Murphy's Notes

Today, we begin a mini-series on the utopian school system. The first school that a child is exposed to is the home school. Unfortunately, many home schools are not effective, leading to a one-sided education for most children. In this note, I share a personal experience of how my childhood environment and family shaped my life. I also share some suggestions on decision adjustments that we can make today to improve the effectiveness of the home schools of which we would be in charge in the future.

You’re never truly independent until you’re financially independent. This note is a sequel from last week. Most people do not realise that you can “lose your voice” if you’re dependent on someone outside of yourself for your basic needs. In today’s note, we talk about some steps you can take to retain your voice for the long term whether you’re young or old.

Slight correction from the video "Passive income DOES require upfront work...". I was speaking fast 🙂🙂

A lot of people are living their lives according to a script. The challenge is that there are some inherent flaws in the script that a lot of people do not realise until it’s too late. You won’t be working 9 to 5 your entire life. Do you have a solid retirement plan? If your pension or retirement benefits are your sole retirement plan, you might need to think again. Today’s note is food for thought. Next week, we’ll try to dig a little deeper.

We've always been encouraged to work hard. Hardwork is good, but you may be working hard on the wrong things. Sometimes, you need to apply a few principles and optimise processes to get better results with greater efficiency, less time, and less work.

As a kid, I thought I’d bag all the degrees and then start life. What I did not realise was that things do not really follow a definite sequence that way; it's all a mix. In this episode, we emphasise that beyond degrees, it's important to commit to lifelong learning.

Have you ever thought deeply about the rationale behind employing people based on their years of experience? Well… Experience is not always a result of years. You can put in more years on paper but you’re less experienced in practice. In this note, we talk about the various factors that might make a student to outgrow their mentor or teacher. We also emphasise that it’s important for students and mentors to work together, complementing each other’s strengths.

Welcome to Season 3 of Murphy's notes. On this note, we do a recap of some of the highlights from season two. Hope you enjoy this 10-minute summary.

Life is in phases and what works well in one phase may be your greatest undoing beyond a certain point. It's important to identify when a phase is over and adjust for the new phase. A safety belt today could be a trap tomorrow. Know when to unstrap!

While it is good to emulate people and draw inspiration from them, we must be wary of trying to be someone else. Oscar Wilde rightly said “Be yourself, everyone else is taken!”. You can never be the best version of anyone else but yourself. Embrace your uniqueness and ensure that you do not simply copy and paste someone else’s template blindly.