CSF Journals

This is precisely what the CSF Journals are about, the perceptions, actions and reflections of my life that has led me to start a Community Service First initiative as my contribution to humanity. This is a series of journals incorporating my interest to Connect, Synergize and Futurize with the community or communities that I can be of assistance. Let me share with you my feelings right at this moment of life. As I scan my brain and my heart of years of accumulated thoughts and feelings, my output is as follows : My life has been one of continuous learning, appreciating, improving and sharing. Learning helps me improve my thinking while appreciating helps me improve my feelings. Thinking and Feeling develops my Perception which when shared to the world comes in the form of my Actions in life. Reflections serve as a sharpening exercise from the feedback that is received which can further improve my thinking and feelings so that a cycle of Perception, Action and Reflection can be...

I remember the world that I was first introduced to. It was a safe place where I had caring parents who seem to take care of everything in the world that I lived. The world then was the home in which I lived where I had learnt the basics of life. From the baby cot to the boundary of the house, I grew progressively to connect to all that is around me. Much of my learning seemed to be of the unconscious kind in the sense that I wasn’t receiving formal instructions but through my own senses, I began to pick up certain patterns that became not only useful for me but made the world regard me as more intelligent. I guess my first cry as a baby must have been a sign of relief for the person who delivered me as well as my parents to know that I was going to be a normal child who could express himself. My connectivity with my parents, siblings and others around me in my home soon helped me picked up a more formal language of communication. I had learnt not just the English language but severa...

The formula Performance = Abilities + Circumstances + Motivation rings true for many in life. It appeared that my natural abilities were not useful when I had to leave home to be formally educated. My development was slow in the beginning as it took time for me to adjust from my natural way of learning to one that was based on tests or the punishment and reward system, which never motivated me then nor to this day. I remember the strict school that I was transferred to where at every year end, the school principal would have all the classes in the same level to assemble in the school hall. The names of the top students would be called and they would appear in front of everyone to receive a standing ovation. Then when all the clapping was over, the boy who failed the most subjects and was last in position in the whole level would be called to appear. He would receive a stroke of the cane from the principal for every subject he failed. For some reason, this boy who wore a turban, bein...

Before we were born, we were already connected physically to our mothers through an umbilical cord for food and nourishment. In another sense, we are connected to our parents through our genetic inheritance of numerous characteristics of our race so whether we have brown or blue eyes is a matter of our connection to our ancestry. Great grandfather on the left and his great-grandson on the right  Even in the womb, we are connected with the outside world as any polluted food, water or air through our mothers’ intake inevitably comes to us. How about the variety of stimuli that we could feel as we are connected to our mothers? Imagine the dreams, happiness, and joy together with the anxieties, fears, and apprehensions of our mothers that could be possibly felt by us through our connectivity? After we are born, nature and nurture continue to influence our characters. Both the conscious and subconscious mind is fed with a host of information first through our interaction with fam...

My research on Optimal Performance and Thinking finally connected to the topic of Energy and here is the simple explanation. If we want to analyze anything, we need to break down the matter to more details to understand the detailed processes involved. What can be more detailed than the understanding of subatomic particles? Most would think that the source of the energy in our bodies is a process of chemistry within. We think of the metabolism or break down of the food we eat to become energy to be stored or used for our body needs. I remember vividly in my chemistry class at school in the mid-70s that we were taught the Periodic Table at school. This was my first introduction to the understanding that chemical elements were made up of atoms, the basic unit of matter. These elements were further made up of protons, neutrons and electrons and the Periodic Table was a ranking of the number of protons each element possessed in its nucleus. It didn't mean much to us as students then ...

Living in a world of change seems chaotic for most with a doomsday belief for some. Some go to the extent of being a suicide bomber to kill others and themselves as a solution to the problems they are facing. To me, the energy level in the person could have been put to better use for if he could live for another 5 years to help change lives for the better, he would certainly have contributed far more than taking his own life. On the other extreme, most would have energy levels applied only to preserve themselves. They carry on with the status quo, believing that they must take care of themselves first. They will stick to what was good for them in the past thinking it will continue to be good for them today and the future. In a world of continuous change, such beliefs are only fatalistic not only for themselves but also others. The truth is if we do not change to improve ourselves, the tide of change will wipe us out like a Tsunami. Now let it be clear that I am not against anyone w...

When I was assaulted by 4 men, on 7th June 2008, who were operators of a bus company in Kuala Lumpur, I learnt about the fears in the streets of our community. (Refer to Familylane ) From the rude bus operators who behaved like gangsters in ushering passengers around, it was no wonder that after I was bashed up, I could not get anyone present there to be my witness of the incident. I personally appealed to them one by one, be it a young or old man and even a religious woman with her hair traditionally covered. None would nod their head to indicate a desire to assist me. My own boys in the bus of course were willing to help especially my youngest who was surprisingly calm and said he would be a willing witness. But when my oldest boy gave out a loud cry of trauma as I sought his help to translate to an older mandarin speaking man for his help, I knew the air was tensed with waves of anxiety and fear. I must add that coming out of the bus itself when I was finally allowed to, I must h...

See I have observed that fear is a big culprit of our subconscious minds. I’ve noted that fear can do one of two things to one who is conscious of the fear or has it hidden in the subconcious. First is that it can paralyze the person, making the person fear further in repeating an action or weakens the individual to feel it’s a waste of time to do anything to change the circumstances even if it involves carrying out a non-related action. Apathy is the result of what you get with fears in our subconscious minds. On the other hand, for more action orientated personalities, fear can invoke anger in these individuals which if not controlled by thought results in violence. Fear narrows the mind to a fight or flight mentality, thinking there are only two choices when there could be a third or more. That is why educated people, who in my opinion have had education gone through them instead of just having gone through education, will find themselves in a more optimal state to do something ...

Fear can be said to be part of an automated response system built into our being for a good purpose and generally that is to prevent Man from hurting himself when confronted with a situation where the body senses there is a danger. Faith on the other hand I perceive is not something that is part of an automated response system but involves a higher faculty of the mind, especially for adults. Why I say especially for adults is that for children, faith seems to come naturally when their higher faculties of the mind are not mature yet. Yet they seem to exercise childlike faith but that is attributed mainly to the fact that they are new in experiencing the world and in learning. Therefore they develop a natural faith to accept what is new with little knowledge or experience of fear. It is through time that fear develops as children personally experience danger or are conditioned by the parents to fear many things that they have not experienced personally yet so that they will be more care...

The last two decades have produced more research on the brain and more new brain technologies than all the discoveries of the past. Current research shows the brain is physically shaped by the interaction among genes, the environment and experience. The debate about whether a child’s brain is shaped by genes(nature) or by experience(nurture) is over. “It’s both. And the truth is in the interaction,” said neuroscientist Judy Cameron, a member of the National Scientific Council on the Developing Child (NSCDC), in the perspective “Stress, Neural Systems, and Genetic Code.” (2006) The NSCDC says, “The brain is composed of billions of highly integrated sets of neural circuits (i.e., connections among brain cells) that are ‘wired’ under the interactive influences of genetics, environment and experience.” (2007 Report) While brain circuits shaped through early experiences retain “plasticity” and “may adapt their architecture, at least partially, to experience in adulthood,” later interventio...

I was born a year after the independence of Malaysia. I was therefore nurtured in an environment where I enjoyed a freedom that was part of my life in Malaysia.  I had also traveled to other parts of what they call the 'free world'. In my teens in the winter of 1976, I had a chance to back pack in Europe, which was an eye opener. I took Aeroflot, a Russian airline which transited in Moscow in the then 'communist world' that we knew. It gave me a short glimpse of what the not so free world would be. After that mind opening trip to Europe, I would spend another 3 years in a land of nature and freedom of Australia for my tertiary education. After going home to raise a family and begin my professional career in the business world for the next 30 years where the United States was the key country of my visits besides doing business in busy Asia. I believe my accumulated experience gave me a good grounding of what it is like to be in the democratic and capitalist world. B...

(To auto scroll to the bottom, click here. ) The beauty in the basics of democracy is that there is mutual respect, ability to enjoy harmony in diversity and to agree to disagree. What is theory is of course not always the same in practice but in the case of Malaysia, I must say that the freedom I experienced living in what the world regards as a developing country is comparable even to some of the advanced democratic countries of the world. When I talk about freedom, I'm specifically referring to freedom of mind to believe what I choose to believe in, freedom to move around freely and safely in the country and with a freedom to chose my vocation and lifestyle with a choice of goods and services available in most other countries and perhaps even more. My feelings that the freedom I had experienced in Malaysia is comparable to America was shared in an early day post here.  I stated that perhaps the well-defined laws in the US created the environment of mutual respe...