Life is too short to be arrogant.
人生は、傲慢でいるには短すぎる。
The easiest way to let people leave you is to be arrogant. The price of being arrogant is WAY too high.
Stay humble whenever possible. It doesn’t take anything from you.
Whatever you think, write it down.
あらゆる考えを書き留めよう。
I’ve seen many people saying, “Well, let me think about it.” But their outcome is often quite similar (if not the same) with what they said before thinking about it.
We human beings tend to think the same thing over and over again. Especially about bad things. This is how our ancestors survived for millions of years — if they didn’t focus on bad things, most of our ancestors would have been killed by other animals.
But now, this tendency does not always give us an ideal outcome because we have many choices. There are millions of ways to make something happen or avoid something happening. In order to get a better outcome, we have to stop our brain going around the same place.
Always carry a notebook and pen (or whatever you can write) with you. Write your thought down whenever it comes up. Or draw an image in your brain. Then forget it and think about other things.
The more you think and write down, the more likely you come up with better idea.
Observe the context around you.
周りの状況を観察しよう。
In business, people just don’t always talk about the facts. They often talk about part of them in an indirect way.
If your boss says to you, “Can you please show me your presentation before submitting it to our big boss? I think I can help you on that”, you might expect your boss to make your presentation much better. And that might be true in a sense. But in many cases, your boss is also keen to check if you don’t screw up and wants to make himself or herself look good from your big boss.
You shouldn’t take it personal, like “Oh my boss doesn’t trust me”. Because your boss is not lying. It’s about the context your boss is in. Or the context your boss wants to live with.
You are just part of their context. Observe and understand what it is. Then figure out how you work on it.
It doesn’t mean that you need to sacrifice yourself. Just enjoy the situation. Try an improvisation when you can. See closely how other people act around you. It gives you a lot of insights to better understand why people say what they are saying and why people do what they are doing.
In business, you always need to play a certain role. Enjoy the play and utilize the experience to make you a better person.
Never be lazy in what matters to you.
自分にとって大事なことには手を抜かない。
“Why don’t you speak more in English?”
About 10 years ago, my American colleague asked me while we were drinking beer at the bar in Kuala Lumpur. “I don’t like speaking in front of people”, I said.
That was not true. I lied to him. I just didn’t want to make any mistakes when I speak English — my second language. That feeling paralyzed me and prevented me from speaking English at that time.
I still feel scared when I speak or write English because of the fear of making mistakes. Even now. Because there are people who judge someone by the accuracy in using English (or whatever) language.
And I hate mistakes although I almost always make some kind of mistakes. When someone kindly points out my mistakes, I always feel ashamed and inferior after thanking for their kindness.
Is it a perfectionism? Probably.
The good thing is though, it forces me to learn English as if I were six years old. I just want to be better. Much much better. I can never get lazy.
Get out of a small world.
小さい世界から出よう。
When I was a kid living in a rural area, my dream was to live in a big city. So I decided to go to college in a metropolitan area.
After I lived in a big city for years, living abroad became my next dream. I didn’t know how at that time, but a few years later, I happened to have an opportunity to work in the United States.
I traveled around the world. There are still zillions of places I haven’t visited yet, but now there are people who work on taking human beings to Mars. It would be great if I could go and live there someday.
It is easy to imagine or talk about something big. When we actually see or touch it, we’ll see it’s completely a different story.
Go outside of where you are now. Create an opportunity by yourself if no one gives it to you. See how the outer world is. It can be an experience that changes your view forever.
