As we conclude on this series today, it is important to re-emphasize that you can only travel as far as your relationships permit. If you have the right people in your life and at the right time, you will likely get to your destination easily. If otherwise, your chances of reaching your goal are very slim. It will be unwise to despise relationships that matter, such will only be setting himself up for failure.

The last relationship we will be looking at is relationship with your employer as an employee. Your career is like a building and every job experience represents the brick in the building. If you do not keep a healthy relationship with your supervisor or manager or the business owner, your ability to move up in your career will be hindered. I am not promoting eye service. I am asking you to be dedicated  committed, passionate, efficient and innovative on your job functions.

Reward Systems in most well managed organizations are designed to reward those who bring the most results. Your passion, skills, commitment and creativity must therefore be geared towards increasing your output per time or your efficiency. If you make yourself very relevant, you are likely to become indispensable to your employer. If you do your job well, you won’t have to lobby for promotion or more perks.

Beyond your job function, try to have a personal relationship with your supervisor or manager. It will separate you from the pack and will position you better than your contemporaries. Never exit any job without following the right exit procedure. Don’t resign abruptly and leave the company stranded. Don’t trade with your employer’s trade secret, it is unethical and will backfire. Respect your colleagues and be helpful where possible.

In summary, on your job you must aim to have a 360 degree positive influence. Have a positive influence on your superiors, contemporaries and subordinates. You will reach the peak of your career if you maintain a 360 degree approach to work.

You will observe that I have not mentioned relationship with your friends or neighbors in this series, the reason is that your friends and neighbors will either be destiny helpers or professional colleagues . We will commence another series on Relating With Your Enemies next week.

God bless us all.

Good morning!

“After decades of talk, we finally began to wean ourselves off foreign oil, and doubled our production of clean energy.” –  President Barack Obama, Speech at 2016 DNC. This is very instructive for my country’s government and other national governments who are running economies relying on a single commodity.

For Nigeria and other oil producing countries, we need to wake up to the reality that the world is moving away from oil. The world is moving to cheaper and cleaner forms of energy. Rather than moaning over depletion of oil revenue, let us shift our focus and energy on diversifying our economies.

It is equally instructive for us in our individual lives, that we should not stay glued to one idea, one line of income or  one cash cow. The world is evolving rapidly, tastes, fashion, lifestyle choices are changing rapidly. So if you don’t want to be left behind you need to embrace the change. Have you been recording low sales, low patronage, low income, it may just be time to switch to the innovative gear. It may be time to change your product or service, or market or sales channel, or even strategy.

Don’t stay glued to an unhealthy relationship, except if you are married. If you are married and you are having issues with your spouse, sit down together and work it out, seek help together, if need be. If you are not married yet and you are going through emotional and physical abuse, yet you are still waiting for your partner to change, it may be like waiting for a plane that has taken off!

As a believer, be receptive to the nudging of the Holy Spirit as a believer. Peter never expected that he will be asked to preach to the Gentiles, Paul did and he recorded more Epistles and acts than Peter.

Stop waiting for a plane that is already airborne.

God bless us all.

Good morning!

Life can be very unfair and we often complain so, especially when it seems life has chosen to deal unjustifiable blows at us. When Job (in the Bible) recorded unprecedented losses, the wife was angry and saw God as an unfair God. Meanwhile before the losses she never thought that God was unfairly fair to her husband! That is our natural thought pattern, we complain when we don’t get the expected, but forget to appreciate when we get the undeserved, unexpectedly.

When life is cruelly unfair to us, one of the things that can make it bearable is the presence of friends and relatives who are there to support, encourage, pray and help out in any way. Unfortunately, most of the times, we don’t get such supports when we need them and this has sent many to early grave and truncated many great destinies. We are often betrayed by our very own, just like Job’s wife asked him to curse God and die.

It is therefore important we show up for our own when it matters. Let us be there for one another. Your call may be the last thing that will restore that hope. Your words of encouragement via sms may just be what will save that fellow from committing suicide. Your prayers and gifts may just be the ray of hope for another, that perhaps God has not forgotten him. Your little seed may be what will save that other fellow’s dream or business. You may just be the last hope, succour, comfort, or lifeline. Don’t withhold that love, care, concern or prayer. Give it out for it might be a lifesaver.

Let us make the world a better place for ourselves by being there for ourselves.

God bless us all.

Good morning Africa!

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adewumioni.com

Just as a child would have to accept some pains in the process of growing up, so we must need accept some pains as part of life. A baby boy has to endure the pain of circumcision, while a baby girl has to endure the pain of ear piercing. When a baby start the teething process, it comes with pain and discomfort, but it must happen.

In life, you cannot gain anything without some pains. Nothing worthwhile happens without sacrifice. Some of the pains you have to endure in life are:

1. Pain of Learning: You have to subject yourself to the rigor of learning either formally or informally in order to become informed about a trade, skill or profession. Learning requires discipline, sacrifice of time, sleep, money and sometimes relationship. If you want to become a medical doctor, for instance, you must be willing to stay up longer at your reading desk more than an aspiring engineer. You cannot become a leader without learning to be a servant. Leaders are made through the process of learning. If you desire to become an actor, you must be willing to learn how to act. Whatever you desire, you need to pay the price of learning it. This is an unavoidable pain. If you don’t learn you can’t earn.

2. Pain of Giving Birth: If you cannot stand the pain and discomfort of carrying a pregnancy for nine months, plus the pain of labour period, you have no business expecting a child. For you to birth anything great, you must bear the pain of carrying and nurturing the dream. If you dream of owning a house, you must bear the pain of savings towards land acquisition. You must deny yourself a lot of things during the building process. Whatever it is that is worthwhile that you want to achieve, if you are not ready for the pain, then stop hoping for it.

3. Pain of Dying: We are not referring to literally dying here. We are talking about letting go of certain habits in our lives in order to become a better person. You sometimes have to let go of some of your indulgences, in order to become matured and capable of taking higher responsibilities. If you seek spiritual power from God, you must be willing to tame your appetite. You must be given to praying and fasting. Even in the political world, if you desire certain position, you must be ready to sleep less, have less privacy, read more and so on. You want a better relationship and you are not ready to deal with yourself first, then forget about it. Living starts with dying first. We die to self so that we can live for others.

We will look at some more pains tomorrow.

God bless us all.

Good morning Africa!

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adewumioni.com

There are certain movies I saw as a child that remain stuck in my memory for different reasons. Some have characters  that are lovable and who kids would want to emulate, like Veeru and Jai in Sholay (Amitabh Bachchan and Dharmendra). Some have terrible and wicked characters that you just detest as a kid, like ‘the bad’ in the movie ‘The Good, the Bad and the Ugly’ by Clint Eastwood. Titanic is another movie that told the story of love in a better way than Romeo and Juliet. Jack (Leonardo di Caprio) played the lover who sacrificed his life to keep his lover alive after the Titanic sank. It portrayed sacrifice in love and love without holding back.

We all have such movies with heroes and villains whose roles still flash through our minds. Now try to imagine that your entire life is a movie and it is being shown to the whole world. What perception will the audience have about your role? Heroic or Villainous? Would the world dislike your role like that of Gabbar Singh (Amjad Khan) in ‘Sholay’? Or would you be loved like Jai and Veeru (Dharmendra)? We know leaders who are like Gabbar in our times. We equally know leaders who are like Veeru and Jai. Who are you like?

It is time to pause and reflect on your life and see it as a movie. Do you like your roles so far? Are you proud of your contributions thus far? Are there things you wish you could undo? Begin to make amends and necessary adjustments as you deem fit. Truly, our lives are like storybooks, we daily write our stories with our actions. The parting questions are ‘what kind of story am I writing with my life?’ and ‘if my life was a movie, will I be seen as a hero or villain?’.

God bless us all.

Good morning Africa!

Today we will round up on the Laws of Life. There are other laws but we will pause here while we focus on applying these laws in our lives.

9. Law of Appreciation: This law is a derivative of the law of Seed and Harvest. It states that whatever you appreciate and consciously show gratitude and value for, tends to increase. Simply put, appreciation brings increase. This law is applicable in every area of Life. Try appreciating the efforts of your spouse more and watch the effects. Or show gratitude for the output of your workers and give positive or constructive criticism, you will be amazed at how it will impact greatly on subsequent output. A small gift in your life can become your major source of income if you appreciate it.

The converse of this law is the law of depreciation. Simply states that what you don’t appreciate will depreciate. So start checking your appreciation quotient. The higher your Appreciation Quotient, the better your standard of living. It is not how much you have that determines your standard of living, but how much value you place on what you have. If you want your marriage to become better, start appreciating your spouse. Show that you are grateful for his or her efforts. Give kind words. Stop focusing on his or her weakness. Praise his or her strength.

This law can be applied to career, life, politics, and just anything. If you show love to even your domestic animals or pets, you will be amazed by the kind of loyalty you will get from them. Start today.

God bless us all.

Good morning Africa!

Question
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