As you go through life and work toward your dreams, knowing who you are and what you aspire to be will remain the key to your success. There is the need for you to believe in yourself. Believing in yourself goes a long way in making others believe and support your dreams. Your family background may not look like what it should be, the environment itself may not be encouraging, but knowing and believing who you are and what you aim at becoming is very essential.
How can I be who I want to be?
1. Be Original.
Embrace the person you are. Do not try to imitate anyone else. You have to be honest with yourself about who you really are, what you are passionate about and who you want to be. There’ll be more than enough people who’ll criticize and try to discourage you. I’m sure you’ve heard about Sanballat and Tobiah, who tried to discourage Nehemiah from rebuilding the wall (Nehemiah 4). Yes, there are people who in the long run, will discourage you, but you have a goal that surpasses their attitude, just go for it. Be yourself 100%.
2. Have a Vision.
People’s dreams perish for lack of vision. Without the idea of who you want to be and a strong laid out procedure of how you want to achieve them, you’d get discouraged easily. You won’t even know where or how to aim for it. Keep the vision top of your mind and remind yourself daily that you have a goal you must reach.
3. Believe in yourself.
Author Richard Bach once said, “You are never given a dream without also being given the power to make it true”. So, no matter how discouraged you may get at times, you must know that you cannot be given a dream without also having the things needed in you to make it true. You have the abilities to make your dreams true, just believe in these abilities.
4. Do not just sit.
As much as you have all things in Christ as a believer, there is the part of your own dedication and commitment. You do not just sit and build an empire, you do not just sit and become the world biggest business tycoon, you do not just sit and become a hero in the fashion world. You work! The bible said in Isaiah 60:1, that “Arise and Shine”. It didn’t say Sit and Shine. You have to Arise, there is the place of diligence and consistency before you can achieve your dreams. So, get up, Arise and just do it.
5. Be wise.
Wisdom is profitable in all things. Be wise. Read books that will help you in your field and connect with those who have gone ahead of you.
6. The G factor.
Above all, God is important. We have the holy spirit as believers and his works in us have been activated. We cannot do without the guidance of the holy spirit. You’ll in fact be cheating on yourself when you do not allow him to lead you. God loves us so much, more than we can ever imagine and he has only good plans for those who believe in Him.
My darling, you can be whoever and whatever you want to become. See you at the top. I love you so so much.
Tomi Kehinde'18
Most of us at some point or the other of our lives have been in that position where we thought we were nothing, we felt like we couldn't come out and speak in the crowd because the crowd would think that we were crazy. We couldn't speak among friends for the fear that they would think we weren't smart. We considered ourselves inferior and couldn't even take major decisions, we wouldn't open our mouths to speak against decisions taken on our behalf even when it had to do with something we weren't interested in or didn't like.
No one can say they've never felt like this, we all have at one point or the other, the only thing that differentiates us from the other is whether we got through it and how we got through it. You shouldn't for any reason feel condemned or bad about yourself, it's a phase and the basic thing is to discover who you truly are, what you are and be able to get through this phase.
You need to realise that in your own way and in your world you are a king, you are a queen and at any point in time and at anywhere you can speak with boldness and authority.
I believer that some of us have gone through certain situations in life that has put us in this position and given us another image of ourselves than what we actually are, I need you to overcome that situation or that circumstance. I can't tell you how to overcome it because my way of overcoming it might not work for you but then that's what makes you unique and so you can always work on it and overcome it.
The basic thing you should know is that you are a king and you are a queen. You are unique, you are bold, you are strong and you are beautiful/handsome therefore you can stand and speak in a crowd, you can say your mind among friends because you are smart, you can take decisions on your own and you can oppose decisions.
I'll be adding the lyrics of a song here and I hope it encourages someone here. XoXo
You come from Royalty,
An aristocratic dynasty
The goal of the enemy,
Is that you don't know who you are
There's power when you speak
Be mindful of words you release
I know that life has challenged you,
But the King in me speaks to the King in you
You were born to rule
There is a king in you
There is a king in you
Is there no King in you,
Then why do you speak, speak with such defeat
Is there no King in you,
Then why do you speak, speak with such low esteem
I know life has challenged you,
But the King in me speaks to the king in you
You were born to rule
There is a King in you
The other day, I was trying to sew my traditional cloth: iro and buba, that is a wrapper and blouse. Sewing the wrapper was easy but sewing the blouse gave me a tough time, why? Well the thing is the hands have to be balanced with the body area. The armpit line also has to be in balance with the body area.
There's also ecological balance which is a state of stability where different species coexist with each other as well as the environment they are in. Most of us probably don't understand this but then we all can relate to having to balance equations in math or balancing our sheets in account.
What am I driving at? You see in everything that we do, we need to find a balance. We have to be able to balance our physical, spiritual, mental and economic life with our goals.
We all have goals, dreams or aspirations that may be the reason why we're in school or it may be outside of what has brought us to school, the thing is we need to be able to balance it all.
You can't focus on your goals and neglect your academics or other parts of your life, likewise you can't focus on your academics and other areas of your life and ignore your goals. You need to find a point where they meet and balance it out such that your academics is not suffering while your goal is enjoying all the attention, likewise your academics be enjoying while your goal is suffering, they both have to have your attention.
How can we find this balance? We have to be committed to both our goals and other areas of our lives and we also have to be focused, not letting anything thwart the plans that we have. Also, we need to set a timetable that involves everything that we do, we also have to set standards and place our priorities right.
We believe that with this, we will be able to set a balance and succeed. You don't have to wait till you're out of school or fully achieved before you start working towards your goal, there is never a right time or moment. The right time and moment is now.
You sleepy head, it's high time you woke up!
You procrastinator, the time is now to venture into that which you've been rescheduling!
Time waits for no man, so the saying goes
And in reality, it's no joke!
For you sleepy head, don't keep relying on family or friends as regards your future, don't be of the 'tomorrow will take care of itself' gang. The earlier you start planning your future, the better.
Oh ye procrastinator, that which you've rescheduled for a latter time can actually start now, no matter how little or minute you may think it is. Don't wait for the time when your idea is big enough before you start, remember, the journey of a thousand miles begins with a step. Your 'big idea' won't just come into reality while you're doing nothing towards it. Rome was not built in a day.
If you start now, more ideas and innovations keep coming in and before you know it, your big idea will be right before you. Big things start small you know.
Vision without mission is mere hallucination....so as much as you have your ideas, work towards bringing your ideas into reality.
I hope this call really wakes you up!
Nothing productive comes from being idle. Successful men did not just sit doing nothing while success came knocking. Elon Musk did not just sleep in his bed and think about Space X, Tesla motors or Solar City coming into existence, he went as far as benefitting about $4.9billion in government support, it did not end there, the first few rockets launched into space didn't even get halfway, some didn't even leave earth, but he went ahead to make certain changes, and boom, the rockets did get launched into space.
Elon Musk not just thinking space X, Solar City and Tesla into existence, but working towards it becoming a reality is an example of what I call toil, and he going as far as benefitting a huge amount of money in subsidy from the United States is what I call risk. It could have gone either ways for him, but he was of a positive mindset and here we are with Space X, Tesla and all.
Aliko Dangote was said to start his business with $3000, but see where he is now. He is not just influential in the country, he is the richest man in Africa. The sacrifices he made back then when he started is what has led him to being what he is today.
Don't just sit and think because your dad is rich, that automatically qualifies you to be rich. Paddy Adenuga had to leave his dad's company where he was the Group Executive Director to set up an oil brokering firm in London with Cayne & Cayne and at the age of 29, he almost bought Chevron, Netherlands.
Toil and risk, and at the end, you will have the glory!
We all have at one point or the other in our lives been angered by humans or situations. The outcome or aftermath of the anger was not that cool if you will all agree with me. For those whose anger is on a low level, the aftermath as little as it might be may result in broken relationships and all while for those whose anger is on a higher level, it may result to having blood on one's hands and thereby 'rotting' in jail.
Anger makes a terrible fuel, it can't help you build anything, it can only make you destroy. The Bible in the book of Ephesians 4:26 attests to anger not being a good thing. It says 'Be ye angry and sin not: let not the sun go down upon your wrath:'. It's okay to be angry, in fact you can not do without being angry, BUT no matter how provoked or frustrated you may be, no matter how far to the wall you have been pushed, do not let the sun go down on your anger!
The sun going down on your anger does not literarily mean you have to let go of that which makes you angry before the sun sets, fine, that's advisable to do, but it also means not to get angry for a long period of time. A friend of mine does one thing when he's angry: he counts backwards one to a hundred, that means, he starts counting from one hundred to one and by the time he reaches halfway through the counting, the anger's subsided already and we all start joking again. That might not work for you, but all the same, get angry less and find a cure to your anger.
Thank you!
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