My CEO Journey

 So on Wednesday, I wrote about being thankful for my jobs past and present to motivate myself through work. While being thankful, I don't want to stay addicted to the perks of job and forget my long terms aspiration.   Since today is Friday, it's time to think far about where I want to be years down the road. When I was an engineering consultant, climbing up some towers, I told myself I don't want to be climbing towers when I am in my 40s. I am glad before 40, I left that job. Now with 3 years before I hit the 40 year old mark, there are other things that I want to change. When I am in my 40s, I don't want to ask for permission to take leave. I want to be able to spend birthdays with my family and heck the important business stuff.  So while I recently said I aspire to do nothing, I am embarking on projects on the side. Doing nothing most probably could buy me instant happiness, but I'll probably be doing what I am still doing now years down the road. Cannot imagin

It's lunchtime blogpost again, where I blog during lunch some small nuggets that I think of.  We all work for a certain purpose. Since I'm at work today, let's look at some things we are grateful for (as a result of working). Hope this motivates your day on Wednesday. So here are some things I'm grateful for, for working at a job.  I work to earn money, so that my family can live comfortably and my kids can pursue interests they are interested in.  This is the key to working, isn't it.  But there's more to it .  I work so that I gain excess to network which I by myself (using my name) won't be able to do so (think about I'm Ms. XXX, vs I'm Ms XXX from FAMOUS COMPANY - which will give you more access?). I work so that I get to mingle with a certain group of people from a certain social circle - notice most of your colleagues are in similar social class? I work so that I gain excess to credit. Credit cards, mortgage and so on all look at our income. N

 My daughter is going to primary one next year. I have been shortlisting schools that I want her to go to.  Based on location, and chance of getting in ( my daughter is in the sg50 babies), I have shortlisted 2 schools. One is due to distance (just a road away), and another is due to affiliation. So I went to study the differences in the school. From, CCAs, to what they are famous for and so on. To he honest, all schools specialize in something, and their CCAs are almost the same with some differences. LOL. But what caught me was the significant difference in the time the kids knock off from school. One was usually 1 pm, except for a day that is 12.30pm. Another was usually 1.45 p.m, with some days at 1.15 p.m. why a 45 minutes difference?! Aren't primary school suppose to teach similar stuff.  When I was in secondary school, I remembered school ends at 2 p.m. And each period was 35 minutes. The rationale for the 35 minutes was to allow teachers 5 minutes to travel from a class to

 You must be seeing a lot of post by me recently. Simply because I have loads of time which I don't know what to do with. I just joined a new company, not really just, it is months already. As I figure out how things work, I start to do things faster, and with my boss being  based another country I really have loads of free time. And I really like it. I have no interest in asking for more responsibility or jobs. Things won't stay like this for long anyway, there is peak period which fortunately isn't now. But, well, in short I am quite free for now. While being free is good, I have a problem. I can't do my own things (except during lunch when I would actually actively watch youtube or blog. I sawy colleagues watching Korean drama during lunch, so I figure out lunch time you can do anything. Only problem is I cannot bring my things to do. So well, I am with my phone actively typing away. Phones are great inventions. They let you do what you used to do on a computer on su

I live in a HDB flat in Singapore. As I bought a resale home, I got to choose the type of homes. The older types of HDB in Singapore are honestly super varied. As my home approaches the 5 year minimum occupancy period (MOP), I am seriously considering whether to move or not. Currently, I live in a door -to- door unit. For such units, there are just 2 units facing each other ( sharing the common corridor). And since all levels have a lift, only 2 units share a lift per level. I am not sociable. So having just 1 unit is ideal. No need to say hi to everyone. But there is actually more to it. You get to use the space occasionally as if it is your outdoor space.  My neighbor use this space for prayers and so on from time to time. I use it for my kids to do some "zero point" game, and so on. Basically some games that you need space, but just don't want to go downstairs. Alright. So recently, I went house hunting. And I saw a very interesting door to door unitm such units have 2

My youngest turned one a few months back. As I see how his elder brother and sister enjoy playing and being his leader ( I simply mean bossing him around), I thought for a moment whether it would be great for him to have another sibling. This was a a decision that I made for my eldest and second one. And the decision came easily then.  But for this time round I was hesitant. True enough the baby bonus, and CDA benefits are great for 4th child. Though there will be no additional tax benefit for me since I hit the limit. But, these benefits to me, are ' side effects' to my decision. They are never part of my decision. During the pandemic, I got lots of time with the kids. But I also realized it was just tough to give all of them attention at the same time. My kids learnt less than I could teach if there were fewer kids, and I spent less time due to significant distraction by another ( e.g. diaper change, or just another kid making too much noise, etc.). To me, more kids would be

 I was talking to my friends and many were thinking of quitting their job to set up their business, focus on looking after their kids and so on. Well, we are are just some wannaquitters. Want to quit only, but won't okay. But anyway, we were talking about what we want to do. Some want to take some tuition and spend their other times with kids, some want to do businesses and so on. But... For me.... I just want to do nothing. Wake up when I feel like, binge on tv when I feel like, eat when I feel like it and so on. I am in the stage of life where I just need enough to survive and I just want the freedom to do whatever it want. Why set up a business when you have to go for meetings at times when you don't feel like. How different is it from a job. Why be a tutor when on cozy days like now what you want is to lie in bed and rest and not teach. Okay, I am not promoting laziness. But I guess if I were to transition out of work, I will most likely be spending what I have rather than

My goal for this year is really simple. It's simply to focus on spending time with my kids, and myself. So, in other words, I'm looking at doing just things I really really like.  I was looking back at my past posts. One of them, I talked about finding  passion from impulse , where I find a hobby I truly enjoy by trying out. I named 5 hobbies in this post here: (1) gardening (2) Singing/ Music (3) Teach (4) Write (5) Artist.  I kept saying that I did nothing, but I realize how untrue that's. Looking back, thanks to my kids and this blog, I actually did lots of those. Singing/ Music I have been teaching my daughter piano, and whenever she comes home with a new song she learnt in school, I'll play it on the piano while she sings. Of course, I also taught her formally. Best book to use is John Thompson 's books. I started learning the piano with these books and I realized why. By repeating the few notes so often, the little ones will know those few notes by the time th

 Does $93,000 sound familiar to you?  This post is all about $93,000, and if you find this number very familiar, you might have remembered that the basic retirement sum (BRS) for 2021 is $93,000 . Nonetheless, apart from this similarity in sum, this post has nothing to do with CPF, BRS and whatsoever. Instead, I'm talking more about a challenge that I 've set for myself.  I'm trying to find out how long can $93,000 last (for me). So if I only had $93,000 and my mind (to conjure out ways to stretch, maximize, grow ,etc the amount of money), how long can it last. Rules of the challenge To make this experiment easier to track, I have topped up one of my bank account to $93,000. This is also the account that is responsible for paying most of my bills (school fees, credit card, etc.), but a separate account where my salary is credited. No, input from my salary is not counted. I could put this $93,000 into stocks/ bonds, and it will still be counted, but  I'll track it in ano