Cat Slaps Dog

Even animals can display human-like characteristics.

The little puppy was just looking for someone to play with.

However, the cat was not interested and got so irritated that he slapped the puppy.

Look at the puppy's expression - it displayed surprise, hurt and disappointment.

So, all sentient beings share the same thing - to be happy and accepted.

Awaken Your Dreams

"Logic can bring you from point A to B;
But imagination can take you everywhere"
- Albert Einstein

We exist in a mundane world where we live our lives very logically, with each action and decisions taken in a practical way.

We see our daily routines as simple as setting goals, figuring the way to reach it and then just taking the action to get there.

However, our lives would be very much richer if we just take some time to dream and let our imagination soar.

It is during these periods of silent, of "Me" time that we can set our minds free and just think about the "What Ifs" and the "Why Nots".

It is these dreams arising from our imaginations that allows for breakthroughs and inventions that changes our lives as well as affect the lives of people around us.

Apple was just an idea that Steve Job imagined in his mind and brought to reality in his garage.

And Facebook was just a big dream of making connections with everybody that has grown to more than 500 million friends around the whole world.

So, do not be afraid to use your imagine. Dream big.

And most important of all, take the necessary actions to awaken your dreams, and manifest a beautiful reality here on earth...

Life's A Mess...

Life’s a mess. You are not entitled to expect anything from it.

Life is not fair. Everything does not balance out in the end.

Life happens, and you have no control over it. Good and bad things happen to you day by day, hour by hour, moment by moment. Your degree is a poor armour against fate.

Don’t expect anything. Erase all life expectancies.

Just live.

Your life is over as of today. At this point in time, you have grown as tall as you will ever be, you are physically the fittest you will ever be in your entire life and you are probably looking the best that you will ever look. This is as good as it gets. It is all downhill from here. Or up. No one knows.


What does this mean for you? It is good that your life is over.

Since your life is over, you are free. Let me tell you the many wonderful things that you can do when you are free.

The most important is this: Do not work.

Work is anything that you are compelled to do. By its very nature, it is undesirable.

Work kills. The Japanese have a term “Karoshi”, which means death from overwork. That’s the most dramatic form of how work can kill. But it can also kill you in more subtle ways. If you work, then day by day, bit by bit, your soul is chipped away, disintegrating until there’s nothing left. A rock has been ground into sand and dust.

There’s a common misconception that work is necessary. You will meet people working at miserable jobs. They tell you they are “making a living”. No, they’re not. They’re dying, frittering away their fast-extinguishing lives doing things which are, at best, meaningless and, at worst, harmful.

People will tell you that work ennobles you, that work lends you a certain dignity. Work makes you free. The slogan “Arbeit macht frei” was placed at the entrances to a number of Nazi concentration camps. Utter nonsense.

Do not waste the vast majority of your life doing something you hate so that you can spend the small remainder sliver of your life in modest comfort. You may never reach that end anyway.

Resist the temptation to get a job. Instead, play. Find something you enjoy doing. Do it. Over and over again. You will become good at it for two reasons: you like it, and you do it often. Soon, that will have value in itself.

So what should you do? You will find your own niche. I don’t imagine you will need to look very hard. By this time in your life, you will have a very good idea of what you will want to do. In fact, I’ll go further and say the ideal situation would be that you will not be able to stop yourself pursuing your passions. By this time you should know what your obsessions are. If you enjoy showing off your knowledge and feeling superior, you might become a teacher.

Find that pursuit that will energise you, consume you, become an obsession. Each day, you must rise with a restless enthusiasm. If you don’t, you are working.

Most of you will end up in activities which involve communication. To those of you I have a second message: Be wary of the truth.

I’m not asking you to speak it, or write it, for there are times when it is dangerous or impossible to do those things. The truth has a great capacity to offend and injure, and you will find that the closer you are to someone, the more care you must take to disguise or even conceal the truth. Often, there is great virtue in being evasive, or equivocating. There is also great skill. Any child can blurt out the truth, without thought to the consequences. It takes great maturity to appreciate the value of silence.

In order to be wary of the truth, you must first know it. That requires great frankness to yourself. Never fool the person in the mirror.


I have told you that your life is over, that you should not work, and that you should avoid telling the truth. I now say this to you: Be hated.

It’s not as easy as it sounds. Do you know anyone who hates you? Yet every great figure who has contributed to the human race has been hated, not just by one person, but often by a great many. That hatred is so strong it has caused those great figures to be shunned, abused, murdered and in one famous instance, nailed to a cross.

One does not have to be evil to be hated. In fact, it’s often the case that one is hated precisely because one is trying to do right by one’s own convictions.

It is far too easy to be liked, one merely has to be accommodating and hold no strong convictions. Then one will gravitate towards the centre and settle into the average. That cannot be your role. There are a great many bad people in the world, and if you are not offending them, you must be bad yourself. Popularity is a sure sign that you are doing something wrong.

The other side of the coin is this: Fall in love.

I didn’t say “be loved”. That requires too much compromise. If one changes one’s looks, personality and values, one can be loved by anyone.

Rather, I exhort you to love another human being. It may seem odd for me to tell you this. You may expect it to happen naturally, without deliberation. That is false.

Modern society is anti-love. We’ve taken a microscope to everyone to bring out their flaws and shortcomings. It far easier to find a reason not to love someone, than otherwise. Rejection requires only one reason. Love requires complete acceptance. It is hard work – the only kind of work that I find palatable.

Loving someone has great benefits. There is admiration, learning, attraction and something which, for the want of a better word, we call happiness. In loving someone, we become inspired to better ourselves in every way. We learn the truth worthlessness of material things. We celebrate being human. Loving is good for the soul.

Loving someone is therefore very important, and it is also important to choose the right person. Despite popular culture, love doesn’t happen by chance, at first sight, across a crowded dance floor. It grows slowly, sinking roots first before branching and blossoming. It is not a silly weed, but a mighty tree that weathers every storm.

You will find, that when you have someone to love, that the face is less important than the brain, and the body is less important than the heart.

You will also find that it is no great tragedy if your love is not reciprocated. You are not doing it to be loved back. Its value is to inspire you.

Finally, you will find that there is no half-measure when it comes to loving someone. You either don’t, or you do with every cell in your body, completely and utterly, without reservation or apology. It consumes you, and you are reborn, all the better for it.

Don’t work. Avoid telling the truth. Be hated. Love someone.

- Extracted from the speech given by Adrian Tan to the graduating class of 2008.

The Highest...

The highest skill lies in the realization of selflessness.
The highest nobility lies in taming your own mind.
The highest excellence lies in having the attitude that seeks to help others.
The highest precept is continual mindfulness.

The highest remedy lies in understanding the intrinsic transcendence of everything.
The highest activity lies in not conforming with worldly concerns.
The highest mystic realization lies in lessening and transmuting the passions.
The highest charity lies in non-attachment.

The highest morality lies in having a peaceful mind.
The highest tolerance lies in humility.
The highest effort lies in abandoning attachment to works.

The highest meditation lies in the mind without claims.
The highest wisdom lies in not grasping anything as being what it appears to be.

~ Atisha

The 59th Minute

David Suzuki, the world-renowned environmentalist from Canada was at the Sydney Opera House last week to talk about his passion - the environment.

He presented a case that our Mother Earth is in the 59th minute of a suicidal path of economic growth.

Mr Suzuki asks us to imagine putting 1 bacteria cell, which divides every minute, into a test tube full of food. This is the exponential growth, which is the path of humanity when it believes in unlimited economic growth.

"At time zero, you have 1 cell; one minute later, you have 2; two minutes you have 4; three minutes, you have 8; four minutes later, you have 16."

"That is exponential growth," he said "And at 60 minutes, the test tube is completely full of bacteria and there is no food left - a 60-minute cycle."

"When is the test tube half full?" he asked. "Well, the answer, of course is at 59 minutes; but a minute later, it is completely full."

"So at 58 minutes, it is only 25% full; 57 minutes, it is 10 1/2% full. At 55 minutes of the 60-minute cycle, it is only 3% full."

"Therefore, if at 55 minutes, one of the bacteria said to its companions that they had a poplulation problem, the other bacteria would be incredulous because 97% of the test tube would be empty and they had been around for 55 minutes!"

"Yet, they would have only 5 minutes left..."

"How do we add even a fraction of 1% more of air, water, soil or biodiversity?", Mr Suzuki asked.

"We cannot!! The biodiversity of our planet Earth is fixed and finite!!"

"And every biologist I have talked to agrees with me - we are past the 59th minute", he said.

The above conversation was really scary. It seems that in our greed and self-absorption for relentless consumption, we are all rushing towards the path of mutual destruction.

We never really think that each of our actions affect the eco-system and the biodiversity of Mother Earth. We delude ourselves that She can provide us with unlimited resources, for us to use, consume and discard with no consequences.

Well, as the recent news about hurricanes, wild weathers, droughts, long winter storms, volcanoes and earthquakes around the world is showing us, Mother Earth is struggling to maintain its equilibrium amidst all the damages that we are doing to Her.

So, please help Mother Nature and ultimately, your loved ones and yourself.

Cut down on your blatant consumption. Ask yourself if you really need more material things to be happy. Pause and consider before you splurge on the latest "In" thing or fashion. Can you live without buying any of your "wants" and still be happy?

Something for you to think about as you go through your life every day.

Remember, we are at the 59th minute already...