Story Around

Nomadic life

[blablanomad]

Radio

I had Tumblr since high school and I thought I'd be Traveler writer after graduate. Turns out, I worked in Radio now. As an announcer--still trainee tho (remind me with what I did in Malaysia 2 years ago). And yes, the schedule little freak me out, I should announce from 12 am until 4 am in the morning... too early to be morning.

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Realized

People will never hear you. They just want to scold you.

So, don't talk too much to other who don't know you well. They just want to be heard but don't want to listen.

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This book I bought in 2014. This is one of a novel from the series of STPC or Every Place Has Stories (Setiap Tempat Punya Cerita). This book tell you about An Indonesian guy who looked for his brother in Bangkok, Thailand while he met a Thailand girl--who would make him fall in love. You would be suprised to read this book. The romance thing also not that awkward so it was very good for me. Very recomended. But in this year, to get this book such an impossible thing. The book may be sold out or already vanished from bookstore. 😂😂😂

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Bubbles

[amer-s]

42 Practical Ways To Improve Yourself

42 Practical Ways To Improve Yourself

Books are concentrated sources of wisdom. The more books you read, the more wisdom you expose yourself to. What are some books you can start reading to enrich yourself? Some books I’ve read and found useful are Think and Grow Rich, Who Moved My Cheese, 7 Habits, The Science of Getting Rich and Living the 80/20 Way. I’ve heard positive reviews for The Tipping Point, Outliers and The Difference Maker, so I’ll be checking them out soon.

Learn a new language.As a Singaporean Chinese, my main languages are English, Mandarin and Hokkien (a Chinese dialect). Out of interest, I took up language courses in the past few years such as Japanese and Bahasa Indonesian. I realized learning a language is a whole new skill altogether and the process of acquainting with a new language and culture is a totally a mind-opening experience.

Pick up a new hobby. Beyond just your usual favorite hobbies, is there something new you can pick up? Any new sport you can learn? Examples are fencing, golf, rock climbing, football, canoeing, or ice skating. Your new hobby can also be a recreational hobby. For example, pottery, Italian cooking, dancing, wine appreciation, web design, etc.  Learning something new requires you to stretch yourself in different aspects, whether physically, mentally or emotionally.

Take up a new course. Is there any new course you can join? Courses are a great way to gain new knowledge and skills. It doesn’t have to be a long-term course – seminars or workshops serve their purpose too. I’ve been to a few workshops and they have helped me gain new insights which I had not considered before.

Create an inspirational room. Your environment sets the mood and tone for you. If you are living in an inspirational environment, you are going to be inspired every day. In the past, I didn’t like my room at all because I thought it was messy and dull. A few years ago, I decided this was the end of it – I started on a “Mega Room Revamp” project and overhauled my room. The end result? A room I totally relish being in and inspires me to be at my peak every day.

Overcome your fears. All of us have fears. Fear of uncertainty, fear of public speaking, fear of risk… All our fears  keep us in the same position and prevent us from growing. Recognize that your fears reflect areas where you can grow. I always think of fears as the compass for growth. If I have a fear about something, it represents something I’ve yet to address, and addressing it helps me to grow.

Level up your skills. If you have played video games before especially RPGs, you’ll know the concept of leveling up – gaining experience so you can be better and stronger. As a blogger, I’m constantly leveling up my writing skills. As a speaker, I’m constantly leveling up my public engagement abilities. What skills can you level up?

Wake up early. Waking up early (say, 5-6am) has been acknowledged by many (Anthony Robbins, Robin Sharma, among other self-help gurus) to improve your productivity and your quality of life. I feel it’s because when you wake up early, your mindset is already set to continue the momentum and proactively live out the day. Seth recently wrote a waking up early series which you should check out to help cultivate this habit.

Have a weekly exercise routine. A better you starts with being in better physical shape. I personally make it a point to jog at least 3 times a week, at least 30 minutes each time. You may want to mix it up with jogging, gym lessons and swimming for variation.

Start your life handbook. A life handbook is an idea I started 3 years ago. Basically, it’s a book which contains the essentials on how you can live your life to the fullest, such as your purpose, your values and goals. Sort of like your manual for your life. I started my life handbook since 2007 and it’s been a crucial enabler in my progress.

Write a letter to your future self. What do you see yourself as 5 years from now? Will you be the same? Different?  What kind of person will you be? Write a letter to your future self – 1 year from now will be a good start – and seal it. Make a date in your calendar to open it 1 year from now. Then start working to become the person you want to open that letter.

Get out of your comfort zone. Real growth comes with hard work and sweat. Being too comfortable doesn’t help us grow – it makes us stagnate. What is your comfort zone? Do you stay in most of the time? Do you keep to your own space when out with other people? Shake your routine up. Do something different. By exposing yourself to a new context, you’re literally growing as you learn to act in new circumstances.

Put someone up to a challenge. Competition is one of the best ways to grow. Set a challenge (weight loss, exercise, financial challenge, etc) and compete with an interested friend to see who achieves the target first. Through the process, both of you will gain more than if you were to set off on the target alone.

Identify your blind spots. Scientifically, blind spots refer to areas our eyes are not capable of seeing. In personal development terms, blind spots are things about ourselves we are unaware of. Discovering our blind spots help us discover our areas of improvement. One exercise I use to discover my blind spots is to identify all the things/events/people that trigger me in a day – trigger meaning making me feel annoyed/weird/affected. These represent my blind spots. It’s always fun to do the exercise because I discover new things about myself, even if I may already think I know my own blind spots (but then they wouldn’t be blind spots would they?). After that, I work on steps to address them.

Ask for feedback. As much as we try to improve, we will always have blind spots. Asking for feedback gives us an additional perspective. Some people to approach will be friends, family, colleagues, boss, or even acquaintances, since they will have no preset bias and can give their feedback objectively.

Stay focused with to-do lists. I start my day with a list of tasks I want to complete and this helps make me stay focused. In comparison, the days when I don’t do this end up being extremely unproductive. For example, part of my to-do list for today is to write a guest post atLifeHack.Org, and this is why I’m writing this now! Since my work requires me to use my computer all the time, I use Free Sticky Notes to manage my to-do lists. It’s really simple to use and it’s a freeware, so I recommend you check it out.

Set Big Hairy Audacious Goals (BHAGs). I’m a big fan of setting BHAGs. BHAGs stretch you beyond your normal capacity since they are big and audacious – you wouldn’t think of attempting them normally. What are BHAGs you can embark on, which you’ll feel absolutely on top of the world once you complete them? Set them and start working on them.

Acknowledge your flaws. Everyone has flaws. What’s most important is to understand them, acknowledge them, and address them. What do you think are your flaws? What are the flaws you can work on now? How do you want to address them?

Get into action. The best way to learn and improve is to take action. What is something you have been meaning to do? How can you take action on it immediately? Waiting doesn’t get anything done. Taking action gives you immediate results to learn from.

Learn from people who inspire you. Think about people you admire. People who inspire you. These people reflect certain qualities you want to have for yourself too. What are the qualities in them you want to have for yourself? How can you acquire these qualities?

Quit a bad habit. Are there any bad habits you can lose? Oversleeping? Not exercising? Being late? Slouching? Nail biting? Smoking? Here’s some help on how you can quit a bad habit.

Cultivate a new habit. Some good new habits to cultivate include reading books (#1), waking up early (#8), exercising (#9), reading a new personal development article a day (#40) and meditating. Is there any other new habit you can cultivate to improve yourself?

Avoid negative people. As Jim Rohn says, “You are the average of the 5 people you spend the most time with”. Wherever we go, there are bound to be negative people. Don’t spend too much of your time around them if you feel they drag you down.

Learn to deal with difficult people. There are times when there are difficult people you can’t avoid, such as at your workplace, or when the person is part of your inner circle of contacts. Learn how to deal with them. These people management skills will go a long way in working with people in the future.

Learn from your friends. Everyone has amazing qualities in them. It’s up to how we want to tap into them. With all the friends who surround you, they are going to have things you can learn from. Try thinking of a good friend right now. Think about just one quality they have which you want to adopt. How can you learn from them and adopt this skill for yourself? Speak to them if you need to – for sure, they will be more than happy to help!

Start a journal. Journaling is a great way to gain better self-awareness. It’s a self-reflection process. As you write, clarify your thought process and read what you wrote from a third person’s perspective, you gain more insights about yourself. Your journal can be private or an online blog. I use my personal development blog as a personal journal too and I’ve learned a lot about myself through the past year of blogging.

Start a blog about personal development. To help others grow, you need to first be walking the talk. There are expectations of you, both from yourself and from others, which you have to uphold. I run The Personal Excellence Blog, where I share my personal journey and insights on how to live a better life. Readers look toward my articles to improve themselves, which enforces to me that I need to keep improving, for myself and for the people I’m reaching out to.

Get a mentor or coach. There’s no faster way to improve than to have someone work with you on your goals. Many of my clients approach me to coach them in their goals and they achieve significantly more results than if they had worked alone.

Reduce the time you spend on chat programs. I realized having chat programs open at default result in a lot of wasted time. This time can be much better spent on other activities. The days when I don’t get on chat, I get a lot more done. I usually disable the auto start-up option in the chat programs and launch them when I do want to chat and really have the time for it.

Learn chess (or any strategy game). I found chess is a terrific game to learn strategy and hone your brainpower. Not only do you have fun, you also get to exercise your analytical skills. You can also learn strategy from other board games or computer games, such as Othello, Chinese Chess, WarCraft, and so on.

Stop watching TV. I’ve not been watching TV for pretty much 4 years and it’s been a very liberating experience. I realized most of the programs and advertisements on mainstream TV are usually of a lower consciousness and not very empowering. In return, the time I’ve freed up from not watching TV is now constructively used for other purposes, such as connecting with close friends, doing work I enjoy, exercising, etc.

Start a 30-day challenge. Set a goal and give yourself 30 days to achieve this. Your goal can be to stick with a new habit or something you’ve always wanted to do but have not. 30 days is just enough time to strategize, plan, get into action, review and nail the goal.

Meditate. Meditation helps to calm you and be more conscious. I also realized that during the nights when I meditate (before I sleep), I need lesser sleep. The clutter clearing process is very liberating.

Join Toastmasters (Learn public speaking). Interestingly, public speaking is the #1 fear in the world, with #2 being death. After I started public speaking as a personal development speaker/trainer, I’ve learned a lot about how to communicate better, present myself and engage people. Toastmasters is an international organization that trains people in public speaking. Check out the Toastmaster clubs nearest to you here.

Befriend top people in their fields. These people have achieved their results because they have the right attitudes, skill sets and know-how. How better to learn than from the people who have been there and done that? Gain new insights from them on how you can improve and achieve the same results for yourself.

Let go of the past. Is there any grievance or unhappiness from the past which you have been holding on? If so, it’s time to let it go. Holding on to them prevents you from moving on and becoming a better person. Break away from the past, forgive yourself, and move on. Just recently, I finally moved on from a past heartbreak of 5 years ago. The effect was liberating and very empowering, and I have never been happier.

Start a business venture. Is there anything you have an interest in? Why not turn it into a venture and make money while learning at the same time? Starting a new venture requires you to be learn business management skills, develop business acumen and have a competitive edge. The process of starting and developing my personal development business has equipped me with many skills, such as self-discipline, leadership, organization and management.

Show kindness to people around you. You can never be too kind to someone. In fact, most of us don’t show enough kindness to people around us. Being kind helps us to cultivate other qualities such as compassion, patience, and love. As you get back to your day after reading this article later on, start exuding more kindness to the people around you, and see how they react. Not only that, notice how you feel as you behave kindly to others. Chances are, you will feel even better than yourself.

Reach out to the people who hate you. If you ever stand for something, you are going to get haters. It’s easy to hate the people who hate us. It’s much more challenging to love them back. Being able to forgive, let go and show love to these people requires magnanimity and an open heart. Is there anyone who dislikes or hates you in your life? If so, reach out to them. Show them love. Seek a resolution and get closure on past grievances. Even if they refuses to reciprocate, love them all the same. It’s much more liberating than to hate them back.

Take a break. Have you been working too hard? Self-improvement is also about recognizing our need to take a break to walk the longer mile ahead. You can’t be driving a car if it has no petrol. Take some time off for yourself every week. Relax, rejuvenate and charge yourself up for what’s up ahead.

Read at least 1 personal development article a day. Some of my readers make it a point to read at least one personal development article every day, which I think is a great habit. There are many terrific personal development blogs out there, some of which you can check here.

Commit to your personal growth. I can be writing list articles with 10 ways, 25 ways, 42 ways or even 1,000 ways to improve yourself, but if you’ve no intention to commit to your personal growth, it doesn’t matter what I write. Nothing is going to get through. We are responsible for our personal growth – not anyone else. Not your mom, your dad, your friend, me or LifeHack. Make the decision to commit to your personal growth and embrace yourself to a life-long journey of growth and change. Kick off your growth by picking a few of the steps above and working on them. The results may not be immediate, but I promise you that as long as you keep to it, you’ll start seeing positive changes in yourself and your life.

42 Practical Ways To Improve Yourself

[ozzyla]

Lily personally recommends you to follow 42 good steps by @azumeryl These are helpful and means alot for me. Hope it does at you too XO

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One of the twin tower. In the night when I go to KL for second time. Flashtrip.

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Street cat at Kedai.

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Canai Gule and Tea Ais

Since I lived in other country, I began to eat the authentic food from this place every day. The one that I really like to eat is Canai Gule. It is Canai bread with sugar, butter, and a little condensed milk. The taste is--ofc--so sweet but delicious. Seriously!

I see many people eat this Canai Bread every morning. Usually, people eat Canai Egg with Kare or Masala. It is a soup with spices. That one is the most favorited breakfast here and I just like the sweet one.

Actually, in my country, there is also Canai Bread and people eat it with chocolate condensed milk or they add some cheese on it. The taste quite good. Better than that the Kare one.

Friend of Canai in the morning is Tea Ais for me. Some people migh love Tea Tarik one. Tea Ais actually Tea Tarik with some Ice and the pronounce is like Ice--'Ais'. But here I just have a picture of Tea Tarik without Ice.

So yeah, if you come here, in Malaysia, you should eat Roti Canai and Tea Ais every morning to bright your day!!

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Subway

I knew Subway from a drama called Goblin. And I think some ppl knew the drama well. Yes, it is K-drama. In my country, there is no Subway. And I finally found Subway in the country I lived now.

One of the sandwich is my first Subway. I ordered a Steak and Cheese one with some vegetables there.

Yes, I've bite it 😂😂.

The taste is quite good because I ordered the good one with ketchup sauce and mayo. It was 6 inch bread and the price is RM 12 without drink.

And a few days ago. I comeback to subway and order the Tuna one with discount voucher. Subway has discount with some variant now, and you can find the voucher in the website. I just pay RM 12 for 6 inch Tuna sandwich with extra cheese and cola.

And I bring it home.

Actually the taste of the Tuna is not really good. The Tuna is just too much and the taste bacome so salty.

But that is alright, later I won't buy the same variant anymore. I would like to order the Steak and Cheese one. That one is tastier than the other so far.

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A Story From a Bibliophobia

So, now I worked in a hotel that made me could meet with many people from other country and also stand with their attitude.

One thing that I really like today is I met with a bookish person! His style is really nerd and tbh I loved it.

He used Harry Potter's necklace and brought Murakami's book. Even I havent read the book he read but totally interested with his mind about the book. I have Murakami and Harry's book but yea you know I love to collect them, I will read them later.

Even I just talk like, "Room number?"

"Thank you"

"Good evening"

And just chit chat like, "Oh you read Murakami!" And "That necklace, Harry Potter, right?"

And he just, "oh yea." Like uh-oh everyone knew that. Yea I know sih... huhuhu

I feel like... I wanted to meet him again and talk a lot about book. Wish so.

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The cat eyes colored yellow. Found it at Kedai when I want to buy Roti Canai Gule and Teh Tarik. I've told ya about cat around my hostel. They are not a common one, but the uncommon race that used to be pet, not the street cat. But this one, on picture, is a street cat! Usually I can see some cat has collar on the neck and the owner such a good man, they let the cat free. But sadly, they used to eat unhealthy food in the outside. I actually afraid with cat, I like them but scared of them. I hope that my condition will be healed soon. I really furious and wanted to playing around with cat.

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Walking After Night Shift

Every morning, after my night shift I will walking back to my hostel, alone. Sometimes, which is so rare, Hotel Driver would pick me up and escort me safely and fastly to my hostel. It is rare because they kind of busy in every morning, sending guest to the airport or pick guest up from airport.

I personally prefer to walking than go back by shuttle bus. By walking I can see many things, such as squirrel, raven and its sound, cat, car, people, sky, and the way itself. I'd love to see squirrel and cat because they are so cute. Street cat here looks more expensive because their race is not the common one. But it is a common thing to see Angora Cat or even Persian Cat in the street (I forgot to take their picture >.<).

That was what I used this morning. Here, the place is really quite and seems not busy. People is not really going out from their house to greet their neighbors or just talking with vegetables seller--like in Indonesia. Because this place so quite, it is becoming dangerous for women to go outside alone. People ask me to not going alone in the night and always bring something that can be a self-defense tool everywhere.

That one, the blue things I hold by my left hand is umberella. That is my self-defense tool. The big one so I can hit people who have dangerous intention. I would like to walk like a boy and playing around with my umberella, so people won't greet me or catcalling me in the way. I usually got anxiety to go outside alone. I feel afraid. But I can't give any hope to people so, yea, I should be brave and strong.

That was a view this morning, usually the sky will be so bright and the color is blue. Today the gloomy sky come again, it is happen because the rainy season has came. I walk about 7-10 minutes from the hotel to my hostel. It is so good to refresh my body everyday.

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Malam ini adalah malam kesekian saya mendapatkan shift malam selama On The Job Training di sebuah hotel. Shift malam tidak begitu menyiksa, hanya keadaan paginya saya harus tidur berjam-jam untuk memulihkan badan yang tidak terbiasa begadang lebih dari pukul 1 pagi. Shift malam berjumlah 8 jam apabila tidak overtime. Dari pukul 11 malam hingga 7 pagi saya akan berjaga di front desk, menginput data tamu grup maupun tamu yang tiba malam hari, juga menyiapkan expected departure hingga hotel transportation dan wake up call. Dibantu oleh Supervisor tentunya. Ini adalah minggu ketiga saya mengikuti On The Job Training. Di negeri seberang yang suku budayanya tidak begitu berbeda dibandingkan Indonesia. Foto di atas adalah salah satu pemandangan yang kelak akan saya lihat hingga 5 bulan ke depan. Rangkaian bunga dalam vas besar yang katanya berasal dari Indonesia. Proud? Ya, but I'm not that over-proud. That's quite cool tho. Omong-omong, tinggal di negeri orang dalam kurun waktu beberapa bulan memang telah menjadi mimpi saya dan #lifestyle yang akan saya jalani semasa hidup. Bukan hanya satu negara, melainkan banyak negara. Jadi, OJT ini adalah sebuah batu lompatan untuk menciptakan mimpi itu menjadi nyata. Sisa menjalaninya saja yang harus penuh tanggungjawab demi hasil yang saya harap sangat baik. Sebab, OJT dan kuliah ini hanya saya persembahkan kepada Bapak dan Mama. Untuk saya, side-effect collage saja yang ingin saya ambil. Side-effect yang baik. Mungkin memang sulit untuk memaklumi dan menjalani apa yang bukan dicitakan, tetapi mengingat kepada siapa apa yang dijalani sekarang akan menjadi bara api untuk tetap bertanggungjawab atas pilihan itu. I believe that I am strong and I know that I can do everything in a good way if I want to learn. 힘내!!

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That's me by the way. I draw my own picture year ago. Yes, it was almost look the same, just add some acne on my cheek and blackhead on my nose. That would be a little bit perfect. I started to use Tumblr since I was Junior High School and I forgot the username-password-even the website. Then, I made it again when I was Senior High School. Http://xinnus.tumblr.com/ was my other site in tumblr. The site consisted with anime and kpop things. So, yea, I decide to make this new one to practice my mind again. To blow it with my own mind and people's minds. I usually talk about things that happen in my life. About my nomadic life, dreams, people around me or even things that is not important. Actually, I've had another blog in another blog-engine. It is almost fail, I guess, even the visitor quite a lot for my Urbex post. But, the content already set up to be a mature me, which is I can't be sighing there, I can't share things from my mind and also can't be the crazy one who love to blow her mind. And that was boring. So, here I am. blablanomad would be a perfect place for my mind. It is about everything I experienced. About things that stuck on my mind. Hope so... (I have an unique character that I should be wise-polite when I write, also when I live in the world. Yeah, a character that force me to do something by the rules). Wish me be loyal with this one. I have a lot of blogs out there but it just become like pixel in the picture. It is there but invisible and forming something we can see clearly.