Man In The Mirror

Dear lovely people,

My most admired singer, songwriter, record producer, dancer, and actor is the all-time best King of Pop - Michael Jackson. One of his most critically acclaimed songs is Man In The Mirror in which Michael actually goes a step further and offers a straightforward homily of personal commitment:

"I'm starting with the man in the mirror

I'm asking him to change his ways

And no message could have been any clearer

If you wanna make the world a better place

Take a look at yourself and then make a change."

  

Michael’s song actually breaks bounds by departing from popular themes of love, sex and heartbreak as seen in pop music today and rather focuses on the efforts of an individual to improve himself and change the world.

  

We make dreams to change ourselves and the world but partly due to our own inequities, lack of focus, internally crafted factors both conscious and unconscious, compounded by external circumstances beyond our control work in synergy to make us fail with devastating consequences sometimes.

The world today suffers from a major men and women problem that has overwhelmed families, divorce courts, social services, schools, and the criminal justice system. It has so confounded gender norms that men and women alike lead lukewarm, often defeated, lives-and they hate it.

Michael’s "Man in the Mirror" remains popular as highlighted by the continued importance of the questions it raises: What is the individual's responsibility to society? Can we change the world by changing ourselves? What is the power of one person to create change? Whether it is homelessness, poverty, AIDS, nuclear weaponry, or war, Michael Jackson in that song inspires listeners the world over to do something about human suffering for longer than a passing moment.

A good starting point for us all Michael points out, is to look at the man in the mirror? All around us are people with attitude problems, people needing help, people without money, food or clothing, people who have lost hope and dreams. Yet we count our blessings just like Michael who references his favorite winter coat while turning a blind eye to the plight of the poor.

If we all start looking at the man in the mirror, then, we’ll end with a better vision for our lives after a proper diagnosis of our ways and adopting the requisite treatment plan and execution strategy.

Today, decide to …make that change.

A Stainless Steel Personality - Episode 04

Dear lovely people,

 

In Episode 03, we looked at the importance of breaking down your goals to daily achievable tasks. lets now in Episode 04 to the art of being visionary...

Episode 04

You have to remain Mindful & Visionary. Stay in the present moment, taking the very next little step towards your goal. Feel it, celebrate it, be mindful and aware of it.  You are taking action. At the same time, remain visionary about where each step is getting you to.  You need to be able to combine both present mindfulness with future vision.

Episode 05 will even be more appealing, stay tuned....

Persistence is Your Magic

Dear loving people,

Most of you will agree with me that the one ingredient you’ll always need for the journey of entrepreneurship is persistence. It can take your further than any other quality alone. Probably that’s why Benjamin Franklin thinks that “Energy and persistence conquer all things.”

Talking entrepreneurship, I think of a young dynamic lady Justine. It was the fifth time Justine was refused a loan at the bank. The people around her quickly figured out that her dream of owning a restaurant was gradually being eroded. She went home that afternoon, dejected, with a thousand questions in her mind and ‘why me?’ was one of them but, she was not discouraged. An idea popped up in her mind and she told herself it was not over yet. Back home, she decided to change her strategy. 

That’s how she started a maize farm as a step towards raising the needed funds for her restaurant business. At the end of the next farming season, Justine was smiling to the bank. She became so attached to her farm and having seen the rewards, she decided to put in another year at the end of which she had what she wanted.

The same bank did not only give her a loan but doubled the amount she had requested the previous years. Justine was able to start her restaurant that is flourishing today. She equally maintained her maize farm that is still feeding her bank account with the needed cash to repay her loan.

Justine’s secrete was the fact that she clearly understood that the power to keep going will conquer all other obstacles. She combined that with the energy and passion to see new ways around the challenges she was facing and thus, she achieved her goals.

Persistence is not just about hanging onto what you are currently doing even when you hit a stone wall. Persistence is equally about changing strategy when what you have going on is not yielding fruits and keeping on the right track until you attain success. 

Calvin Coolidge says “Nothing in this world can take the place of persistence. Talent will not. Nothing is more common than unsuccessful men with talent. Genius will not. Unrewarded genius is almost a proverb. Education will not. The world is full of educated derelicts. Persistence and determination alone are omnipotent.”