Open Your Mind to Prosperity

If you hold a book for a few minutes, you will feel nothing.
If you hold a book for an hour, your arm will ache.
If you hold a book for a day, your arm will become numb and your arm will have severe muscle stress and might become paralysis.

The problems or challenges that you faced are something like this.

Think of them for a few minutes and you are still alright.

Think of them for a long time and you will have headache and other problems.

Think of them even longer and you will be paralyzed. You will not be able to think or do anything.

It’s important to think of the challenges or problems in your life but it is more important to let go. If a person is under extreme stress, he/she will breakdown eventually. So it is important to learn to let go.

If you face problems at work, you must not bring your problems home and bring stress to your family members or vent your frustrations on them. You must be in calm state if you want to solve any problems or else you may even worsen the situation. Take a break and you will feel better and eventually you will be able to solve the problems.

Do not think of the problems before you go to sleep. If you think of the problems before you go to bed, it is for sure that you will not sleep well. Sleep well and when you wake up the next day, you will feel fresh, recharged, strong and can handle any issues, any challenges that comes in your way!

Please remember to ‘LET GO’.

Nobel Prize winner Kenzaburo Oe had a son born at a hospital in Hiroshima, Japan. To his sadness, his son was born with abnormality of the skull and needed operation. But even if the operation were a success, he would still remained retarded and autistic. He was very sad and thought it better not to have a child like this at all. He was hoping in secret that the operation would be a failure, so put everything to an end.

He spoke to the hospital director about his thought and feeling. The director tried to counsel him with his own experience. He told him that this hospital was built with the mission of treating patients who were harmed by the atomic bomb and its radiation. The kindest doctors from all around Japan were called to serve here. Even though some doctors themselves were suffering from effects of the atomic radiation, they all continued to serve the patients with love and care. However not long after, a strange situation arose. More doctors than patients were committing suicide. When some of the doctors saw that they were unable to cure the patients, they blamed themselves for being incapable and committed suicide.

When there was a lack of acceptance and flexibility in the heart, even the professional doctors cannot live on. The director told Kenzaburo Oe to accept his son’s disability and who could tell the child might in future displayed special gifts.

Touched by the director’s sharing, Kenzaburo Oe accepted that his son, Hikari Oe, is retarded and autistic. He recorded many sounds from nature and played them for him to listen. Having listened to nature’s beautiful music since young, Hikari Oe grew up becoming a well-known classical music composer. He has composed music that can treat insomnia, helping people to sleep. It was a hit in Japan.

Later, Kenzaburo Oe won the Nobel Prize in Literature. At the ceremony, he gave a brief account of his son’s story and said with a sense of humor, ‘If you are unable to sleep, buy my son’s CD. And if still unable to sleep, buy my novels to read. You sure can sleep this time.’ An accepting heart usually brings about an unexpected result.

Wherever You Are, Be There
by Steve Goodier

A delightful story is told about a young man who applied for a job as a telegraph operator. He answered an ad in the newspaper and went to the telegraph office to await an interview. Though he knew Morse Code and was qualified in every other way, seven other applicants were also waiting in the large, noisy office.

He saw customers coming and going and heard a telegraph clacking away in the background. He also noticed a sign on the receptionist’s counter instructing applicants to fill out a form and wait to be summoned to an inner office for an interview. He filled out the form and sat down to wait.

After a few minutes, the young man stood up, crossed the room to the door of the inner office, and walked right in. Naturally the other applicants perked up, wondering why he had been so bold. They talked among themselves and finally determined that, since nobody had been summoned to interview yet, the man would likely be reprimanded for not following instructions and possibly disqualified for the job.

Within a few minutes, however, the young man emerged from the inner office escorted by the interviewer, who announced to the other applicants, “Thank you all very much for coming, but the job has just been filled.”

They were all confused and one man spoke up: “Wait a minute — I don’t understand. We’ve been waiting longer than he and we never even got a chance to be interviewed.”

The employer responded, “All the time you’ve been sitting here, the telegraph has been ticking out the following message: ‘If you understand this, then come right in. The job is yours.’”

This man knew a valuable life-lesson that most people miss: Wherever You Are, Be There. If you’re there physically, also be there emotionally. Be there mentally. Be there attentively. Be there as fully as you can.

It’s about being present and fully alive in the moment. Wherever you are, be there. Give your full attention to others (is there really a better gift?). Give yourself fully to the task at hand or to the present moment. When you’re completely present, you’ll make the most of every minute. And minutes lived fully add up to a life lived magnificently.

Chinese celebrates Mid-Autumn Festival. Mid-Autumn Festival is also known as “Moon Cake Festival” which is one of the most well known Chinese Festival. The date of Mid-autumn Festival is on the 15th moon day of 8th Chinese lunar month. This year’s Mid-autumn Festival is on 25 September 2007.

This day is for family members to gather to eat moon cake, Pomelos and drink Chinese tea. The round “moon cakes” eaten on this festival are symbolic of family unity and closeness. There are a lot of favors like durian, lotus, green tea, green bean, red bean favors to choose from.
Pomelos are also eaten on this day. The Chinese word for pomelo is 柚, which is homophonous with the word for “protection”. 柚expressed the hope that the heaven give them protection. Moon gazing is another essential part of this festival. On this day, the moon is at its roundest and brightest. This is also a time for lovers to tryst and pray for togetherness, symbolized by the roundness of the moon.

Children are happy on this day because they can eat sweet moon cakes, play with candles and their friends. They can carry lighted lanterns and walk around during the night time.
Moon Cake Festivals symbolize unity, joy and harmony. Let’s wish that all nationals will unite and our world will be full of joy and harmony.

A big family lived together in a small house somewhere in a small town of China. Chinese New Year was coming and the whole family once again took time to make all the New Year goodies themselves.

After getting busy for one whole day, they finally finished making some cookies and the wife placed trays of them on the kitchen floor to cool down. She did not switch the lights on to save on the electrical bills. Then her husband came home. As it was very bright outside, his eyes had not yet adapted to the dimmer kitchen as he entered into it and he stepped onto the cookies which were left on the floor.

The husband looked apologetically at the family members whose hard work had gone into waste. He said, ‘I’m very sorry. I was too careless!’ His sister at once said something to ease the embarrassing atmosphere, ‘Actually I’m to blame. I almost stepped on them too when I came in just now. I should have shifted the cookies away then.’ The wife who was standing at one corner said promptly, ‘No, it’s my fault. If I had put the baked cookies at the right place, this would not have happened.’

The mother-in-law didn’t want others to hold responsibility alone for what had happened and said, ‘The kitchen light was switched on earlier. It was I who switched it off to save electricity. But it turned out to cause even greater loss.’ Unexpectedly, the father-in-law had something to say too. ‘No, no, no. I went in and out the kitchen many times just now. I should have thought about someone might stepped onto the cookies when he entered into the kitchen. I should have made some precautions earlier.’

One person stepped on the trays of baked cookies but the whole family took turns to apologize and take the blame on him/her. How endurable and embracing of this family to someone’s fault in the house!

If the husband, upon stepping on the cookies, started scolding:‘&@#*! Who’s the idiot who put this thing here?’ And her sister added, ‘Sis-in-law, how careless you are! How can you put the trays of cookies here to cool down?’ The atmosphere in the house will then be totally changed. When everybody picks on others’ fault, it is quite easy to find all kinds of flaws and mistakes in each person. The human relationship will then turn sour in the house, school, office, etc. Do the reverse. Endure and embrace others’ flaw. Think about other people’s good points and the world will become friendlier and lovelier to everyone.

Lee loves buying fruits for his family and friends. He has almost never selected the fruits himself. He always leaves it to the fruit seller to help him pick. Sometimes, he would even ask the fruit seller to choose a few from each of the different types of fruits that are in season and he would just pay for whatever he has chosen. Every time, the fruits chosen for him were very fresh and tasty. His family and friends enjoyed them very much.

One day, a friend of Lee asked him out of curiosity, ‘How is it that you are so good at picking fruits? You seem to know every type of fruit extremely well. The fruits that you’ve brought for us all year round tasted so good and sweet.’ Lee told him his ‘secret’. ‘It’s not that I’m good at picking fruits. I’m good at picking the fruit seller! I find this fruit seller very honest and reliable. So every time when I want to buy some fruits, I’d just ask him to choose for me. I know that I can depend on him. It’s even much better than choosing them myself.’

The person who knows how to choose the fruit-seller need not choose the fruits himself. It is the same for choosing workers for a job and for choosing our friends. When we have selected the right worker and when we have found the right person as our friend, there are a lot of things we need not worry too much about.

However, it is quite a sophisticated knowledge on how to choose the right person, more difficult than choosing fruits. Every one needs to acquire the skill of knowing people. First of all, one must be broad-minded and willing to accept the various type of character we find in people. Discover the strength, weaknesses and potential of these people and see the value of these to them and to us.

On the other hand, there are people who think that they are masters of all trades or they have little trust for people around them. They feel the safest when they carry out things by themselves. This is not only tiresome but also shows an unhealthy inter-personal relationship.

Long time ago, a man who was very rich in a certain village often made use of his wealth and power to oppress the poor. A man borrowed a sum of money from him but due to business failure couldn’t repay the debt on time. The rich man said to him, ‘I can forget about the debt if you would let me have your daughter as my second wife.’

The daughter wouldn’t agree so the rich man came up with a plan. He brought the girl to the backyard and showed her a pouch, saying, ‘There’s a black and white stone each in the pouch. Put your hand in and take one out. If it is a black stone, you must marry me. If it is a white stone, you don’t have to marry me plus I will write off your father’s debt. While he was talking, there were many people with them. They all thought that it was a reasonable plan so all agreed to be the witness.

The poor man’s daughter was a very witty and clever person. She knew how cunning the rich man was, so very likely, the stones in the pouch were both black. Her quick wit began to work again and she had a brilliant counter-plan.

She reached her hand into the pouch to take a stone out. However, while the stone was coming out from the pouch, she pretended to be careless and dropped it. Now the ground had many black and white stones so it was impossible to tell which color stone she had dropped. The daughter quickly said, ‘Oops! I’m so sorry. How careless am I! But that’s OK. Let’s take a look at the stone left in the pouch and can then find out for certain the color of the stone I have dropped.’

As expected by her, the rich man did set a trap by putting 2 black stones in the pouch. When the pouch was opened, everyone saw that it was a black one. It then went without saying that the girl had dropped a white one. The rich man had no choice but to keep his words - the girl was let off and her father’s debt was written off.

Make use of change of methodology, our wit, creativity and other wisdom God has given us and many problems can turn out to be different or solved totally. Being smart is not about knowing the knowledge that we learnt in books but also how we apply it. Being street-smart is very important!

A teacher tells the class that if each person contributes 5 dollar can help the people in Africa to chisel a well. The child went home to ask his mother for 5 dollars. Instead of giving her child 5 dollars, his mother says: “Let’s help in the resources recycling to gain these 5 dollars together”.

Unfortunately, the next day, the teacher says to the class:”I am sorry that I had made a mistake. To chisel a well, you need 5,000 dollars.” After knowing this, that child summoned the entire class mates to help in resources recycling to make money together. Eventually, he realized his dream with others’ help!

Therefore, please do not have this idea that your child cannot to it, anything is possible in this world. Parents should help the child to interpret and realize their dream. In daily life, if given the opportunity, they certainly can achieve!

This story tells us that even a child can realized his dream. So we can also realize our dream if we put our dream into action or else it will still only be a dream.

Do you have Dreams waiting for you to realize it? Let’s realize our Dreams!

Someone visited hell and saw that everyone there ate with chopsticks. However, the chopsticks were so long that although they could reach and hold the food in the plates, they couldn’t bring them up to their own mouths. As a result, everyone there was terribly hungry.

The person next visited heaven and he saw that the same type of chopsticks was used for eating too. But here, nobody got hungry because after holding the food with the chopsticks, everyone would bring it up to each other’s mouth. It was through this feeding of each other that everyone was not only full in the stomach but also joyful in the heart because of the concern they gave to and received from each other.

An educational system that emphasizes too much on exams and competitions, and less on team work and cooperation, tends to produce a generation that is short-sighted and always thinking of receiving with little care for giving.

In this fast-paced society, most of us are so busy with our numerous responsibilities that we have so little time to think about ourselves, let alone for others.

It is usually easier to receive than to give but it is in fact more blessed to give than to receive. We know that in a work place, it is through everyone’s selfless contribution that a project can be done with great success. We also know that on the road, it is through every driver’s careful driving and giving way to each other that a safe and smooth trip is ensured for everyone.

Helping each other makes everyone happy, increases productivity and improves harmony in the society. It is almost like a heaven created. But if everyone is selfish and self-centered, there will be a possibility of turning our living environment to be hell-like. Take a small step at a time. When a person has helped you, help someone back. Do it at least once everyday. Let us together create a great living place for everyone to stay, starting from today!

We should review our daily life. Are we working like a busy bee or a hardworking cow or a robot? Is work our only contribution to the Nation? Are we studying so hard just for the sake of work or to live on?

A lot of people study very hard when they are students. They work very hard when they are employees to earn money and as a result they fall sick due to the fact that the body cannot take it anymore. Some people cannot cope with study pressure and some people cannot cope with work pressure. They need to use their hard earn money to seek medication treatment to heal them. Some of them might be bedridden for the rest of their lives and their hard earn money is use to pay for the medical expenses. Nowadays medical treatment is not cheap, their hard earn money might not enough for long term treatment.

Is it worthwhile to work so hard to earn money with the expense of your health? If we know that our hard earn money is for paying the medical bills, will we work so hard for the sake of money? The answer is very obvious. Without good health even if we have a lot of money, we are not able to enjoy life. So we need to strive a balance, we can work hard to earn money but must also take care of our health. When it is time to rest, we rest and when it is time to work, we work. When it is time to play, we play. We are here to live not here to work only.

Let’s work to live and not live to work.