
My fiancee is interested in learning more about creating investment portfolios.
I would like to know more about them too. But I don’t have the mental capacity to learn them just yet.
I’m glad I have a partner whose values and interests that compliments mine 🙂
Find more of my work here, here and hereÂ