As I am writing this, we are still in a lockdown in Malaysia because of the pandemic. We are all stuck at home and many people are apparently suffering especially economically. Many have lost their jobs, many get their salary cuts and the list goes on and on. The point is that after all these issues, many people are still not awake to the new reality. They are still hoping that soon everything will be back to normal. 

If you have read my other postings, you know that I am strong believer that we should have multiple sources of income. Sounds good, but how do you start? 

I am going to use a simple and practical strategy that I used myself and made me a lot of money during this period. Actually, it is so simple that some of you will be like...come on. I knew this. Then why didn't you use it? 

How to spot opportunities in crises? I used Facebook. That's right, Facebook. You have noticed that during the pandemic people starting being even more active in social media. Many gurus out there also became even more active. Many started sharing webinar links to attend for FREE. 
How many webinars did you attend? 
How many webinars did you attend? 
How many webinars did you attend?

What about other posting from your friends who managed to pivot during crises? Did you find out more about what they did and how they did it? 
When one of my friends, Dr Janson Ang, posted his photos in farms, he got my attention. Many other friends just wished him "Congratulations" to his farming ventures. I did the same, but I did not stop there. I called him on the phone to find out more about his farming projects. That phone call led to a three hours meeting at Coffee Bean, which led to us starting a community of people who believed in our vision.

The point is, the same farming photos were seen and commented by many people and friends but 99% of them did not benefit from it because they did not go the extra mile to find out more. I did and I am still benefiting from it.
So, be diligent. Maybe your next opportunity is in the next Facebook post or even advertisement. Do not ignore it. What do you have to loose if you check it out? Nothing. You learn new things. You equip yourself with new knowledge. 

Why people did not take action? One of the reason is that they make assumptions like, going into that business is costly or I do not have the money to invest in another business, etc. You assume, which means, you make and ass of you and me:) Some will get the joke.

Stop assuming and start learning. New opportunities are waiting for you. Take action. 

It has been a year since the pandemic crises started and since things are looking brighter, many people are ignoring the impact of the crises or many do not even think that could be another crises one coming. 

I have been preaching that we all should have multiple sources of income and there are two aspects to this. You see, we can have some sources of income that are active income like your job, your enterprise, and anything that needs your active involvement. The other aspect of multiple sources of income is, passive income. So while we are earning active income that takes time and effort, we also need to build our passive income portfolio. 

Why?
This is my reasoning. Active income means that we are working smart and hard for the money we earn. Passive income, you are using the money that you get from the active incomes, in other words, you are using money to work for you. This is it. 

I am truly blessed that around a year ago, a good friend of mine got involved in contract farming projects. I saw his posts in facebook and I met him for three hours to understand the whole system. Many people saw his photos in the farm and many commented in facebook but apparently no one thought of the opportunity part of it. It is so true what someone have said many years ago "Opportunities are passing by everyday of our life". The question is, did you see it or you ignored it?

Well, I saw it and I have been blessed to invest in contract farming during this covid crises and the returns are really good and the risk is really low. On the top of that, I had the opportunity with my partner, to market the farming investment opportunity to other friends and even to the cold market out there via webinars and the respond is amazing. Now we have a community of investors and donors who believe in the eco system and invest regularly.

In summary, look for opportunities to build your passive income. Use the money to work for you and do not just work hard for the money. Be blessed.

Covid 19 is still there and many countries are still in a dilemma on how to handle it. After a period of lock down restrictions, we are still to use masks in public places and if we don't comply, a huge fine will be given. The impact of this pandemic is not over. One of my clients, is getting rid of 3o% of the workforce. Well, some of the people leaving the workforce will get some monetary benefits to leave but the future is...

No one can tell the future, and that is the reason that I am a strong believer that everyone should have multiple streams of income. I have been telling friends and communities that I have been invited to share in the topic of money that depending on a single source of income is a very dangerous way to live. I was shocked to see the comments of people attending the webinars that I was speaking to. So many of them said they are jobless or about to be jobless. Many already have salary cuts.

It is time to wake up!
No one can tell the future but there are things we can do to face the future. The main reason that people lose hope, commit suicide, feel depressed is money related. Statistics also show that one of the main reasons of divorce among coupples is money matters.

So, what is my point? The point is that we all need multiple sources of income. Let me use my situation to make it clear and you will know that I am not sharing just some theory stuff. If you know about us, I mean, my wife and I, we have a business, Fivecat Productions, that functions as a marketing agency helping our clients with leads generation, content creations, social media engagement and much more.  Was the business affected during the Covid 19 lock down? Yes, to a certain extend but we still managed to have some online campaigns for some clients. 

I also have my entertainment show business. I am "Mr Bean" impersonator, so I do a lot of live shows for companies for the past seven years and during the lock down,  I had zero shows. Zero shows means zero income from entertainment. Well, not exactly, we did a couple of special birthday greetings recording but the charges are very low to consider it an income.

This is the interesting part. For many years, at my own pace, I have been doing online trading mainly forex trading. Not a big deal, and when I started back in 2008, I lost a lot of money. Then I refined my methodology and I got better at it but I still did not take it seriously until the Covid 19 hit. 

I was stuck at home. So, I cannot do "Mr Bean" shows, the marketing business Fivecat Productions is handled by my wife, and I decided to focus more on my trading. It was a breakthrough for me because during the month of March when the situation around the world was the worse, I made the most money trading online. My wife got shocked. 

Why am I telling you this? The reason is to show you for real that generating income from different sources is possible and doable. And that is not all. I also launched an online course on how to trade. I went live on Facebook where around 40 people were watching and half of them bought my online course. This generated another stream of income.

Dear friends, I hope by now your mind is more open to the idea of multiple streams of income. Some of you might have gone back to "normal" situation. Back to your job and business, but remember, No one knows the future. Do something about it. Do not live on one source of income. Learn and monetize a new skill. It might even be your hobby. Just do it. Do not waut for another major crises to happen. Take action NOW. 

"Brother Faiket, I think I need some advice on money matters" was the message of one of my friends. The reason he contacted me was because someone posted a message on a Whatsapp group about my book "Uncensored Truth About Money" and the guy was strongly recommending the book. 
I replied my friend that we can discuss but the way we minister/advise is very direct and some people cannot take it and easily get offended. Knowing that he is older than me, I thought he would not mind a straight forward approach...but to my surprise, he paused for sometime and said he will be in touch.

It has been more than three months that this conversation happened and I have not heard from my friend. Many people would rather accept the status quo that they are living instead of accepting a correction. Many waste many years of their life trying their best to figure out something that they don't know when all it takes is about 30 minutes with someone who already knows the answer to their problem.

Be open to correction is very important if you are serious about changing your life. Just like using the waze or google maps when you drive somewhere. You might be taking the wrong turn and the waze application will figure out another way to reach your destination. You have two choices to make: accept the new way that waze application is showing you or ignore it and continue your way and delay reaching your destination or getting even further from your destination. 

Be open to correction. 
 

Today, my wife and I went to check and do some cleaning at one of our investment properties. We had a very nice tenant who took good care of our property. We were very happy with the cleanliness of the unit and as we were leaving taking the lift, I noticed the buttons of each floor and just saw the button which is the highest floor of the building, level 45, and there was a writing beside it "Sky Deck". My wife, Olivia and I, looked at each other in surprise and I said "We did not know all this while that we have a sky deck on our building!". 
I pressed the lift button to go to the highest floor (45) to have a look at the sky deck an d it was very nice. 
So, why did I share you this story. There are times in our lives that we do not know what we already have. There are times we forget, there are times we do not recognize what we have. 

This morning I met a friend that has written his first book and we exchanged our books over a cup of coffee. He was sharing some of his life's journey and how he ended up going from Malaysia to USA to take up John Maxwell's certification course on leadership. He said that God told him to do so and he asked God back as where does he get the money to cover the course fee, the airplane tickets and accommodation. He continued to ask God for sometime, "where is the money?'. Suddenly God told him that he already has the money. In other words, the money is already with my friend. He literally shook up and realized that God was absolutely right. Something happen to him recently and he got a lump sum of money which would cover all his expenses for the USA trip and he totally forgot about it.

Many of us fall into this trap. There are talents and gifts that we already have and we forgot about it, we ignore it, we are not sure about it or we don't know it. Just like my case. I started doing entertaining shows as Mr. Bean impersonator around six years ago. But, do you think, six years ago, suddenly, I was transformed and looked like Mr. Bean character? Of course not. All the while I had that look but I did not recognize it or I ignored it even when someone would say that I looked like Mr. Bean. Maybe I wanted to look like Tom Cruise:)
Let's do a self check. Let us find things, external and internal that we already have but we forgot about it, we ignored it, we are not sure or we might not know. It is worthy. Be blessed.
 

We are living in a world that is filled with negativity and stress from every corner. The media has been making tons of money because negative news sales. Negativity leads to stress. Many people that I know take pride in declaring they are stressful. Ask someone how are you and the common response is "I am very buzy and under stress." Looks like the corporate world has to be stressful or something is not right.

Next point that I want to make is that stress leads to health problems. Many diseases are cased by stress. Many years ago I was involved in the wellness industry and at some point I was consulting individuals on certain immune condition. These individuals used to come and meet me almost weekly to monitor their progress. There were weeks when their condition was really bad and we checked the lifestyle and there was no major changes to cause their condition to become worse except the stress level. 

The book of Proverbs states something very powerful that most of us ignore. It says, laughter does good like a medicine. This was written thousands of years ago and science has proven the health benefits of laughter. Find something to laugh about daily. Many people take themselves too seriously. Take some funny selfies with your phone...just do it. The reason I wrote today about laughter is because of Facebook. Facebook reminded me today of a video we took with my kids and their cousin two years ago. It is a funny video of us dancing. I looked at it and I started laughing. 

The moment you finish reading this article, please find something to laugh. Maybe you need to call a friend who is funny. Some people go to stand up comedy shows. Some people like to watch Mr Bean series. One of the reason I like doing Mr Bean impersonation shows is that I like to see people laugh. Bringing surprise joy to people is really fun. 
Laughter does good like a medicine. Laugh and be healthy.  

Happy Valentine's Day!
My posting today on Instagram and Facebook is "With her, everyday is a Valentine Day:)
I can hear some of you would say "Come on, be real...". Well, it depends how do you define valentine's day. If it all about love, then yes, no matter what we go through on a daily basis, the foundation of our relationship is love. 
Even though yesterday we argued about me cleaning up my desk, which is messy, we do not allow arguments to affect our love.

I have come to realize that love is more than a feeling. Love is a decision. If my love for Olivia is dependent on some intense feeling of deep affection as defined by some dictionary, then we will be in trouble. Because our feelings are not consistent. I can feel angry and mad at moments so does it mean I do not love my wife during those moments? 
Not persuaded? Let me go to the spiritual side. God says love your neighbor as yourself and God goes to the next level to love your enemies. If this depended on feelings, I don't know about you, but for me it is totally impossible. So, love is a decision. 

I am reminded of a man of God, Mark Varughese who said something profound recently "See the God in people, see the good in people, see the gold in people." This  is so true. Olivia is not perfect and I am not perfect but we have learnt to see the God in each other, see the good in each other, and see the gold in each other. 

Love is daily decision. We have been married for 16 years. We took our vows 16 years ago and we decided to do life together back then. But love is a daily decision. Why? Have you seen couples who started very well for a few years then something happened. There are storms that may come along the way related to money, related to career, related to other people, temptations, and so on, and that is the reason I say love is a daily decision. The first thing to thank God for in the morning is my wife. The Bible says,  He who finds a wife finds a good thing, and obtains favor from the Lord. 

​Happy Valentine's Day guys!
​

It is the last day of January 2019. It is the first month of the year. A few days ago I met a young entrepreneur and we had a short conversation. He started our chat by telling me that the beginning of the year is slow. He meant is business is slow. 
I responded "Well, not for our business. We have been super busy this January and the clients are asking for more projects to be executed."

My answer to him was not based on some positive thinking formula so I would look and sound good. My answer was based on the fact that our business is really good, even though it is January, the first month of the year. 

The young entrepreneur is following a pattern that majority of people follow. Meaning, literally everybody will say, especially in Malaysia, that beginning of the year the business is surely slow. So, what they declare, they believe. As a man thinks, so he becomes. So, he kept on thinking that business is slow in the beginning of the year and that is what he experienced. It is just like when people talk about flu, "Oh it is the flue season. everybody is getting the flu. Better watch out." 

Why chose to become a victim of circumstances? The worst part is that what people declare is not even the truth. Let me prove it to you. Do you think all of businesses experience a slowdown during the beginning of the year? Of course not. I am very sure there are many businesses that thrive in the beginning of the year. Do you think everybody got the flu during the flu season? Of course not. 

But the economy is bad. I met an entrepreneur last year, during the "bad" economy, who just purchased a brand new Porsche. He calls is his toy. His business is growing locally and internationally. 

So, what is the solution? Start with positive expectations. This is a powerful principle. This is not wishful thinking; "I wish the economy is good", "I wish I will do better this year". Expectation is attraction. What you expect, you will attract. We did not expect the beginning of the year to be slow. Actually, to be honest, we expect supernatural results because we believe in the supernatural realm. 

So, start with positive expectations whether it is regarding your health, business, relationships and every aspect of your life. Be blessed.

"You inspired me" he said. I did not expect those three words to come out from my ex-client. I bumped into him in one of the shopping malls and after greeting each other he said "You inspired me". I was like, how can it be? In what way? He told me that he has been following me on Facebook and noticed that I started doing shows as Mr Bean impersonator and I even quit my full time job to pursue the entertainment business. He said that my decision inspired him to pursue his passion to be on the stage as an entertainer (something related to music). So, he quit his lucrative corporate job and yes, he was holding a high management position, married with children, which means he has responsibilities, just like me. 

Why am I sharing this story with you? Is it to brag on myself? Definitely not. The point of sharing the story is this. You never know what our decisions cause to someone else. I could have never imagined that my life choices could have inspired and impacted someone of that level to make some radical choices too. To be honest, in my first few months that I started doing shows as Mr Bean impersonator, I thought that people like my client will look down at me for leaving my consultancy, and full time employment for something like an "impersonator". comedian. 

It has been six years since I started the entertainment business as I look back, it is one of the best decisions that I have made in my life. Life is full of surprises. Sometimes we just need to take a leap of faith, take a risk towards the unknown and flow with it for a while. That decision six years ago enabled me to be free from the employment mentality and the success that I achieved through the shows, influenced my wife's mindset to look forward to her freedom. She quit her job to join me and we started expanding our business beyond just entertainment to social media content creation and management. Thank God for the journey. 

So back to the main story. Remember, sometimes you never know who are you inspiring. This evening that I am writing this post, we just came back from a wedding celebration. One of our friend's daughter got married. We met some other friends there that we have not met face to face for a long time. After the usual greetings, our friend said "You guys are doing very well yah!". "How do you know", I asked. She said "I have been following you in Facebook". 

I believe your decisions this year will inspire somebody. I believe your decisions this year will inspire many people. Let's make this year an inspiring one. You inspire me!

Shortly after I published my book "Uncensored Truth About Money", I was invited as a speaker in business networking dinner with about thirty entrepreneurs/business owners. I shared our life journey and of course I focused on certain factors that impacted our life and I gave major credits to my wife Olivia. I told the audience that I would not be on the platform if my wife was not supportive and encouraging through our ups and downs, especially during crisis.

So, chose your life partner carefully. Your partner can make or break you. It is true. I have seen a lot of marriages that are destroyed. In many cases the major issue was money. For some marriages the issue was the lack of money. For some, believe it or not, too much money, and these are the cases where a partner cheats and stuff like that. 
So, one of the main factors for the success in my life is my wife, Olivia. 

The most important factor though is God. Yes, God. There is the spiritual side of life that many are not aware of. I am not talking about a vague religious concept of God and believing that there is God. I am talking about a relationship with God and applying His principles in life. I wrote a lot about this relationship in my book "Uncensored truth about money" and the subtitle of the book is "From the curse of poverty to the promise of prosperity". Why did I use strong words like "curse"? Because it is true. We were not aware of the curse for many years and we suffered a lot financially. But once we realized that the financial curse was active and God has provided in His Word the way to stop the curse through His powerful principles, our life turned around. 

So, during the same dinner event, someone raised his hand to ask a question and it was interesting. The guys asked, besides God and your wife, what other factors contributed to your success in business. I paused for a while and answered him, strategic partnerships. We are living in a world that is so dynamic. We cannot be doing business in a traditional way. Traditional methods of running a business are too slow. So we realized, for us to be at the top of the game, we need strategic partners. We cannot be good at everything. But when a few parties comes together and put their strengths to work as a team, wonders can happen. We are blessed to work with great strategic partners.

Did you notice that actually all the three factors that I mentioned are about partnerships. Partner with God, partner with my wife and strategic business partners. I trust that you will consider seriously who do you partner with. All the best to your success.