Yesterday has no governing power over tomorrow

Your past does not determine your future. When I was a kid mom used to tell me that once milk was spilled, it was gone. Many times we agonize over things and events that may have happened in our past when our life is really in the future. Don’t allow the past to be a stumbling block. The best is yet to come. It’s in the future. Yesterday has no governing power over tomorrow.

As a leader in my student’s body in college I used to tell fellow student’s that if I made a mistake, no one should come back to me and tell me that I should have done things differently. I’ve never been a fan of history lessons. My passion is about the future, about tomorrow, about what we can do differently today in order to ensure a better tomorrow. What happened in the past has already happened. Let bygones be bygones. Now, what can we do today to make a better tomorrow?

Going Back to My Childhood

Tomorrow I will be celebrating one of my many birthdays. One thing that always comes to mind every July 21st is the fun I had as a child, running through green pastures (metaphoric), enjoying my friends and living it up. As I have advanced in age, I have unlearnt so much of the fun I had as a child. A mentor once taught me that it’s what we learn after we know it all that counts! That was an eye-opener! It really made me think about how becoming a man has robbed me of so much that I had as a child. Many times we advance in age and so much changes that we lose touch with the things that make life worth enjoying. Certain activities and pursuits are shunned because they are for ‘children’. But being childish and being childlike are two very different things.

Children are learners. True learners never say that they know it all. Childish people are stuck in their mannerisms. I want to go back to my childhood days because that is when I learnt the most. I want to walk in the rain, I want to jump in mud puddles, I want to collect rocks, I want to enjoy rainbows and roses once again, I want to smell flowers, I want to blow bubbles, I want to stop along the way just for no reason, I want to build sandcastles, I want to say hello to everyone, I want to go barefoot, I want to go on adventures, I want to act silly, I want to fly kites, I want to have a merry heart, I want to talk with animals, I want to sing in the shower, I want to read childrens’ books, I want to take bubble baths, I want to get new sneakers, I want to hold hands and hug and kiss, I want to dance, I want to laugh and cry for the health of it, I want to wonder and wander around, I want to feel happy and precious and innocent, I want to feel scared, I want to feel sad, I want to feel mad, I want to give up worry and guilt and shame, I want to say yes, I want to say no, I want to say the magic words, I want to ask lots of questions, I want to ride bicycles, I want to draw and paint, I want to see things differently, I want to fall down and get up again, I want to look at the sky, I want to watch the sun rise and sun set, I want to watch clouds and name their shapes, I want to watch the moon and stars come out, I want to trust the universe, I want to stay up late, I want to climb trees, I want to daydream, I want to do nothing and do it very well, I want to learn new stuff, I want to be excited about everything, I want to be a clown, I want to enjoy having a body, I want to listen to music, I want to find out how things work, I want to make up new rules, I want to tell stories, I want to save the world, I want to make friends with the other kids on the block, and do anything else that brings more happiness, celebration, health, love, joy, creativity, pleasure, abundance, grace, self-esteem, courage, balance, spontaneity, passion, beauty, peace, relaxation, communication and life energy to…all living beings on this planet.

Time-Outs: The Key to Refocusing and Reviewing Our Plans

One of my favorite sports is basketball. I’ve always loved the game, even though it took me a long time to understand the rules and grasp why they did things the way they do them. One of the features I never understood for a long time was the concept of time-outs.

A time-out is simply a short interruption in a regular period of play during which a referee stops the clock so that the players may rest, deliberate or make substitutions. I always thought that time-outs were unnecessary and that players should play continuously. My thinking was that time-outs robbed the game of it’s continuity.

However, as I’ve grown and developed in my thinking, I have come to realize that time-outs are absolutely essential. Not just in sports, but also in regular every day activities of life. Time-outs allow us to think. Thinking is one of the mental exercises that very few people ever engage in. Many would rather be caught doing other things rather than thinking.

Time-outs are essential for a basketball team to refocus and review their game plan. Take time today for your time-out. Go to the balcony and reflect. Take a walk and ponder. Go to the back yard and meditate. Think about your life; the journey towards your destiny; etc. Enjoy your time-out. Don’t be in a rush to get back into the game. The game can wait. Go think.

The Progressive Unfolding of Destiny

Life is a journey. Success is a journey, not a destination. I came across a quote that beautifully captures how to navigate this journey towards success. This is from Jack Canfield, author of Chicken Soup for the Soul. He says,

“Think of a car driving through the night. The headlights only go a hundred to two hundred feet forward, and you can make it all the way from California to New York driving through the dark, because all you have to see is the next two hundred feet. And that’s how life tends to unfold before us. If we just trust that the next two hundred feet will unfold after that, and the next two hundred feet will unfold after that, your life will keep unfolding. And it will eventually get you to the destination of whatever it is you truly want, because you want it.”

Where are you in your journey towards success? No matter where you are, continue to trust that everything is unfolding in a pre-determined manner. You will make it to your destination if you will just continue to stay focused. The best is yet to come.

Born for Success

We all want to achieve success. Human beings are designed and born for success. Success, however, is not automatic. There are certain key things that we have to do consistently in order to really attain that which brings significance to our lives. Here are six key things that I believe will usher in success to anyone who applies them.

1. Set big goals and dreams and go after them - Every worthwhile pursuit in life begins with a dream. Dreams are the substance of life. Once you have a dream, you need to create step by step goals that will allow you to get that which you desire. Goals must be pursued diligently. Diligence is the guidepost to fulfillment in life.

2. Learn from every problem or obstacle you face - Problems, challenges, obstacles and crisis are great teaching schools. When problems arise, take notes and study them. Learn from your mistakes and that will enable you to not repeat them. True success comes through challenges and trials. The road to success is littered with problems and obstacles that were conquered by winners.

3. Learn the key skills you require for success - Skills separate the winners from the losers, the successful from the successful. One of the things that has helped me a lot over the years is studying the lives of successful people. They have all been people who amassed great skill at doing what takes them over the top. Learn the necessary skills and you will definitely make it to the top.

4. Get the support and cooperation of others - No man is an island. The day of the lone-ranger is over. Teamwork makes the dream work. If you will truly reach your potential, you must embrace the power of teaming up with others. The support of people around you is crucial. Develop an inner circle of people who will support you. Find mentors and learn from them. Create networks with successful people and add value to them.

5. Focus on priorities and concentrate on key tasks - Priorities are the pathways to success. Your priorities in life determine the quality of your results. Goals should be prioritized. High impact goals should befirst on your goals list. Clear set-up of priorities enables you to develop a powerful focus that directs your pursuit of your goals. The objectives that bring you the most reward in life should be the center of focus.

6. Develop persistence and unshakable self-confidence - Persistence and self-confidence go hand-in-hand. We all encounter obstacles in life but it is those who persists through the obstacles who will attain their full potential. Self-confidence sets you apart. Most people sabotage themselves by second-guessing their abilities and strengths. Don’t let doubt, uncertainty and societal barriers stop you. Success is yours for the taking.

Go for it!

Circumstances Reveal the Real You!

Many people fear crisis situations but the truth is that crisis is the furnace that truly tests a leader and reveals what kind of substance she is made of. Greek philosopher Epictetus once said, “Circumstances do not make the man; they merely reveal him to himself.” A crisis is the genuine test of courage and effectiveness in a leader. Crisis reveals what we are made of. Rather than shun crisis situations, we should embrace them because they allow us to grow and develop our character.

What challenges are you facing today? Are you approaching them with a proper attitude? Even more important, think about the future. What challenges do you anticipate in the future? By thinking keenly about them now, you can choose how you will respond to such situations. Allow your crisis situations to develop maturity and leadership substance within you. Remember, crisis reveals who you are.

Develop A Concrete Philosophy About Helping Others

Zig Ziglar famously said, “You can get anything you want in this world if you can just help enough other people get what they want”. The truth is that if you do something nice for someone else, they will feel obligated to do something nice for you. That’s the power of reciprocity. I learnt this with a friend of mine a while back when I invited him and his family for a fully paid tour of an exhibition in our city. He was so delighted that all evening he kept on asking if there was anything he could do to help me.

You should always be looking for opportunities to help other people. Make it your goal that you will go the extra mile in helping people attain what they desire. Make it your personal goal to do more than you are paid for. Be committed to putting in more than you take out. When your input exceeds your output, your upkeep will be secure. By extending yourself, you improve your positioning in the other person’s mind. Few people have a concrete philosophy for helping others. Develop one for yourself and you will stand head and shoulders over many.

Laboring Under Correct Knowledge

People sometimes attribute other’s successes to ‘luck’. Luck, to me, is a term for the uninitiated. True success comes only through smart work. LUCK therefore is Laboring Under Correct Knowledge! When we have the right knowledge and apply ourselves in implementing it, luck will be the output of our smart efforts. Achievement does not come out of the blue. It comes from laboring under correct knowledge. Gain the right kind of knowledge and apply yourself and doors will surely open.

The Road to Excellence

We live in a world in which giving an average performance has become the norm. Most employees work just enough to keep from being fired and they are paid just enough to keep from quitting. Service in many industries is at best average. Very few companies and organizations stand out as excellent service providers. If we are going to attain our full potential, we must commit to being excellent at everything we do. Many times we talk a better game than we can play. We make big commitments to give our best but when the rubber meets the road, we come short and fail to provide what we had said we would.

Col. Harland Sanders, founder of Kentucky Fried Chicken said, "I made a resolve then that I was going to amount to something if I could. And no hours nor amount of labor nor amount of money would deter me from giving the best that there was in me”. A good study of his life will show us that the road to success is paved with a commitment to giving your very best on a daily basis. Now, the road to mediocrity is littered with sub-standard service and average performances. We need to break out of that cycle of average and truly give our best in everything we do. That is the key to truly maximizing our lives.

Dynamics of Mental Attention

One of the most beautiful tools that we can use to change our lives is the idea that whatever we focus and dwell upon expands. Our attention, therefore, is very important. What we pay attention to becomes a dominant factor or force in our lives. There are two aspects to this:

a). Quality of Attention - There are varying degrees of attention. Our highest degree of attention should be given to things, people and activities that multiply value in our lives. What good will it profit us to pay attention to worthless things and rob the more important things in our lives of the time they deserve?

b). Quantity of Attention - How much attention we give the things, people and activities in our lives also matters. We want to live a well-balanced, all-round lifestyle. The key to this is to prioritize all these areas of our lives and allot time to them. As we do this, we also find that certain activities pair well with others and can be combined. This enables us to save on precious time.

Action Steps: Look at critical areas of your life. Are you paying adequate attention to all of this? Learn how to give good quality and quantity of time to things that matter and you will realize a lot more in life.

Making Quality Choices Daily

Every day provides lots of opportunities for us to shape our lives. Many times we fail to maximize on these opportunities because we have a short-term perspective on our lives. When we approach our lives with a more long-term perspective, we begin to see that our daily events are forming the permanent ‘us’. Someone once said that ‘what you do daily determines who you become permanently’.

We shape our lives daily by the choices and decisions we make. Each choice we make is either a step up or down in the formation of our ultimate character. Show me a person’s choices and I will tell you the character of person that he or she is. Quality choices enable us to develop a solid character. Poor choices ruin our character. The process of shaping your life therefore begins with the character choices you make.

Stretching Our Minds

One of the things that puzzles me is why we sometimes close our minds to the entry of new ideas. If we are to grow we need to continually stay open to the entry of new ideas and information. New ideas and information allows us to grow and break out of our comfort zones. Man’s mind, one’s tretched by new ideas and information, never goes back to it’s original dimensions. One of the assumptions we sometimes live by is that we have no time to learn new ideas and gain new information. Sometimes we tend to think that we have mastered it all and need no new information. The truth is that it is what we learn after we have known it all that counts. So, stay open to new ideas.

On Being Solution-Centered

When things go wrong, our first temptation is usually to find someone whom we can assign the blame for the problem. This tendency works against us in the long-run because we are focusing on the problem instead of the solution. Our main objective should be to fix the problem. We fix problems by being solution-centered.

When things go wrong, do not jump at the temptation to assign blame. Focus on finding solutions. Assigning blame is the lowest level of engagement in the process of problem solving. Rise above the norm. Be solution-centered!

Learning Wisdom From Our Foes

Aristophanes, a Greek writer, once said, “A man may learn wisdom even from a foe”.

This makes me think about all the adversity I’ve had in my life over the past couple of years. What we sometimes think to be adversity may be a blessing in the long-run. What really determines whether we succeed or not is how we respond to adversity. Adversity, therefore, may be a friend. Adversity helps us to grow and develop better skills. Adversity sharpens our focus and enables us to thrive. Embrace adversity today.

Force Fields of Personal Destiny

I learnt the workings of magnets in primary school but never gave it much thought since my thinking at that time was that science was basically a pain I had to go through in order to pass my exams. Well, as I’ve grown older (and hopefully, wiser) I’ve come to see that a lot in life revolves around the principles of the working of a magnet. A magnet is simply a device that produces an axial vector field that traces out solenoidal lines of force in and around closed electric circuits and bar magnets. (Ok. I just lost half of my readers there. You now understand why I had such an attitude about science as I grew up).

Simply put, we are living magnets. Our thoughts create force fields of energy that radiate out from us and attract back into our lives the people and circumstances in harmony with those thoughts (Better, huh?). Any thought you have, combined with an emotion, positive or negative, radiates out from you and attracts back into your life the people, circumstances, ideas and opportunities consistent with it. You are a living magnet!

The key then to success is to develop an idea of your dream, goal or vision and then hold onto it on a continuing basis. By harnessing that mental image of your desire and making it a dominant part of your thoughts, you set in motion an unseen force that attracts the resources that will bring you your desires. Pretty simple, huh. How do we apply this, then? It starts with guarding our thoughts than planting those good, goal oriented thoughts in our brain. By feeding our brain with solid thoughts of who and what we want to become, it forms an attitude fo mind that is unshakeable and that begins to attract those things to us.