I like simplicity. As part of my continuous effort to simplify life for you and myself, I’d like to propose to you how understanding bottom line in any give situation can help us simplify it and find a quicker solution.

Sometimes, you may get stuck in a situation because you get too caught up in the details. These details may even overwhelm you and lead you to inaction. Or, these details may have little relevance in solving the problem. In such scenario, it is often helpful to revisit the bottom line instead of trying to solve the details and not the main problem. You have lost sight of the big picture, and hence, whatever you do, it has a large chance of being something that won’t solve the problem and likely something you will regret later.

What is bottom line? Bottom line means the single most essential point in a problem, as far as this post’s concern. By asking yourself what the bottom line is and once again defining it, you can re-focus on the main problem and the actions to solve it will be revealed. Let me quickly walk you through some examples.

Example 1 – You are in bad financial shape or you simply want to get rich
Bottom line: You need to spend less and make more.
There are many ways to do spend less and make more. Those would be details.

Example 2 – You want to get healthy or lose fat
Bottom line: You need to exercise and have a balance diet.
Get up from your behind now and do some real exercise. Get sore!
Oh, and stop engulfing them junk food.

Example 3 – You want to gain muscle
Bottom line: You need to adjust to a higher calories + protein diet and go pump irons.

Example 3 – You and your partner are arguing
Bottom line: You both love the other person, and therefore wish good things and happiness to happen to them.
Why are you still screaming, fighting, clawing, and divorcing each other?

Example 4 – Coworkers arguing in a meeting
Bottom line: You want to provide a product/service wanted by customers to profit the company in order to get paid.
Everyone one of us workers are just trying to bring bread home on to the table. There is no reason to fight and hurt each other…

Example 5 – Girlfriend came to talk…
Bottom line: Does she like me enough?
(At least, I believe this is the bottom line.) If the answer is no, there is no point to beg on your knees because she won’t stay anyway. If the answer is yes, there is no need to beg on your knees because she probably will stay before you get to your knees. Aha! There is no reason to bruise your precious knees.

I’m not saying to ignore details, and I’m not saying they don’t matter. Just that, next time you get confused and lost in a situation, try asking yourself what the bottom line is. If you cannot do or accept the bottom line, then maybe you are not ready to solve the problem, or there is a bigger problem.

I hope this will simplify your life.

Talk about having fun, kids can easily beat their adult counterparts, like taking candy from a baby. Seriously, adults can be so bad at enjoying the moment and having straight fun that they may as well just watch the weather channel.

My observation is substantiated by watching my niece who’s only slightly over one year old. It’s fascinating watching and paying attention to her. If you know a toddler around you, try to pay attention yourself.

I talked about living in the moment previously, young children are the ones who can really do it, probably because they are at a stage before they learn to have the kind of thoughts that we adults have, which in most cases, are simply illusions.

If a kid sees someone they like, they smile and is very excited.
If an adult sees someone they like, he or she may think, “Is it appropriate?”, “Does that person also like me?”, “Is that person going to return the favor?”, before smiling and show friendliness toward that person.

If a kid enjoys doing something, they are simply doing it and enjoying the moment completely.
If an adult enjoys doing something, they think about if it’ll last, if they can hold on to it, trying to capture the feeling, instead of simply doing it.

What I’d like to say is: We adults have much to learn from the kids, on how to live in the moment and how to simply have fun sometimes.

Living in the Moment…
What does it really mean?
Does it mean to live it up, festivity and party every night?
Does it mean to live like there is no future and seek pleasure day after day as an hedonist?
Does it mean to spend all your livelihood for a trip to the Bahama resort at a whim?
Aren’t we living and breathing every moment? Aren’t we already living?
What exactly does it mean to live in the moment? It sounds so…cliché.

You may have your own thoughts on what it is. Below is what I understand about living in the moment.

Living in the moment means having awareness in the here and now. If you are unclear about what I mean by awareness, why don’t you read my previous post on awareness and zen first. Like I said before, awareness is inside of all us and therefore, we can all learn to live in the moment. Living in the moment can also be described as simply being, simply doing what we do in each moment, with awareness. Not letting our egotistic thoughts and emotions dominate us. Stop regretting about the past. Stop worrying about the future. This helps us to appreciate each moment, along with all the small things within each moment.

Sounds simple enough? Not so fast… Not so easy…

What happened is that we learn NOT to live in the moment as we are growing up. When we are kids, we can’t wait to become teenagers. When we are in high school, we can’t wait to get into college. When we are in college, we can’t wait to be working and making money. When we are finally in the corporate world, some of us want to go back to school and some of us get bored and can’t wait for retirement. When we are single, we want to find a girlfriend or boyfriend. When we are finally hooked up with someone, we want our single life back. By this point, we are all safe to say WTF. Additionally, from day 1 after birth, we are bombarded by advertising that conditions and always tells us this one more thing that we need to be happy and to keep up with the trend and the Jones.

If only I buy this LV bag, I’d be happy…
If only I afford this Lamborghini, I’d be happy…
If only I own a house, I’d be happy…

As it goes, we are constantly thinking about and longing for the next place we want to be, the next thing we want. We constantly chase these ideals that are thoughts in our heads instead of doing what matters.

On the other hand, we need to be cautious about our memory, as our past can become another form of ideal or baggage where we hold on to the happy times or stuck dwelling on the bad ones. Your past has contributed to what you are today, accept it and do what you can with what you have now.

Living in the moment is simply sitting if you are sitting. It is simply doing whatever you are doing. It does not involve thinking about the past. It does not involve thinking about the future. It only involves awareness and whatever that you are doing. As described above, our behaviors have been trained to do just the opposite, myself included, we need to practice in order to get better at it, just like everything else in life – practice makes perfect.

Meditation is a pronounced method to practice living in the moment and also awareness. Living in the moment and awareness go hand-in-hand. Moreover, I’d say awareness is a pre-requisite because it lets you see your thoughts as you start thinking about past and future. Now, it is not that you cannot learn to live in the moment if you don’t meditate. Meditation is a method that allows a faster pace of learning because you are only sitting during meditation instead of being in motion (i.e. It is quite hard to concentrate if your boss is talking to you). The stillness of just sitting makes it easier to practice awareness and notice your thoughts. As you sit, you maintain awareness and pay attention to your body, its tension, and the emotions and thoughts that appear in your mind. As you let the body relax and the thoughts come and go, you learn to simply sit and you come to understand better what it means to live in the moment.

Meditation is merely practicing awareness so that it becomes natural to you, so you are present in the moment everywhere you go, whatever you do.

Of course, there are other things we can do to practice living in the moment. In fact, things such as listening to music, playing the piano, dancing, drawing, riding motorcycle, playing a sport, etc., we are inherently able to do them as if we are living in the moment. As I listen to music, it’s easy for me to simply listen. As I used to fence in college, I simply fence. In those moments, the only things that exist are my opponent, myself, and our blades. There is no room for external thoughts. It is easy to be in the moment in the favorite activities. Now we must do so in the non-so-favorable ones.

You can practice living in the moment by applying this “simply doing” concept on other things. For example, when you are talking to someone, you listen and focus solely on the conversation partner, instead of thinking what to eat for lunch or which candidate you’d vote for president. Even if your thought starts to drift, your awareness will let you see that you are thinking about something else and then you can shift your focus back to your conversation partner. As for me right now, I am writing this post and its my only focus, which should allow me to write it to the best of my ability. In other words, an analogy can be drawn between “living in the moment” and “doing the best in what you are doing in the moment”.

Don’t mistaken “living in the moment” as in giving up thoughts, past memory, and plans for future. Living in the moment can provide a new sense of appreciation and enjoyment in everything we do everyday. If you learn to live in the moment, you learn also to find peace and joy in every moment, and thinking and worrying less about past and future.

And why else do we want to find peace and joy like said? Because then we can have a good time without chasing material goods and learn not to be dependent on external means to be happy. Kinda like knowing how to have a great time without being drunk.

As any topic in Zen is quite difficult to write about and my principles and philosophy center heavily about Zen, my writings may lack certain clarity. Please feel free to contact me if you have any question.

Success is my topic on this blog. Success is not simply one thing and definitely not about money.

That is why I have a tendency to write more about concepts in personal development and less about personal finance. I write much less about in specifics and details in what to do with your money. Besides the fact that there are plenty of info and references on the internet already, the truth is that if you can master the basics, success in life (and therefore personal financial life) will soon follow. Kinda like martial arts practice – the ability to a more advanced move comes from the mastery and understanding of doing a more basic move.

How do I mean? What are the basics? These qualities quicly come to my mind:

• Understand Yourself
• Responsibility
• Awareness (part 1, part 2)
• Discipline
• Open-Mindedness
• Compassion

You may be thinking, “Compassion? Wha…?” Don’t laugh because compassion IS a basic and requirement in success in life.

Use the “Search” on the right to locate my posts on these topics.

I’m here to confess today. I don’t have Roth IRA nor do I plan to open one, au contraire to just about any books, blogs, or references you may have read about personal finance. I do contribute to my 401k to get my company match. It’s my way of putting the personal aspect in my personal finance.

I dislike the illiquidity of retirement account due to the fact that withdrawal without penalty is not allowed until retirement age, which is a long freakin’ 40 years away for me. Enough of my money is “locked up” in my 401k, especially because I made extra contribution to kick start the account in the past/1st year of my career. I switched back to the company matching percentage in the new year.

It’s not like I’m guaranteed to live that long. And honestly, I don’t plan to live that long, pass 80s and such. There is only so long one can stand the absurdity of human society :P Among various factors like not living ’til I have saggy skin, 401k, my wonderful(boring) discipline with money, taxable accounts, and the hopes of a very established future spouse(a.k.a. sugar mama), somehow I have faith that I will manage.

I’m done with my rant. Now is your time to call me stupid.

Oh, I was just kidding about the sugar mama since, bluntly, no one can cover your own a** better than yourself.