The stock market is holding a big sale. Oh no 😲

We humans are so weird. When there’s a store that is holding a sale, we run towards it and even buy things we don’t need.

But when there’s a sale in the stock market and stocks and indexes are undervalued, we run away.

Stock market is the only place where we are afraid of the sale season

Of course, the reasoning that we tell ourselves is:

How do we know that it’s a sale?

What if the discounts get even deeper? I would just be missing out by buying right now at potentially higher prices.

Then as the prices start increasing, we still tell ourselves “well, this could be a short-term increase and I’ll wait until the market really bottoms out.”

Of course, nobody knows when and if that’s going to happen.

We are routinely telling ourselves that we can time the market when In the back of our mind we know that even the bravest of the brave and the richest of the rich humans around the world have not been able to figure it out.

Yes, that is correct. Even Warren Buffett will tell you that he does not have that figured out.

So what do you do? Do you dive in or do you wait?

Well, since we understand the departmental store sales so well, I think we should use the same analogy.

If we see an Under Armor shoes that is being sold for $30 and we know from past experiences that its value is really $60, we pick it up. We don’t wait for the prices to go further down because we fear that the sale might go away or the shoes might no longer be available anymore.

What if we followed the same mindset when picking indexes or stocks to invest in? When we see a sale and we know for a fact that it is a sale and that the index or the stock is definitely worth a whole lot more (which definitely requires research and understanding of the particular entity), we invest!

We don’t worry about the possibility of a deeper sale which is definitely possible. We just pull the trigger now and keep it simple.

I know that what I just said above is easier said than done. It requires keeping our emotions in check and changing our mindset completely. But I firmly believe that it is definitely possible to do. Good luck to us all!

How I became a writer

I still remember the day when I was talking with a friend in college who was an English major and loved writing articles. I was an Electrical Engineering major and I hated writing articles. I could not understand how this person could love writing long form articles. In my mind, it seemed like a torturous thing to do.

Many years have passed since that conversation and I now produce many articles or blood a month. Some of them you might argue are too long 😊.

So how did that happen? How did I become a writer ?

Well, to be honest, the truth is that I still don’t ‘write’ for the most part. I talk.

Let me explain…

 

I have been speaking on various topics in classes as a trainer and speaking at conferences as a speaker all the world.

The first official class I taught was on C Sharp in Buffalo Grove, Illinois back in 2002. Since then, I have produced curriculum and taught in person as well as virtual multi-day courses online more than a few hundred times on many different subjects.

On the other hand, I have been speaking at conferences since November 2006 when I first presented a session in Las Vegas on the concept of SharePoint Excel Services.

Since then I have been speaking on all kinds of topics related to technology and sometimes psychology of employees in organizations.

Needless to say, I’ve done a Lot of speaking over the years and enjoyed all of it since I love the process of transferring the knowledge that I am acquiring to other people.

My conundrum was that I wanted to be able to replicate this transfer of knowledge through text as well so I could reach folks who love consuming this information through the written word.

So how do I do that if I don’t enjoy the traditional form of putting fingers to the keyboard to generate the text…?

 

That’s when I discovered the speech to text functionality within the Google and then the Microsoft ecosystems – the two technology companies that I utilize the most in my personal and professional lives.

And my life changed forever…

I now use the speech to text function everywhere! In fact it is my preferred mode of “writing”.

 

I use it to:

  • Compose text messages
  • Write emails
  • Transcribe articles
  • Write down my notes
  • And everything else in between that would have required my fingers before

 

Don’t get me wrong, I still end up using my hands to massage the writing after I have done the initial brain dump using my voice. But that still is for me so much better than writing the whole thing using the keyboard.

So there you have it, the secret to how I became a writer (or a ‘voicer’… Is that such a thing?)

 

Focus on the small picture

Sometimes the big picture can be so scary that it paralyzes you. That’s when you need to focus on the small picture and take it 1 day and 1 hour at a time. Focusing on things that are in your control and not worrying about the big picture that looks insurmountable.

The trick to forgetting the big picture is to look at everything close up.

—CHUCK PALAHNIUK

As they say, the only way to eat an elephant is one bite at a time 🙂.

Lessons from our dog Amber

I’ve never had a dog. Not until we got one in 2021 during the height of COVID. I realized after getting a dog that I have so much to learn. It’s amazing what our dog Amber has taught me without saying anything verbally.

I’m a true believer that there are lessons to be learned all around us. Natural patterns of the creation and the universe is filled with so many lessons if we are willing to stop and pay attention and learn from them.

Dogs are definitely one of those entities that if we observed quietly, we can learn so much from.

The way they look at you, the way they love you, the way they care for you and the way they convey how they feel without any spoken words…

When it all comes down to it, they just want to give love. All they want in return is attention from you. In fact, you can even starve a dog and it will still love you. That kind of unconditional love is unheard of. I mean where are you going to find a creature that loves you no matter what. You can starve a dog, you can beat it up (not that you would ever do that) and it will still come back to you, want to be close to you and empathize with you, can even feel your feelings and support you when you need it most. Who does that? No humans that I know of at least.

It’s hard to believe that dogs originated from wolves. We look at wolves and we see a ferocious creature that can rip you apart and then you look at a little cute yorkie poodle, like we have, or something similar to that and all you can think of is how cute he or she is and how you just want to shower them with your love and attention. Nature is funny that way.

I definitely have learned a lot from our dog Amber and still continue to learn how to love, how to not be judgmental, how to be caring, how to appreciate the smaller things in life and stop to smell the flowers (and grass, and weeds and everything in between ☺️). It’s like she is an explorer every time we take her out. Like she is seeing and experiencing things for a first time. In the back of my mind, I know that she is really searching for new smells and other dogs’ pee and stuff like that but just the act by itself helps you remember that the wonder of all that is around us is something to be appreciated and paid attention to instead of just walking by. Keeping the wonders alive in our minds is what keeps us young. Repetitiveness makes things boring and we get older faster IMHO. I really believe that wonder by itself is an anti-aging potion which prevents boredom and keeps things interesting. Time goes by a lot more fruitful when you are intentionally spending it instead of having it spent by repetitive tasks that are mundane or waiting for others to tell you what to do.

So thank you Amber. I very much appreciate the life lessons that you continue to teach me. I’ll continue to pay attention and learn from you.

You will be forgotten

I know it’s a hard thing to accept but every single one of us that is alive today will be forgotten eventually.

It might take a few generations, but unless you make a mark on the world like Rockefeller, Einstein, Hitler, etc (yes, good and bad…) there will come a day when no one in the world will remember your name. How they remember you is up to your actions.

The first death is when your breath leaves your body. The second death is when you have been forgotten from the thoughts of the people living.

Of course, then come the questions: why should I care about doing anything if I’m going to be forgotten anyway? What’s the point of living?

Since we come into this world with nothing and leave with nothing. What’s the point of it all?

The point is to not focus on the duration of life but the donation of yourself.

What’s in your hand? What can you do to benefit others no matter how small?

That’s where you and I both should focus on. The impact we can make on others and on the world. That’s what the meaning of life is all about. Leaving this world and the people in it better than how you found it when you arrived.

The meaning of Life

The big question: what is the meaning of life?

The answer: 42 of course ☺️

Of course the reality is that nobody knows and everybody is guessing. Let me tell you my guess FWIW.

When humanity was living in caves and worried about sustenance including food, water and shelter, I doubt if anybody cared about the answer to what the heck am I here on this Earth for? It was all about survival. Just like we see all animals doing aside from humans – arguably the most intelligent animal.

But then we kept on evolving, had our basic necessities taken cared for and then had a lot of extra brain power to think about things like: what is the meaning of life?

When we think about us in the grand scheme of things as far as we know, even our whole planet is like a speck of dust on a vast beach filled with sand. And each of us is a speck of dust within that speck 😊.

On top of that, each of us will relatively live around 100 years old – more or less. And then we’re gone. Once enough generations go by, each of us will be forgotten.

Sorry to be so gloomy but these are just facts that we need to contend with.

We are too small. Each of us sometimes feel like we are the center of the universe, but we are not. We are nothing in the grand scheme of things. Many have come before us and many will come after. The sooner we make peace with this face, the better IMHO.

So what should each one of us do? I mean we have a very brief existence on this planet, and we were put here by someone or something and we just came to be. So what the heck should each of us do while we are here? That’s the main question right?

Here’s my answer:

Our part is to live the best life we can while having positive impact on ourselves and the people and things around us.

That’s it. Nothing else to it. It’s not complicated. It feels like it should be more than that, but my humble belief is that it’s not. It’s that simple. If we just do that, the universe takes care of the rest.

Quit discounting yourself

We all have dreams and wishes, but often they’re not big enough. We continue to discount the possibilities of what is possible and what is not.

Quit discounting yourself.

Realize that you’re Not in charge. And the one who is, does not have the same boundaries that you do.

Forget about the possibilities that seem the right fit for your skill set and your current state. Thinking about it like that will just hold you back.

Think about possibilities beyond measure. What do you really want to do with your life? Got that picture clear in your mind? Probably not the first time you think about it… No worries. Keep thinking and clarify your vision.

Then from now on all of your actions will automatically start working towards that vision. All you gotta do is focus, work hard and believe that the universe will provide.

Put on your own oxygen mask before helping others

There’s a reason that flight attendants tell us to put on our own oxygen mask in case of emergency before helping others – even our young children.

Our instinct is to do whatever we can to help those whom we love. Especially our children that are like pieces of our hearts running around outside of our body. In case of emergency, we instinctively reach out to help them before helping ourselves.

The problem with helping your loved ones at the expense of your own well-being is that eventually you will run out of energy and capability yourself to be able to help them. Then they’ll be on their own anyway and that might be when they really really need you.

I have not always felt that way but I now strongly believe that it is our responsibility towards our loved ones to first take care of ourselves – both inner and outer selves. That means keeping our mind body and soul in shape to take on any challenges that come our way.

We owe it to ourselves and our loved ones to put our own oxygen mask on first. In fact, we need to do that not only at the time of an emergency but to do it regularly and proactively so we have readily available capability when our loved ones truly need us.

 

 

Control your supercomputer or be controlled by it

Imagine you put a baby in a diaper by a computer. What is she going to do? What do we expect her to do?

Probably just bang at the keyboard and produce gibberish. Uncontrollable exuberance resulting in incomprehensible output.

How is that different from what humans do with our minds which are no less than a super computer itself?

Are we able to control it or is it controlling us?

I think we all know the answer. In fact the stress and anxiety that our supercomputer produces is enough to drive most people insane. I would go as far as saying that if you reduce the power of the human brain, the reduction would linearly result in increase in happiness. Because then your brain is not hyperactive and bored all the time looking for “something to do”. Boredom is frequently the source of evil.

So why do we let our minds control us instead of us controlling it?

Well, the answer is simple. We don’t let it happen, it happens because we don’t know how to control our mind – much like that baby sitting on the computer. If we had a manual and knew how to control it, perhaps the output would be different. But we don’t.

Now consider the possibility that there was a way that we could turn things around and gain the ability to bend this super computer to our will. Imagine the magnitude of power and control we would have if we could control our own mind. Imagine the happiness we could produce at will.

There’s a concept of separating yourself from your mind and your body. The more space you create, the better you feel. When you first hear this concept, it just does not make sense or at least it did not make sense to me the first time I heard it. I could not imagine myself separate from my mind and body. I thought that my mind and body are “myself”. What’s the difference I thought? But the more I thought about it the more I realized that my mind and my body are items that I have accumulated since birth. My mind is made up of all the thoughts since birth and my body is the accumulation of everything that I ate and drank or was fed by my mother in the womb. “Myself” is different than these items that I usually identify with. Some can call it the soul, the noor, the force, particles of the universe… whatever you call it, that’s the thing I’m talking about. That is what’s truly “yourself”.

Let’s look at an analogy of what it’s like to separate yourself from your thoughts and your mind. Imagine you are sitting in traffic. It’s early in the morning, the sun is hot, traffic is jam packed, you are late to work, you forgot your coffee, people are honking their horns around you and everyone is frustrated. You are frustrated. This is similar to what happens in our minds all the time. Lots and lots of traffic and we are right in the middle of it all.

Now let’s say that you get out of your car, leave it where it is and you step into the carriage of a hot air balloon. It’s a nice big beautiful multicolored hot air balloon and the carriage is very comfortable. You get inside the carriage and it starts elevating. You get to 50 ft then 100 ft. You look down at the traffic. These cars and people that were around you are now below you. Everyone is still frustrated but now you are not in the middle of it. You are an observer from above. Your stress level drops a bit.

The hot air balloon keeps on rising and now you are at 500 ft and then 1,000 ft. Now the cars look even smaller from this distance. It’s hard for you to relate why these people below are frustrated. The whole scene starts looking a bit comical and beautiful at the same time. The balloon continues its rise and now you’re at 10,000 ft. Now you are literally seeing the big picture and wondering to yourself why you were ever frustrated to begin with? Your perception of reality has changed. Your thoughts of being late at work have evaporated. So what if you’re late. What does that all mean in the big scheme of things anyway?

This experience of you rising in the hot air balloon and separating yourself from the traffic is exactly what it would be like if you separated yourself from your thoughts. If you become an observer, a witness to what’s going on in your brain and separated yourself from your thoughts, you would become much more attuned with the processes in your brain since now you are observing them much more objectively rather than subjectively.

Of course all this said, none of this is easy to do otherwise we would have a lot more happy people around the world. But hey… let’s not stop trying. A conscious mind has a lot of potential. No need to numb our minds with excessive alcohol, drugs and other substances to temporarily slow down our supercomputer just because it’s hard to handle. Instead, let’s practice ways that will get us better equipped to control that power we have on hand. It will be worth the effort for sure 👍

Strive for excellence at the expense of perfection

So many projects and initiatives never see light of day because the creator believed that it was not perfect. Such a shame because many of those things could have truly helped people who had a need for that information / product / service…

I know this because I have succumbed to this pressure of being perfect many times myself. Many more times than I would care to admit actually.

I was listening recently, on a podcast, to author Adam Grant talk about his own addiction to being perfect and how it is so much more rewarding to try to strive for excellence rather than perfection. I completely agree with Adam and wanted to write some words about that myself in this article.

If you’re a religious person, you most likely have that belief that nobody is perfect except God.

If you’re not a religious person, I can still bet that you don’t think that anyone in this world is perfect.

No matter what our beliefs are, we all know this in the back of our mind that none of us are perfect and nothing we do can be truly perfect either. Yet, it still ends up blocking us from getting stuff done at times because we feel that our creation (ex: product, project, article, video, etc) is not ready just yet. Much like this article that I’m writing. If I keep on thinking about this subject, I’m sure I will think of something new every single day. But if I really want others to read what I am writing so I will eventually have to click “publish” ☺️

Adam’s notion of striving for excellence instead of perfectionism is very thought-provoking. You might be asking at this point: how can something be excellent unless it’s perfect…?

I think the answer lies in the question. By definition, excellence means “extremely good” and surpassing ordinary standards. Notice that it does not say perfect. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Excellence

I would go even as far as saying that perfection is the enemy of excellence.

The practically unachievable goal of perfection holds us back from being our excellent selves.

You have to ask yourself: how many plans or projects do you have that are just in the phase of strategy, planning, half baked or “almost done”? I have lots on my plate for sure and I can bet you have many as well that you can list out.

So then the next question we have to ask ourselves: isn’t it better to either call it quits for certain things or take it to completion to the best of our ability and “click publish”?

That is exactly what I’m about to do right now and click publish on this article. I hope you can do the same and let the world benefit from your knowledge and wisdom. Best wishes! 👍