Appreciating Life

I have been feeling busy and tired. TD caught stomach flu from his parents. Recovered with just probiotics, so I should feel happy. Then there are always family issues, pulling me back from getting back to my work momentum.

However, tonight, two issues touched my heart.

1) I just realised that my helper who is close to 40 was trying for a kid before she was asked persistently by MIL to come back to Singapore to help. After this contract, she will go back and continue her family planning as she currently has one daughter only. I felt touched. Imagine being at 40, she gave up her own family planning to come to foreign land to help out another family's baby. Based on her medical checkup, she is still able to have babies, so she will continue her plan when she returns.

2) I watched the Marine Parade GRC short rally between PAP and NSP (while pumping milk). Not sure why I got emotional and sobbed! Somehow I felt that whichever party wins, the fact is there are people who would step up to fight for values or justice they believe in. Their decisions can impact/ benefit millions of people (lets not talk about the unhappy minority - there will always be people unhappy whenever a policy has to be made - with this, neither does this indicate that I am a PAP supporter either).

I used to talk a lot about politics when younger. I questioned my Dad, Why this, Why that? Why is it like this? Then, one day while in the car, my Dad said, in Singapore, this is a country, if you don't like its politics, you leave the country. His point was, no point questioning it(maybe I was asking too much questions). With that, I stopped all politics inquisitiveness till now! Till I saw and read more about Nicole Seah.

The point is, there are people out there who are willing to serve the country for the good of all. How about me? How am I contributing to the society, to the world? Perhaps I am contributing to TD more directly...but can I be more useful?

I guess at this age, I do not have much of an option, but can contribute more in terms of trying to grow and make my family happy; contribute to my family business and hope that I make the right decisions and policies that can benefit the employees (they work hard, and I hope that we can make lots of $$ to remunerate them; and that they have a reasonable working environment that they can enjoy working in); and add value to our clients.

There were some challenges at work today. I am glad that I handled it well. It comes with maturity (age!). At a higher management level, it is important to be calm, insightful and compassionate. This paragraph from the Dalai Lama book best explains it:

Trouble is bound to come, so cultivating the right attitude is crucial. Anger diminishes our power to distinguish right from wrong, and this ability is one of the highest human attributes. If this is lost, we are lost. Sometimes it is necessary to respond strongly, but this can be done without anger. Anger is not necessary. It has no value.

Tired, but loving my day!