Daily Lessons from Life 21 December 2009

21 December 2009 The New Paper "Aunt's death gave him new lease of life

IT TOOK the death of a beloved aunt to turn his life around.

Tan Ping Hau, used to be known as a 'pai kia' (Hokkien for bad boy) in school and barely passed any exams. But yesterday when the N Level results came out, he was second in his school with a score of 9!"

I always like a prodigal son turned good story. Unfortunately it sometimes take a tragic event to shock a complacent or indifferent person into re-evaluating his or her life and make good. I guessed it is better to be able to help oneself realized the fool hardy way without any tragic event happening but if it did take that event to turn around one's life for the better, the death will not be in vain. And the dead may actually be comforted!

Lessons for me are:

1. in the life journey, studying is just part of that long journey. If one focuses, it is not that difficult to turn around from a 'bad' student to a good one;

2. when tragedy struck that shook us to our cores, we will thoroughly reevaluate our life and our past behaviors. Sometimes we will continue to stick to the old bad way as the tragedy reinforced the fatalism of 'I cannot change anything'. Sometimes we will turn the sadness and sense of loss to 'I must change so that that tragedy did not happen in vain!'. It is up to us to decide how we want to respond;

3. in the bigger picture of life journey beyond academic pursuit, it is important to learn to appreciate what we have rather than to lament what we had lost. To cherish what we have rather than only craving for more. The past is history, the future is unknown, and the now is Present! What we learned from the past and do in the present will decide what type of future we will have!

Congratulation to the 'bad' boy turned good. May his aunt rest in peace and be comforted that he has responded positively. May he continue his journey with many more successes.