One of my goals for this year is to build good habits and keep them. Good habits like getting up early in the morning, being persistent & living a healthy life.
Old habits die hard. The good news is: they do die. 🙂
“Don’t ever get comfortable when you have the ability to achieve more.”
Photo taken at the Floriad.
I’ve promised myself to keep motivated & be disciplined for the whole year by taking on self imposed “plank challenge” & “21 jump rope challenge ” since the beginning of the year. It’s coming to the end of February and I think I’m still on track.
The next challenge I’d like to take on is “30 days eating with a plan challenge”. Not sure if it’s possible for me but I’ll give it a go.
For the next 30 days, I’ll cook at least 5 times a week and design the dinner menu for the week beforehand. We are going away for a holiday for 8 days in March which means we’ll eat out every meal but as soon as we come back, I’ll stick to my plan again.
So here goes for next seven days meal plan:
Have smoothie every morning and sandwich for lunch
Day 1 Wed dinner: Thai stir fry + egg tomato omelet
Day 2 Thur dinner: Grilled Salmon + chips & green salad
Day 3 Fri: Roast duck + Spanish & orange salad
Day 4 Sat: Pork ribs + Oven baked sweet potato
Day 5 Sun: Eating out
Day 6 Mon: Dumplings
Day 7 Tues: Curry chicken + Roti
It’s been a month since I started doing pushups (my version) and plank pose every morning. From a week ago, I started to jump ropes at night. Though my point of doing all these is not to lose weight, it is still a bit demotivating to see that I’ve actually put on weight one month into sticking to an excise routine. In the past, if something doesn’t work as the way I expected, I would give up all at once. But my job is to keep myself motivated when things are not going so smoothly. I exercise because I want to healthier and stronger so the exercise part will have to stay. There must be something else I’m doing wrong to put on weight. Two of these factors must have contributed to my weight gain.
1. I eat whatever I want and whenever I want until I burst.
The idea of preparing dinner for two makes me stressed. The work involved such as planning our meals, going shopping, preparing, cooking, washing up afterwords is beyond my ability to handle. I’m not a good house keeper, yet. Very often we just eat out and get take away food. As I always have a superb appetite and loathe the word “dieting”, I have never controlled the quantity of my food intake. My diet consists mainly meat and seafood with hardly any vegetables or fruits.
Oh dear, it does look bad when I actually write it down! I need to take control of our food intake and be responsible.
2. I’ve slept less.
Never believed that sleep more can help you to loose weight but looks like it’s true. I’ve been a night owl and late riser for the last five years. I don’t use alarm and wake up whenever I feel like to. As a result I’m never tired enough to go to bed before 1 – 2 am. For the past five years, I always had 9 hours sleep every night. From this year, I decided to shape up & get up earlier in the morning. I’ve been getting up before 8am since the new year but my body clock doesn’t allow me to fall asleep before 2am yet. So I’ve only had 6 hours’ or less sleep every day for the month of Jan.
Knowing what my problems are, I’ve decided to incorporate some new habits in my life starting from February.
- Plan our weekly meal. Cook healthy meals at least 3 times a week. This really stresses me out but I’ve got to do it. Hopefully, it’ll get easier over time.
- Eat slowly to allow enough time for the brain to realize that I’m actually already full, no need to eat like there’s no tomorrow.
- Set alarm at 10:30pm to go to bed and read a book. Don’t sit in front of the computer until after midnight. Again, this will be a challenge as old habit die hard. But again, I’ve got to do it. Hopefully bywaking up before 7:30am every day will adjust my body clock to enable me to fall asleep before midnight therefore retain at least 7 hours’ sleep every night.
I am so not proud of my sloppy old habits! But I’ll keep steering myself to the right direction!
Keep going.
I’ve just completed my 20 day pushup & plank challenge. Obviously it is a low target for many people but it is the first time I’ve ever done any form of excise without stopping for 20 days in a row.
This morning I woke up with bad cramps and felt dizzy. Today is also my 20th day of my pushup and plank challenge. Every 20 days also, I suffer from this serious pain and dizziness. This condition will last a few days to a week, every month. Every other time when I started a excise routine, I gave up when this condition kicked in. After one week, there would be no routine any more. I would simply fall back to a sloppy physical state and never stick to any kind of excise routine in the long run. That’s my excuse any way:).
But today I took the usual pain killer, waited 1.5 hour until the pain settled a little then did 15 girly pushups and 1 minute plank pose. I will do the same for tomorrow and carry on this basic form of excise every morning consistently.
Speaking of consistency, there’s something else I want to add on to my morning routine. Here’s a wonderful article that might help improving my voice:
10 Tips for a Powerful Voice
Make your voice one of your best assets.
It’s the morning of the big call. You prepared your material and went to bed early–even if you didn’t get much sleep. Now you hover near the phone, waiting for it to ring, thinking about everything that might prevent you from establishing a great rapport. Maybe he’ll sound like Elmer Fudd. Or, worse, maybe you will.
Either way, an important connection is about to be made, sight unseen. And your voice will play a big role. How can you prevent your voice from sabotaging everything from business calls to presentations? Use these tips for working your voice, instead of letting it work you.
1. Rise and try to shine. After getting out of bed, head to the bathroom for some warm-ups. Look at yourself in the mirror and take deep breaths. Are your shoulders rising as you inhale? Don’t let them. Stand straight, relax and let your breath come in down low. It should feel like it’s entering your body around your waist, not being pulled down your throat.
2. Keep it up. Not only does slouching look like you couldn’t care less, but it also prevents your lungs from filling up. Full lungs keep your voice from cracking, make you sound more powerful and keep you from running out of air. When you realize you’re hunched over while on the phone, sit back and straighten your spine to allow more energy to come across.
3. Support can be beautiful. Some people are blessed with resonant voices like James Earl Jones or Lauren Bacall. Most of us aren’t. But rather than throwing in the towel, try wrapping it around your waist. Breathe in low and gently expand your abs and obliques. Relax, let go and pretend the towel is like the waistline of your sweatpants. You can feel it grow a little wider.
Then open up and say “Ah.” Now repeat. This time, use your abs to expand your waist. You’ll also feel the downward push of your lower abs. Say “Ah” once more, and as you expand, you’ll hear the sound get stronger. Use this technique for more volume and a stronger sound.
4. Open up. When you get nervous, your voice gets squeaky and high. Not the confident image you want to project. And the more you try and control it by force, the more you start to lose it altogether. The cure: breathing low, gently using your lower abs to push down and relax. And always let your throat be open and free of tension. An open throat protects your voice and produces a richer sound.
5. Variety is key. Want to control your whole audience? Speak in a monotone voice, and you can send a group of 2,000 people off to dreamland. Especially when working by phone, that dead air may not be your client pondering. Try listening for snoring. To prevent this, remember the “four P’s” of vocal variety:
- Pace: Speak too fast and it sounds like you’re nervous or a used car salesman trying to pull a fast one. If the pace is too slow, you’re going to sound like the village idiot.
- Pitch: Pit your voice too low and nobody will hear you. Speak too high and you sound nervous.
- Pauses: Build them into your speech–sparingly. If pauses are too short, it’ll sound like you’re scrambling for words. But a few well-timed pauses create a sense of intrigue and curiosity.
- Passion: This all-important quality will be the biggest selling point you have. Love your topic.
6. Get rid of nasality. There’s a problem if your voice sounds disturbingly like Fran Drescher’s. If you’re a whiner, try this: yawn. Feel your mouth open wide. You won’t feel that kind of space if you’re nasal. The soft palate–a flap of skin on the back of the roof of your mouth–lifts and allows air to float up into every chamber of your head, resulting in a full, resonant sound. It’s like a little trap door that can open and close. Conversely, when the soft palate lowers, the air stream is blocked off from the head, and the air can only pass out of the nose.
For a quick fix, say “Ing–Ah.” Elide the “Ing” right into the “Ah,” and don’t break them into two sounds. Feel what’s happening inside your mouth. On “Ing,” the back of your tongue is pressed up against the soft palate and no air can get into your head. It’s nasal. When you say “Ah,” the tongue peels down from the roof and allows the sound to lift.
7. Modify your accent. How boring the world would be if we all sounded the same. But if your native tongue gets in the way of communication, you should correct it. The process used to be called accent “elimination,” but “modification” is a more accurate term. Spend a few sessions with a voice coach who can give you the basic sounds of English, help you pronounce its most confusing words and model them for you, face-to-face.
8. Tune your tone. Being able to adjust your tone to any situation is paramount to successful business communication. If you do sound monotonous, ineffectual or annoying, you may lose a client. If your tone is lackluster, they think you’re bored. If you sound angry or bullying, that aggressive style can put them off. But if you’re able to suit your tone to any occasion, you’ll win the day. Learn how to sound passionate even if you’d rather be anywhere else.
9. Leave it at the beep. Leaving a great voice-mail message is essential. If you sound positive, polished and professional, people will get a wonderful “first vocal impression.” Leave your name clearly. Spell it if you have to. Leave your phone number, twice. Tell them briefly what you can do for them. Let them know when you can be reached, or ask them the best time for you to call back. Be brief, but not vague.
10. It is, actually, about you. The most important tip is to be authentic. Take time to find what’s unique about you–your sense of humor, your newfound confidence, your persona. Stop trying to sound like a phony announcer.
Mastering these tips for voice power will soon become second nature. And if your potential client does sound like Elmer Fudd, well, know that your newfound vocal skills will make an excellent first impression. Weally.
So from 23rd January onwards, after my morning pushups and plank pose, I’ll pratise at least 30 minutes based on those tips.
Note to self: be patient & persistent.
It is raining outside. I woke up with chronic headache & still felt nervous about my unpleasant dreams overnight.
“Stay in bed, there’s no need to get up. ” A little voice inside me started to tell me what to do. “It’s Sunday morning and it’s raining — perfect for sleeping in.” But I got up anyway.
There are new price lists needed to be set; a whole set of sample materials needed to be designed and produced with a tight deadline. There’s really no time to lie in bed for extra long hours. Besides, I’ve had other commitments.
Let’s just get up and do it, shall we:)
“You can’t fall if you don’t climb. But there’s no joy in living your whole life on the ground.”
-Unknown
Sunset @Sydney Centennial Park
Self Discipline is what I should have tried to learn a long time ago. Sadly enough I didn’t really understand what is self discipline and the the importance of it.
The good news is self discipline is a learned skill instead of a born habit. So here’s hope;). 2015 will be my first year to develop self discipline seriously.
Naturally, I dislike routine work and avoid doing the same thing every day. But research has shown a great correlation between self discipline and success. It requires a lot of self discipline to run your own business. Without planning and setting up a system, no business will survive in longer terms. I was very good at planning, setting up systems and managing projects successfully from the beginning to the end while working in the corporate environment. But I kind of let it all go free style in terms of running my business. As a matter of fact, I simply waited for things to happen and react to them. I let my business run me instead of running it effectively.
With the intention of learning, I must learn to be self disciplined and start to take action now. People say Discipline means behaving according to what you have decided is the best, regardless of how you feel in the moment. “the undisciplined are slaves to moods, appetites and passions.”
It’s going to be hard for me to stay on track & I don’t want this mission to be short lived so my journey is starting with a couple of baby steps:
1. 20 Day Plank and Push up challenge
This 30 day plank challenge from internet got my attention a while ago. While I know that I’m not capable of doing any kind of excise 30 days in a row, I also know from experience plank pose works for me to control my muffin top.
So I’m going to modify this to my version: 20 Day plank & Pushup challenge:
- 10 full push ups
- 1 minute plank pose everyday
for 20 days every month.
2. Get up the same time everyday: 9am to start with
For the last 5 years, I’ve allowed myself to sleep as much as I could and wake up naturally. That leads me to getting up after 10am every morning, some times after 11am. After a few failed attempts of getting up earlier in the morning, I surrendered and convinced myself once again: I’m not a morning person. The thing really annoyed me is that no matter how late/early I get to bed the night before, I still wake up at 10 to 11am. If I go to bed at 3am, I wake up after 10am. If I go to bed before 10pm in hope of getting up earlier in the morning, I still wake up at 11am the next morning!
You see – something has to be changed. So from now onwards, I’m re-introducing the old, trusted alarm clock in the morning to wake me up the same time every morning. Instead of watching exciting new movies in bed before going to sleep, I will read books from my e-reader from 10pm every night. I’ll only sleep until I feel really sleepy.
Larry Winget once said, “Nobody ever wrote down a plan to be broke, fat, lazy, or stupid. Those things are what happen when you don’t have a plan.”
What I also want to add to this quote is: BE DISCIPLINEd to execute your action steps until the desired result is achieved. Remember what they say? “The price of discipline is always less than the pain of regret”.
Happy Friday.
Got to admit I’m the king of being spontaneous and a pawn of being persistent. My head is full of ideas of new projects but I never had the patience to follow any of them through. The bad news is I didn’t recognise this weakness of mine any earlier in my life but the good news is I’ve finally recognised it and decided to make an effort to grow better. Never say too late hey.
Looking back, 2014 has been a year of learning -learning new skills and learning more about myself. While carrying on learning, my theme of the year of 2015 is communication. In order to be better at communication, I must learn to be:
1.Focused. Don’t be distracted by other chores that come along the way once I start a new task.
2.Persistent. Know the value of persistence. Take continuous effort to be a better communicator. Don’t be discouraged by obstacles. Don’t ever quit.
3. Less emotional. I happen to be a very emotional person. So it’s very important to be aware of this and don’t let my emotion take me over. Be less emotional and more effective.
Aside from all the serious stuff, it’s time to prepare for tonight’s NYE party:) We’ll watch Sydney NYE fireworks at this very spot & celebrity! I hope everyone party hard, be safe and have a successful 2015!
Dreaming is a good thing as long as there are actions too.
Try to do something that seems impossible to you.
Never get too comfortable, otherwise you step backwards in life without knowing it.
Your body is a reflection of your lifestyle. Strive to be stronger.
It’s officially 2014! Despite the relentlessly marching of time, every year brings a new beginning and new hope. So it’s time to let your champagne flow, hair down and celebrate like there’s no next year.
My goals for 2014 are:
1. Be stronger and consistent.
2. Learn new skills, like how to do a proper push up. No kidding, I can’t even do one push up. Yep, that’s how strong I am.
Happy New year everyone. May your 2014 be as splendid as the New Year’s Eve fireworks!
Found a photo of mine taken over a year ago which I was going to delete initially but decided to keep it in the end. Suddenly realised nowadays I only wear daggy clothes with no jewellery and make up on.
Need to feel inspired again?
Definitely.
Here goes another doze of quotes of the week.
………………………………………………………………………………..
Don’t ever get comfortable when you have the ability to achieve more.
Every expert was once a beginner.
If we quit every time we felt uncomfortable we wouldn’t achieve anything.
Talk about your blessings more than you talk about your burdens.
Yay! It’s Monday again!:) This week is going to be a great week because of:
- Exercise. This week I’ll continue with last week’s routine, swimming for 30 minutes everyday, 5 days a week.
- Blog. Can you believe I have a degree in journalism? Once upon a time, I saw my articles and name on newspapers quite often. Ok those were not written in English but still, I should have kept on writing. I don’t mention it now because it was such a long time ago and I hardly make time to read or write now, in any language. So last week, I pushed myself to post 6 blog entries to get into the rythm. This week, I’ll try my best to keep this online journal going.
- Healthy food. Oh relax, it’s not about dieting and starving… I will keep eating, to my heart’s content. But stay away with junk food.
- House keeping. Yes Internet, you’ve heard it right. From this week I’m trying to be a
betterhouse keeper. Start with my desk everyday! Remember that saying? A clean desk speaks a happy mind. - Australia Day. Instead of a lazy picnic in Centennial Park, this year we might try one of these things around Sydney.
This is a total irrelevant photo. I was on a cruise last year late August and snapped it with the mobile phone camera. The image is a bit fuzzy but the sunset on river Thames was just amazing.
Happy Monday!
Year 2013 started with spectacular fireworks all over Sydney harbor. I’m feeling lucky to call this amazing city home.
Last year, for the first time in my life, I wrote some personal goals in a spiral bound book and kept it for the whole year. It turned out to be a great way to stay on track so I’ll be doing same at the beginning of each year and pray harder for each year to go a little slower.
My main goal for this year is to manage my time better so that I can read more books and spend more time on the beach.
Speaking of books, I want to finish the book that is lying around unfinished for the last 10 years– The Story of Pi. Now that someone has made a movie out of it, I’d better manage to at least finish reading the book. I’m up to page 53 as I write this, so there’s a good chance it’ll be finished by the end of January. At least read 1 book/month, 12 books this year. Trust me Internet, I’ll make an effort.
Sydney has been mostly blessed with warm beach weather since 1st of January this year. And boy, did we enjoy the blissful time off. We spent the New Year’s Day at Pearl beach. In the first week of January, we drove through the scenic roads and notational parks to the south coast, north coast, and central coast. We soaked up in sun. We spied crabs walking sideways in theirs caves. We swam in calm ocean water. We let roaring waves crash on us too. We went home everyday with glowing suntan, lots of photos, and happy memories that never fade.
Scenic Drive Through Sea Cliff Bridge To NSW South Coast
I can be one of the moodiest people and suffer from green grass syndrome frequently (someone is having better hair, more fun, more successful and happier at the moment). A couple of days ago we drove pass this cute house painted in a bright color on the way to Kiama with a sign says: “Carpe Diem” fixed on the front wall of the house. What a perfect reminder of life is all about: Carpe Diam/Seize The Day.
With that in mind, here’s to the New Year, enjoying/making the most out of each day, endless possibilities and creating a life of your dreams.
As everybody kept talking about Apocalypse, the end of the world, I shook my head and found it hard to accept the cruel and relentless marching on time,”it can’t be 22nd of December already. It’s like, early October, the latest. In 2008.”
At the beginning of this year, I wrote out my goals for 2012. Since it’s Apocalyse today, there’s no better time to review my goals of the year, to see how far I’ve come. It’s time to see what needs improvement, how to grow further, if there’s tomorrow or next year. So here it goes..
Keep a clean desk – the whole year: Significant improvement compared to last year. Still need to do a much better job.
Exercise 4 times a week: Hmm. Not v good. Need to stay motivated all time.
Be a consistent winner in FX trading: A roller-coaster ride. Think I finally found the secret to FX trading.
Be a better friend, sister and daughter: Been very good. On top of that, got engaged and married to my best friend and soul mate. Sounds unreal hey? But it’s true:). Next year’s goal will be harder though: be a better wife…
Travel the world again: Traveled overseas twice this year. Very happy.
Read more and blog more: Bad. Not reading enough. So much to read, so little time. But no excuse, ok?
Grow more vegetables: Tomatoes died (sob) -not enough sunlight. Spinach is growing like weed – good. Found super power fertilizer. Spring onion is looking healthy.
That’s it. I’ve done it, something scary. This is the first time I had personal written goals and actually took time to review it. Promise I’ll do better next year. It’s going to be the whole new world from tomorrow right? And hopefully by the end of next year, I’ll be able to get myself a pair of pants like this:
