Jump into the Rain if You Have to Make It

Dear loving people,

Tekinda got up that morning feeling on top of the world; he was all-smiles as he gaped at the mirror on his wife’s vanity table. His smile broadened even more as he nodded to himself. His brand-new 3-piece suit was nothing less that perfect on him. In fact, he loved the way it folded along with his natural contours.

Satisfied with his dressing, he headed for the door and just as he grasped the door handle, he came to an abrupt stop and looked towards the ceiling in total disbelief, a terrifying lightening sent bright rays through the windows and lighted up the room, then came a mind-blowing thunder accompanied by torrential rain.

Peeping through the window of his sitting room, it was clear to Tekinda that he will not be able to make it in time. I met a completely dejected Tekinda that afternoon; he was filled with rage for having missed a recruitment interview. He had been job-hunting for the last three months and here was the first opportunity that just went down the drain, he arrived fifteen minutes late for the interview and was sent off.

I asked Tekinda a question; are you angry at your improper preparations, the rains, the lost opportunity or the time conscious interview panel? Behold, he was speechless. You see, most of the time; we leave the object and go chasing the shadow. If Tekinda my friend badly needed that job, and translated his desire into action, he would have tried all options and if it all came to the worse, he would have jumped into the rains. Yes you heard me right and why not? He must have thought like many other people that just for the simple reason he so badly needed a job, the universe was just going to align with him without minimal effort on his part. No way! All research on earth concord with the universal rule, which states that there is no free lunch. What you get out of life must equal your level of effort.

Tekinda did not do his homework well. If he did, he would have realized it’s the rainy season thus; he should have made arrangements for an umbrella or should have arranged for a cab to pick him up early.

How many times have you been in a similar situation? Instead of evaluating it, learning from it such that you do better next time, you retreat to a corner in total dejection. When you do that, you simply reinforce the guarantee that the next time, you might repeat the same mistakes or do worse.

How many people do you know who desire to be rich, who want to step onto the higher grounds of individual achievement but turn around each day and either do those things that rather distance them from what they so desire or do nothing at all? How is it possible that you want success but you are not ready to pay the price? Get it from me today if you have not already, every single major achievement in life, has a price tag on it.

“You say you love rain, but you use an umbrella to walk under it. You say you love sun, but you seek shelter when it is shining. You say you love wind, but when it comes you close your windows. So that's why I'm scared when you say you love me” says Bob Marley.

Success Lessons From 2014 - Part 11 - Trust Things Will Turn in Your Favor

Dear loving people,

One of the best prayers that we could ever pray is “God, not my will, but Your will be done.” If you will stay open to His direction, and follow your heart, for sure, God will protect you. So sweet isn’t it? So then, what if you believed that everything in your life was happening for your greater good?  That you couldn’t go wrong? That even in the face of adversity, the universe was colluding in your favor? This however, doesn’t mean that we eventually get everything that we think we want in this moment. That tends to require settling for a smaller version of our life’s ultimate purpose.

Get me right here! Things always make sense in retrospection. When we look back on our lives, we can see that we went through the exact challenges that were necessary to allow growth in the precise way that we most needed it. Our personal struggles led us exactly where we really wanted to go but didn’t know it at the time. I’ve seen people jump into a relationship or a business deal that they didn’t feel good about, but they wanted it so badly. God is a gentleman. If you insist, He will back off and let you do things your way. Most of the time when we do that, though, we end up settling for second best.

Here is the trick; you have to muster unbelievable amounts of enthusiasm most of the times. Having an attitude of gratitude really does go a long way. If you want something in life you have to will it. You have to open a layer in the Universe that is going to take into consideration your request and to do this you have to be positive. Enthusiasm, a good attitude and sincere excitement go a long way in this world. If you’re thankful and show it, if you don’t think you can say thank you enough, if you always remember that all the pieces have to fall into place JUST SO, then 100% more wonderful things will happen to you.

Some of the times however, all might not be well. If events are not happening as quickly as you would like, or if you are not seeing circumstances change in your favor, open your grip on the situation; relax and learn to trust God. Know this: God is on your side. He is not trying to hold you back. Nobody wants you to fulfill your destiny more than Almighty God. Nobody wants you to see your dreams come to pass any more than He does. He put the dream in your heart in the first place. Let Him lead you and guide you.

Joel Osteen puts it another way “You may be going through great difficulties, and you’re tempted to think, I’m never going to get out of this. This is never going to change. I’m never going to win this situation. Stand strong. When negative thoughts come, reject them.”

Success Lessons From 2014 - Part VI - Get Your Mind In Shape

Dear loving people,

If you asked every ten people you meet, chances are high that you would get a I would say that what goes on inside you (in your mind) is much more important in determining whether you're happy or miserable than any of the outer circumstances of your life. Did I just say that? Yes of course and does what you just read sound reasonable? Do the inner workings of your mind really have a greater effect on you than, say, your possessions or your surroundings? After all, big companies spend billions every year trying to convince you that the opposite is true! In their eyes, your best shot at achieving happiness is to buy whatever they're selling. They appeal to the "if only" mentality: If only you drove a fancier car, lived in a bigger house, wore the best clothes you can find in the market, and used a softer perfumed toilet paper — then you'd be truly happy. Even if you don't believe everything advertisers tell you, don't you believe that the external conditions of your life determine how well off you are?

To get a picture of what I mean, consider the following situation. Two friends of yours, call them Jovi and Joni, take a vacation together to Zanzibar in Tanzania. They stay in the same luxurious guesthouse, eat the same food prepared by the same master chef, and engage in the same recreational activities. But, when they get home and tell you about their trip, their stories sound like they vacationed in two completely different worlds! For Jovi, Zanzibar was heaven on Earth, but for Joni, it was pure hell. For every wonderful experience Jovi brings up, Joni tells you about two awful ones. This situation is hypothetical, of course, but doesn't it sound familiar? Hasn't something like this happened to you or your friends? True stories like this scenario aren't rare, so how can you account for them?

The example (and relevant ones from your own experience) demonstrates that the outer circumstances of your life aren't the only factors or even the most important ones in determining whether you're content or not. If external conditions were more important than the condition of your mind, both Jovi and Joni would've loved Zanzibar, and no rich and famous person would ever contemplate suicide.

The more closely you look, the more clearly you'll see that your mental attitude is what mainly determines the quality of your life. This is not to say, however, that your outer circumstances count for nothing, any more than a person has to give away all of his or her possessions to be a sincere spiritual seeker. But, without developing your inner resources of peace and mental stability, no amount of worldly success, whether measured in terms of wealth, fame, power, or relationships can ever bring real satisfaction. Or, as someone once said, "Money can't buy happiness; it can only allow you to select your particular form of misery."

Cancer survivor Lance Armstrong says: “Real healing meant getting my mind in shape; it meant getting my confidence and priorities in shape, too.”

 

Carolyn Warner adds, “I am convinced that attitude is the key to success or failure in almost any of life’s endeavors. Your attitude, your outlook, how you feel about yourself, how you feel about other people, determines your priorities, your actions, your values. Your attitude determines how you interact with other people and how you interact with yourself.”

Stay Ahead, Be the Real You!

Dear Loving people,

As you cruise on towards success, one pitfall is sometimes playing-the-tough-guy game; craving to be what you really are not. Why not be the decent you that you naturally are and for once be sincere to your own very self?

Don’t always seek to steal the show at all cost, rather cruise along with the cool-headers, then you will easily identify pitfalls before jumping into them blindly. However, “don’t be afraid to run too fast only to stand still”. Just be the real you.

Voltaire said "A witty saying proves nothing." Don't use the conversation to show off how knowledgeable you are about things nobody might even care about. And don't use it as a chance to complain about other people or your problems. In other words, don't talk for the sake of talking. If you don't have anything good to say, you're better off not speaking at all. Just be the real you.

Instead, be as neutral as possible. Start with something small like a sincere compliment or even something as clichéd as the weather. When it comes to dealing with people you're just getting to know, it's best to save the potentially controversial topics and heated opinions for later. Just be the real you.

Cyril Connolly was right when he said "All charming people have something to conceal, usually their total dependence on the appreciation of others." You don’t want to be one of such.

After all, you are the only CEO of your own life. Just be the real you.

Take Action - Now!

Dear loving people,

I had an interesting call yesterday from a Living Lectures subscriber in Belgium and she asked me an important question. “You’ve been talking about taking action for a while now, what is it really all about?” let us now reflect on what taking action entails…

We all desire almost at all times to succeed in whatever we do right? To go from where you currently are in your life, to where you desire to be in the future, requires that you have goals. Depending on how big your goals are, will determine how much you grow to feel motivated to achieve them. Your future thus, is the continuous manifestation of what you are planning to do!

In other words, what you plan today, determines what you are going to do tomorrow! Your goals must be achievable and reachable; and with this in mind, they must be scheduled in a plan to the point where you conjure up enough emotion inside of you that drives you achieving them!

Imagine yourself 5 years from now... What would you like to achieve? What would you like to manifest for yourself? After you create success, how will you help the people around you? This requires you to make a 'present' decision, in this very moment – To Take Action!

Your daily actions are governed by your everyday decisions! Can you remember a time when you got fed up with something and you decided 'enough was enough' and it pushed you to create success? Start thinking about what you want to create, and then think about what will happen if you don't create it; what would be the ultimate price if you don't take action?

 

Dreams, wishes, and hopes, whilst all an important part of success in life they won't do anything for you - except to potentially cause you to become frustrated - unless you take successful action. The most successful people in life are committed to taking action on a regular, consistent basis.

Napoleon Bonaparte (the great warrior of 1769-1821) said “Take time to deliberate, but when the time for action has arrived, stop thinking and go in.”

What I understand in Napoleon’s statement is that it’s often easy to procrastinate and over-think things. Often the most successful people are those that simply tried many different approaches until they found one that worked.  This is equally in line with Mark Twain who said “80% of life is simply showing up.”

People often look at business leaders and successful people and wonder how and why they are so successful – a large part of this is that they simply chose to take action. Instead of talking and thinking about what they could achieve, they more often than not did something about it.

Leadership is essentially nothing more than swift and responsible decision-making that in turn creates consistent action. Ensure that you are taking action but without trying to over-control the outcome. So, what can you do today to take some action towards a goal?

1.    Choose something today and take action immediately!

2.   Don’t get stalled by negative feelings of ‘fear’ or ‘what ifs’

3. Don’t worry if your idea is not 100% perfect – it never will be. You can fine-tune it as you go.

4. Remember to be open to different outcomes and to relax and enjoy the productivity of ‘doing something useful’!

5.  Learn from your choices. Even if you don’t get the result you want, you can learn from your experience

I guarantee you that by taking action and doing something useful (no matter how small) you will come out feeling positive, enthused and energized. It may take a little practice to build up the energy in your body and then release it gradually.  Your ability to use this technique will surely improve over time.

Give this simple technique a try, and allow your own thought waves to drive you into action.