The Feeding Years
Behind every great man or woman, there is a mentor, a teacher, a buddy, a spouse or a trainer - one who made the difference in his or her direction in life, be it the direction, the career or the destination.
It could be through inspiration, motivation or passion, or the disciplined, guidance and actual lessons that was passed on from the older to the young, the senior to the junior, the teacher to the student, the trainer to the champion. He or she was there to nurture, develop, encourage, teach, guide and train his disciple or pupil.
A parent - whether father or mother certainly contributes to the foundation of this great person, whether genetically through the genes, or through the growing years. The parent's input, whether by example or by words of wisdom, even hands-on teaching and guidance, passing on from father to son, perhaps was the way in which certain trades and skills pass on. Dad or mum definitely wants his or her child to grow up successful, learning from his or her mistakes, taking off where they left, venturing into greater heights, newer territories, crossing frontiers and markets, even beyond where they have never tread upon.
The wise parent goes beyond his own ability, knowing his or her own skill or knowledge is limited. They source for a teacher, a trainer, a tutor, a centre or an institution where their child can receive the best teaching, education, exposure and guidance towards producing a new breed for the next generation.
The eaglet thus remains under the mother and father's wings for up to four years. Four long years of nurturing, feeding, sheltering is a long time, far longer than most animals, fishes or even birds. Yet, those are necessary years - to groom a leader, a prince and the master of the skies. Once the training years are over, they soar to the skies totally free and independent, often never to return again. A new family is formed. when eagle junior flies off and finds his mate.
If the eaglet takes four years, the young man or woman should not take any less. Four years is a good time to allow growth, development and maturity in all areas. Four years, however, can fly by in no time, if we fly around without a clear purpose, direction and destination.
Let this day be the first day of your own four year plan. Your life begins today, whether you are ten, twenty, thirty, forty, fifty, sixty or even seventy. Moses led the Israelites out of Egypt at the age of eighty. Don't retire now. Retire tomorrow.
You will discover and realise that one can learn many new skills simultaneously. Indeed, you can learn several skills and even several languages at the same time. One also is never too old to learn. We need not have to wait until we have mastered one skill before going on to another. So, begin now! Write down what you want to achieve from 2006 to 2009, so that by 2010 you will be accomplished in something you are raw at this moment.
Yes, you can learn three, four or even five languages simultaneously just as you can learn to use the Internet, play tennis, do horse-riding, learn to sing, play the keyboard, learn to drive, learn to swim, and pick up bird-watching simultaneously. Why not? That is exactly what students do - take up several subjects and activities simultaneously. Your brain has the capacity to do it, if you have the time and the passion.
The key is to search your heart, understand your heart's desires and passions and plan and organise the next four years. How do you do it?
Firstly, list out four or five new goals for a start, beginning now for 2006. Focus on these and ensure you make good progress for each. Once, these new studies or programmes have taken off, you may consider beginning another and another, 6 months or a year later.
For example, you are poor at ten-pin bowling at this moment. You have decided that you will improve and become a good bowler. You can. There is a price that you have to pay, though. Find a good teacher or trainer and set aside the time to bowl, twice a week for example - to bowl 4-6 games per session. In four years, you will be an above average bowler, not yet a champion, but you will certainly know how to deliver strikes and convert to spares.
At the same time, you have decided to take up archery, singing, painting and two other languages e.g. Japanese and French. That makes a total of six new skills in four years.
Archery may only need a tutor for a few sessions and practice once a week and subsequently once a month - just for the fun of it. In four years, you will be pretty good in archery.
Yes, you croak in the shower. You can hardly hit a note right. Your singing teacher will take you through the basics of voice control, correct breathing and when you keep singing along wherever you go, in the shower, in the car, at the karaoke lounge, you will improve. In four years, you will be a competent singer, not a star, but certainly able to go on stage, belt a few songs and entertain friends.
Painting has been your life-long passion. You want to be a good oil-painter. Do it the right way. Find a proper school. Set up a studio at home. Get the right tools. Learn the basics from a good teacher. Visit art exhibitions. Talk to painters and artists. Learn from teacher to teacher. After four years, you would have learnt the basics and am now ready to fly, to develop your own skills, while you continue to learn.
If it was just a hobby, you can be contented to cruise along. If the passion is accompanied by talent, after another four years, you may be holding your own exhibition, with your own unique style. It may take you another ten years, before you have mastered the art. With natural ability and good basics learnt from the masters, you can soar and go higher and higher.
By now, you can see and understand that learning a new language is just as easy and straightforward, if you learn it the right way. Remember, it is called one's `mother's tongue' when you learn it from young. Find a good teacher, whose mother's tongue is the language you are embarking to learn. In four years, with a good teacher at a pace of once a week or even once a fortnight, and many hours of listening to the mother tongue, you will be able to speak with the right accent and possess enough skill to communicate with another fellow Japanese or French man or woman. Language takes a long time to master for anyone. The professor in English may have taken 20 to 30 years to master and teach the language.
If you still have the interest and desire to go further in either language, you can rise and soar even higher. After ten years, you have arrived as a proficient speaker, able to read and write the language. It will take another ten years before you master it. So too, for everyone - a good twenty years to master any language.
Hence, do not be discouraged, dear eagle. You can arrive at a good level of proficiency in four years. You will of course need many more years to master your skill and grow in knowledge. Tiger Woods took fifteen years to reach a high level of mastery of golf. He took the next five years to continue to reach the peak in the world and he continues to improve as everyone else follows in their own pace of development and improvement.
That is life, dear eagle. Continue to grow. Feeding is about taking milk and meat - growing in muscles, skills and knowledge - not miserable fat and sheer kilos in weight.
These are the feeding or growing years. When carefully planned with the right talent and skills, we see success, exemplified by a new Tiger Woods. There is no short cut in this walk or path. You decide to start on a new route. You have a destination. You begin your walk, with a guide and teacher, who has been there before. You trudge along, through the forest, the thick rough, the potholes, streams and rivers and finally reach your destination. You made it with perseverance and practice. under the watchful guidance of a teacher, a trainer, an expert.
Good nutritious food with the right exercises, under a good trainer produces a great body, with the right muscles, toned up, skilled and capable for the specific tasks ahead.
Be an eagle in the area of your interest or skill. Make a choice or make choices. You can start from zero. Be it in writing, tennis, squash, salsa dancing, horse-riding, sailing, fishing, gardening, carpentry, aikido, knitting, cooking, flower arrangements - in almost anything. The same applies for knowledge. You can become very knowledgeable in a certain area or field, if you begin to read and research around a specific area. You will certainly be more well read than the man next door. You will probably know enough to write a PhD thesis in four years. Decide on it and take it up today. You will not be the same fowl four years from now.
You have not entered ministry. You are regular attending services, but have yet to take up Bible studies seriously. Search your heart. Four years can make a difference. Enrol in an online Bible degree course, or take up study on your own seriously. In four years, with the right tutor and guidance, you can become an accomplished believer in the faith, well grounded in the Word, ready for ministry. Indeed, every believer should be and can be equipped by his church in a four year period, to be ready for His Majesty's Service.
The well-fed, well-nourished eagle is ready for take off.
Page 10
It could be through inspiration, motivation or passion, or the disciplined, guidance and actual lessons that was passed on from the older to the young, the senior to the junior, the teacher to the student, the trainer to the champion. He or she was there to nurture, develop, encourage, teach, guide and train his disciple or pupil.
A parent - whether father or mother certainly contributes to the foundation of this great person, whether genetically through the genes, or through the growing years. The parent's input, whether by example or by words of wisdom, even hands-on teaching and guidance, passing on from father to son, perhaps was the way in which certain trades and skills pass on. Dad or mum definitely wants his or her child to grow up successful, learning from his or her mistakes, taking off where they left, venturing into greater heights, newer territories, crossing frontiers and markets, even beyond where they have never tread upon.
The wise parent goes beyond his own ability, knowing his or her own skill or knowledge is limited. They source for a teacher, a trainer, a tutor, a centre or an institution where their child can receive the best teaching, education, exposure and guidance towards producing a new breed for the next generation.
The eaglet thus remains under the mother and father's wings for up to four years. Four long years of nurturing, feeding, sheltering is a long time, far longer than most animals, fishes or even birds. Yet, those are necessary years - to groom a leader, a prince and the master of the skies. Once the training years are over, they soar to the skies totally free and independent, often never to return again. A new family is formed. when eagle junior flies off and finds his mate.
If the eaglet takes four years, the young man or woman should not take any less. Four years is a good time to allow growth, development and maturity in all areas. Four years, however, can fly by in no time, if we fly around without a clear purpose, direction and destination.
Let this day be the first day of your own four year plan. Your life begins today, whether you are ten, twenty, thirty, forty, fifty, sixty or even seventy. Moses led the Israelites out of Egypt at the age of eighty. Don't retire now. Retire tomorrow.
You will discover and realise that one can learn many new skills simultaneously. Indeed, you can learn several skills and even several languages at the same time. One also is never too old to learn. We need not have to wait until we have mastered one skill before going on to another. So, begin now! Write down what you want to achieve from 2006 to 2009, so that by 2010 you will be accomplished in something you are raw at this moment.
Yes, you can learn three, four or even five languages simultaneously just as you can learn to use the Internet, play tennis, do horse-riding, learn to sing, play the keyboard, learn to drive, learn to swim, and pick up bird-watching simultaneously. Why not? That is exactly what students do - take up several subjects and activities simultaneously. Your brain has the capacity to do it, if you have the time and the passion.
The key is to search your heart, understand your heart's desires and passions and plan and organise the next four years. How do you do it?
Firstly, list out four or five new goals for a start, beginning now for 2006. Focus on these and ensure you make good progress for each. Once, these new studies or programmes have taken off, you may consider beginning another and another, 6 months or a year later.
For example, you are poor at ten-pin bowling at this moment. You have decided that you will improve and become a good bowler. You can. There is a price that you have to pay, though. Find a good teacher or trainer and set aside the time to bowl, twice a week for example - to bowl 4-6 games per session. In four years, you will be an above average bowler, not yet a champion, but you will certainly know how to deliver strikes and convert to spares.
At the same time, you have decided to take up archery, singing, painting and two other languages e.g. Japanese and French. That makes a total of six new skills in four years.
Archery may only need a tutor for a few sessions and practice once a week and subsequently once a month - just for the fun of it. In four years, you will be pretty good in archery.
Yes, you croak in the shower. You can hardly hit a note right. Your singing teacher will take you through the basics of voice control, correct breathing and when you keep singing along wherever you go, in the shower, in the car, at the karaoke lounge, you will improve. In four years, you will be a competent singer, not a star, but certainly able to go on stage, belt a few songs and entertain friends.
Painting has been your life-long passion. You want to be a good oil-painter. Do it the right way. Find a proper school. Set up a studio at home. Get the right tools. Learn the basics from a good teacher. Visit art exhibitions. Talk to painters and artists. Learn from teacher to teacher. After four years, you would have learnt the basics and am now ready to fly, to develop your own skills, while you continue to learn.
If it was just a hobby, you can be contented to cruise along. If the passion is accompanied by talent, after another four years, you may be holding your own exhibition, with your own unique style. It may take you another ten years, before you have mastered the art. With natural ability and good basics learnt from the masters, you can soar and go higher and higher.
By now, you can see and understand that learning a new language is just as easy and straightforward, if you learn it the right way. Remember, it is called one's `mother's tongue' when you learn it from young. Find a good teacher, whose mother's tongue is the language you are embarking to learn. In four years, with a good teacher at a pace of once a week or even once a fortnight, and many hours of listening to the mother tongue, you will be able to speak with the right accent and possess enough skill to communicate with another fellow Japanese or French man or woman. Language takes a long time to master for anyone. The professor in English may have taken 20 to 30 years to master and teach the language.
If you still have the interest and desire to go further in either language, you can rise and soar even higher. After ten years, you have arrived as a proficient speaker, able to read and write the language. It will take another ten years before you master it. So too, for everyone - a good twenty years to master any language.
Hence, do not be discouraged, dear eagle. You can arrive at a good level of proficiency in four years. You will of course need many more years to master your skill and grow in knowledge. Tiger Woods took fifteen years to reach a high level of mastery of golf. He took the next five years to continue to reach the peak in the world and he continues to improve as everyone else follows in their own pace of development and improvement.
That is life, dear eagle. Continue to grow. Feeding is about taking milk and meat - growing in muscles, skills and knowledge - not miserable fat and sheer kilos in weight.
These are the feeding or growing years. When carefully planned with the right talent and skills, we see success, exemplified by a new Tiger Woods. There is no short cut in this walk or path. You decide to start on a new route. You have a destination. You begin your walk, with a guide and teacher, who has been there before. You trudge along, through the forest, the thick rough, the potholes, streams and rivers and finally reach your destination. You made it with perseverance and practice. under the watchful guidance of a teacher, a trainer, an expert.
Good nutritious food with the right exercises, under a good trainer produces a great body, with the right muscles, toned up, skilled and capable for the specific tasks ahead.
Be an eagle in the area of your interest or skill. Make a choice or make choices. You can start from zero. Be it in writing, tennis, squash, salsa dancing, horse-riding, sailing, fishing, gardening, carpentry, aikido, knitting, cooking, flower arrangements - in almost anything. The same applies for knowledge. You can become very knowledgeable in a certain area or field, if you begin to read and research around a specific area. You will certainly be more well read than the man next door. You will probably know enough to write a PhD thesis in four years. Decide on it and take it up today. You will not be the same fowl four years from now.
You have not entered ministry. You are regular attending services, but have yet to take up Bible studies seriously. Search your heart. Four years can make a difference. Enrol in an online Bible degree course, or take up study on your own seriously. In four years, with the right tutor and guidance, you can become an accomplished believer in the faith, well grounded in the Word, ready for ministry. Indeed, every believer should be and can be equipped by his church in a four year period, to be ready for His Majesty's Service.
The well-fed, well-nourished eagle is ready for take off.
Page 10
posted by DrTim Sng at 4:57 AM
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