Let’s have disagreement!

Do you embrace disagreement?

If two men on the same job agree all the time, then one is useless. If they disagree all the time, then both are useless.
~Darryl F. Zanuck

The quote above is taken from the book Winning with People by John C. Maxwell. The book is sharing on how to find agreement in the middle of disagreement but I’m not going to talk about agreement here. I’m interested to share more about the first part of the quote. It’s about disagreement, why it is important and how to handle them.

Inspiration

Last week I had a chat with one of my “apprentice”. I am leading a small bible study group, and I was asking one of them for some feedback on the articles I have written. The feedback again was not satisfying. He mentioned that he disagreed on some of my points though he could not remember them. My first reaction: I was disappointed. Subsequently, I was reminded on the quote above. That reminded me that I should have embraced disagreement. The disagreement proves that my “apprentice” is not useless. And I should be grateful that he can express his disagreement.

So here are some lessons on disagreement I would like to share:
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Ten symptoms of having vision beyond yourself

Which one comes first? Helping ourselves or helping others?

Do you know the chicken and egg dilemma? Which one comes first, chicken or egg? That is a dilemma that has never been solved. And I find some similarity with our self-improvement process. Helping ourselves and helping others, which one comes first?

Should we help others in order to help ourselves?
The statement that Chris Melton from soupornuts.com shared, “In order to help yourself, you must help others. There’s no better long-term strategy to achieving your success.” That statement sounds like the “helping others” comes before “helping ourselves.”

But… shouldn’t we help ourselves before helping others?
The other quote that sounds to be contradicting, comes from Jack Welch, “Before you are a leader, success is all about growing yourself. When you become a leader, success is all about growing others.” Now it sounds as if the helping ourselves comes first before helping others.

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What is your motivation?

What is your motivation in life?

I read Abraham Maslow’s hierarchy of needs on Wikipedia while preparing for my last message, “When it comes to relationship, limitation sells“. There is one statement that caught my attention there…

Once an individual has moved upwards to the next level, needs in the lower level will no longer be prioritized.

One day I was sharing my new hobby to one of my friend. I shared my enthusiasm on blogging to him. And then I shared how I got to know many people through my blog. His reply is not as what I expected, it was a critical statement. In summary, he said that I will not find satisfaction there, as I will not know the people who I am relating to with my blog.

I believe many people has negative impression on befriending a person over the web, first reason is the vulnerability for not knowing who is the other person, and the second one is the lack of return, it seems impossible for the other person in helping/loving you back. These reasons are valid reasons, and that made me wonder for quite a while, “what if he is right?”, “what if nobody will help me because I no longer have any friend that is next to me?”, “what if one time all I have is only friends contactable by emails?”

His statement bugged me for quite a while, until one day I came to realization on how selfish that motive is. If the thing that takes me away from my passion in blogging is the fear of not having friends, then that will be a very selfish ambition!

Reflecting on my life, I got more understanding on how my motivation has changed over the past two years. The path that leads me to blogging, how I take a step over another step following the Maslow’s hierarchy of needs…

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When it comes to relationship, limitation “sells”

Does limitation “sell”?

This is the last article on this “Limitation & Advantages” series (check the previous articles at the bottom of the article). This time I’m going to share more about how limitation can “sell”.

Nowadays, selling is too much associated with things related to money; somehow “selling” is associated with an action of taking money from the other person. I’d like to introduce a better word that I found more accurate to be associated with “selling”, it’s called “relationship“.

In a relationship, we’re all selling. Lovers sell their rights to love and to be loved. Friends sell their time to care and help one another. Mentors sell their influence, while mentees sell their potential to be nurtured. Salaried employees sell their time, energy and intellectual property to the company they worked for. Bosses sell their company and vision to their staff. Entrepreneurs undoubtedly sell their products and services in the marketplace, while customers sell their money for the service and products they need. We’re basically selling whenever we deal with at least one person.

Selling does not have to include money; selling without money is called giving.
Selling is not all about our benefit as well, it is also about the others’ benefit.

The only nice thing about being imperfect is the joy it brings to others.

Doug Larson

The first question comes to my mind when I’m reading the quote, “Why does it bring joy to others?” My next thought: “Is it the joy of taking advantage of the others’ imperfection?” A narrow-minded person will think that others’ imperfection is an advantage; imperfection of others will make them looks better, or maybe a way to manipulate, deceive or win over the person. Yes, it is a sort of joy that others’ imperfection can bring for us, but it is a joy for a wrong reason, and hardly people will be really happy and successful with that kind of attitude, jealous and deceitful.

How does our imperfection become a joy for others, then? Here are the answers I found from various sources…

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Now you can consider your limitation as advantages

Have you ever considered your limitation as advantages?

This is the third message in the “Limitation & Advantages” series. The first message shared with you the big picture, the five steps how you can win with your limitations. In the message, I am not suggesting us to ignore our limitation. None of us is perfect and instead of resisting our limitation, we should be able to acknowledge and befriend them, that is the beginning of how we can overcome and stretch them.

You should notice that the tag line of this blog is “Turning limitation into advantages, helping introverts to be successful.” That message will be empty without any examples. The second message in this series, the 7 interesting (and useful) facts about my flaws, will help you to know me better, the struggle and limitations I have. Hopefully this message will also become an inspiration on how you can turn limitation into advantages.

This article will share with you the reasons why you can consider your limitation as advantages. I have divided them into two, this part will share their benefits for you and the next one will share their benefits in the relationships you have.

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The 7 interesting (and useful) facts about my flaws

Can you laugh over your flaws? How about considering them as your friend, interesting and helpful?

[This article is edited and republished for better clarity and structure, together with additional links and resources]

Two bloggers, David and Amy tagged me to share 7 strange/interesting facts about me. At first, I planned to put random facts, but eventually I wanted to write more, my story on turning limitation into advantages.

Mastery is attained by understanding our vulnerability and working with our situation.

Evan Hadkins (That Which Doesn’t Kill Us . . . Can Leave Us Maimed)

This is the second part of my series on turning limitation into advantages. The first part shared with you the five steps to win with your limitation, in short we have to acknowledge our limitations, own them, express them, turn them into advantages, and stretch them.

In this article, I will share my 7 flaws that many consider as limitations, but those are the ones that made our life interesting, not perfect but interesting.

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The five steps to win with your limitation

Do you have limitation?

I watched a TV program few weeks ago, it’s called I Journalist, an opportunity for amateur journalist to practice their journalism skill. The episode I watched that time is the struggle of someone with some kind of physical disability that troubled him to walk properly and to live a normal life. I can’t remember most parts of the show; but there is a statement that caught my attention while watching the show…

Everyone is disabled in a way, only that the physically disabled is more visible.

Sometimes I envy disabled person…

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In the pursuit of happiness…

My previous article -All you need to know to create your own happiness- has driven much traffic and readers. I’ve got a number of comments and thoughts that helps me reflect more on happiness. The list is truly far from complete… Here are some updated lessons on happiness that I have been collected from the comments, and some article that I found on the internet.

Alex Kay gives me a profound thought about not putting 10, but 7 or 9 as his scale of happiness. It is based on the explanation that he expected to learn more about happiness, a room for growth, to experience more happiness. I agreed with him that we all need to keep on learning to be happy, as all of us are actually in the pursuit of happiness.

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All you need to know to create your own happiness

How do you define happiness?

Many relate happiness with something they need to pursue and have. Many say that they need to have this and that to be happy.

But here is my finding about happiness, taken from Dan Gilbert video on TedTalk.

We synthesize happiness but we think happiness is a thing to be found.

Dan Gilbert

If I have to define happiness, it is not something that you need to find somewhere; happiness is an option of your response to your circumstances. Happiness is your choice, not what the circumstances give you. Happiness is something you can synthesize…

How can you synthesize happiness?

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Dating Introvert: Eight ways to become an attractive woman

I’ve done with the men’s part and now I’m getting into the women’s part. What you need to do in getting a date?

Okay, it is not as if I am promoting girls to be aggressive, taking the first step, asking guys out, and so on. I am not against that, it’s only that some guys will be turned off by all that. You will be seen as an aggressive woman, and men, who are normally having a bigger ego, will be trying to run away from you.

Girls, what you need to do is being an attractive person. This is a proactive step you can take. Yup, beauty and size does matter for guys, but it is actually more than that.

I will prove my point with the following points from Bo Sanchez’s book, How to find your one true love. This article will give you few of the insights from his book on finding your one true love. His ministry in Philippine has helped many men and women in their love and relationship life. You can find his website here and you can also buy the e-book from there.

There are 8 points I want to share in this article, inspired by Bo’s book, the 8 ways how you women can become attractive to men…

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Popularity: 50% [?]

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