The Best Year of Your Life

Let 2009 be the Best Year of Your Life

It’s that time of the year again – to reflect on how we have fared in the year which is about to draw to a close and to make New Year resolutions. – promises to ourselves that something in our lives will get better – our finances, our relationships, our career…. My husband used to tell everyone around this time of the year that he has kept all the resolutions he made the year before, and when everyone looks suitably impressed, he would add, “See, I kept them all in my wallet!”

Let us not allow another year to pass us by, with our hopes and dreams still far away in never neverland. Let us today, right now, make the decision that 2009 will indeed be the best year of our lives. Let the coming year be the time that we discover our true passions, the time when we set out to live those passions. No more excuses, no more justifications. Let’s make it a “life and death” priority for indeed, it is life and death. For who among you wants to be part of a community of what I call the “walking dead”? People who would wake up each day, go to work at a job they are indifferent to, go to lunch with people they are not excited to be with, go home for dinner with people they love but have lost the passion for, watch TV programs that fail to excite or thrill, and then it’s off to bed and another same old same old day. People who are just “occupying space”. Sad, but true for so many, if you care to admit it.

So before you heave a big sigh and wished you had not started to read this “depressing” article, let me assure you – there is hope yet! All of us can live our dream lives. It is within our grasp and within our control, and not meant to be left to “Fate” or the whims and fancies of some Higher Power out there!

All it takes is the courage to say to yourself, “Yes, I have one life to live and I want to live it the best way I possibly can. 2009 will be the best year of my life!” Shout it out loud, with real conviction, and I promise you, the moment you have put this desire in your heart, doors will open up that you have never seen before. People who can help you will magically come into your path. It will be as if the whole universe has heard your voice and is moving to help you achieve your dreams.

Not convinced? Well, ask yourself, what do you have to lose to believe and to act on your belief?

You can start by learning how to seize each magical moment in 2009. And to do that, you need to put on new “glasses” that are specially designed to help you recognize special moments in your life. It can be good things and blessings that you enjoy currently but have taken for granted. And of course as you start looking for the magic in each event in your life, you learn to create magic moments. And viola, you have the best year of your life.

As the integrative coach and best selling author Debbie Ford says, “When we are committed to claiming the moment, we look upon, create and invent our ordinary experiences as something extraordinary. We become a magnet for the unique and special. The lens through which we view life shifts, and we become seekers of the divine in every moment. To see with new eyes, to become aware of the blessings we hold, to create new intimate moments each day – these constitute a spiritual quest. This is the art of making the ordinary moments of your life extraordinary.”


Article by Jessica See, life coach and trainer with the Institute of Business Coaches. To find out more about being a coach or if you want to engage a coach, write in to ibc@masteryasia.com.

Learning from Brands of the World

I had the opportunity to spend the past two days with branding and marketing experts from around the world at the Global Brand Forum Malaysia.

Today I will share with you what I learnt from Joanne Ooi, also known as the “Turnaround Queen” for China’s first luxury brand, Shanghai Tang. This lawyer-turned-fashion maven took a luxury Chinese brand from clichéd to fabulous and raised the status of “Made in China” to a whole new level.globally.

So how did she achieve that in the plethora of choices available at just about every corner of a shopping centre in any major city of the world? In short, what makes a brand a Brand? Says Joanne, The high end consumer is definitely looking for an emotional connection to the shopping experiemce. Why do we yearn for that Louis Vuitton bag or that pair of Jimmy Choo shoes?

 Idiosyncracy, humanity, personality are to be cherished. The customer seeks a dream, rather than a collection of products pre-ordained by what sold best the last season.

 Customers are looking for identification and aspiration. That’s why it’s important to stick to a clear message when you are a brand.

 The customer regards the best brands as unfailing dispensers of a certain philosophy of beauty, luxury, experience when you shop within their walls. Says Joanne, do not disappoint that customer!

A brand is often seen as an “oracle of wisdom”, the club that one aspires to belong to.

How can we learn from these lessons as we move on the path of developing our own personal branding?

As I’ve always stressed, the three keys to branding yourself successfully is Clarity, Consistency and Authenticity.

Starting with authenticity first, the undeniably best way to remain authentic and true to yourself as a brand is to build it on the premise of your personal Passion, not from some beliefs that you borrow from someone else but something you feel truly passionate about. Passion sells. When you have a dream, much like Martin Luther King did, others will buy in to you and your dream.

Next, is of course clarity. You can’t be a personal brand if you are no6t even clear about who you are and what you stand for! And to top that of, you have to be consistent in your message as to what you stand for in every interaction you have with others. Do not disappoint those who believe in you.

In other words, you have to stick to your guns where your personal vision and mission is concerned. The moment you relax and say, never mind, let’s just compromise, then you will lost the trust of those who believed in you.

I learnt this lesson years ago when I was running a magazine for working women. We had a strong vision and unshakeable concept that I was truly passionate about. But I recall at one of our internal meetings, I wavered, and was immediately corrected by one of my staff, an advertising sales executive who had a strong belief in what the magazine stood for. I think that day, I fell many notches down his ladder of respect, something I truly regretted. He’s not with us today, and I just want to digress a moment to say, I loved you Pito, you were a wonderful person and I will never forget you.

Now back to personal branding. What I learnt from the Global Brand Forum is there is really not much difference between branding a product and a person. As long as you have a good product (that’s you) that delivers on what it promises, a great story to tell, a passion that can ignite other people like you, people will want to be associated with you and what you stand for… and that’s when Brand You is born!

Picture is taken from www.shanghaitang.com

WORK MATTERS: WHAT I DO MAKES A DIFFERENCE

When was the last time you ask yourself: Am I doing what I really love to do?

Or are you simply working hard just to pay bills and once a year, perhaps, go for a holiday with your family to “de-stress” (and come back feeling distressed that you have overspent!)?

Well, if the answer is “yes”, you are not so different from 80 percent of the population.

Sad, but true. Many people living in developed and developing countries do not like their jobs and what they do in their careers. Most are what I call just “occupying space”. They wake up in the morning, travel in the traffic jams to work, push paper and pen around or stare at the computer for the next eight to twelve hours, then go home to their real “life” – their family and home, spend some not-so-quality time there and it’s off to bed until the next day’s routine starts again. Day after day. Month after month. Year after year. Decade after decade.

That was the startling conclusion I came to after nine years of working with people as an editor of a business magazine. That is no way to live (more like exist, than live), I protest! So that sparked off my passion to educate and coach people who want more out of their lives. People who want to make a difference. People who want to be sure that what they do for a living matters.

The good news is: It’s not difficult to transform from a mere employee who’s just working for a salary into a passionate, self-motivated HAPPY individual. In fact, it’s as simple as A-B-C-D. Please note that I say it’s simple, but that does not mean it’s an easy route. It takes effort and commitment, but I assure you, it’s well worth your while as this is your LIFE we’re talking about!

A. Start by ASKing yourself: What do I really want?
If you don’t know what you want out of life, whatever you’ve got has to be good enough. Like the Cat said to Alice in Wonderland, “If you don’t know where you want to go, it doesn’t matter which road you take.”

So, go and sit in a quiet spot and ask yourself these questions:

1. What are you really passionate about?
2. What’s your dream job/occupation? What would you do if you knew you couldn’t fail?
3. What is missing from your current life that you must have to go forward?
4. What could you do tomorrow to get started?

As someone once said, “Passion is rhythm to the heart and music to the soul. Live your life with passion. Anything else is a compromise.”

B. Look for the BIG picture.
Now some of you, after deep reflection may decide that your current job does not give you what you want. That’s fine; at least now you know what alternative career you may want to move into.

But for most of you, changing jobs or career may not necessarily be the answer.

All you may need to do is just to change yourself and the way you think. I had one person who came to me for coaching and even after going through all the questions above, she said she didn’t know what her passion was.

She is a financial planner who liked what she was doing, but it was just okay. Now “just okay” is not passion. But at the same time, she didn’t want to do anything else – it made good income for her and she enjoys it. I told her that discovering her “passion” does not necessarily mean embarking on a new business or career. All she needed to do was to understand what in her day-to-day activities made her feel really good.

Upon reflection, she realized she felt good knowing she had made a real difference when her clients’ needs were met in times of crises. Once she started seeing the big picture in how her everyday activities can make such an important impact on other peoples’ lives, she began to feel great enthusiasm for her work.

You may be just a small cog in the wheel in the company you work for, but when you realize that the wheel will not function well without this cog, you will be able to feel real passion and see meaning in what you do.

C. COMMIT yourself to the most important project – the Reinvention of You.

How does one define commitment? To me, real commitment means you are willing to give up everything in order to achieve what you set out to do. It offers no loopholes, no “but’s and if’s”, no parachute clauses.

So, how important is living the life you really want? If you answer “yes, irrevocably so!” then no excuses only results count.

D. Just DO it!

If that’s the case, then as Nike says, just do it! Just decide what you want, determine what will get you what you want, then act! As my coach always says, “Success is not what you know; it’s what you do with you know.”

And if you still don’t know how to get started, find yourself a coach or a mentor who can be your “conscience”, your success guide and encourager.

So, go on, life’s for living. You’ve got nothing to lose – except a limited life, where nothing awesome ever happens; and everything to gain – a fulfilled life with no regrets!

Article by Jessica See, Certified Professional Trainer, NLP coach and founder of Image Coach International. For those interested in coaching, write to Jessica@imagecoach.com.sg or visit www.imagecoach.com.sg

Design Your Life

There’s an old German saying that goes, “You have to take life as it happens, but you should try to make it happen the way you want to take it.” Are you planning to just let life “happen” to you or do you plan to play an active part in designing the life you want?

Some of you may say, yes, I would like to do that, but trouble is, I don’t know how to get started. So you just go with the crowd, or take the path that’s most hassle-free. Unfortunately, more often than not, the crowd may not know where it is going, and if so, then everyone ends up like everyone else, wondering what has happened to their life many years down the road!

A lot of people tend to take life for granted. They think that by the time they are in their 40s or 50s everything will fall into place by itself.

Are you willing to take that chance? Remember, you only have one life, and you can’t turn back the clock. Life is not a full dress rehearsal; it’s only going to happen once. You can’t say, “Cut, let’s start it all over again.”

The truth is, for most people, after 20 or 30 years of working, they only discover what they do not want, without a clue as to what they really want in life.

We all know we want something. Words like financial freedom, wealth, lifestyle, are catch words everyone is using. But do they know what it actually means? Do they know what it takes to achieve that? Do they know how or where to get it?

So my advice is: take the time right now to work out a design for your life. If life was a movie, and you are the producer and actor, what role would you want to play and how would the plot unfold? Designing your life is like making a movie. You have to be able to see the end at the beginning. It may start off a little hazy, but as you continue working on it, it would become clearer and clearer. You’ve got to write the script, put in the characters. Use your imagination, let your creative juices flow.

Does it mean that what you have designed is going to be set in concrete? Certainly not. You are the producer of your life. You can change, delete, or add in anything you want in your project. But at least by doing this exercise of designing your life, you are in control of your circumstances, rather than become a victim of them.

Here are some simple steps to help you get started!

1. Find a nice quiet spot where you will be undisturbed for at least 20 minutes.
2. Equip yourself with a pencil and a new note pad that will become your “Life Book”.
3. Draw a time line across a page, from now to say five years on.
4. At the left end of the time line, write “Present State”; at the right end, write “Desired State”.
5. On the left end, describe as accurately as you can your Present State. Ask questions like:
a. What am I doing now?
b. What is my income, if any?
c. Do I like what I do?
6. On the right side, under Desired State, describe as clearly as you can what you would like to see five years from now. Ask yourself, if I can’t fail…
a. What do I really want to be?
b. What do I want to have?
c. What will my life be like?
7. Between the Present State and Desired State mark on the time line
a. What must I do to get what I want?
b. Who can help me?
c. What skills do I need?
d. What resources do I need?

The first time you may not get all the answers you want. If you do this exercise daily for some time, I can guarantee you that you will end up with a pretty good design for your life. You will know where to get what you want, what to do, who can help you and so on.

You don’t stop working on your project to design your life. I recommend you to keep going back to the “Life Book” you have created; it’s a “project in progress”.

Take charge of your life now. If not now, when?
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Article is contributed by Patrick Lim, a Certified Professional Trainer, and Certified Professional Coach (IPMA UK) and COO of Institute of Business Coaches To attend a free consultation on how you can impact many lives as a professional coach or for life coaching, write to patricklim@masteryasia.com or visit www.institutebusinesscoaches.com

Dare to Dream

If you have a dream, give it a chance to happen. - Richard de Vos

Dreams do come true… for a few “lucky” people, perhaps one in a hundred or a thousand. For the rest of the population, not only do they not achieve their dreams, many do not even dare to dream! So why are some people able to achieve their dreams while the majority fail to do so? Is it really a matter of luck? Of course not! And neither is it simply a matter of IQ, what family we were born into, what colour or race we are, or even what circumstances or opportunities life deals us.

The good news is: dreams do come true – and not by accident or by pure luck. We can all make our dreams come true by applying a set of strategies that can be easily learned and put into practice by anyone, regardless of background, education level or circumstances. Now if you have gotten even this far in picking up this book, your chances of making your dream come true are indeed very high.

Most of us started off in life with dreams, some with huge dreams. At ten or fifteen, some of us are declaring to all who care to listen, “When I grow up, I’m going to be the best dancer in the world,” or “I’m going to marry a Prince Charming and live in the most beautiful castle,” or for the guys, “I’m going to be the richest man in the world!” But unfortunately as the years catch up with us, many of those dreams get shrouded by doubts of our own ability, disillusion with the world, people around us telling us, “Hey, be realistic! Just get yourself a good job, work hard and you’ll be OK.” For many, the dream simply dissipates, and with it, the will to shape our destinies.

The other day, I heard a pastor say, “All of us are born with great potential. It’s up to us whether that potential reaches fulfillment or disintegration.” How very true.

What you need to do right now is to unshackle your mind and set it free from the chains you have put upon it. We want you to dare to dream again. And not only to dream, but to make those dreams come true!