Conversations in Singapore
by Michael E Daly
(Liberties Press)

“It is difficult to answer the question: ‘What is true success?’ But Michael [Daly]’s conversations have shown me what true success means to me, and you have to read them too to learn what true success means for you.”

That is how Dr Imre Gombkoto, an associate professor at the University of Miskolc, Hungary, describes Conversations in Singapore, a new book by Michael E Daly, a trained monk who is now a speaker and workshop leader. Daly says writing this, his second book was, not a straightforward task. When he conceived the idea, on contemplating the meaning of true success, his agent believed that taking “an academic stance – a review of success down through the ages” was going to be its significance. 

For Daly, however, it was really something else, an urge “to write a book that feels true to me”. Eventually, Daly set off on a near six-month overland trip “from London to Sydney, to give me a chance to figure it all out”.

Daly got what he wanted, unexpectedly, in a hotel in Singapore. There, the mysterious Parandin posed a series of questions to him on what it means to live a life of true success. This chance meeting was like a gift from above as Parandin challenged Daly “to share what I have learnt, in order to inspire others”.

Indeed, the book is full of inspiration. As Daly highlights, if you are “feeling that the success you want in your life has evaded you or passed you by, you have been pursuing someone else’s idea of success or you have no idea what true success might mean for you, Conversations in Singapore is writing for you”. 

And it doesn’t matter “whether you are just starting out on your life’s journey or have already gone some way down the road,” as Daly writes, because he shows “that it is never too late to discover what true success means to you, and to go after it. For when you do, anything can happen.”

Daly brings together all his experiences from his travels and teachings, as well as his life as a monk and his leanings in pursuit of all his qualifications in public administration, social care, and innovation, entrepreneurship and enterprise, as well as in healthcare management. This makes the book both unique and easy to learn from.

What makes it doubly interesting is that the chapters are based on relevant questions about oneself and real-life situations: How much is enough? Do you love the work you do? What is your legacy going to be? What is stopping you? How do you make success a way of life? These are captivating questions for anyone.