Isn’t it ironic that every time just before your vacation you suddenly get so busy that you actually don’t know where left and right is anymore? I normally manage to schedule my workload so well that I don’t have to ever think about work outside of work hours, but this week sure hit me like truck. Funny enough everything has to be finished before I leave, as if I would never come back or take three month off.
I am going to New Zealand the day after tomorrow, and I am very much looking forward to it. It will only be for nine days but I am sure I will enjoy every bit of it.
It has been over a year since my last vacation and after this week I sure feel like I need a month off.
One thing I have learned today though is that you need to speak up, when you need help. Once put forward to the boss that I might not be able to finish everything despite staying back till all hours of the night, really made a difference... Fist of all we figured out what really needed to be done urgently and then got some of the coworkers to give me a hand as well.
I am funny when it comes to working, for some reason I always want to do it myself. I guess that comes from my parents constant reminder “if you want it done right, do it yourself” and as much as that is hammered into my head, I am learning to let go of this belief and actually enjoy being helped.
I will not be able to write any blogs in the next ten days, but I will make sure to tell you all about New Zealand when I get back. Hope you have a great week
I read this sentence above in one of these inspirational emails that friends send me and I thought it was quite clever. I hope I can inspire some people in my lifetime.
Do you have someone in your life that truly inspires you? Someone you look up to and wish you could be that little bit more like him or her? Or maybe you are like me and get inspirations in different parts of life from different people.
A true inspiration to me was David Bussau. David Bussau is a social entrepreneur whose innovative approach to solving world poverty has been recognised world wide.
I watched a live interview with this man last weekend and was almost in tears listening to the story of how he is currently helping 1.8million people in 27 developing countries. He provides small loans to promising entrepreneurs, empowering them to start or expand their own small businesses. This enables whole families to get out of poverty by their own means not relying on charity for survival.
"Each of us has the capacity to be incredibly productive and those who realise this are the ones who make the difference in the world," says Bussau. "For me the challenge is to find ways to release that incredible potential in human beings, to enable that creative force and drive to be expressed."
His organisation has distributed over one million loans since it began 30 years ago. A Manchester University study has shown that for each job created, on average six people are permanently taken out of poverty and 13 people in the community benefit, so over five million people were potentially helped by David’s Organisation ‘Opportunity International’ in 2003 alone. He was named the Ernst & Angus Australian Entrepreneur of the year 2003.
What an inspiration!
I found the story of a young man to be very touching, which David shared on the weekend with his audience. This young man and his wife lived in poverty, expecting their third child. This child, the man told David, would as soon as it was born inherit three generations of debt. Even though the man was working on the fields of a rice farm all day, he could not provide enough money to his family and pay off the debt. So together they thought of a way the family could get out of this financial crisis which has been their reality all their lives. The wife was very talented in sewing gowns, so David gave a one hundred dollar loan to buy a sewing machine. Within three month the couple was able to give the money back, buy another machine and employ another lady. This business is still growing now, employing many people and making a huge profit.
Thank you David for sharing your story, I am very honoured to have been in your presences
