The True Entrepreneurship Journey -- Lesson 1

This is the first installment of my journey as an Entrepreneur. I hope it will strike a cord with whoever is looking to take this long, hard, heart wrenching, tiring journey of love and labor. At times it's really fulfilling for it may allow you to find, inspire extraordinary people who perform feats that you literally take your breath away. These people go on to become your generals who will lay their life down literally for you. Other times you will cross path with people who start like champions and they turn out to be the meanest crook that will rob your dreams, energy or even your very will to go on.

But if you are a true blue entrepreneur, you will get up and keep going till you reach the next milestone, catch your breath, admire the view for a moment, set yourself on the next milestone and set off again....

At the time of writing, I turned 39. I started my journey at the tender age of 14 and had to really get into this by 17. Had enough to be Financially Retired at 31 and again at 34. Enough for 2 lifetimes. I have lost over 200k in business wasted 3 years of my life, nearly gone bankrupt 3 times, lost 1 really good friend and started a chain of disruptive companies and still building ranging from education, healthcare, corporate services, Fintech, real estate etc.

There are many roads to getting there and this is my journey... as it serves to permanently preserve my knowledge, experience, lessons and legacy. 

I will not talk about my businesses directly instead would talk only about lessons learned from them. In fact, if you google, you will find little about me but some of the companies you probably heard of. 

I hope anyone looking to be inspired or looking for a way or feeling down would find this useful. You are welcome to reuse my content in any way, just send me  where you are going to use it and if you like an acknowledgment and if you do make a buck, I always welcome royalties.

Lesson 1 - The price of anything is determined by what value you can show.

The very first deal I did was when i was 14. I grew up from a very averaged middle family, single income. My father was an Aerospace Engineer in a Multi National Company making airplane parts. He started as a small foreman eventually worked his way up to become the site manager. He was a man of few words, taking the brunt of the work to ensure we were provided for. I never recalled him ever complaining to us about how tough it was, even when he was nearly retrenched twice. He would always come home and smile. My mom was married in from a foreign country. In the early days, my mom does not speak English. As a result  unlike other

My mom was married from a foreign country. In the early days, as she does not speak English well, she could not find any decent work. As a result, she stayed at home and looked after me.

During one of my holidays on those lovely islands, I learnt how to ride a bicycle. After returning back to Singapore, I asked my dad to buy one for me. He said that if i wanted one, I had to get one myself.

At that age of 14, way back in 1991, if i were to work at MacDonalds, I was looking at $3.50 an hour. If i worked the whole school holidays, I would not be able to get any decent mountain bike, so I went off to find a job that would allow me to be able to afford that bicycle. I decided to try my luck selling Christmas cards door to door. I was suppose to take the Christmas cards together with this " I am doing charity card " and sell each pack of 10 cards for $3.50 and hope to make some money by going door to door in flats.

What happened was instead i went door to door in private property without the I am doing charity card and sold them from $10 to $50 per pack, and I grossed the highest sales in the company getting freebies like CD player or extra money.

I learnt then the price of anything was not determined by the price label on the item but the value that you could let the buyer believe or understand or the cause you believe in. I was told to take the "charity card" and sell at "$3.50". That is the price label. Instead, I went out there and took out the nicest cards in the pack, showed it to them, let people know I was a student and I am making money on the side for my hobby and my story that my dad wanted me to earn my keeps, I had better sales!

For those really curious, I sold with a net profit of SGD $4800, allowing me to buy for myself a really nice Trek 820 mountain bike and one for my brother with change in my pocket.

Hope you all liked this first lesson I have created.