Image courtesy of eatsdirt

Is today my lucky day? Actually, I should be asking is this month my lucky month as I have a lot of lucky occasion all happening in this month. Today is a special day for me as I have managed to pass my driving test after taking it for a total of 5 times. lolx. Anyway, it is not a very glamorous thing to say as I have friends who managed to pass their driving test with just 1 try. However, I do feel lucky as I thought I was going to fail after making so many mistakes during the test.

As I have mentioned previously that I have a lot of lucky occasion happening this month, I have won an overseas trip of 3D2N Baan Saen Doi Resort & Spa Chiang Mai stay through one of the online survey I have done previously. I was surprised when I received the email from the organizer but I do have a feeling when I was doing the survey. One thing that I noticed is that whenever we are filling up a survey form or prize sheet that will allow us to stand a chance to win a prize is that we did not actually monitor our thoughts. What is the first initial thought in your mind? If you have the mindset that it is hard to win a grand prize or even winning a prize, do you think you will really stand a chance to win? As the law of attraction states that what you focus on will expand, what I realized was the first initial thought that I have when filling up the online survey form was it would be very cool to win this prize and enjoy myself to chill at the resort.

Aside from getting my driving license and winning an overseas trip, I have also won a key chain from the national library after taking part in a contest by filling up a few questions that I did not even know the answer at all. Upon winning the contest, I was really feeling lucky as all these winning actually comes from having the right mindset in the initial stage. Therefore, I have decided that I will learn to monitor my thoughts in whatever contests or survey that I am taking part in.

Cheers
Javier

P.S. Hope today is your lucky day too!!

Yeah… This is one of the goals that I wanted to achieve this year and I have successfully completed a full 42km marathon last weekend. This is my first 42km full marathon and I can say that it’s a very tiring one as I have not tried running such a long distance as the longest one I have ran is the 21km Army Half Marathon. This time round I managed to survive running till 19km and my legs already starts to feel the cramp. However, I try to jog and walk along the way till 27km and the rest is pure walking as my legs has maxed up its energy to run already.

Total timing for this marathon is 6:52:58 and I start to appreciate transport vehicle while trying to complete the whole marathon. Starting of the race is simple as you just need to run, however, when you reach the 21km mark, you do not feel like continuing running as your legs will start to feel the ache and cramp. Some people stop their run and give up in the middle of the race while the rest just endure through the whole race. I can say it is an enjoyable run as you get to see Singapore through the journey from early dawn till hot afternoon.

Currently, I am resting myself to recover from the run in order to prepare for my upcoming driving test. One thing I have learned from this marathon is that what you need to do is keep on moving forward and never give up as once you set the end point, you will definitely reach your destination no matter how much pain, ache or obstruction that you need to go through along the journey.

Image courtesy of Rockie Nolan

Recently, I have a talk with my girlfriend regarding a few things about our future. She mentioned something that I feel is very important about treating everyday like a brand new day. Personally, I was hit by her words straight in the head as I have read about this theory before in some self-help books but I did not really apply it in my daily routines.

What do I mean about treating your everyday like a brand new day? Everyday is actually a brand new day as the sun rise and set daily but do we actually treat our everyday like a brand new day? Most people will think that everyday is just another day in their lives but what we shouldn’t really do is bring our past experiences to the future which is the next day. Example like keep on thinking about the bad things that happened yesterday or even a few years ago and get affected by feeling depressed or low due to it.

Personally, I have been putting a lot of mental weight on myself through the past bad experiences and I am feeling guilty about it too. Therefore, I have decided to learn to treat my everyday as a brand new day. Let me bring you to a situation where you will see a clearer picture of what I am talking about. Imagine you are a basketball player, if you keep on thinking about why you miss the shot previously in the first half, will you able to focus on the game in the second half and make a comeback? The answer will be no unless your opponent is not doing a good job. Therefore, we have to learn to turn our mindset around by focusing our energy in the right direction.

I have given this method a try on a mahjong game last weekend and it seems to work for me. I have lost in the first few round of the game but the game has not ended yet as it is still quite early in the game. I change my mindset and stop focusing my mind about the games I have lost in the first few round. I focused all my energy on the next few games and the overall game results turned out to be me as the overall winner.

I think that all of us should focus our mind in the right direction and stop letting those negative thoughts from bringing us down. I will start implementing this findings and will update again if I do see a big change in my life in the upcoming future.

Cheers
Javier
P.S. Do remember to remind yourself today is a brand new day!!

Image courtesy of magda.indigo

Do you know that the first hour of the day is considered one of the most important part of the day? Or have you heard that breakfast is considered the most important meal of the day? Today I am going to share with you why is it important for you to master your first hour of the day over here in this blog post.

Few month ago, I read a blog post by Affilorama about motivation to start your day and I can say that the blog post has actually motivated me to move myself to start my engine to work on myself. To summarize the best part I got from the blog itself is

“Whenever you feel too tired to go out and train, just get off the couch and run the first 500 meters, then if you’re still too tired, go back home and rest”

That paragraph of words is really kicking myself in the ass as sometimes I am reluctant to do what I am suppose to do and procrastinate so much that make me very unproductive. I have put up the above paragraph as my desktop wallpaper to remind myself to just start doing something and it really helps as it kick start my whole momentum to do more.

Ok let’s get back to the topic of why mastering your first hour is very important as recently I read this book called Personal Development For Smart People by Steve Pavlina and inside the book, there’s a portion where he mentioned the importance of master the first hour.

Here’s the abstract from the book itself:

It’s been said that the first hour is the rudder of the day, meaning that the way you start your day will tend to set the tone for the rest of it. If you adopt a disciplined routine for your first waking hour, you’ll probably enjoy a higer productive day. But if you squander that first hour, it’s likely the rest of the day will be equally unspectacular. Conquer that first hour by exercising, reading, cleaning, writing, or doing other productive tasks.

Many people have told me that whenever they complete an important task first thing in the morning, they gain a tremendous feeling of well-being and energy that lasts for hours. I’ve experienced this as well. Finishing an important task early in the day is motivating and energizing. When you conquer that first hour, you feel that no matter what else happens, your day is already a success.

Personally, I totally agree to what Steve Pavlina said in his book regarding about mastering your first hour of the day as I feel it’s the same theory of eating your most important meal of the day which is your breakfast. I have read before that in order for you to do more in the day, you must actually have your breakfast as it boost your power and provide the energy you need to start your day well. It is also healthy for you to take your breakfast as it helps to kick start your body system by providing the energy to start it well.

Cheers
Javier

P.S. Hope this post has inspired you to learn more about the importance of your own time and body. Make sure you check out on Steve Pavlina’s book at any bookstore or library near you as there’s a lot of insides about personal development that I felt are useful to all of us.

Affiloblueprint Members Meetup at Singapore Merlion
(Clayton Terao is beside me on my left)

Do you know that Clayton Terao is in Singapore? You may be wondering who Clayton Terao is and whether is he a superstar that you may not have heard of. Haha. Hope I have caught your attention so far towards reading this post as I am going to reveal to you the answer of who this secret person is.

Clayton Terao is the owner of this blog called JourneyOfMyOwn.com and you can actually find out more about Clayton Terao at his site. Clayton is not a superstar or a celebrity that you have seen on TV (maybe someday he will if he wants to..) but someone who has inspired me and became a friend of mine from Seattle. It is my first time experience to meet up a friend from another country in Singapore and it is a very amazing experience because I have been reading his blog for close to a year and I had started what he has doing in March 2010.

Clayton has been traveling around in South-East Asia for the past 2 months using the money he has made online after implementing the course called Affiloblueprint. He was previously unemployed due to his high qualification but he did not give up and made a difference by living a travel lifestyle through the income he had made online. Personally, I have learned a lot through his blog and I can say that when he mentioned that he will be coming to Singapore, I was pretty excited like going to meet my idol as he has achieved what I want to achieve so far. Anyway, after meeting up with him, I realized that he was just like me “Another person from Planet Earth” which means that what he has achieved so far, I can do it too. This has struck me hard as what he had done for his internet marketing effort are all his hard work and persistence that really pays off itself. After meeting up with Clayton, I am inspired that I can do it too and he is a really fun and interesting guy to meet up with.

Anyway, for those who are reading this may be wondering why do I made my title of the post to be “Clayton Terao Is In Singapore”. Firstly, it is to catch attention and next is to give Search Engine Optimization (SEO) a try to see whether few days down the road whether this keyword “Clayton Terao” will appear on first page of Google or not. haha. You will never know as maybe one day this name will be a hot keyword where people will key in Google to look for when the word of mouth spreads when clayton become a super affiliate like the uncle who caught a lot of prawns (our joke at Singapore Prawn Fishing area).

Our Prawn Fishing Session

Do check out on the course that Clayton has been implementing if you want to live the internet lifestyle of travelling around the world just like him. Anyway, be prepared to work hard to make it happen.

Cheers
Javier

P.S. Clayton, if you are reading this, thanks for the inspiration and the sharing you have with us.

Image courtesy of JackDog2508

It’s been a few weeks since my last post on my personal blog as I have been busy trying to work on my goals for the year. Although I am busy, I still managed to complete 1 bucket list item. I do not know whether you have realized there’s a portion of my blog that states bucket list as this is the place where I put down all the things I want to do and achieve in this lifetime.

If you have checked out my bucket list, you will know I have actually got to know about this from another blogger name Clestine Chua. Recently, I have managed to catch a old movie called The Bucket List by Jack Nicholson and Morgan Freeman. The movie was about 2 old man who were going to die of last stage of cancer and were trying to face life with a more positive attitude by doing what they want to do before they passed on. I realized that life is short and if you don’t cherish the moments, you will definitely regret when your time on this planet is up. Therefore, I feel that we should treat our daily lives in a more positive manner and try to achieve what we want in life as times goes by.

Anyway, back to my blog post regarding my personal bucket list, I have actually managed to complete one of the items I have listed in July. The item that I have completed is how to roller blade which means inline skating. Initially, I was actually quite reluctant to take up the inline-skating course as the price was quite expensive for just 4 lessons. However, there was an offer at my workplace which cost 1/3 the price of normal private inline skating course. Personally, I believe in law of attraction and feel that I should take up the course. Therefore, I signed up with my girlfriend and learned it together. After going for a few sessions, I was glad that there were no more falls and injuries as I was able to skate more smoothly after so many falls and injuries.

Now I can officially cancel off one item on my bucket list already as I have managed to achieve it by mastering how to skate on roller blade. Next, I hope I can complete 2 or 3 more items on my list by the end of this year and I will update my blog again once I have completed any more items.

One thing to note to all readers on this blog, try not to live your life by default and not making any choices in life as not choosing your own desired lifestyle is also a decision of choice that you make. Therefore, write down the things you want in life and try to achieve it one by one. You may call them dream list or bucket list as it is all up to you. Just make sure you enjoy the process like what I do.

Cheers

Javier

P.S. Do check out the movie, “The Bucket List” if you got a chance and be inspired to create your own bucket list too.

P.P.S. If you are currently living in Singapore and actually keen to learn inline skating, do drop me a email as I can get my coach to organize lessons for you.

Image courtesy of Leon B. Dista

It has been a few weeks since my last blog post as I have been busy with my own stuff and getting myself back to healthy conditions due to the change of weather. Today, I’m going to share with you a great tip that I have stumble upon during a quarrel with my own family member. Most of you may have quarrel over some matters with your own family members no matter whether it is small or big. For my case, it is over the issue of our home’s internet connection that happened a few weeks ago. My sister has accidentally switch off the main power supply of the cable modem and thus resulted to a reset to the router main configuration. This caused the whole internet access of our home to cut off and we have to call our router service provider to reset the router.

Usually, when things goes wrong, people will start to point finger at who has created the problem and this happened in my own family too. My brother was angry and blamed my sister for switching off the main power supply which was always on. While my sister start pushing the blame to me, saying she had consulted me before switching it off. I was fed up with her as I told her not to switch off the lights as I was reading and she thought I told her to switch off. This kind of miscommunication has created a lot of conflicts before and I was really sick of it. The funny thing is what my brother and sister want is to get the internet back to action so they can use it to do what they want. However, they did not see the main part of the issue and start throwing flare around which I feel is very unnecessary.

This lesson has allowed me to learn interesting aspect about human beings and in the end, I’m the one who managed to fix the internet connection back to it’s original working ability. Although I was pissed off at that moment, I took the initiative  to try to solve the problem at hand instead. After solving the problems, everyone is happy without any quarrels. Therefore, I urge everyone who is reading this blog to be more aware of yourself and others when handling any situations. Is there a must to feel angry? Is feeling angry or sad going to solve your problems, if they are not going to help, put them aside first and think of solutions to help solve your problems instead.

Cheers
Javier
Feeling Great

Yesterday was the 21km Singapore Bay Run Challenge aka Army Half Marathon. I have managed to complete the run in 2 hrs 58 mins. I have took more time than I have anticipated as I expect myself to run within 2.5 hrs. However, I can say it’s a great run with lots of cramps happening in terms of legs cramps and human traffic cramps. haha.

As usual like the previous 16km run, I am going to share with you what I have noticed during the run. …..Click here to read more

Image courtesy of Mr-Wild

Recently, I have managed to win a swatch watch through the card limit that hit a certain amount. I have won 2 of those lucky draw swatch watches a few months ago and I was quite surprised that I have managed to win another one. On the first two watches I got, I have tried putting the swatch watch on an online free classified website to sell and there were quite a few responses but I did not try to push the price higher as I was quite lazy to bargain the price. In the end, I got my friend to sell it for me at a local cash converter shop.

Fast forward a few months, I got another swatch watch for free and I decided to sell it at the cash converter shop near my girlfriend place. After spending some time at the cash converter waiting for my queue, I realized this business is quite good as quite a lot of people is selling and buying stuff over there. However, I did not sell my swatch watch as the amount they give is lower than the previous round that my friend sold for me. The person at the counter feedback to me that different branch price different items differently and it is really depending on the demand of the locations. In the end, I chose to go somewhere near my house outlet to give it a try. The price they gave me was slightly lower than the price I got at my girlfriend’s location.

To cut long story short, I chose not to sell the swatch watch to the cash converter company and wanted to do an experiment by selling it online instead. To most of the general public, they will usually perceive the value of a swatch watch at a higher value compared to company. The result of my experiment was positive and I managed to sell my free swatch watch at a higher price which is even higher than the price I got throughout the whole process.

What I’m trying to get to you is sometimes you have to put your items or product that you want to sell at a different locations where the perceived value is higher. I think this is a good lesson learnt for myself as I believe I can apply this knowledge in the future for whatever thing I come across with.

Cheers
Javier
P.S. Something I hate about doing this experiment is that I have put in too much time and effort traveling around to sell a swatch watch as I realized I can use that time more effectively in other areas instead of going for a few dollars more for just one unit item. However, I am glad to learn something great through this process and I will definitely remember this.

Recently, I went to Bintan Lagoon with my girlfriend and friends which is located in Indonesia. My friend managed to ballot a 3 bedroom 2 bathroom villa for a 4 days 3 nights stay with a very cheap price through his army system. We were only managed to stay for 3 days 2 nights as the first day fall just nice on my girlfriend’s exam date. However, we have a lot of fun during our stay as we have a great adventure and ride with our villa buggy. All of us did not have a driving license yet but we went ahead to drive the buggy as we have been learning how to drive a real car before and was just waiting to get our license only.

We brought our own food over to cook and the stay was just like our home sweet home where we would take turn to cook on each day. Both of the dinner were steamboat base but different type of soup and I could say we have a great meal and time over there. We had gone through the guest book too and found that if you go during the early month of the year, you will tend to find more bugs in the villa. We were lucky as there wasn’t many bugs during our stay and we have a great time playing mahjong, riding buggy, cooking, kayaking, swimming and playing table tennis at the leisure  centre.

Bintan Lagoon is a project by Singapore investor and I can say the facilities are great and the ambiance is very cool good. I think the best part of this trip is that we get to ride a buggy which makes me feel that we are riding to a golf course. Anyway, if you get a chance to go Bintan Lagoon, you may want to book the villa too if possible as you will get your own villa buggy where you can tour around the place. Touring around Bintan Lagoon on buggy is definitely better than walking as you will have a different feel.

Here’s some of the photos that we took during our trip to Bintan Lagoon:

Bintan Lagoon Resort

Our Villa Living Room

Our Villa Buggy

Our Kayaking Group Photo

Bintan Lagoon Leisure Centre

Swimming at Bintan Lagoon

I have only updated a few photos here about bintan lagoon as most of them are uploaded on my facebook instead. Anyway, I have learned some great things through the guest book I have read which is always be prepared to bring the stuff needed and most important is enjoyed the fun and process of the overseas trip. Make sure of what is available to you and don’t complain what you don’t have as you will definitely come out with great ideas with what you have currently.

Cheers
Javier