Hello!
I know I got my order of habits a bit mixed up. The order of habits is:
1. Be Proactive
2. Begin with the End in Mind
3. First Things First
4. Seek First to Understand, then Be Understood
5. Seek Win-Win
6. Synergise!
7. Sharpen the Saw
So I have blogged about habits 1 to 5, and I would like to blog about the last habit first, before getting to the 6th habit, cos some of my experiences recently were about that.
Sharpening the Saw talks about the balance between doing the task and sharpening our tool. We all know that when we saw a log with a blunt saw, or write with a blunt pencil, we are not as effective in our task. So although taking time to sharpen our saw or pencil seems to be a waste of time as we are not producing any output, we are actually saving time for ourselves later on. Easy to understand, but difficult to put into practice when we extend the same analogy to ourselves. While we are not tools, we also need to take time to hone and prime ourselves - to rest, to recharge, to meditate and consolidate, to learn new things, so that we are sharp and fresh and effective, when we go about our daily living.
As a Christian, the thing most of us struggle with is regular quiet time with God. Every pastor, church, cell leader and Christian book will talk about the need to regularly read the Bible, pray and commune with God. But because God is invisible, because God doesn't appear in our face and yell and clamour for our attention, but many other things do (e.g. kids, our spouse, our parents, our boss, urgent emails, even our stomachs), we find it somehow more needful to attend to those, and when we have spent the day doing so, we are usually exhausted, brain-dead, and want to spend any remaining time pampering ourselves with our favourite entertainment, be it a book, a movie, a TV show, websurfing, music or treating ourselves to some comfort food (sometimes a combination of the above) cos to do anything else seems to need too much effort. To then quieten ourselves, close our eyes and pray to an invisible person, or open the Bible to read, or to spend time listening to God, seems to take so much more energy and focus than we have left at the end of the day. Ok, so you say, since we have limited mental and physical energy in a day, don't do your quiet time at the end of the day when you're spent, do it at the beginning, when you're still fresh.
Aha, but then, the morning has its own troubles - waking up late, the morning rush, the lack of time, the need to leave the house in 5 minutes, no, actually, 5 minutes ago - makes any quiet time rushed, hurried, and quite difficult to have any quality or deep conversations. I say conversation because actually, a relationship is built by conversations and observations. But somehow we are ok with having monologues with God most of the time, us talking to Him. Yes, we hear from Him too when we read the Word, but that's like sitting in a lecture, a monologue going the other way, we are a passive recipient. I like to think that God, being an interactive, communicative God, would actually like best to have a conversation with us, but most of us are probably too busy and distracted to notice it.
Recently, I had an intriguing thought - whenever my husband is texting or reading stuff on his iPhone when he should be having a conversation with me (increasingly often), instead of stewing and getting angry, I reflect upon how this must be how God feels most of the time! We are so busy with the people around us, with imbibing media, with doing things, we never notice God is right there waiting to have a conversation with us. Sigh... guilty as charged.
Anyway, so the one thing that would sharpen my saw, is doing my quiet time. Regularly.
So, how did I apply this habit? Actually just doing a very simple exercise. And it was triggered by my cell group (again). Recently I learnt during my cell discussion that God talks to us in a lot of ways. It could be from His Bible, from a sermon, a book, a Christian friend, or any experience we are having. He could be talking to us.
Intrigued, I went home and over the weekend, I decided instead of my usual laundry list of prayers, I would spend time just listening to God. So I got down on my knees and my prayer went something like this "Dear God, today I'd just like to hear from You. I'm sorry I haven't been spending time with You. I'm sorry.... [and it went on in this vein for a while]... But now, I'm here. I'm listening. So, if there's anything You want to say to me, please say it now."
And I stopped talking and listened, just thinking how I'd really like to hear God's voice. And in my heart I expected God would say "Ah! It's about time! As a cell group leader, you should be spending time with me daily, instead of reading fiction books on the train. And why were you so rude to your mother? And you haven't been witnessing at your workplace" Etc etc.
Silence.
"Ok God, whatever You want to say to me, I'm listening."
And then, out of the blue, I had an impression, a thought, which came into my mind, which was so unlike anything I expected to hear from God, I was amazed. The last thing on earth I would expect God to say, actually.
What was it?
Haha, I'm tempted to put it only on my next blog post, but since I am short of time, I'll reveal it here.
It was "I love you, very very much."
And that was it.
Now, as an Asian, if I ever told my parents if there was anything they wanted to tell me, I can imagine it would be a laundry list of all the things they have been telling me, which was all the things I haven't done, or have done badly. The last thing on earth I would expect them to say, would be that they love me. And not just that. But very very much.
And because it was so unexpected, so unlike anything I thought I would hear, I believe it must be from God. And when I think about it, I feel strangely comforted, and inspired to do even more things for God.
And, this also gels with something I recently heard. A Singaporean Professor said in China, they were finding out that social networking websites that called the web user "Qin1 Ai4 De" or "dear" or "beloved", had a lot more hit rates than other websites. People love being called beloved, or being dear to someone, loved by someone.
And when I asked my hubby to try the same prayer experiment, surprisingly, God also spoke to Him. Ok God said a lot more things to him, but He started with "Beloved,". And that is just simply amazing.
Sunday, July 28, 2013
Tuesday, July 23, 2013
Is Win-Win Always Possible?
Hello!
This habit (I believe it's the fifth) has its roots in an abundance mentality (as opposed to the scarcity mentality), which means believing that there is enough to go round for everybody to get what they want, and it isn't always that if you get what you want, I will lose, or vice versa.
Now I must say having been schooled in the Singapore education system, which tends to focus on getting good grades, the win-lose mentality is pretty ingrained in me. I.e. there can only be one top scorer in the class, and if I help you do well, you will do better than me and I will no longer be number one. Hence, for the extremely kiasu among us (guilty as charged for my earlier school years - thankfully I changed quite a bit after I became a Christian), the idea of helping others succeed, get what they want, is pretty alien, as it is usually all about me, me, me. And the idea that somehow, there are limited "goodies" in this world (e.g. wealth, coveted positions, power, even eligible partners), and we are all in a competition against one another to get those goodies, also seems like an accurate reflection of reality. I suppose this could thus be pretty much the mindset of many people.
However, to practice this habit well, requires actually understanding many perspectives (that's where the habit of seeking to first understand comes in), cos actually, we may find that what we perceived as a "lose" for us, may actually not be so, or can be avoided through an ingenious new solution, if we really understood what the other person wanted to achieve. I give an example of a class I took in my university where the Professor split us into 2 teams and gave us a different brief for each team. The briefs stated that we were from a pharmaceutical company (A or B depending on which team), flying to another country to try to get the last remaining 5 eggs from a precious bird for a product we were making. The other rival company also wants the same eggs for another product they are making. On our flight, we sit next to the representative from our rival company, and we are supposed to negotiate with them such that we can get what we want. On the surface, this looks like a straightforward win-lose proposition. Some teams ended up with a compromise - you get 3, I get 2 or something like that. Some argued long and hard and arrived at no conclusion. However, when it ended, the Professor got us to read our briefs aloud, and he pointed out (I actually missed it) that if we paid attention, both companies were after different parts of the egg! One wanted the yolk, another wanted the shell. Hence we could have both gotten what we wanted, had we spent time clarifying what each other wanted and expressing what exactly we wanted.
The exercise left a lasting impression on me.
Recently, I also encountered a similar situation at work. There have been 4 policy groups set up in my organisation - 3 to assist operational departments in their policy work (I'm in one of them), and 1 central policy group to coordinate among the policy groups. I know. Sounds like a mess and a lot of additional layers for the poor operational departments.
Recently, the central policy group got CEO to approve a policy workflow which involved them sending up all policy submissions and items to CEO, on behalf of the departments. What made it even more fishy was that they did not consult any operational department before presenting to CEO. After it was approved, it was simply sent to us "for dissemination to departments". My boss for the policy group had a fit. He felt that this was clearly them trying to usurp power and take ownership of a lot of policy issues that were rightfully under the departments. I sympathised with him and thought the head of the central policy group and her boss villains, and felt like fighting them tooth and nail to prevent this from happening. I even came up with ideas in my sleep on how to jam this process and make life difficult for them :P
However, two things happened which helped me see the win-win in that. First, I had cell group. That night, we had a discussion on conflict resolution, and I asked how we could be "as shrewd as snakes, and as innocent as doves", especially in light of politics in the workplace, and I gave mine as an example. My cell members gave their opinions on the matter and the person facilitating the session that night shared some verses on conflict resolution (e.g. strife results from having wrong motives, going the extra mile, being kind to our enemy), which were very relevant for me. After meditating on those verses over the weekend, I realised a lot of my emotion stemmed from selfish ambition and the desire to get ahead, or rather the fear of not getting ahead. I decided to let go of those motives and desires, and ask myself, "in light of all that Christ has done for me, and what lasts for eternity, what should I do?" and the answer was - these little things don't matter, and we should actually just work together for the common good. That allowed me to go to work without all these negative emotions roiling in me.
Then the second thing happened - the head of the central policy group asked me out to lunch one day, and in a cool-headed frame of mind, we had a good talk where I shared (in a rationale, objective way) all my concerns about what this meant for operational departments, and she shared a lot more about the rationale for this, and how this would actually benefit the departments (by alleviating a lot of writing burden from them, so they can focus on actual operations). She assured me they would still be involved in the policy crafting process (so it wasn't that they didn't need to think anymore), and the proper credits would be given. In fact, if they were more familiar with the issue, they could even present to CEO. After talking it out, I realised this actually wasn't a bad proposition for us. So I took it back and we convinced my boss it was ok. We will brief the departments next.
In my life, I am always looking for win-win. There have been times when it has not been possible, so we go for compromise (e.g. choice of movies), or we intentionally give in one time, with the understanding the other person will give in next time (e.g. my husband and I taking turns to have our "alone time" every once in a while, while the other watches the kids). Perhaps for these, we just haven't thought hard enough, but I guess we should reserve our energies and mental power to find win-win solutions for the big things first, cos as I said, it requires a lot of honest, open communication and some creativity :)
This habit (I believe it's the fifth) has its roots in an abundance mentality (as opposed to the scarcity mentality), which means believing that there is enough to go round for everybody to get what they want, and it isn't always that if you get what you want, I will lose, or vice versa.
Now I must say having been schooled in the Singapore education system, which tends to focus on getting good grades, the win-lose mentality is pretty ingrained in me. I.e. there can only be one top scorer in the class, and if I help you do well, you will do better than me and I will no longer be number one. Hence, for the extremely kiasu among us (guilty as charged for my earlier school years - thankfully I changed quite a bit after I became a Christian), the idea of helping others succeed, get what they want, is pretty alien, as it is usually all about me, me, me. And the idea that somehow, there are limited "goodies" in this world (e.g. wealth, coveted positions, power, even eligible partners), and we are all in a competition against one another to get those goodies, also seems like an accurate reflection of reality. I suppose this could thus be pretty much the mindset of many people.
However, to practice this habit well, requires actually understanding many perspectives (that's where the habit of seeking to first understand comes in), cos actually, we may find that what we perceived as a "lose" for us, may actually not be so, or can be avoided through an ingenious new solution, if we really understood what the other person wanted to achieve. I give an example of a class I took in my university where the Professor split us into 2 teams and gave us a different brief for each team. The briefs stated that we were from a pharmaceutical company (A or B depending on which team), flying to another country to try to get the last remaining 5 eggs from a precious bird for a product we were making. The other rival company also wants the same eggs for another product they are making. On our flight, we sit next to the representative from our rival company, and we are supposed to negotiate with them such that we can get what we want. On the surface, this looks like a straightforward win-lose proposition. Some teams ended up with a compromise - you get 3, I get 2 or something like that. Some argued long and hard and arrived at no conclusion. However, when it ended, the Professor got us to read our briefs aloud, and he pointed out (I actually missed it) that if we paid attention, both companies were after different parts of the egg! One wanted the yolk, another wanted the shell. Hence we could have both gotten what we wanted, had we spent time clarifying what each other wanted and expressing what exactly we wanted.
The exercise left a lasting impression on me.
Recently, I also encountered a similar situation at work. There have been 4 policy groups set up in my organisation - 3 to assist operational departments in their policy work (I'm in one of them), and 1 central policy group to coordinate among the policy groups. I know. Sounds like a mess and a lot of additional layers for the poor operational departments.
Recently, the central policy group got CEO to approve a policy workflow which involved them sending up all policy submissions and items to CEO, on behalf of the departments. What made it even more fishy was that they did not consult any operational department before presenting to CEO. After it was approved, it was simply sent to us "for dissemination to departments". My boss for the policy group had a fit. He felt that this was clearly them trying to usurp power and take ownership of a lot of policy issues that were rightfully under the departments. I sympathised with him and thought the head of the central policy group and her boss villains, and felt like fighting them tooth and nail to prevent this from happening. I even came up with ideas in my sleep on how to jam this process and make life difficult for them :P
However, two things happened which helped me see the win-win in that. First, I had cell group. That night, we had a discussion on conflict resolution, and I asked how we could be "as shrewd as snakes, and as innocent as doves", especially in light of politics in the workplace, and I gave mine as an example. My cell members gave their opinions on the matter and the person facilitating the session that night shared some verses on conflict resolution (e.g. strife results from having wrong motives, going the extra mile, being kind to our enemy), which were very relevant for me. After meditating on those verses over the weekend, I realised a lot of my emotion stemmed from selfish ambition and the desire to get ahead, or rather the fear of not getting ahead. I decided to let go of those motives and desires, and ask myself, "in light of all that Christ has done for me, and what lasts for eternity, what should I do?" and the answer was - these little things don't matter, and we should actually just work together for the common good. That allowed me to go to work without all these negative emotions roiling in me.
Then the second thing happened - the head of the central policy group asked me out to lunch one day, and in a cool-headed frame of mind, we had a good talk where I shared (in a rationale, objective way) all my concerns about what this meant for operational departments, and she shared a lot more about the rationale for this, and how this would actually benefit the departments (by alleviating a lot of writing burden from them, so they can focus on actual operations). She assured me they would still be involved in the policy crafting process (so it wasn't that they didn't need to think anymore), and the proper credits would be given. In fact, if they were more familiar with the issue, they could even present to CEO. After talking it out, I realised this actually wasn't a bad proposition for us. So I took it back and we convinced my boss it was ok. We will brief the departments next.
In my life, I am always looking for win-win. There have been times when it has not been possible, so we go for compromise (e.g. choice of movies), or we intentionally give in one time, with the understanding the other person will give in next time (e.g. my husband and I taking turns to have our "alone time" every once in a while, while the other watches the kids). Perhaps for these, we just haven't thought hard enough, but I guess we should reserve our energies and mental power to find win-win solutions for the big things first, cos as I said, it requires a lot of honest, open communication and some creativity :)
Tuesday, July 9, 2013
Haze!
Hello!
Sorry I've been missing in action for a while - blame it on the haze. I was minding my own business at work, when I suddenly got called into a haze meeting and was suddenly involved in haze issues for a whirlwind one and a half weeks, where I attended three or four meetings a day, prepared slides or papers in between, skipped meals, ate at strange times, and otherwise just lived, breathed and ate haze-related information and updates. That was when I realised that I am not a person really suited to wartimes. Because I felt I was falling sick after about 4 or 5 days of not having regular, proper meals, working over a weekend flat out (we came back both days and had meetings almost all day!) and being slightly stressed out all the time. Perhaps it's because my blood group is A+ . Apparently I am the blood type that does not take stress well. On the contrary, this other girl who is my counterpart from another department, who was roped in one day earlier, worked longer hours and is even busier than me with haze issues, was perfectly fine, health-wise.
I must say when the 3-hour PSI (Pollutant Standard Index) hit a high of 400, I got really worried about Singapore, in particular, Singaporeans. And I despaired of ever seeing clear skies again for months, as information from the authorities on how long the haze was going to last was not forthcoming (I believe they can only project one day in advance, and the dry season is supposed to last until the monsoon rains come in Nov-Dec!). Thankfully, the rains came, the wind blew (in our favour), and the haze lifted, after a horrible, choking few days. And I realised how much worse haze is than the SARS outbreak in Singapore years ago. For SARS, it affects some people, and you feel like you can take precautions against catching it (practice good personal hygiene, avoid people with coughs or colds), but haze - it affects everyone, and you can't really get away from it when you're at home, unless you are fully air-conditioned. Even then, some air seeps in. My office floor had a slightly hazy look on the week when the haze was particularly bad. And the complete lack of air purifiers in the market just added to everyone's (and in particular my) sense of despair. I just hope someone comes up with a cheap and good technological solution that can help us clean up our indoor air during haze periods (and perhaps even during non-haze periods) sometime in the near future!
Sorry I've been missing in action for a while - blame it on the haze. I was minding my own business at work, when I suddenly got called into a haze meeting and was suddenly involved in haze issues for a whirlwind one and a half weeks, where I attended three or four meetings a day, prepared slides or papers in between, skipped meals, ate at strange times, and otherwise just lived, breathed and ate haze-related information and updates. That was when I realised that I am not a person really suited to wartimes. Because I felt I was falling sick after about 4 or 5 days of not having regular, proper meals, working over a weekend flat out (we came back both days and had meetings almost all day!) and being slightly stressed out all the time. Perhaps it's because my blood group is A+ . Apparently I am the blood type that does not take stress well. On the contrary, this other girl who is my counterpart from another department, who was roped in one day earlier, worked longer hours and is even busier than me with haze issues, was perfectly fine, health-wise.
I must say when the 3-hour PSI (Pollutant Standard Index) hit a high of 400, I got really worried about Singapore, in particular, Singaporeans. And I despaired of ever seeing clear skies again for months, as information from the authorities on how long the haze was going to last was not forthcoming (I believe they can only project one day in advance, and the dry season is supposed to last until the monsoon rains come in Nov-Dec!). Thankfully, the rains came, the wind blew (in our favour), and the haze lifted, after a horrible, choking few days. And I realised how much worse haze is than the SARS outbreak in Singapore years ago. For SARS, it affects some people, and you feel like you can take precautions against catching it (practice good personal hygiene, avoid people with coughs or colds), but haze - it affects everyone, and you can't really get away from it when you're at home, unless you are fully air-conditioned. Even then, some air seeps in. My office floor had a slightly hazy look on the week when the haze was particularly bad. And the complete lack of air purifiers in the market just added to everyone's (and in particular my) sense of despair. I just hope someone comes up with a cheap and good technological solution that can help us clean up our indoor air during haze periods (and perhaps even during non-haze periods) sometime in the near future!
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