Losing a pet can feel like the end of the world but not everyone sees it that way
This is the first real thing I’ve written in more than a month. Not for anyone else or for social media, not for work or to provide any kind of value. It’s merely an exercise in self-expression, a verbal outpouring of grief.
Even as I write this piece, just after 1am on the 1st of June, I don’t know yet if I will finish it today*. If it can even be finished.
How does one be finished with grief?
From experience, I know that it never goes away. …
UNTOUCHABLE HOURS
You don’t always need classes and a syllabus to learn
I visit my mom every weekend and whenever I do, I always pay a visit to the chicken rice stall nearby her place. It’s just a little stall in a coffee shop that has other hawkers.
Even though it’s in an area that’s considered far away from the city, the shop is often crowded and the chicken rice usually sells out by 2pm, if not earlier.
Although it’s not a venture capitalist-backed startup or a multi billion-dollar conglomerate, I’ve learned a few valuable lessons on business from this little enterprise.
Create a great product
Every hawker center in Malaysia will typically have a chicken…
Company budget cuts during COVID-19 made me think about what good leadership is about
It’s a really tough time for a lot of businesses in Malaysia. We’ve had two weeks on restricted movement with an order for a further extension until April 14.
As someone who’s been plugged into the drinks industry in Kuala Lumpur (I write about bars in KL), my heart especially goes out to the bars and bar owners whose sales are suffering, especially indie bars that aren’t owned by large hotel chains.
I also have clients from a range of industries and even those from online retail have been struggling with sales. …
UNTOUCHABLE HOURS
Some life hacks I’ve implemented into my workday
In Malaysia a few days ago, the government announced a movement control order. Non-essential businesses are closed and most people are working from home.
Many of my friends who are unaccustomed to being at home all day are feeling stir crazy after just two days. When they ask me how I’m doing, I find myself shrugging and saying: This is normal for me.
I work from home all the time. I don’t leave the house unless I really have to.
But during a meeting I had a month back — it was over the phone with someone who also worked…
UNTOUCHABLE HOURS
What I do while traveling to avoid wasting time
Living in a country where traffic is a given at almost all hours of the day, commuting used to frustrate me.
Trying to get to work in the city centre — I lived in a suburb about 40km away — took me about two hours. And that was just one way!
These days, I rarely travel during peak and rush hours, but when I do, it usually takes at least 20 minutes from one place to another.
When you’ve got loads of things to do and very little time to do it in, 20 minutes is a long enough period…
Forget doing what you love. Love what you do instead!
If anyone had told me four years ago that I would be a business owner with a profitable, seven-figure business, I would have laughed. I was a writer, not a business person.
Yet here I am. I managed to sell my business last year, and have been working on and investing in other businesses in 2019. I’m finally beginning to work up the balls to call myself “an entrepreneur”.
What did I do and how did I end up here? I’ve been asking myself lately.
Occasionally, it feels as if I tripped into a wormhole and ended up on the…
Keep the appointments you make with yourself
“What are you busy with after this?” he asked. I was out with a friend for dinner and I’d told him that I would have to leave by 9pm.
I’m going home, I told him. Apparently, this was an “unacceptable” reason to end a night out early. “No way, you’re coming out for drinks with me,” he said.
“No I can’t, I have plans,” I said. From the look on his face, I was sure that he’d took it to mean that I was going home to either: a) ravish my husband or b) keep to a curfew. …
How practising stoicism made me more chill
My heart was pounding. There had been a severe mistake in one of our large shipments and the client was furious. He was out for blood. We were going to lose a generally easy to handle, recurring customer. He was going to sue us. We would have to suit up for war.
As you can see, my mind makes huge leaps towards worst-case scenarios. And once, I might have given in to the crippling physiological sensations that come with anxiety.
But I’ve found something that work better than medication — stoicism. …
UNTOUCHABLE HOURS
How you can use procrastination to analyse your goals and methods of achieving them.
So many times, we talk about the things we want to do and achieve.
We revel in the dreaming and the ideating. We don’t actually do anything. We don’t start.
We put things off, say, I’ll do it when I’m less tired, I’m too busy to think about it now, I’ll get round to it eventually.
Days turn into months, possibly into years. Our ideas sit on the shelf and one day, we see someone making millions doing the exact same thing.
“I could have been rich,” we say. “I could have been famous.”
But of course, we couldn’t. Because…
You were like a child that was thrust into my arms, not mine to begin with but slowly, I grew to love you. Perhaps because of how much work you required.
You started out as a vape subscription service — a business that lived in the grey areas of the law in Malaysia. In the world of advertising, you were taboo.
The person who gave birth to you didn’t know how to tell the world about you. He asked me to help. And you became mine as well.
I was a writer, a coder. I didn’t think I knew anything…
