Wedding is for a Day, but Marriage is for a Lifetime

Its has been a year since Sharon and I were married. I would like to share some lessons I learnt in my first year of marriage.

Some say there are 3 rings to a marriage. 1st is the engagement ring, then it is the wedding ring. After that it will be suffering! We got married last year in October, one day after her birthday. I thought it was a great idea, because I will only need to buy one gift combined for the birthday and wedding anniversary, can save money! I am not as stingy as you think, it was because the date was 10 Oct, so its 10/10, a nice number. This year it is even nicer, 10/10/10, and it is our first year anniversary.

I believe our wedding is for a day, but our marriage is for a lifetime. So that’s why I spent very little on our wedding reception! Although we did not spend much on wedding reception, we spent and a lot for my house, especially our bed, because we are both very good in bed; we can sleep for days. When sleeping, she will take up the whole bed, rolling here and there while I only occupy a small space. She will come into my sleeping area. She will wake up the next morning and wonder “Hey where is my hubby?” I will be either on the floor or under her.

But more importantly, my wife and I got to work on our relationship and understand each other so we will not fight in the 4th ring, which is the “Boxing Ring”.

Our marriage really changed me. When I was single and staying with my parents, I just need to call out the magic word, “Wati!”, and things will be served to me, whatever you name it. Now, if I call “Darling!” nothing will be served to me and I still got to serve her. I learned how to mop the floor, clean the toilets, clear the trash, etc. Of course we do the housework together, just that she will be the in charge and I will just follow instructions. I can be very competent at work and take charge, but once it comes to housework, I can be at a total loss. Without instructions, I can create even more work for my wife to clear up.

During our first Valentine’s Day together as husband and wife, I wanted to whip out a good meal for our romantic candlelight dinner. So the first thing I thought off was “Spaghetti!”, as it was simple and easy to make. Just cook the noodles and pour the sauce over it. Boy, I was wrong. I realized that cooking, like work, also needed planning! I didn’t plan and went ahead to cook the noodles first, then the sauce, and then the ingredients. The kitchen looked like a battlefield halfway through the cooking and I got to cry out for my wife to help. She come in like a wonder woman, and cleared up everything in no time. However, we still ended up eating hard spaghetti as it was left in open too long. The heartwarming part was my wife did not condemn me, but even encouraged me to cook more. I thought I better stick to Maggie Mee.

I believe compliments are very important in marriage. I always make a point to compliment my wife every day. In our marriage I really got to know my wife better. If you dress my wife up, bring her out and snap photos of her, she will be happy like a bird! We were at our honeymoon in Hokkaido, and everything she saw she wanted to pose and take picture with it. And she will have many poses, victory sign; look into the sky, finger point to cheek, and more. And I had to multi task, being the backdrop, being the cameraman, etc. I felt like I was on a working business trip rather than a honeymoon! But those feelings all disappeared when I saw her beautiful and satisfied expressions on the photos. We really captured the happy moments on our honeymoon.

We discovered each other’s gifts too! She is an excellent administrator and I am a visionary, or rather a dreamer. I love to socialize, talk to people, dream of ideas, etc. But when you come to my study area, it will be a total mess. And I can live with it while my wife will go crazy living in a sty. She and will ensure things are placed in order and keep things organized and systematic. Our gifts really complement each other.

Our marriage has a principle, which is to spend quality time often and communicate with each other. Some of our friends, who are still single or married with no children yet, encourage us to have children as soon as possible. The real parents will say “Welcome to the club” with a funny tone. I understand how they feel, as when the child comes out, all the attention of the parents will be on the child. But I also feel it is important for the husband and wife to have quality time alone together as it will strengthen the marriage and marriage is for the long haul, like running a marathon.

So far, these are the few lessons I have learnt on marriage. I learnt how to change myself for the better, and I know my wife deeper every day, exploring her gifts, and communicate with each other. I firmly believe that marriage is for life and what we do now will affect our marriage and family in the future. So I want to encourage you to be married only when you are prepared for it, treasure your spouse and enjoy every moment with your family.

LOVE 4 EVER

Who has been in love before? Who has not been in love before? Who does not believe in love?

Love is sweet. And I love to be loved. When I’m in love, I will wake up without procrastinating and each day is filled with joy. Everything I see seems so lovely, even my boss seems so funny and cute. Being a macho man, I used to hate romantic dramas and comedies. Now watching them make me go Awww… like a little kitten.
Now about my ex girlfriend, who is now my wife. Sharon is the most beautiful person I have ever met. We met during my medical treatment at the hospital and she was the nurse attending to me. When she poked the needle into my arm, it was so PAINFUL. But it’s ok, as long I can get to see her. One day, our mutual friend who was her colleague asked me out for karaoke session. I knew she was going and I immediately jumped at the opportunity to impress her! I used up all the gel for my hair, put on my best clothes, and sprayed my perfume which I didn’t used for months. Hopefully, my voice did not scare her away…

I’m going to share 4 lessons I have learnt on my journey of courtship to marriage. This only applies to the single men here. The 4 lessons is in the word, “GIRL”.

G - Guts

In 2008, we got closer together. I was taking a very difficult exam and I pulled my hair every day. I needed support and she was there. I was studying at cafes and she will just quietly read her storybooks, giving me her silent support. I was touched and my torch for her grew brighter and brighter. But I had fear, the fear of being rejected. I had no guts to tell her my feelings. Soon, she was going to China for holidays. So one night, at Macdonalds, I mustered all the courage I had in my guts and I wrote on a serviette, “I’m going to miss you when you go to China,” My heart was thumping furiously as I waited for her response.

She looked at me, smiled and nodded her head. “What was that supposed to mean? Does it mean she accepts me?” I asked myself. Being an overly positive person, I assumed that her silence meant yes! So on our next date, I bought her flowers. But to my horror, she rejected me and said she only treats me like a good friend. I was devastated. But I did not give up. I applied the second principle called Interest.

I - Interest

This interest is not the bank interest. This interest is the deep interest I had in Sharon. She went to China for holidays and I called her everyday, taking an deep interest in her life. I must have been like a pest, but I did not care. I was fighting for my life happiness. I believed she felt my sincerity, or irritation at that time.

She came back on the day of my exam, just in time to give me the encouragement I need. At that time, my health had some problems and was in and out of hospital. In the darkest period of my life, she came to the hospital to visit me, gave me encouragement and was by my side. After an operation one day, I finally took courage to hold her hand and she did not draw back! I was elated and knew I had won her heart.

Subsequently, I had to undergo a major operation and it was successful. I eventually recovered and wasted no time to propose to her. I sang her favorite song and knelt before her, presenting her ring. She cried and accepted my proposal!

R - Relax and have fun!

In a blink of an eye, we were doing the wedding preparations. Even though it was stressful at times, we made a point to relax and have fun. The procedure of finding a flat, looking for bargains, finding a restaurant, tasting the food, sitting at the studio of the whole day while the my bride tries on her gown, preparing the guest lists, memorizing the speech, being teased by the ‘sisters’ on the wedding day, etc. Looking back, it was indeed a fun time and I will not exchange those times for anything else.

L - Love unconditionally

Now that we are married, I realized that the wedding is only for a day, but the marriage is for a lifetime. Being 2 different persons, we really had to understand each other, resolve conflicts, forgive each other and love unconditionally. It brings to mind a story:

A man fell into a deep sleep and an angel brought him for an excursion to heaven and hell. First they went to hell, and saw that the people there were all very thin and weak. They were trying to feed themselves with a very long spoon, and could get the food into their mouths. Next they went up to heaven, and he saw that the people in heaven were very well fed. So he thought that they must have had normal spoons. But to his astonishment, they too had very long spoons. The difference is that the people in heaven were feeding each other rather than themselves.

This story encourages me to always fill up the love bank in my wife, and put her interests before my own. I find that this way, she will have always enough love to share with me, and I will be fulfilled also. To me, the final ‘L’ in the acronym is the most important ingredient to keep our relationship and marriage alive. As long as I love Sharon unconditionally, I will have the guts to take action, take a deep interest her life and our relationship will be relaxing and fun!

I wish all of you will find your Love 4 Ever!

A Time with the Next Generation

I will be 30 years old this year. And a session with the Victoria School students during one of my workshops with them reminded me of my teenage years in school. The students, like me 15 years ago, were buzzing with energy when we played the stock market game with them.

They were so inquisitive, and kept on bugging the facilitators to tell them the “news” that was to come the next round of the game. To me, it was such a joy to see them having fun with their friends and learning at the same time.









I too was overjoyed when given the opportunity to share my life story with them. To inspire the next generation is indeed my calling and I feel so much satisfaction when I taught them basic life skills such as budgeting and planning for the future. I also drove home in their hearts the importance of savings, which to me is the fundamental ingredient for financial success when they grow up. Too many young adults today are caught in the trap of credit cards and sucked into the bottomless pit of debt.

Finally, I shared with them investment concepts and some ideas which they could apply immediately in the game.







It was also hilarious when we saw the faces of the participants as they see their stock prices rise and fall. We truly had a great time.









That day with the next generation was very memorable. 400 students were seated and listened to me share my arduous journey with illness and overcoming all odds to become who I am today.








They were greatly inspired and I knew I had deposited something special into their hearts as I read their feedback forms. One of them said, “This is the best post exam activity I ever had!” And other wrote, “Greatly inspiring and fun.”









To me, the next generation means hope for the future. It means lives that will make a positive difference in the world we live in. And it means we have the responsibility to impart timeless values to them that will nurture them to be leaders for tomorrow.

The Theatre of Education

“If give a man a fish, you feed him for a day. If you teach him how to fish, you feed him for a lifetime.”

Over the last few years, there is a buzzword called lifelong learning. In my school days, I wished that after graduating from university, I could stop reading my textbooks, doing my assessments, stop taking examinations and work in a single profession all my life. But I was wrong, I realized when I started working, I got to keep learning new things, unlearn former things and relearn to stay relevant in the marketplace. This is a reality in the ‘Knowledge Economy’. We not only have to learn the technical skills of our trade, but also IT skills, Public Relation skills and presentation skills.

However, I also believe that education is not just for the advancement of our careers. Education is also about life skills which help us to manage our daily affairs with our family, our personal emotions and the way we think about ourselves and others.

There are 3 reasons why investing in lifelong learning is the best investment in life:

Education is not only in school. Life itself is the theatre of education.

I grew up in the Singapore school system. I was trained like an academic soldier, and my only goal was to score As for all my examinations. When examinations drew near, I would reduce my social activities, lock myself in my room and do my 10 year series. My friends found this repulsive, but I told myself I had no choice, I had to score my As in order to succeed in life.

However, I had a serious medical condition when I was 21 years old and I had to quit school to recuperate. My condition was so serious that the psychologist told me not to stress myself and take an easier path in life. This well meaning advice rang like a death sentence. Having propped myself solely on my academic achievements, I felt like I had lost my only clutch in life. I fell into depression and had thoughts of killing myself. But I realized these thoughts were fatalistic. I urgently changed the way I thought about life and saved myself with the help of my family and friends.

I took half a year of rest and reflection. I had the privilege of talking and learning life skills from the elderly when I went for my morning walks at the park. I learnt the importance of overcoming trials, building quality relationships, having faith and many more life skills. I learnt valuable lessons from the theatre of life itself.

Our society focuses a lot on paper qualifications and our next generation faces much pressure from studies. I fully agree that we have to be taught how to do maths, science, and score well for our examinations. But I firmly believe that life skills, such as overcoming failures, looking beyond academic performance are even more vital skills that we need to teach our next generation.

Our success depends on our belief system

One of my favorite books is ‘Think Rich, Grow Rich’ by Napoleon Hill. Napoleon did extensive research on how the traits that successful people have and he found common denominators that successful people share. One of which was having right belief system to acquire wealth.

If we believe that we cannot fail, we will not dare to take needed risks to grow our wealth or advance our career and lives. Even when I mustered enough courage to propose to my girlfriend, I had to contend with the risk that she might reject me and hurt me emotionally. However, I believed that even if I failed in proposing, it was a necessary risk to take. And now, I am blessed with a lovely wife and a fulfilling marriage.

The successful people believed in action, so they will not procrastinate and will continuously take action to fulfill their dreams. They also believed in team work, so they leverage on other’s talents and skills to achieve something greater than themselves. So we need to start examining our beliefs and evaluate whether are they propelling us or hampering us to greater success.

Don’t fear failure; fear we do not learn from failure.

Who in this room hasn’t failed before? All of us face failures. But if we fail and do not learn from our mistakes and dare to try again, that would be more tragic than failing altogether.

When we do not succeed in doing something, do not think of it as a failure. Rather, think of it as ‘delayed success’. Walt Disney went bankrupt several times before he finally succeeded with Disneyland.

Thomas Edison before he invented the light bulb, failed 1000 times before he finally succeeded. He said, ‘"I didn’t fail 1,000 times. The light bulb was an invention with 1,000 steps."

I would like to encourage you to embrace your lives in the theatre of education and learn from its every facet. Let us reflect on our daily lives, and replace negative thoughts with empowering ones. Finally, when we face failures, let us learn from our mistakes, draw strength from each other, overcome every obstacle and emerge as the successful person aspire to be.

Aaron Graham Tay

Ushering the Year 2010!

It’s the beginning of a new year again. More importantly, it is the beginning of a new decade. The last 10 years have been eventful for the world and for me personally. In 2001, we have the earth shattering news of the 9/11, which sparked off a series of wars, terrorism, etc. In 2003, we have the SARS, and we witness the strength of the human spirit in battle against the virus. Tsunami came in 2004 Boxing Day, and a quarter million lives were claimed. 2007 was the beginning of the sub prime crisis, which culminated in Oct 2008, after the fall of Lehman Brothers. In view of all these which happened, 2009 seemed like a pretty peaceful year.

There were inspiring trends too. Technology advanced so much from desktops to notebooks to netbooks and to surfing net on our mobiles. Social media and networking took an exponential rise with the emergence of Friendster, Youtube, Facebook and Twitter. With these advancements, it makes one wonder how will the face of digital media change over the next decade. I am excited, are you?

Personally, my life was also like a roller coaster. In 2000, I tasted the first failure of my relationship. It was bitter. Following which, I went into depression and lost the focus of my life when I learned that I could not fulfill my ambition as a doctor, in which I held dearly for 6 years. I went into the pharmaceutical course in university instead. Still I was lost and depressed, which translated to a collapse of my health with my underlying childhood illness. In 2001, I was admitted to the hospital for 1 month and had to quit my school. Life at that time took a standstill.

I was in recuperation for half year when I really reflected on my life and my faith in God. My pursuits in life changed from academic achievements and money to family and friendships. My faith in God was renewed and I was given a new name, Graham, which means ‘homestead’. Family was what really matters at the end of life. I had also the new vision to set up a foundation to help families who are lost, sick, poor and needy. Thus in 2002, I went into Business Studies, majoring in Finance, in order to learn the ropes of managing and growing money.

In the course of my studies, there were so many thanksgiving miracles that I will not elaborate here. God gave me the mercy, grace, strength and the wisdom to study despite my frequent fainting spells, doctor visits and feeling physically weak most of the time. In 2004, last semester of my studies, I had to undergo dialysis for the next 4 years. I was definitely depressed, but God sustained me, and even gave me motivation to study harder, resulting in the best semester of my studies and graduating with an Honors degree.

In 2005, I went into the Financial Advisory Business full time with the knowledge on finance and the desire to help families. It was challenging, but fruitful period of my life. Thorough my work as a financial advisor, I am able to share in the lives of my clients and help them even beyond personal finance. I grew as a professional through CFP studies and also as a person through my life interactions with clients.

In 2008, I received the news that my heart is failing due to the frequent dialysis of 3 times a week. I needed a kidney transplant urgently as I will not be able to go for the operation if my heart continues to fail. Without a transplant, I had only 5 years to live. I was only 28 at that time. I felt helpless. My brother, who was then 22 years old, agreed to donate his kidney to me and save my life. I am forever grateful to his act of kindness. Family is whom you can count on in times of crisis. Sadly, many people in this time and age do not have close ties with their families, as seen in my interactions with people. I consider myself to be very fortunate.

Also, through my ordeal, I got closer to a personal friend, Sharon, and we became an item. This wonderful lady did not mind my medical issues and stood by me through the darkest moment in my life. I was very touched and intend to marry her if I could survive the operation.

Few days before I was wheeled into the operating theatre, the cardiologist advised me against going for the operation as my heart is very weak. I cried. I felt that my only hope was gone. However, my renal doctor said we had to take this chance, if not there is no hope. Thus, we made the decision to carry on with the major operation. At that moment, I knew how it felt to surrender my whole life to God. Whether I come out alive in the operation will be His call, not mine. With that peace, I closed my eyes.

I was reborn on 29 Sep 2008, 3 days before my actual birthday. I regained the use of my kidney and all body functions were back in place. My heart was 100% normal again. I had a new lease of life, a 2nd chance in life. And I am not going to waste a single moment in my life. Therefore, in 10 Jan 2009, I proposed to Sharon and she said yes! I couldn't’t believe my ears.

2009 was a year of total transformation. From a dialysis patient with no hopes of ever getting married, I was a healthy man preparing for marriage with the woman of my dreams. We had good mentors who guided us in our premarital training and eventually walked into the marriage covenant on 10 Oct 2009.

I am now a husband, and I truly understood the meaning of my name Graham. I am to build a family based on godly principles. I experienced true love and family ties. This is my call in life and I will continue to fulfill it day after day, by loving my wife. As a financial advisor and trainer to families, it is my divine duty to ensure that their family foundations are in place. This is my vision for 2010.

What is your vision for 2010?