Keywords: life system; deterministic modules; survival function; system reliability; resilience model; exemption power; non-forced operation; open source declaration
About This Article
This article describes my personal educational and thought structure. My thinking structure sits at the intersection of two phases: a Chinese humanities foundation before age 21, and an English science-and-engineering framework after. In Singapore's education system, I had no access to elite schooling — only the standard path of ordinary public education. It was within these constraints, through decades of practice and iterative experience, that CYSM gradually took shape.
The system can be understood through three layers:
1. Life Events (Signals)
The raw materials of life—moments that appear random or coincidental: the "Credit Gate" photo in 1991, the Physical Alignment at Suntec City, the sparrow in 2025, the inspiration in the kitchen. These are not fate or superstition; they are signals waiting to be recognized.
2. System Processing (Time)
How these signals are processed through engineering thinking: 40 years of maintaining electrical systems, testing systems, building facilities, and automation systems. The right brain detects the light; the left brain builds the lighthouse. When rushed (1998), the system crashes. When given time (27 years waiting for SDGAI), signals naturally align.
3. Long-term Stability (Exemption Power)
The outcome of a system that has been maintained long enough: when failures cannot accumulate, time becomes an asset. This is not a sudden achievement, but the natural result of a system that has remained stable over decades—what I call "exemption power."
My goal is not to achieve success, but to prevent failures from accumulating; when failures cannot accumulate, time naturally becomes an asset. (The "Why" Behind Extracting Certainty from Randomness)
In 1991, I stood before a gate in Malacca that read "Credit Gate" (赊钱门) and took a photo. I was 24, a young man at NEC Semiconductors who knew nothing about investing.
Two years later, I bought my first stock, those were the discounted Singtel shares I bought.
In 2001, due to my frequent consumption of processed foods and excessive concentration on writing my blog online, I failed to process the intuitions and impulses I was capturing, leading to excessive fright, a near mental breakdown, and auditory and visual hallucinations. I was unable to work until, inspired by my mother, I found a part-time job in the vegetable retail department of NUTC-FairPrice in May 2002.
In 2006, I opened a personal CPF investment account at DBS Bank in Singapore and began investing in unit trusts using my CPF and cash, and also started investing in RSP. I officially completed my combat readiness service with the Singapore Civil Defence Force. That same year, I stayed at the Singapore Institute of Mental Health for two weeks and was diagnosed with schizophrenia.
In 2009, I purchased my first REIT (Suntec), the same year my mother passed away, marking a turning point in my life.
In 2013, my schizophrenia relapsed due to my unauthorized temporary discontinuation of medication. After the relapse, I was admitted to the Singapore Institute of Mental Health for two weeks.
In 2015, my father passed away, marking another turning point in my life.
From 2015 to 2017, I began building my CDP-REITs portfolio.
From 2016 to 2024, I worked in facilities maintenance and management at the Suntec City commercial complex.
In 2021, I woke up feeling unwell and suddenly discovered that my left eye was completely blurry. I took sick leave from work and went to Toa Payoh Polyclinic to see a doctor early in the morning. Later, I was transferred to the Tan Tock Seng Hospital Eye Centre, where I even vomited. At the Eye Centre, I was diagnosed with glaucoma.
After retiring on March 1, 2024 (at age 57), I ceased to "sell" my time for survival.
One year later after that, a sparrow flew into my kitchen. Looking at its effortless freedom, I realized my life’s work wasn't about accumulating wealth. It was about lowering the pressure to participate in a mandatory social system.
This white paper is the "Source Code" of how I achieved that exemption.
Part I: Poetic Metaphors & The Soul of the OS
Before math, there was the "Awareness."
The "Credit Gate" Prophecy (1991): My 25-year plan was essentially "borrowing" time from my youth to buy back the ownership of my future. "The Poetic Metaphor of the Life System" there are a total of 6 photos, one of which also defines why my investment portfolio is focused in Asia, and reduce direct holdings of assets denominated in US dollars.
External Discernment: I avoided career and financial landmines not by calculation alone, but by leveraging my family's "external awareness" to know when to walk away.
The Physical Alignment at Suntec City: From 2016 to 2024, I worked in facilities maintenance and management at Suntec City—the very building that housed my first REIT purchase in 2009. Years later, standing inside a building I partially owned, maintaining its systems with my own hands, I realized: this was not a coincidence. It was the alignment of "ownership" and "maintenance" in physical space. The Fountain of Wealth stood there as a silent witness, and my daily work was simply to ensure the building's "buoyancy" remained intact. This was not planned. Time allowed it to happen naturally.
The Sparrow Signal: A symbol of a system that is light, agile, and autonomous—proof that certainty can be extracted from a random world.
External Discernment: I avoided career and financial landmines not by calculation alone, but by leveraging my family's "external awareness" to know when to walk away.
The Physical Alignment at Suntec City: From 2016 to 2024, I worked in facilities maintenance and management at Suntec City—the very building that housed my first REIT purchase in 2009. Years later, standing inside a building I partially owned, maintaining its systems with my own hands, I realized: this was not a coincidence. It was the alignment of "ownership" and "maintenance" in physical space. The Fountain of Wealth stood there as a silent witness, and my daily work was simply to ensure the building's "buoyancy" remained intact. This was not planned. Time allowed it to happen naturally.
The Sparrow Signal: A symbol of a system that is light, agile, and autonomous—proof that certainty can be extracted from a random world.
Part II: Deterministic Module Breakdown (The Components)
"Exemption Power" is not obtained through deliberate effort, but rather through the withdrawal from deliberate effort. Involuntary effort is not laziness, but rather, after the system structure is aligned, stability naturally becomes the source of freedom. Involuntary effort ≠ inaction; rather, after long-term calibration, the system naturally enters low-energy operation, and these are all the building blocks for constructing a state of "zero exit pressure."
5.61% The Income Engine: This is the power source of the system. By constructing a portfolio of core Asian assets that does not rely on "risking one's life for money," I have locked in a return of 5.61% annualized. It is not for getting rich quick, but to cover the operation of the "low-energy engine," ensuring that the system achieves permanent self-circulation without depleting the principal.
Skill Evolution (1984–2025): A continuous recalibration from ITE Electrical Engineering to a 2025 Specialist Diploma in Applied Generative AI. This ensures my "Human Capital" remains an asset, not a liability.
The SGD 667 Engine: By locking monthly survival costs at a low energy state, I decoupled my happiness from my net worth.
The 15% Buffer: A cash safety net that turns "market volatility" into "visible, tolerable data".
Part III: System Operating Indicator
How the components harmonize into a repeatable index.
The Engineering Architecture Index
Life Mastery ≈ {Total Portfolio Yield (5.61%) x Skill Evolution Chain (Python/AI)} / {Low Energy Expenditure (SGD 667) x Risk Buffer (15% Cash)}
The Autonomy Multiplier Index
Life Autonomy ≈ Deterministic Modules x Survival TimeThe Inversion: Most people trade time for security; I lock in security with my system, letting time be the outcome. I don't pursue one-time success; instead, I reduce the probability of system failure. When the probability of failure is low enough, time naturally translates into profit. This is my survival function.
The Foundational Logic of Life Autonomy
Positioning (Lincoln): Clearly assess where you stand, and map the system's safety boundaries.
Self-identification (Frankl): Cultivate an internal compass—through continuous learning and calibration—that does not depend on external validation.
Correct Decision-making (The System): With true coordinates set, extract certainty and minimize the probability of failure.
Conclusion: The real way to reduce risk is not to try to outsmart the market, but to first locate your true coordinates—and live from that truth.
Galileo said: "You cannot teach a person anything; you can only help him discover it within himself." These three indicators of CYSM —the Engineering Architecture Index, the Autonomy Multiplier Index, and the foundational logic of Life Autonomy —are not rules designed to "teach" you how to live. They are tools to help you "discover" the operating state of your own life system. Indicators are not judgments; they are feedback. Data is not the answer; it is the signal.
Part IV: Open Source Declaration
Money can be unlimited; lifetime is finite.
The philosophical significance of non-deliberate operation lies in the fact that non-deliberate operation is not about following the crowd, but rather about structural inertia. The cost of deliberate operation is the loss caused by long-term misaligned operation. "Exemption Power" is hard-won because it stems from withdrawing from deliberate operation.
If life is running code, I am simply publishing my version so that reality can continuously backtest it. I don't try to be the smartest variable; I just reduce the probability of being eliminated. This isn't a worldview; it's engineering. And the core of engineering is precisely: verifiable, testable, backtestable, and adaptable.
I'm open-sourcing this "white-box" logic that's been running for 40 years, as a sample that will be continuously backtested: as long as the focus shifts from "pursuing returns" to "managing certainty," anyone willing to exchange short-term excitement for long-term stability can reclaim control over their life. If it survives in reality over the long run, then it becomes the answer in itself.
Einstein said that the most beautiful things we can experience are mysterious. I have spent 60 years proving that those mysterious moments (the door to the credit gate moment, physical location at Suntec City, the sparrow, the inspiration in the kitchen) can be addressed with engineering methods, from which we can extract certain truths. This is my life system: responding to the mysterious with reason, embracing poetry with engineering, and placing uncertainty within certainty.
Part V: Order of Thought
I did not encounter these thinkers only in my later years.
As early as secondary school, I was already exposed to Galileo Galilei. His words:
“You cannot teach a man anything; you can only help him discover it within himself.”
became one of the first philosophical signals I received from the Western world.
But even before that, my deeper intellectual foundation had already been shaped by Chinese literature and traditional thought.
One sentence that stayed with me for decades came from Mencius:
“To believe completely in books is worse than having no books at all.”
At a young age, I did not fully understand what it meant.
Only many years later did I gradually realize that the sentence was not rejecting knowledge itself. Rather, it was reminding us that reality must always take precedence over textual authority.
A system is not validated by how convincing it sounds in theory, but by whether it can continue operating under real conditions.
In some ways, this eventually became one of the deepest underlying principles of CYSM:
Theory may guide, but systems must run.
In 1989, when I graduated from ITE, I was deeply moved by Albert Einstein’s reflections on “the mysterious.”
Yet long before I encountered Western thinkers, Chinese literature had already given me something equally important: imagery, poetic intuition, historical depth, and the ability to tolerate ambiguity.
That was why, later in life:
When reading Abraham Lincoln, I understood positioning.
When reading Viktor Frankl, I understood self-definition.
After retirement, when I encountered Charlie Munger, I recognized a structural version of myself.
Before diving deeper into the philosophical parallels, the following chart summarizes how Charlie Munger and CYSM differ — and converge — in their insurance logic.
Both frameworks aim for resilience, yet one safeguards capital while the other safeguards life itself.
After completing CYSM, I unexpectedly discovered Ludwig Wittgenstein. What struck me was that he did not derive philosophy purely from abstract reasoning in a study room. His philosophy was deeply tied to lived experience.
But Wittgenstein ultimately moved toward silence:
“Whereof one cannot speak, thereof one must be silent.”
He chose to let go of what could not be fully expressed.
CYSM moved in a different direction.
Where language reaches its limit, I allow systems to continue the verification process through operation.
CYSM does not need to explain everything completely. It only needs to continue functioning under real-world conditions.
Wittgenstein chose silence. I chose operation. That is the deepest difference in temperament.
This is not philosophical transplantation, but structural convergence.
Different civilizations, under different constraints, arriving at similar engineering truths.
He used language analysis and logical criticism. I use engineering modeling and system maintenance.
His achievement was clarity of thought. Mine is long-term system stability.
He paid the price through lifelong struggle with language and mental exhaustion.
I rely on AI collaboration to reduce cognitive overload and prevent system collapse.
A few weeks after encountering Wittgenstein, I encountered Zhuangzi.
Zhuangzi said:
“Everyone knows the usefulness of what is useful, but few understand the usefulness of what appears useless.”
That sentence suddenly made me realize that my entire life trajectory had long followed this exact structure.
Chinese-stream education:
In Singapore during the 1970s and 1980s, Chinese education was increasingly viewed as a secondary path, while English represented industrialization, employment, and globalization. Yet decades later, Chinese education became the source of my civilizational observation, philosophical expression, and long-range historical perception — forming the humanistic foundation of CYSM.
AI studies in 1994:
At that time, AI was considered a technological wilderness with little practical value. Yet I chose to study it early, unknowingly planting a long-term signal. Thirty years later, AI became the cognitive amplifier that helped accelerate the refinement of CYSM.
Zhuangzi reminds us that value is not defined by the dominant assumptions of the present moment, but by time and structural evolution.
This is precisely the CYSM equation:
Life Outcome = Signal × Time × Stability
Zhuangzi expressed “the usefulness of uselessness” through philosophical language.
I express the same structure through engineering logic: Signal × Time.
Different expressions. Similar convergence.
I simply spent sixty years turning that logic into a tree that can now be publicly observed and verified.
The order in which I encountered these thinkers was not destiny. It was causal alignment.
Each encounter emerged naturally when my life system evolved to the stage capable of recognizing that signal.
Part VI: System Maintenance Notes (On Patience and Failure)
- Lessons from 1994: Recording the system crash caused by haste.
- Calibration in 2024: Recording the natural closed loop of AI learning after adapting to its inherent patterns.
These two life experiences illustrate that the reliability of a system is never guaranteed by "predicting storms," but by daily maintenance across four dimensions.
- Health Management: Gut microbiota balance, SGD667 dietary control—this is the system's biological hardware.
- Psychological Stability: Recognition and calibration of "right-brain signals," vigilance against "hallucinations"—this is the system's software.
- Financial Stability: A 5.61% revenue engine, a 15% cash buffer—this is the system's energy supply.
- Time Structure: 6-months active blank space, a 27-year signal waiting, a 60-years of causal alignment —this is the system's time domain.
Life System Reliability = f(Health Management, Psychological Stability, Financial Stability, Time Structure)
Final Conclusion: Don't try to plan the direction of the storm; plan the buoyancy of the ship.
"Life is not a 100-meter sprint, but a cultivation that follows the seasons. In 1994, I
learned not to 'pull up the seedlings,' and in 2024, I reaped the harvest of an entire
spring. I can say that I am someone who has lived life earnestly, kept meticulous
records, and carefully calibrated my life. What I pursue is not one-time success, but
sustainable survival."
This framework summarizes the essence of CYSM — stability over success, where time transforms certainty into enduring outcomes. And "exemption power", hard-earned, is the right to let life run on its natural rhythm without forced compensation.
Author’s Note:
If I hadn't delayed gratification before retirement, I wouldn't be where I am today. Delaying gratification isn't the goal, but rather to give the system time to build its infrastructure. After retirement, I no longer need to delay gratification—because the system is already functioning naturally.
Furthermore, "Exemption power" is not obtained through deliberate effort, but through the withdrawal from deliberate effort.
Before retirement, I was forced to make countless compensations to fit external schedules—sacrificing sleep, compressing recovery, pushing my body against its rhythm. These actions raised short-term performance but eroded long-term stability, even shifting the baseline of health and mind.
After retirement, time returned to me, and the system began to run on its natural rhythm: preparing my own meals, finishing dinner before nightfall, sleeping eight hours, fasting twelve hours. These are no longer “deliberate discipline,” but structural inertia.
Non-forced does not mean passive. It means that after long-term calibration, stability itself becomes the source of freedom.
This is why I say—"exemption power" is hard-earned. It is the result of decades of refusing collapse, the right for a life system to finally operate according to its own rhythm.
Disclaimer in advance: I am not a philosopher. I am simply a life maintenance technician who spent forty years learning how systems remain stable. SGD667 is not something achieved through cost-saving measures. It is a natural result of the coordinated operation of the health subsystem, time sovereignty, capital buffer, and housing firmware. When infrastructure becomes the power source, low energy consumption becomes the system's idling fuel consumption. This is not an investment note, but a life system operation report. It documents how, under real constraints, I spent sixty years moving from “Credit Gate” to “Exemption Power.”
If I hadn't delayed gratification before retirement, I wouldn't be where I am today. Delaying gratification isn't the goal, but rather to give the system time to build its infrastructure. After retirement, I no longer need to delay gratification—because the system is already functioning naturally.
Furthermore, "Exemption power" is not obtained through deliberate effort, but through the withdrawal from deliberate effort.
Before retirement, I was forced to make countless compensations to fit external schedules—sacrificing sleep, compressing recovery, pushing my body against its rhythm. These actions raised short-term performance but eroded long-term stability, even shifting the baseline of health and mind.
After retirement, time returned to me, and the system began to run on its natural rhythm: preparing my own meals, finishing dinner before nightfall, sleeping eight hours, fasting twelve hours. These are no longer “deliberate discipline,” but structural inertia.
Non-forced does not mean passive. It means that after long-term calibration, stability itself becomes the source of freedom.
This is why I say—"exemption power" is hard-earned. It is the result of decades of refusing collapse, the right for a life system to finally operate according to its own rhythm.
Historical Footnote
In 1965, Singapore separated from the Federation of Malaysia. It was not a voluntary choice, but a necessity imposed by circumstances. At that time, Singapore had no natural resources, no army, no hinterland, and even depended on external supply for drinking water. Independence meant designing a national system that could remain stable under extreme vulnerability.
Thus, CPF, HDB, bilingual policy, and national defense were established. Over time, these structures became part of the nation’s natural rhythm. They were no longer “deliberate compensations,” but “non-forced operations.”
This history shows that stability—whether for a nation or for an individual—is hard-earned. Singapore’s independence and my "exemption power", though on different scales, share the same logic: within constraints, keep the system running, and let time transform uncertainty into certainty.
A Note on Modern Academic Education
CYSM does not reject the value of modern academic education. In fact, without Chinese-stream education, technical training at ITE, polytechnic education, and forty years of engineering practice, CYSM would never have existed.
However, the objective function of academic education differs fundamentally from that of Life Systems Engineering.
The primary mission of academic institutions is to cultivate professional expertise and support social specialization. Their optimization target is performance.
CYSM, by contrast, asks a different question:
How can a human life system remain stable under long-term real-world constraints?
Its optimization target is survival.
Modern academic institutions are highly effective at producing scientists, engineers, doctors, and managers. Yet they rarely teach questions such as:
How do we build personal financial buffers?
How do we manage long-term health risks?
How do we design time sovereignty after retirement?
How do we apply scientific cooking to maintain biological stability?
How do we prevent small failures from accumulating into system-wide collapse?
As a result, we often observe an interesting phenomenon:
A person may possess extraordinary professional expertise, yet still struggle to maintain a stable life system.
This is not a problem of intelligence.
It is a difference in optimization objectives.
Modern educational systems primarily optimize external metrics such as degrees, publications, positions, income, and academic influence.
Life Systems Engineering, on the other hand, optimizes health, time, financial resilience, and psychological stability.
Modern academia relies on peer review to validate knowledge.
CYSM relies on long-term operation in reality.
For me, true validation does not come from external evaluation systems, but from the operating results of the system itself:
Stable sleep, a healthy body, sustainable cash flow,
And a life trajectory that does not collapse under reality.
Papers may be published. Titles may be earned. Awards may accumulate.
Yet whether a life system can operate stably over decades cannot ultimately be outsourced to institutions, journals, or algorithms.
Because life itself is the final peer review.
What CYSM attempts to address is precisely this missing layer in modern education:
How can health, capital, time, and cognition be integrated into a life system capable of long-term stable operation?
When the kitchen and the spreadsheet begin to operate together, a person gradually acquires the Exemption to live according to the natural rhythms of his own system.
Academic education teaches people to pursue performance.
CYSM teaches people to design survival.
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