Do you believe in 4D?

My mother is a housewife. She has never held a full-time job after she was married as her hands were full with looking after her brood of children. Later when we were reached our teenage years and were old enough to look after ourselves, she would take on house cleaning job occassionally. Not anymore now as age catches up with her alongside with age-related ailments.

I remembered mum like most other Singaporeans, would bet a dollar or two on 4D with dreams of strucking it big. Being a mathematician, I am too logical to believe in 4Ds. Yes, you may win one big prize but the temptation of winning again will make one plough back all the winnings. In the long run, Singapore Pools is the one laughing to the bank.

The Alternate 4D-way to Success

However, I have my own version of 4D which I learnt from a fellow Toastmaster Ramana. Ramana has just completed his project 10 of the Competent Communicator manual and he will be conferred the title "Competent Communicator" for this accomplishment. The 4Ds are:

1. D- Desire
2. D- Decision
3. D- Determination
4. D- Destination

I agree with Ramana that this set of 4Ds is the secret of success to anything that one wants to do. It is especially poignant now when I compare my emotional state of mind in the past and now when dealing with challenges.

In the past which was more than 5 years ago, I would feel so stressed out that I could not think. Even when I was thinking, my mind was filled with negative emotions. In short, I was thinking about why was life so unfair to me. No longer, I come to realise that while I could not change the cards that I am dealt, I could change the way I play the cards. Some may say that the hard fact of life is that sometimes, bad things happen to good people. I beg to differ believe that things happen to me for a reason. These things happened to me because they are there to make me a stronger person that I was yesterday.

This belief helps to cultivate the habit of persistence which is an insurance against failure. No matter how many times one is defeated, one finally arrives up toward the top of the ladder. Failure is never final as long as one keeps trying.