My Very First Article

Walking with the Jedi

Bringing the Force into your life

"The Force will be with you, always.”

-Obi-wan Kenobi

I believe the word ‘Jedi’ will definitely lead our thoughts in one direction, Star War the movie. Indeed, the trilogy directed by George Lucas had not only brought the fascinating stories on the big screen, but it had also introduced new idols into the global culture. ‘Jedi’ is one of them, it represents the pinnacle of melee combat and mental superiority; and sparking off countless fan sites, video games and controversies.

However, this article is neither about how to weld a 3600°C glow-stick nor about cranial optimization. It is about introducing an old friend; a Jedi with immense wisdom to guide you on living your life; just like how he had patiently coached Luke Skywalker to attain Jedi-hood.

For the non-Star Wars fan, please allow me to give you some clues. Think of a highly eccentric, winkled green skin alien with size handicapped and bad grammar. No, it’s not George Bush, I’m referring to Yoda, the little green man with 900 candles on his cake and he lives in a swamp. With his 900 years of experience, dealing with the sentient and the dumb, you can be sure that he IS the right man to bring you through any storms. Being his personal student, I have been instructed to carry on his work to deliver more people from the Backside.

Although he seemed (somewhat) dead in the end, I can assure you that he is perfectly alive. Stay with me till the end, and I will tell you how he has been doing…( No kidding, we’re buddies)

1) Let’s start, I’m pretty sure that you are feeling confused and lost now. Please don’t ever feel frightened or turn-off by anything, whether they are major changes to your daily routines or some unknown. Before I continue, let’s hear what my green friend has to say, he’s good..

“Fear is the path to the dark side.

Fear leads to anger.

Anger leads to hate.

Hate leads to suffering.”

-Yoda

He is correct, nothing good will come out from your experience with fear. It is simply a prehistoric instinct within us. In the past, man had to come face to face frequently with the unknown, which he perceived to be hazardous. The evolutionary advantage of fear helps the body to increase production of a chemical known as adrenaline.

It helps to modify the body’s biochemistry to gain instantaneous boost of physical capabilities to escape predation. However, in our modern context, it is still beneficial in life-threatening situations, but a nuisance in getting tasks done. So does it mean that we are imprisoned by this biological ‘advantage’?

Of course not, the solution to confronting your fear is summed up in Yoda’s next two quotes.

“Clear your mind must be,

if you are to discover the real villains behind this plot.”

“Do or do not…There is no try”

In case you are stupified by his grammer, here's what he meant actually:
The first quote, in plain English, means that if you want to understand the underlying beliefs for your emotions and your fear, you have to take a step back and judge the whole situation again as an outsider. (It is always easier for us to judge other people than our self, right? Now you try judging yourself as from a third-party perspective)

Dissociate yourself from the present and find the reason behind your illogical fear. It may arise from a malicious comment or bad experience. Fear arises from false beliefs which are built upon external influences. So you need to find examples of why the belief is NOT real, by finding counter-evidences and re-examining your original limiting beliefs. You may seek help from friends who can see your strengths better than you do. They can displace your fear better than you think so.

Now for the second quote. It is the mantra for every successful people. Although it is pretty self-explanatory, I’ll explain it here too. If you want something to work, put your heart and soul into it. Giving a half-hearted effort has a few disadvantages.

First, you’ll lose your motivations very easily, since it is not your top priority. So it will not work out very well. Secondly, your strategies will be rather murky. It will be very hard to review it and figure out areas of improvements. Thirdly, You probably have absolutely no goals in mind other than ‘if it works, well…. If it don’t, it’s still alright’. Guess what, you will probably take the easy way out, by contributing minimal effort and time into it.
What can you expect to get out of it?

Similarly, if you are focused on eliminating your fears, put more effort into it, seek help when necessary, but most importantly, never stop in your effort for success,
May the Force be with you


Yoda’s History: Although he ended up to be something of an extinct-species spectral wraith with zero asset to his name, he is currently the boss of a chain of online businesses and the author of several publications. I know it’s true, cause he’s also my personal friend. He’s still eccentric, but has grown much taller, manage to MASTER English Language and has converted to Islam 24 yrs ago. He has changed his name to hide his glow-stick prowess and moved from swampy grave to Singapore. Oh yah, if you are curious whether he has taken any botox injection or skin whitening treatment, you can find him at www.ultimatesecretsofsuccess.com.

Ten ways to sell apples and get rich, which one will YOU choose? (Personal favourite = Last one)

The hard-selling way: Stand out alone in the open street and peddle your apples from morning till night. You will face the scorns and smiles of people passing by. You sold apples, you get paid; you get lazy and you can kiss your earnings goodbye.

The Scam way: There are 101 case studies and theories to expound on. Other more common scams are: substandard apples, waxing the apples’ skin or even masquerading China apples as Fuji apples. Some unique models include: Selling a red banana disguised as an apple or peddling magic apple seeds.

The Direct sales way: Ask your friends and relative to promote your apples to their friends and relatives. You will find strangers calling you at night claiming they are the ex-classmates of your godmother’s colleague’s son-in-law’s neighbour’s doctors’ deceased patients’ classmates. Fascinating ^ ^

The MLM way: Convince a gullible dumb ass that your apples are the best among the industry and he should recommend it to five more friends. Best of all, he can get paid and enjoy the millionaire lifestyle if he teaches his friends to recruit five more dumb asses each to sell the apples and they in turn recruit five more and duplicate it infinitely. Sounds Egyptian-y, doesn’t it?

The Franchise way: Make a public announcement that anyone, including strangers who have never seen your apples before, can sell it to others. These people will pay you to get the franchise rights and earn commissions while you will be reaping the largest share of the pie. Your apples will be sold all around the world and your reputation will travel with it. So far so good, until the day when your franchisee set up a rival stall and you’re history.

The Business way: Borrow huge capitals, set up apple stall in the heartlands and register it. You will employ people to assist you but still spend all day at the apple stall. You will sell more apples, earn big bucks, get interviewed and showered with flatteries, but realise that your mum had forgotten your name.

The Hitler way: Impose your will upon the world that your apple is the BEST and the only thing they ever need to survive. Lie that bananas, oranges and other fruits are actually apple impersonations and they deserve to be send to some collective chute and be fumed.

The JV Way: Liase with other organisations. They will help you peddle your goods in exchange for the same favour. Win-Win Situation. Alternatively, both of you can pool resources to create something else with more value than the total of individual resources. For example, Mac sell apple for their cross-selling. You can sell apples and give away Mac vouchers.

IM way: Set up an online stall to display your apples to the world audience. Success hangs on how you draw traffic to the cyber stall and persuade the visitors to order your apples. You will be making a living from the Internet while sitting in front of the computer in just your underwear, or maybe not.

Ultimate way WARNING, not for the faint hearted. Zero capital, moderate effort, extreme wealth. Successfully utilised by my best friend Jim Dognum. The following is his story.

At the age of twenty, Jim have decided that he wanted to be a millionaire. Without a single dime to his name, he went around asking for 50 cents to start his business. One good-hearted passerby gave him the money and he bought an apple with it.

He used his clothes to polish the apple till his teeth reflection is visible on the skin. With a bit of sympathy, he managed to sell the apple for a dollar and bought two more apples. He repeated the process day by day, always reminding himself that he would be a millionaire. By the end of the month, he stood as the proud owner of an apple-selling enterprise and had $5,000 to his name. And finally, one day…

-
--
-
-
--
His millionaire mother-in-law died and left the daughter and her husband a million.

THE END

Solemn swear to myself

Currently, I’m on the track to my first USD 1000 bucks. Itching to know dear Kun Song have been up to? I’ll let you know when I hit my first thousand bucks.

For now, I want to make my top-priority goal a public declaration.

I, Yeo Kun Song, S86*****J, solemnly swear to
My Future Self in 2026, my Family and Friends
That I will earn my first USD 1000 through that One Way
With the help of my friends, Latiff and Shafi’e.
Until then, I will not cut my hair and will look like a shaggy dog.

And that is my promise to myself, my future self, my loved ones and my friends
The growing of long hair will stay till the day I made USD 1000 bucks!

1///\\\
/@~@\\
111(1111\/
111U

To My First USD 1000!!!
KS

$25 in just 3 hour

Just Monday’s morning, I had made $25, relatively effortlessly. The way I do it is idiot-proof but still took me 3 hours and plenty of fidgeting. But in retrospect, it still amused me.

What I did was to become a ‘beta’ tester for two sets of university entrance exam. Just last week, I received an email from a certain Dr. Tay who told me that I was eligible to help him test out the quality of the two sets of exam papers targeted at China students. It was supposedly A-level standard Physics and Maths. HaHA, sounds so innocent. I told him I’m probably not the best candidate (I did not take A-level physic and my Maths skill is currently as sharp as my pet tofu) but he didn’t seem to mind it. So why should I mind.

The deal goes like this; I will take a two-hour Maths Paper followed by an hour of Physics and the final score will not affect my CAP. At the end of the 3 hours, I will be paid $25. If my results happen to be among the top three, I will be awarded another $50.

And here’s what I have to say…WAIT LONG LONG AH.

Here’s what Really happen: I went to the venue and realised that I was among at least 50 people, majority of them are not Singaporean. Not that I’m harbouring thoughts of hate crimes, but these foreign guys are really the elites for sciences and maths. So hope of that $50 is gone. I have lost my first battle before the war had started.

So we started out with Maths paper first. I remember the anticipation. Maths is always my best subject in school and had never failed to ‘A’ for major exams. But I soon realised why I could perform so well then…because I had daily practice/exposure, which is exactly what I’m lacking now. 10 MCQs and 4 open-ended questions, and I had no answers for all 14 qns. Come on man, it is all graphs, trigonometry, more triangles, and inequalities plus one permutation problem. I can’t help laughing to myself, ‘Kun Song, you piece of dumb ass, now you are stuck on the desk for the next two hours with a piece of rocket science test paper. If you aren’t greedy for $25, all these won’t have happen….’ But it did, so I decided to attempt a few questions. Turn out that I still remember a few chapters, especially permutation. Since I had too much time on hand, I ended up pondering over this deal. Maybe this test is just a façade to observe what students will do under academic test, maybe there are hidden cameras around, or it may be a conspiracy to rig our mind with the hypnotic arrangement of graphs, triangles and numbers. Worst of all, this may be an introductory test to spark our curiosity for the department’ modules and force us to drop our courses and join them instead. Well, apparently it works on me. I really want to know the answer to some seemingly easy questions. This is what happen when your body is rooted but your mind is wandering, creativity will get out of hand and radicalism takes its stand.

Anyway, physics comes next. Much better, at least the module I took during the Special Term helps, not much though. At least it is less conceptual than Maths and consists of 34 MCQs only.But I only have the confidence for 3 questions. It’s back to ‘spinning the pencil’ for the answers to the other 31 questions.
Not that bad, I managed to survive the three hour test and earn $25 bucks amidst the conspiracy theories and some really bad experience.