INSTITUTIONALISED policies in Malaysia, dating back to 1970, have severely damaged our country's capacity to leverage off our once outstanding advantages, such as widespread English fluency and overseas-Chinese-diaspora-led entrepreneurial vigour.
In my opinion, if we had been led by better, globally minded leaders, Malaysia today would have an economy larger than, say Taiwan's or South Korea's. But that is water under the bridge.
The good news in late 2023 is that for all Malaysians willing to work 50 to 100 per cent harder (and smarter) than the average local employee, perhaps by proactively choosing to commit a decade or more to, say, 60- to 80-hour workweeks, immense personal success can still be ours in this sun-drenched, flawed paradise we call home.
We just need to pay the price of success. Repeatedly.
We all know what needs to be done to succeed because of what we did — or observed others do — in school, years or perhaps decades ago. To illustrate what I mean, take a peek at my school years…
LESSONS FROM THE PAST
Both my parents — separately, at various times of my childhood — taught me the importance of studying hard and toiling diligently. While in school I latched onto the helpful idea that since I was a professional student, my "job" was to study effectively to not merely pass my exams, but to rack up as many "As" as possible, along the way.
Although I was seldom top in aggregate totals, I did grow accustomed during my secondary years in Malacca High School to often earn my form's best marks in English, Maths and Science. In the spirit of full disclosure, though, you should also know my grades in Malay and Geography were often stunningly mediocre.
Much later, my maiden paying job was secured at the start of my first year at university — as a student librarian, which meant I was able to park myself in my favourite environment while earning desperately needed money. That was a dim and distant 39 years ago.
Across the intervening miles and decades, I've tried to work as hard and as smart as possible. I trust the same is true for you. If so, you already know the truth about needing to (almost) always pay the price of success in sweat equity. And, yes, that price is steep.
But note: The long-term price of failure, however you may define it, is many orders of magnitude greater — in dashed dreams and pilfered potential.
LIFE'S DIMENSIONS
We all wear many hats in life. They are manifestations of our various roles — child, parent, grandparent, friend, employee, businessperson... the list is endless.
As we focus on the importance of paying the appropriate prices of success in each of those roles to achieve their relevant goals, I'll illustrate that principle in the two common aspirational dimensions of health and wealth. After all, virtually everyone truly wants both.
HEALTH
While health and fitness are not identical, they are highly correlated to each other. Therefore, we would be wise to "pay the price" for both health and fitness by visiting the doctor and dentist for regular checkups, and to exercise appropriately, ideally all our lives.
Sadly, though, most of us don't pay attention to our bodies until they start to creak and break down. How many of us release deep sighs of despair when we step out of the shower and catch a glimpse of ourselves in a full-length mirror? Most of us, I dare say.
We all know what needs to be done to grow healthier (see and then heed our doctors' advice) and fitter (exercise to improve our metrics in the four key areas of aerobic capacity, strength, balance and flexibility).
But will we do the work?
WEALTH
My favourite definition of my professional wheelhouse states:
"Financial planning is the process of meeting your life goals through the proper management of your finances."
A complete personal financial plan requires initiatives in the distinct yet interconnected financial planning dimensions of Wealth Protection, Wealth Accumulation and Wealth Distribution. (To hear my personal elaborations on those areas, here's a 2021 radio interview podcast: www.bfm.my/podcast/morning-run/ringgit-and-sense/wealth-protection-accum... )
Bottomline: We need to pay the price for adequate —
1. Wealth Protection, by buying appropriate insurance policies and diversifying our wealth building assets;
2. Wealth Accumulation, by spending less than we earn, saving and investing the difference, and doing so for a long time; and
3. Wealth Distribution, by writing a will and at least looking into the viability of setting up a private trust, if our circumstances warrant doing so.
In every facet of life that matters to us, we have a choice to shoot for success or to settle for failure. While we choose, we should remember it is a glaring yet monumentally popular LIE to think that in life we can "have it all".
We truly can't. We certainly can have some things and, far more importantly, some experiences. So, it's up to us to decide which of those we care about.
Once we do decide, we should then pay the invariably high price of success for one simple reason: Failing would be tragic.
© 2023 Rajen Devadason
Rajen Devadason, CFP, is a securities commission-licensed Financial Planner, professional speaker and author. Read his free articles at www.FreeCoolArticles.com; he may be connected with on LinkedIn at www.linkedin.com/in/rajendevadason, or via rajen@RajenDevadason.com. You may also follow him on X @Rajen Devadason and on YouTube (Rajen Devadason).
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