Inner Peace... Inner Peace

I swear that on some days this is how I feel ....................

And this is what I aspire to become 

Hell Yeah!! Keep on rocking!

Overcoming my fear on the topic of Investing and the exam screw up

For the past few weekends, I have been locked up in my apartment cramming for my next 2 LOMA papers related to Investing. Four textbooks “impressively” covering various aspects of:
1) Investment for the Individual
2) Investment for Organization
3) Financial Institution & Financial Markets
4) Economics.

This time round I admit that I’ve left my studying to the last possible minute. Each time I tried to open my books, I always found something else much more interesting or important to do. :) By the time I decided that it was time to get SERIOUS, I was nearing a state of panic, constantly checking the calender and counting down to what I would affectionately know as “doomsday”.

I’ve never been knowledgeable about the variety of financial instruments or markets out there. And I totally admit that when it comes to Investing, I can be quite the ranking idiot. The first few chapters was an uncomfortable start for me.

Fortunately, after “hanging in there for a while longer”, I soon found myself getting to know and making fast friends with my 3 buddies: DJIA, S&P 500, Wilshire 5000. Of course, I admit that before you can get to the really fun part of investing, you need to slog through the hours of calculating Present Value versus Future Value, Compounding on Annual or Semi Annual Basis, Yield to Call or Yield to Maturity for Bonds, Leverage/Activity Ratios, Profitability Ratios and so on. Using Capital Asset Pricing Model (CAPM) to determine the risk and expected return for stocks can also take its toil on you. But trust me, once you get over the tough part, it slowly gets more interesting.

Today, indexes/market averages no longer scare me as much as they used to. Also, you won’t find my eyes glaze over during the investment meetings discussing stock splits, NAV, ETFs, Money Market Funds, Closed/Open Funds and so on. Another plus point is that I can also better understand the Financial Section of the newspapers and headlines such as “Bonds Rally After 3 Days Slump” no longer baffles me.

To be honest, after having put in time and effort to finish the textbooks, I’ve been kinda looking forward to taking the papers and getting over and done with it. My first paper was set for today and the night before, I had survived only 2 hours of sleep trying to juggle between work and last minute revisions. The good news is that I finished my revision as I watched the sun rise on another beautiful day, the bad news is that I won’t be taking my papers this week after all.

Just minutes before the scheduled time for the paper, I was "cordially" informed that there had been a screw up and my name were not registered for both papers. *Dumbfounded* My colleague tried to cheer me up by saying:" Look at the bright side, you'll have more time to work on getting a better grade".

Erm...Thanks but no thanks! W@#$!#$%@# :(

What about that..............*Grumbles*

For the past few weeks, I have been locked up in my apartment cramming. 2 papers...4 textbooks: Investing for the Individual, Investing for Organizations, Financial Institution & Financial Markets, Economics. That's just me.....always leaving it to the very last minute until panic sets in before I sit myself at the desk to hit the books for some serious intense cramming.

Lost in a world of financial instruments, market averages and indexes became my best friends: Hello Dow Jones Industrial Average, S&P 500, Wilshire 5000 - How are you doing today?! Feeling bearish...feeling bullish? When I was finally done with my reading, I was introduced to a whole new world of Present Value Future Value, Compounding, Bond Yield, Leverage/Activity Ratios, Profitabiliy, Capital Asset Pricing Model and the list goes on.

Finally the big week arrives. My first paper is on the 13th. I can't wait to get it over and done with!!

Yesterday night, I finally finshed up on work at 1am before I could start with my final round of revision. After bars of chocolate and cups of coffee (plus ice cream and an apple), I finally closed my textbook as I watched the sun rise at 5am. Well, that's all I could have done...I'm all ready to take my exams, come what may....

After 2 hours of sleep, I woke up and almost drowned myself in the shower before I could get out of a zombie state and decent enough to go to work. I still had 2 conference calls to get through before my paper at 1pm and my "moment of truth".

In the midst of the morning, I innocently asked my colleague "Hey...where is the exam held later on?" She takes a look at me and replied "In the training center" and then hurries off. Hmm...did I see her shoot me a funny look? Nah..I just shrugged it off.

A while later she comes up to me and she cautiously starts with: "Jamie, I've got something that I want to tell you." She still has that look on her face and by now I'm sure that I don't like it. She explains that there has been some screw up and that one of our colleagues had not registered me for the paper!!!!

LOMA results

I didn't get the 100 I was looking for... but it sure was damn closeee.........

301: Insurance Administration - 96
361: Financial and Management Accounting -99

For the effort I've put in for this 2 papers, I sure as hell ain't complaining..........:)

Indeed, I do!!

WHIPPEEEE......OUT FOR A CELEBRATION!!!!

Headachesss

Well, in an attempt to live life to the fullest, for the past few weeks, I've been on the "GO".

The result is....a super mind boggling headache that last for 2 days straight in which no amount of pain killers can possibly fix/mend.

On Thursday mid noon, I felt the onset of a major headache. It was like someone was playing Linkin Park full blast in my head. I had alot of sleep on Thursday but I went to bed with a headache and woke up with the same headache. Therefore, on Friday while at work, I was still feeling very extremely horrible.

That's when I became a pill popping maniac and my colleague is screaming:"Whoaa, easy on those pills, you can only take 6 per 24 hours."Still the pain did not go away and for the whole day I was like that ->

Managed to somehow survive the day at work. Wasn't in the right frame of mind and so I'm pretty sure I did alot of things I will later come to regret.

Anyway, come 6pm I am out of the office in a flash, jump into my car and flooring my accelerator I'm on my way home. The moment I'm home...I'm in bed with the covers over my head. No dinner for me, I just need to sleep.

This morn 5.45am. I'm feeling a little better now....

P/s: I saw another really freaky picture about someone having a headache, here is the link: http://www.freakingnews.com/Headache-Pictures-35336.asp

There are really strange strange people out there.

Imperfection...............

People have told me that I'm a perfectionist when it comes to certain thing. (It certainly doesn't apply to ironing my clothes or doing the laundry....) But it does apply to the way I work. I am not proud to say that I succeed 80% to 90% of the time driving both myself and my colleagues up the wall. I've had countless close friends/colleagues tell me very similar things:

Concerned Friend: Hey, you know what your problem is.....you need to learn how to chill......
Me *flustered face*: But but...how can they do such a thing...its crap!
Concerned Friend: Still?! Calm down and just chill
Me: Okay fine fine fine. Its my fault, I should have done xxx and yyy and if I didn't do this and he didn't do that, it won't become like this...... Or maybe if I had done zzz or aaa then.....
Concerned Friend: Stop beating yourself up and stop expecting others to live up to your expectation. The world doesn't work that way......
Me: @#!$@#$ It shouldn't be this way.......

As you can see, I'm a hopeless case. I know I shouldn't ...I shouldn't... I shouldn't...but I do. But I shouldn't. :P

I try to make myself meet a certain expectation of ....myself and yes....I admit it, I have an expectation on others too. (horrors! but definitely better now than before HORRR) I used to get very very disappointed when people don't meet my expectation at work and I show it on my face. I still do that sometimes..old habits die hard..Uey, if I don't meet my own expectation, you can be pretty sure that I'll beat myself up Days and Days over and over again.

My ex boss once told me:" Jamie, you are too hard on yourself. You must learn how to relax". My current boss says: High sense of ownership...:) Keep it up.

**But this week, he started to tell me to relax......and take the day off.

I have been known to destroy something/anything because there is a blemish. A friendship, a relationship, .........., because it doesn't meet my idea of perfect, complete whole....so I strive and strive to meet that goal of perfect, being everywhere and doing everything.

When I say I want to do well, u know that I'm aiming for 100/100 for certain things...i get very sore if I don't do it. In the past, I preferred to fail a paper by not turning up instead of doing the paper at all....if I didn't study. Compulsive....I KNOWWWW *hides face*

Today, K.Ling told me that the first impression she had after she read an article about someone from HP dying due to overwork or excessive stress, the first person she thought about was me. :(

Hey...why do you have that perception of me....wait, let me correct myself, I think many people DO think that way of me....I better chill .....

Perfection...................Imperfection.................Perfection...............

Stress related rash and fever - do you believe?

If you had read my couple of post back, you would know that I was going through a really stressful period of time in Thailand. I think the worst thing that can happen to me is when I feel like I'm being wronged. It really ate me up.

During the worst periods of time during my trip in Thailand, my face would flush such a deep red in anger that my colleagues thought that I was going to have a sudden heart attack or die of high blood pressure. I knew I was really angry but did not know the impact that it was having on my body, I disregarded all the body symptoms that came with the stress.

I was so unhappy and the thought kept growing in my mind and though I didn't know it, people around me could hear me sign and occasionally, while I'm deep in thoughts, my face would turn a sudden deep red.

My mum could tell that something was really wrong the moment she heard my voice. And she flew down to Bangkok to make sure I would be okay. (Sigh! Aren't mum just great?) I tried to pretend everything was OK during the day but at the nights, I would get nightmares of endless, awful meetings and each time my heart would sink with disappointment or pound with frustration.

And then.............. I fell really really ill. It started off with a slight fever that came on and off. I ignored it and carried on at work and then in the evening, by the time I got back into the hotel room, an ugly rash had broken out all over my right arm. I tried to ignore it and continued to work on the computer trying to finish the work that I had to do and then the rash started to spread. over to the rest parts of the body. Feverish with bouts of diarrohea, I decided to call it a night and rest early and amazingly the rash stop spreading.

The next morning I had a meeting before heading to the airport and was really stressed by the time I boarded the plane and then I notice the rash had started to spread again. This time onto my face. I tried to sleep on the plane and calm myself with happy thoughts.

But when I landed in Singapore, I was in the car when my boss called me and after an hour of discussion, I felt more sick than ever. That very evening I had an asthma attack.

You might be wondering why I'm telling you all this. Well, I wanted to share with you that my doctor told me that when we get stressed, it lowers our immune system and allow our body to become more susceptible to viruses and bacterias. And though he believe that the rash is definitely stress related, the fever was due to the body fighting off some unknown virus.

I'm still having very bad diarrohea problems but this gave me quite a lot of time to think about my life and what I really want. I still think we need to work really hard at our jobs because we are paid to do the work but definitely not at the cost of my health. Still its easier said then done because though I'm on 2 days MC, I've been working all day today and tomorrow I will be going into the office for a few meetings.

This experience has made me a true believer that stress can do all those awful things to your mental health, physical health and its just not worth it. Really need to manage it better. The rash is clearing up with the medication but I had another bad dream. Some things are just out of our control. ..................

莫生氣

Recite to myself 20 times a day.

人生就像一場戲，因為有緣才相聚。
相扶到老不容易，是否更該去珍惜。
為了小事發脾氣，回頭想想又何必。
別人生氣我不氣，氣出病來無人替。
我若氣死誰如意，況且傷神又費力。
鄰居親朋不要比，兒孫瑣事由他去。
吃苦享樂在一起，神仙羨慕好伴侶。

人家气我, 我不气
我若生气, 中他计
我不生气, 他更气
其实何必, 来生气
气来气去, 没乐趣
何不笑笑, 消消气
解开心结, 让他去

Passed my Jap Exam..........

Something came in the post today.....*drum rolls* its my score report for my JLPT which stands for japanese language proficiency test.

Jamie's JLPT Score Report
Writing Vocab: (95/100) <- ABit disappointed because I thought I ACED it
Listening: (76/100) <- Super happy because I thought I had FAILED this paper. I couldn't hear what the damn radio was playing from the end of the room. (was sitting way at the back and on the side) hehe...that's an excuse, my listening is really damn kurang MAXIMUM so I know I got to work on that. So happy so happy i Passed.
Reading Grammar (170/200) <-K lah, couldn't remember the essay anymore.

So GRAND TOTAL IS 341/400.
That means PASSED! PASSED! PASSED! 合格! 合格! 合格!
Okay lar...considering the amount of effort I put in for my Jap paper....VELLIE GOOD ALREADY THAT I CAN PASS LOR!

So I should still be going for the next paper at the end of this year. Hope I can still be so lucky. *fingers crossed* Need to improve on my listening tho...its really baddddddddddddd - a fine excuse to watch more japanese drama serial *drroooolsss*. hehe.