With age comes experience, with experience comes wisdom
I’ve had opportunity these past few days to reflect upon what I’m doing here. What is this blog for? For the most part, it is a personal blog. The fact that many of the posts have something to do with politics reflects an academic interest in politics on my part. I have no desire or interest whatsoever to pursue a career in politics. After all, I’m a capitalist through and through, I’d much rather do business.
Recent posts by mr brown here and Mr Miyagi here also got me thinking: as much as I have certain beliefs in how the world is and how the world should be, should I publicise my thoughts? To what ends does that serve? Is it because I wish to change things? And if I am, should I be doing it this way? Or?
There is a reason why some things are the way they are. The young have energy and dynamism, but lack the wisdom and groundedness that comes with age. The older (I’m not saying either of you is old ok mr brown and Mr Miyagi) one gets, the more life experience one gathers. Such experience allows one to see things in a different light, to know how to do things a certain way that would be the most effective.
I think that’s the advantage that mr brown and Mr Miyagi have over us younger bloggers. They’ve made their fair share of mistakes in life, they have the benefit of hindsight. They’ve paid their dues, worked their asses off to be where they are now. Surely, one can see that there is much to learn from their experiences so that we don’t repeat the same mistakes, and have to suffer the consequences?
I had a conversation with my dad over the phone a few days ago, and he was telling me about his business. He shows his love for me by letting me know what his latest projects are, and so even though he gets long-winded sometimes, I still listen through the whole thing.
The essence of the conversation was that the project required something which was not normally within the rules, and that any changes required approval from a certain part of the bureaucracy.
“The most important lesson you must learn,” my dad said, “is that in order to get things done, you must make sure everyone is happy. If you want someone from the G to help you and approve your request, you must also consider how they feel, and see things from their point of view. You can’t be selfish and keep pushing for things to be done your way, and not think about whether doing things your way would get others into trouble, or not leave them any room for backup or to cover their ass. So the most important thing you must learn is that in order to help yourself, you must also help others, and maintain a good working relationship.”
It was as though my dad was prescient. He does not know the existence of this blog, and yet somehow his words are dead on target about the dilemma I am facing.
That, I believe, is the reason why my dad is successful. The lesson that he has learnt in his years of doing business through countless mistakes and hardships is that human relationships are paramount. And when such relationships are damaged, one can surely forget about getting anything done, including making changes to the system.
Perhaps that is what is meant by Asian values (even though I don’t believe ‘Western values’ denigrate human relationships at all in any way). And perhaps that is the wisdom of our elders. (Yes, now THAT includes you mr brown and Mr Miyagi).
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PS: Why do I get this feeling that people are insinuating that my father is advocating illegal means of doing business? Please read the whole thing carefully before jumping to the wrong conclusions. The words from my father is left deliberately vague because I can’t very well talk about my Dad’s business can I? To avoid any further misunderstandings, I’ll leave an example here.
You have a HDB flat, and you want to install a fixture in it. You make an application to the HDB, and they say, no its against the rules as it could be a hazard. So you negotiate with them, saying that why not you get an engineer?s report, stating that the fixture can be built safely and without hazard. That way, they can approve your request without fear of getting their asses kicked as they have an engineer?s report to rely on as a backup to cover their ass.
mrbrown: L’infantile terrible of Singapore: Wait kena sue then you know
My Very Own Glob {Curiosa Felicitas}: Mr Miyagi’s definitive opinion about being sued over something written on a blog
