Can do

The Asian culture is all about following rules and obeying the authority. A typical asian family is also structured this way with the father as the absolute power and someone to respect, but never love and become friends with. That is why, it took me until now to finally breakout of that mindset. Today, after successfully putting together a ventilation system for the cat’s litter box, I realized that I never once thought of the system failing and it did indeed succeed.

It was only last year that I still hold doubts about myself as is evident in the project to install my first door. When the worker at Home Depot told me what I wanted to do couldn’t be done, I hesitated for a few days before going ahead with the project. Two years before this, I was putting together a shelf and my dad ridiculed my design. Berated and laughed at it all the way. I got severely depressed from that encounter, but I ended up completing the project. In his eyes, the design was doomed to fail because it is not the proper way according to him. Oh I so wish he is more like a western father, encouraging me to try and egging me on the whole way. But then again, I might get an alcoholic white trash if my wish were to come true.

I remember asking: “Aren’t you afraid when you start a company? Afraid it’ll fail?” And him responding: “Nah, only the first time.” Or something along that line. I look back and think about starting another company in the future and I realized that I am no longer afraid. There are a lot of nay-sayers in the world who thrives on seeing you fail. But they have no more clue than you and I when it comes to any outside the box project’s potential success. All that they can tell you is that what you are doing is outside the established rules. Unfortunately for most people, outside the rules equals to failure.