Chicken Soup for the Open-Minded Soul

I've been eating quite a lot of that chicken soup lately. I'm referring to words, of course. Can I lamely say that I haven't been updating this blog much because I've eaten all my words for it? :P

Anyway. I recently had to turn down a great opportunity to host a TV show on the Earth and environmentalism, and all that. Not because of schedule, as they were planning on doing it over the weekends. But because of work. And life. And I told myself, not so long ago, that I'd not let work and life get in the way of my performing.

Unfortunately, life has other things in store for me. Fortunately, I believe that it's better things. Right now, I know that I cannot responsibly commit to both and expect to do well in both. I also told myself recently that I had to get my life in order before I started performing again, so I have to hold myself to that, great opportunity or not.

So let's get this down in writing. For the first half of this year (and perhaps the 2nd half too), I'm committing to a few things: 1) getting my life in order, ie Priorities; 2) getting my Finances in order, which also includes excelling at my current job; 3) setting up my performing career, ie Training my voice and my body; 4) enjoying the stuff in Life I had to forsake the past 4 years, ie Diving and Activities; 5) keeping my Writing in practice, be it blogs, articles or stories; 6) reconnecting with the People of my life, ie friends and family.

Tall order eh. Scary now I look at it. Habits I must inculcate: 1) Sleeping early and enough; 2) Exercising / Working out very regularly; 3) Focusing on less and getting more useful stuff done; 4) Being more compassionate and less affected by emotions and emotional dramas; 5) Stop beating myself up over small things; 6) Punctuality.

Nice. In a super tight recap of my past few months, I've learned a lot about:

- death

- money

- the IT world

- small businesses

- the 9-to-5 life

- the value of simplicity in organisation

and have been occupied with these books:

- Your Money & Your Brain

- Outliers

- The Long Tail

- Top Money Tips for Malaysians

- How to become a Millionaire Landlord

and been crazy about boardgames, namely Agricola and the BoardGameGeek.com site; watching bits of anime - The Law of Ueki; trying out Swing dancing; and falling desperately behind on my e-mails and Facebook messages.

Okay. I shall recommit to being regular on my blog, and shall learn to be less cheong hei. Short and sweet, concise, pithy, and so on. Okay okay and to stop using multiple words to say the same thing multiple times. Yes, it's not Boggle and no, I will not earn more points for it. Done.