Introduction

Good morning, everyone. Today, we will continue with the topic of how to conduct oneself. The Conduct and Action series is actually my original work. I have searched a lot of resources online, but I did not find them satisfactory. I have drawn from some materials, but it is mainly my own original content. Today, I will be delivering the third lecture in the Conduct series, with the theme of Basic Principles for Enhancing Your Self-Worth.

I. One Must Learn How to Conduct Oneself Throughout Life

Everyone is born more or less the same; putting two babies together, they are just lumps of flesh, looking quite similar. However, as they grow, the things they accumulate in their minds differ. Some become more valuable, while others become less and less valuable, leading to the distinction between talents and good-for-nothings. Some people live a life of helplessness and boredom, looked down upon by others and even by themselves, truly a state of entanglement and suffering. Everyone wants to live with dignity, but the result is that they become less and less like honorable people. Ultimately, it comes down to learning; one must learn how to conduct oneself, observing how others do it. Of course, learning the wrong things, like making counterfeit money at home, will lead to arrest, as it is against the law. Drawing it with a pen is not counterfeit, but printing it is a crime.

From childhood to adulthood, one is constantly learning how to conduct oneself, and it is a vast field of knowledge. Some people live to fifty and become resentful and bitter, but isn't that the result of their own choices? If they did not study hard in their youth and work diligently in adulthood, what can they expect at fifty? A life without knowing how to conduct oneself is a tragedy. My belief is that how one is born is not important, because neither you nor I were born knowing how to read. You may be stronger than me; I couldn't speak until I was five, while you could talk at one or two years old, but how did things turn out this way? What you do every day will affect your future, so we must learn how to conduct oneself throughout our lives.

We are all born quite similar, which highlights the extreme importance of learning after birth. Therefore, in the upcoming Conduct series, I will devote a chapter to Learning. If others learn well and you do not, and you do not know how to conduct oneself, you cannot blame anyone. So, one must conduct oneself with dignity and reflect on how you are doing in this regard. If you are not conducting yourself with dignity, if you don't know how to be a dignified person, then there is trouble.

II. Talent is a Valuable Resource

Learning is learning to become a talent. Singapore lacks oil and other resources; Its attractive location, but the most important thing is that it has attracted many talents. Later, talent management was called human resources. Before that, it was called the personnel department, which managed personnel files, collecting information about individuals to assess what kind of person they are. Therefore, we must deeply ingrain the concept that talent is a valuable resource. If you are looking for a job, you must know that companies want talents. If you are not a talent, you will not find a job. It is not that you will get the job just because you want it, even if you kneel down and beg. Companies will not give you leeway just because you call them grandpa or grandma; they want talent.

Learning throughout life means learning how to mold oneself into a talent from a young age. If you have not molded yourself into a talent from a young age, it's not too late to start after listening to my lecture today. Even if you are sixty, it's not too late, because you are learning how to conduct yourself. You cannot become a talent if you do not know how to conduct yourself. You must become a talent, a human resource and an asset, not a human liability. Many of our brothers and sisters who work outside have experienced that you won't get paid and hired just because you act like a slave or a beggar, needing them to give you a bite to eat. It's because they need you. If the company needs you, that's great, it means you are a talent.

To become a talent, you must continuously learn and shape yourself, which is crucial. Unfortunately, people have developed many bad habits, turning themselves into a liability that nobody wants, which is terrible. Talent is the most valuable resource. If you understand this concept, you will be powerful. When I was in management, it was very frustrating when I couldn't hire good talent even with high salaries. Liu Bang, an emperor from my family, wrote a poem, Where can I find brave men to guard all directions! It means that the higher the position, the more talent is needed. The problem is the lack of talent, not the lack of money; we cannot find the right people even if we spend money.

Do not think that it is hard to find a job; it is hard to find talent. The problem is that you are not that talent. Whether it is your work attitude, work ability, learning ability, leadership ability, problem-solving ability, if all these are not good, it's really difficult. When I used to work, I was very frustrated because I couldn't find talent. Now everyone knows that salary is not the problem; talent is the problem. From now on, calm down and shape yourself into a talent. That's the most important thing. Some people have trouble even passing the first driving test, look at their learning ability, how can they become talent in the future?

III. The Best Investment is Investing in Your Growth

The world needs talent, but many people do not invest in their growth or improve their abilities. Instead, they accumulate a pile of diplomas. However, diplomas are far from talent. Many people with diplomas are not talented, and many without diplomas are talented. So, investing in your growth is not desperately pursuing diplomas. Some people spend a lot of money to get a pile of diplomas, and some send their children to study abroad for millions, but they never earn back that money in their lifetime. Isn't that a waste of money?

You must invest in your growth. Whether you have substance or not is the most important thing. Let me analyze how I invested in my own growth. I generally avoid eating, drinking, and having fun. When I was in school, I liked to read. When I was working, I liked to work, and I also enjoyed learning and reading while working, so I achieved financial freedom in my forties. Because I invested a lot in myself, I became valuable, and the market needed me. Some people are still in debt in their sixties because they are not smart and don't like to learn. When they learn, they learn a lot of superficial things.

I am greatly influenced by inspirational stories. There is a Taiwanese named Yen Chang-shou, He dropped out of school in his teens because his family was poor and went to work to support himself. According to current laws, that is child labor. It is certainly not allowed to work, you must go to school, but actually even if you go, you are just wasting time. After dropping out of school, he went to a company to work as an office boy, doing odd jobs in the company. Serving tea and water, cleaning, opening doors for guests, and receiving guests. Although he did not graduate from elementary school, he became more and more capable because he was a very studious person.

At that time, he taught himself English and other knowledge. Unlike now, when there is so much information online, it was very difficult for him to find information to learn at that time. Later, he discovered that people in the office were working until 10 p.m. When he asked, he learned that their company was a branch of an American company in the Asia-Pacific region and needed to send telegrams. However, there was no line, just like the modern network is busy, the telephone line is busy. He asked someone to teach him how to send telegrams. After he learned, he sent telegrams for others, so people could get off work at five or six o'clock. The next day, they came to see that the telegrams sent were all correct and very good. Yen Chang-shou was very capable, so he asked others to simply hand over the telegrams to him to send. The next day, they came to see how he sent them, and everyone could get off work normally. If he went on strike, everyone would have to work overtime until 10 p.m. to go home. He went to work so that everyone could go home earlier, so he became the most important talent in the office.

Once this kid doesn't want to help others do it, then people have to do it themselves. Yen Chang-shou is simply too good at conducting himself. Through continuous learning and growth, although he did not graduate from elementary school, he became the head of the Asia-Pacific region of the world's top 500 at the age of 28, and a visiting professor at Harvard at the age of 40. This is a very successful case. I was very influenced by this kind of story when I was young. So I am not very interested in eating, drinking, and having fun. There is always a stack of books on my bedside table, and it is still the same today.

So the best investment is to invest in your own growth, but don't think that a diploma is growth. If you really need a diploma, get one, but that is not the same as learning. A colleague of mine was preparing for the GMAT all day long. He bought a lot of thick books and said he was going to Australia to study for an MBA. I also wanted to study, but later I calculated that it was not cost-effective. The salary is 100,000 Singapore dollars a year, and you have to pay 70,000 Singapore dollars in tuition fees. After studying for a year and a half, 260,000 Singapore dollars is gone. He also gave me the books he used to pass the GMAT. I still feel that it is important to master knowledge, so I bought the university textbooks used for the MBA, a thick stack of several hundred dollars, and put them on my bedside.

After a year and a half, he graduated, and I also finished reading them. He got an MBA, and I also read through all the MBA material. After returning, I invited him to dinner and took the first question in the first chapter of one of the books and asked him how to answer it, but he answered it chaotically. He spent so much money, but I was able to answer without spending money because I am a person who loves to learn. Later, I became a senior manager, and he continued to look for a job and became a project manager, but actually a project manager is a very low position. The best investment is to invest in your own growth, and I am still constantly investing in my own growth today.

Some people invest in real estate, some invest in stocks, or other things. I don't blame you. If you want to invest well, that's a good thing, because you have to live. The problem is that people don't live to make money, but to live out God's glory and noble image. What I am telling you today is from the bottom of my heart. If people want to live out God's glory and noble image but don't have knowledge, they can't live it out. If they don't have spiritual knowledge, they can't live out God's glory and noble image. And if they have spiritual knowledge, but don't have other knowledge that they need to use, they can't do that job. You need knowledge to do anything.

What I am telling you today is actually very important. You must invest in your own growth no matter what . I also found that people only find joy in growth. If you just eat three meals a day and sleep, and don't grow all day long, you will be depressed soon. That's why I am pushing everyone to learn and grow, because only growth brings joy. Even if people are old, they need to grow, because people have to keep growing as long as they are alive. To rejoice in labor is a gift from God, a portion that God has given us.

This is what I have observed to be good: that it is appropriate for a person to eat, to drink, and to find satisfaction in their toilsome labor under the sun during the few days of life God has given them—for this is their lot. (Ecclesiastes 5:18)

If you work to make money, you are wrong. Work is grace, it is a platform to improve yourself. People do pay you a salary, but you will not be happy if you don't grow in this job. If a person works only for the salary, work will be very painful. They hope to be able to go out and play during the holidays, which is not smart. So I am talking about human resource management, because people's minds need to understand these things. Rejoice in labor, because in labor you can improve yourself and make yourself more valuable. Today I am talking about the basic principles of enhancing your self-worth, so the best investment is to invest in your own growth, which no one can take away. This is called learning to conduct oneself.

Investing in your growth to make yourself more valuable, then you have to learn a few of the most important words: clear goals, clear strategy, correct methods. If you understand these few words, you are a smart person, which is very remarkable. Some people invest in themselves, but they do this and that, and in the end they can't do anything well. When you ask them, they seem to know everything, but when you ask them again, they don't know anything. This kind of superficial understanding is the problem.

IV. How to Make Yourself More Valuable

I actually wanted to name today's class Basic Principles of Managing Yourself, But reading it, I don't know how to manage, and I don't know what management is, so I simply called it Basic Principles of Enhancing Your Self-Worth. How to make yourself more valuable, there is too much knowledge in the world. If you want to learn everything in your life, you will not be able to learn anything well. Learning requires first to see what kind of people the market needs. When you see that the market needs this kind of talent, and then see if you have this skill, and you want to do this line of work, and want to put yourself into the pile of talent, you have to do career planning. Actually, career planning should start in junior high school, but unfortunately I didn't even know the word career planning when I was in junior high school. I didn't know it in college either. It wasn't until I became a manager and started managing people that I understood what career planning is.

I regretted it back then. If only I had known how to do career planning when I was younger, imagine the possibilities. Thankfully, I learned about career planning when I became a manager – understanding the profession first, then planning. I found it difficult to manage my subordinates, dozens of them. They wouldn't do what I asked, going east when I said west, catching chickens when I told them to chase dogs. It was very frustrating. So, I developed a career planning theory. My work was published in the newspapers, and I would ask my subordinates what they thought of the job postings. Back then, a job ad would take up a quarter of the page, higher positions taking up even more space. They would say the salary looks good, but they couldn't do the job. I would ask, You want a good salary, but you don't have the ability. Have you ever thought about how to acquire that ability?

The goal is to get people to work hard, but the real goal is to elevate their value. I created a platform for them, where they would encounter problems that needed solving. Each time they solved a problem, it became their experience. They agreed that without solving problems, there would be no experience, and they started working diligently. I share this today hoping you can elevate yourselves. If a person becomes a talent in God's eyes, God's Kingdom needs talents even more. God needs people to manage ten cities, or five cities. He has many cities to manage, but He can’t seem to find management talents. I worry about that for God.

I deeply understand God's feelings. So, plan well to continuously grow. I accumulated many years of experience, reading the Bible for years before becoming a pastor. After becoming a pastor, I studied the Bible deeply to understand the meaning of being a pastor, and then I founded the Chinese Mingding Doctrine. My value lies in becoming a faithful and good servant in God's eyes, and it's the same in the workplace.

If you don't grow, you can't solve problems. Manage yourselves well, and often compare yourselves to job ads to assess your current situation. If you find yourself lacking, study what they require and mold yourselves accordingly. If you're still cleaning floors but want to be a Prime Minister right away, the gap is too wide, and the threshold is too high. It's an uncrossable chasm. Think in terms of becoming a cleaning supervisor. If you can't even clean well, how can you be a supervisor? If you do well as a supervisor, you might even be able to open a cleaning company in the future. To make yourselves valuable, you must plan your career development direction and constantly create learning plans, figuring out what you need to learn.

What I'm sharing are the paths I've walked. When I started as a junior engineer and junior customer service representative, I did the customer service job very well, thoroughly understanding the courses. In my spare time, I immersed myself in learning about networks, servers, and programming. Learning back then wasn't as simple as finding information now. Sometimes, I was so anxious that I was close to tears. But every time I learned to a certain level, God would prepare a position for me. My boss resigned, and I took his place. As I grew further, another boss resigned, and I took his place again. I continued to grow and a new school opened in Singapore and needed to recruit a senior manager. I applied successfully and got promoted again. If I hadn't studied hard, I really wouldn't know how to do that job. That isn't working; that's being on pins and needles.

How to make ourselves more valuable is a main axis in our hearts and lives. It's not that we need a job, but that the job needs us. If you can make it so that the job needs you, that would be wonderful. If you understand my theory, you'll also be a great business manager, clearly articulating how to manage. I encourage everyone today, there are plenty of vacancies in the market, the problem is that we aren't talented. Some people are elementary school teachers, doing the same thing day after day, year after year. How much is there to teach in elementary school Chinese? It's the same with middle school PE teachers, music teachers, and physics teachers. They just do the same thing every day and don't grow, not knowing how to learn to become a principal. Then learn how the department head and homeroom teacher do it! Actually, homeroom teachers are very needed. If there's a good homeroom teacher in the class to shepherd the children, then the children will grow well.

There's a lot to learn, but you're idle and scrolling through Douyin, shaking yourselves into a daze, which Northeasterners call 嘚瑟 [de se - showing off]. You don't have time to invest in growth, but you have a lot of room to grow. Set a good goal and run towards that goal. It's not that running towards that goal is 卷 [juǎn - competitive hustle], but that you need to prepare well to take on that position. When you have prepared the skill well, God will give you that position, and it won’t be so miserable to do it. This is the basic principle of elevating your value that I'm talking about. Today, I've seen so many people who don't grow, just staying there foolishly for years without changing.

We need to readjust our thinking; how to make ourselves more valuable, this is called being human. Some people don't know how to be human, and what they do is “卷” [juǎn - competitive hustle]. You can't see me 卷 [juǎn - competitive hustle], and the people around me have never found me busy because I've always been investing in myself, growing every day. Today’s “being human” chapter is written by myself, when I was preparing, I racked my brains to read the manuscript left and right, learning left and right. A few days ago, when I was talking about strategic management, a coworker bought a book written by Wang Zhigang called Strategy. I took it and flipped through it and found that it was written very well. Wang Zhigang is a down-to-earth person who does practical things. He is a consulting expert and a corporate strategy management expert.

Everyone must come out of laziness and muddling through each day. It’s not that I am terrific, but that I know how to invest. You cannot only invest money but not invest in yourself. Houses are called fixed assets, and you are called human resources. You are human resources and you are also an asset. If, until today, you are still a liability, that is a problem. The person is firmly trapped by money, and money is always more valuable than him. You are burdened with debt and are also a liability yourself. You will never be able to live a good life. If you want to live out the glorious image of God, you must invest in yourself.

V. Learn to Market Yourself

Every product has a product manual. When buying online, you read the product manual and find it described quite clearly, and other people's comments are also positive, so you buy it. If you mold yourself into a talented person, and describe yourself appropriately, and put yourself there, many companies will be vying for you. At that time, you will be a rare commodity, and it depends on how much money you want a month. If you're very busy at work, you've made a mistake. Including myself, I sometimes get it the wrong way around. If I always feel that I need that job, it's a problem. Remember that the job needs me. So, learn to market yourself, and occasionally write a resume for yourself, describing your talents, knowledge, skills, experience, achievements, and other basic qualities. As a result, you find that your work is emotional, your interpersonal relationships are not good, you often pick and choose, and you like high salaries and little work. No one wants that kind of person, and you can't be that kind of person. If you look at yourself like dog shit, and you look at others like dog shit, that's a problem.

Marketing yourself is like marketing: it's backward to get the product right. The market needs this kind of product, so go back to the product research and development department. What kind of functions do people need, and which problems need to be removed? When we market ourselves, we find that we have too many problems, we cannot distinguish between good and evil, we are better at work, and we no longer pick and choose. What kind of talent does the job market need? We will mold ourselves into what kind of talent. The whole world is looking for talent, and all companies have a strategy called talent strategy, which is how to attract talent to their companies. The problem is, are we that talent? Once we market ourselves, we find that we are not good enough. After narrowing the gap, you are that talent, and there is no fundamental problem in finding a job.

Sales skills are a core skill. Many people think that sales skills are needed by sales staff. In fact, everyone needs sales skills. This is called management. When a person pushes himself, he finds that there is a problem with himself, and this in itself is the goal and purpose. When you market yourself, you find out what people want. If we don’t have it, we go home and make up for it. This is why people often take a copy of the recruitment needs and match them with their own development direction to develop their skills.

VI. God Will Give You Good Opportunities

Let me tell you a heartening story. I usually like to study. As I studied, my small boss resigned. I didn’t know why he resigned. God wanted him to resign, and he could not resign, because his position had to be ceded to me. As I grew, my manager resigned again. God prepared another position for him and asked him to vacate this position for me. Maybe God liked me more. Later, as I grew again, a higher position came along. How good it is to have God! God will give you good opportunities. This is proclaimed by faith.

Today you missed many good opportunities. The problem is that you lack those basic concepts mentioned earlier. If you have mastered these basic concepts, and if you are so busy, you put God on vacation again, let God hide on the side, and you lose the opportunity. How many of us have been given opportunities by God? Many people put God aside as they go along, and that is a tragedy, because God is in charge of good opportunities. If God has given you an opportunity, and you treat this job as God, you will suffer a great loss. We need to adjust our internal logical system. If you want financial freedom, you cannot gain financial freedom if God does not give you an opportunity.

Of course, some people rely on their own abilities to become Jeroboam, and they sit in the position of Jeroboam in a miserable state. You must know that everything in the world is under God's control. If you please God and constantly improve yourself, live out God's glorious image. You must never push God aside in order to improve yourself; this is the smartest thing I have ever done in my life. No matter how busy I am or how great the work pressure is, even with mountain-like pressure, I will not let go of my God, because I am most afraid of my God letting go of me. It is good to call on God when I have a problem. If I put God on vacation when I am busy with work, and I call on God when I have a problem, where is God? It will be troublesome if God is also on vacation.

What’s more, every opportunity we have comes from God. Then, I need God, or do I need work? This requires everyone to think deeply. When I say I want to grow, some people only focus on growing well and push God aside. That's foolish. I never taught you to do this. I always teach you to hold on to God tightly, and then, when there is a lot of time left and you don’t know what to do, don’t swipe Douyin, but grow well. Because we manage ourselves throughout our lives, so that we can live out the image of God, and not the image of the world.

Some people in the world desperately climb up, and were removed from their position as Minister of National Defense. It is better not to go up; it is good to work below and to be a general. Many people do not know it and desperately climb up, and they engage in fraud and deception in the entire enterprise, and as a result, they will be in jail before they are even sixty years old. Won't they spend the rest of their life in jail? We must be a smart person. What I am saying today is to tell you a sentence from the Book of Ecclesiastes.

I have seen something else under the sun: The race is not to the swift or the battle to the strong, nor does food come to the wise or wealth to the brilliant or favor to the learned; but time and chance happen to them all. (Ecclesiastes 9:11)

Everything depends on the opportunity at the time, but the opportunity is in the hands of God. I have never been ashamed of trusting God throughout my life. It's not because I'm a pastor speaking like this today, I've always spoken like this, because I've relied on my God throughout my life. May God bless everyone!