Wake up smiling everyday
The story of businessman and the fisherman
There was once a businessman standing on the beach in a small fishing village. Looking out to sea, he noticed a local fisherman rowing his boat to shore. The businessman was impressed by all the fat, fresh fish that the fisherman had caught.
When the fisherman arrived on land, the businessman complimented his catch. Yet he was curious.
“How long does it take you to catch your fish?” he asked.
“About a few hours,” the fisherman replied.
“So why don’t you go out and catch more?” the businessman asked.
“I have more than enough to feed my family,” he fisherman…
Goofy comedies and a drug lord can show you what it means to be human
Humans are complex creatures.
We’re selfish, self absorbed and materialistic, compassionate, intelligent, and vulnerable. We’re raw and happy. We’re wrapped inside our own little world for most of our lives. It’s easy to forget what it’s like to be human — to be empathetic to other people’s suffering, to be sympathetic to other people’s pain, and what our purpose in life is. Society tells us who to be and what to achieve.
Rarely do they ever show us how to be human.
These shows are different. …
Make sure you’re prepared to handle the consequences
Women empowerment is all about knowing and promoting your own self-worth. It’s about exercising your right to make your own decisions and fight for what you believe in. Unfortunately, society hasn’t made it easy for women to have confidence in their own decision-making or in themselves. It seems like we fight and fight just to come to an impasse.
Women empowerment isn’t always collective. We can’t fight for women's equality without fighting for our own empowerment first. That starts with our everyday decisions. Women always have to make split-second decisions. …
The gentrification of Mahjong teaches a valuable lesson on the importance of professional copywriting
Click. Click. Click.
That’s the sound of Chinese tradition being played across generations, a game that grandkids can play with their grandparents. A game passed down from their ancestors and their ancestors before them. The swooshing of the tiles on the velvety green table is mesmerizing, as are the hands doing the swooshing.
Mahjong is a Chinese game. But more importantly, it’s a game filled with Chinese heritage and culture. Not many games have stood the test of time like Mahjong. …
Courtesy of Jeff Goins’ The Art of Work: A Proven Path to Discovering What You Were Meant to Do
“In each experience, we find certain truths we might otherwise miss”
Every day is a new experience in which we can learn something about ourselves.
The smallest task can often teach us the biggest lessons about ourselves about who we are and who we want to be. Pay attention to these small but significant moments.
“Sometimes the route to our purpose is a chaotic experience, and how we respond matters more than what happens to us.”
Things happen to us all the time. Both good and bad. And sometimes to the point where our lives feel totally out of our…
Some women locked themselves in their homes when they received their love note
When you think of romance, Italy automatically comes to mind. Few countries can compare to the breathtaking beauty of Italy. Spain isn’t far behind. So when Fiat decided to send 50,000 love letters to women all over Spain to advertise Fiat’s new Cinquecento (Fiat Five Hundred), it seemed like the perfect marketing campaign for the Italian carmaker.
The anonymous and personalized love letters were sent to 50,000 women in Spain, all written on pink paper. The campaign was aimed at “the independent, modern working woman.”
The amorous love letter read:
“Yesterday we saw each other again. We met on the…
The Coast Guard couldn’t tell the difference between a head, a life jacket, and balloons
It was September 27, 1986. The weather forecast predicted rain for Cleveland that day but they couldn’t postpone an event that was six months in the making.
The idea was to break a Guinness World Record by releasing the largest number of balloons into the air, a record set by Disney the previous year when they released 1.2 million balloons in celebration of their 30th anniversary.
The goal was to raise funds for the United Way of Cleveland and repaint Cleveland as one of the up-and-coming cities.
It was dubbed Balloonfest ’86.
A giant net the size of a city…
Which is why I quit my habit of desperately counting the change
It’s 7am. I walk groggily to the kitchen, brew a cup of coffee, do some stretches, grab breakfast and head over to my laptop.
I don’t check my emails the first thing in the morning, instead I head over to the Medium page and click on the top right corner of the page.
How much did I make yesterday? What were my views? Did my articles get curated?
Check, check, check — dismal, crappy, and okay.
It’s a routine that crept up on me since Medium introduced daily earnings reports.
In April, I started to wean myself off of this…
The power of peace within yourself cannot be underestimated
When you feel out of balance, life can feel chaotic. Compassion and balance can seem elusive and you never have a grasp of your priorities. Instead of practicing self-care, you’re caring for others…all the time. When our life is out of balance with our desires, we’re left feeling drained instead of invigorated. Realignment of our lives can be difficult especially if we’ve lived the same life for too long.
When I think of balance and compassion, the first leader that comes to mind is his Holiness the 14th Dalai Lama, Tenzin Gyatso. He is Tibet’s spiritual leader. While he sees…
And it was all over spilled milk
This was the third time my son filled his mouth with milk and spit it out. It was all over his shirt, counter, and the floor. I hate this new found hobby of his. I usually take his cup away after the first time but he didn’t have much dinner and I wanted to make sure he had some milk before heading off to bed. After my third and last time of cleaning up milk , I grabbed his bottle angrily and threw it in the sink. Milk got everywhere which meant I had even more milk to clean up.
…
Alice Vuong
Living life imperfectly and as creatively as possible.
