​”Don’t limit yourself. Many people limit themselves to what they think they can do. You can go as far as your mind lets you. What you believe, remember, you can achieve.” – Mary Kay Ash

Live your life as though there are no limits to what you can achieve. Truly there are no limits, except the ones you construct in your mind. There is always a  way round every challenge, and there are always higher heights to be attained. Don’t place any limit on yourself. Break the limits. You are unstoppable. You alone can stop You. 

I leave you with the words of Bruce Lee, “If you always put limit on everything you do, physical or anything else. It will spread into your work and into your life. There are no limits. There are only plateaus, and you must not stay there, you must go beyond them.” 

No matter where you are today, leave your plateaus and go forward again. 

God bless us all. 

Good morning. 

There were times I came across some lists of goals or prayer requests I had written much earlier, and as I read through those lists or requests I smiled. I smiled not necessarily because the goals were achieved or the prayers answered, but because reading them much later reveals the inconsequentiality or insignificance of the requests or goals. Some will appear outrightly childish,  some selfish, and some just irrelevant. 

This personal experience has taught me to always weigh my actions, goals and objectives on the scale of materiality in posterity. Materiality in Posterity means ‘will it be material years after?’. I always ask myself questions like, if I don’t achieve this now, will it really matter? Is it that necessary? Will it still be material years later? These questions help me to readjust my priorities and maintain focus on life impacting goals. 

My advice to you today is to begin to weigh your decisions and intentions on the scale of materiality in posterity. If I steal to build, will posterity treat me well? If I lie about my age to get that job, will my body also lie after some years? Is acquiring more cars more material than sponsoring some orphans or less privileged? 

If we do a lot of introspective thinking before acting we will have less regrets in retrospect. Ask yourself before you take that action, ‘will it count later?’ 

Remember this always, ‘Wise men invest in people, ordinary men invest in things.’ 

God bless us all. 

Good morning!

Life starts with knowing yourself and what you are cut out to do (self and purpose), and ends with giving yourself fully to that purpose. 

It is not so much about the money, wealth, fame, or swagger. It is about the purpose and fulfilling it. It is about knowing who you are and what you are made for. 

Stop trying to be someone else. Know yourself and be yourself. You are at your best when you deploy your full strengths, skills and passions toward your purpose. The best an imitation can be is a copy. Be original. 

Appraise yourself. Carry out a personal SWOT. What are your strengths and weaknesses? What opportunities are available for you and what are the threats around you? 

When your strengths fuse with opportunities, greatness is birthed. When those opportunities are along the line of your purpose, and you pursue them with your strengths, you are on your way to achieving greatness that will outlive you. 

God bless us all. 

Good morning! 

For every new level you will attain in life, a new You is required. For every promotion you desire, you will be required to undergo higher examinations. The skill set required for the position of an officer is definitely lower than that required for the position of a manager. An Officer desiring to become a Manager will have to develop higher skills to succeed as a Manager. 

You cannot put a new wine in an old bottle, you will lose both the wine and the bottle. You will need to equip yourself with the right discipline, attitude, disposition, temperance and skills, required for that next level before you can get there. 

Are you desiring to become a husband or wife? Have you considered if you are good enough at managing yourself, let alone managing another person? Are you prepared for the arduous task of keeping the home clean, cooking, washing and maintaining your career all at once? 

What is your current elastic limit? If your elastic limit is not up to the required limit for the next level, then you need to first deal with yourself by stretching your limit further. One of the reasons why many of us are not getting the desired promotion is because we are not yet set for that promotion. If we get it now, it will be chaos and colossal failure. 

Check yourself today vis-a-vis  where you desire to be. Are you packaged for that desired package? 

God bless us all. 

Good morning! 

INDEED, EACH GIVES WHAT HE HAS.

Back in the days when Germany was divided, a huge wall separated East and West Berlin. One day, some people in East Berlin took a truck load of garbage and dumped it on the West Berlin side.
The people of West Berlin could have done the same thing, but they didn’t. Instead they took a truck load of canned goods, bread, milk and other provisions, and neatly stacked it on the East Berlin side.
On top of this stack they placed the sign: *“EACH GIVES WHAT HE HAS”*
How very true! You can only give what you have.
My dear friend, what do you have inside of you? Is it hate or love? Violence or peace? Death or life?
What have you acquired over the years? Is it capacity to build or capacity to destroy? Is it ability to make money or steal money? Is it ingenuity to develop good things that will benefit mankind or ability to bomb those good things that others have labored to build?
*”EACH GIVES WHAT HE HAS”*
O my brethren! Think about it.

God bless us all.

Good morning!

(Pls this was copy and not my write up)

Yesterday I read that Youth Corp members in Oyo State, Nigeria are being owed nine months allowance. While I believe this is an exaggerated report, it is a further proof that times are truly hard for our government at all levels. This should also serve as a warning to Youth Corp members not to see getting white collar job as their main goal. Times have changed. This leads me to another point in this series.

Learn a trade or vocation: I have found out that people who are multi skilled find it easier to survive during times like these. They deploy all their skills at making money. If salary isn’t forthcoming, they use their skills over the weekends to augment their salary income. If all you know is just that one profession or vocation, you are at high risk of becoming unemployed or underemployed. Learn something else. Learn hair styling, tailoring, fashion designing, fashion illustration, shoe making, soap making, bead making, bag making, weaving, carving, painting, etc. Findings show that people still cut their hair, even if frequency is reduced. People still wash and need soap. You can be the soap supplier in your neighborhood. The point is, don’t be mono-skilled, not in this Era. Whatever service you are providing, put a touch of class and taste, this will separate you from the hordes.

Identify Needs in your environment: Entrepreneurs are people who identify needs in the market and provide goods or services to meet those needs at  competitive prices. There are needs all around us. As a matter of fact, the more the challenges, the greater the needs and the more the opportunities. Rather than complain about the challenges, look out for the needs therein and see how you can meet some of them profitably. Become a skilled identifier of opportunities. Successful entrepreneurs are skilful at identifying and creating opportunities. Be one.

You can and you should survive these trying times. The choice is yours to either emerge stronger or weaker.

God bless us all.

Good morning!

One easy way to be frustrated is to keep expecting the government of the day to solve your problems. This government is as befuddled as the citizens. The odds against this government are overwhelming though not insurmountable, if timely and right approach are adopted. The bitter truth is that there are no shortcuts or easy way out of the economic recession we have found ourselves, so it is just wise to be prepared psychologically, emotionally, and physical for the times ahead. Diversifying any economy takes years of hard work and focus. Our past leaders failed to save for the rainy days, so it is like starting all over.

Continuing from where we stopped yesterday, for you to survive the times we are in, you may further do the following :

1. Start a farm: A major part of our income is spent on food items, groceries, vegetables and fruits. With inflation rate up to 16.5%, prices of food items have doubled and in some cases, tripled. If you are lucky to have a place of your own, or if your landlord permits.  you, you should start a farm. It could be just for vegetables, or just for animal rearing. Whether we like it or not, the days of oil are over, we, especially Nigerians must go back to farm. If you can afford a big farm, this is the time to go into agricultural production. Grow your food.

2. Pool Drive: If you drive your car everyday to work or business place, you would likely be feeling the pinch more because of the cost of fuelling. It is advisable to team up with other car owners in your neighborhood and who you share same route with. You can use someone’s car as the pool car on a particularly day. All the users will just contribute a token for the fuelling. Do the same with another person the next day. If you contribute 500 naira each per day in a car of 4 people, you will fuel the car with 2000 and should cover your trip to and fro, assuming no other use for the vehicle during the day. This way, in a week you will be spending between 2500 & 3500 instead of the 10k you will need for fuelling if you were to go with your vehicle everyday of the week. This will even lead to less traffic on the road.

See you tomorrow.

God bless us all.

Good morning!

In the face of static and even dwindling income for some, combined with the rise in cost of living, especially for citizens of oil producing countries like mine, surviving requires some radical steps. Desperate times requires desperate measures, they say. You cannot live the same way you were living before and not feel the heat. I just want to share a few things we can do to stay ahead in this trying time.

1. Be true to yourself: If you are the type who always wants to keep up with the Joneses, this is the time to let the Joneses live their lives while you live yours. Stop the fake life and be true to yourself. Let people say whatever they want to say, stop trying to impress others with the latest car, phone, fashion or whatever. Be true to yourself. If you are the type that always buy ‘aso-ebi’ for every occasion, this may be time to wear what you have, if you must attend that occasion.

2. Cut down on frivolous or impulse spending: Those days of buying everything you see in traffic are gone. We are in the days of financial discipline. If you don’t discipline yourself financially, you will be disciplined by the hardship of life. Make a budget, weekly or monthly depending on the frequency of your income. Don’t just spend without a plan. Have a short term, medium term and long term financial plan. Stick to your budget and make room for emergencies.

3. Deal with your appetite: It will amaze you how much people spend on fast food and unhealthy junks. It is a daily habit for some. Those little spending everyday have a way of draining your purse. It is like a leaking bottle of water, slowly the water will leak away. Try to cook at home. Reduce your indulgence in fast food to once or twice a month, depending on how frequent you have been with fast food outlets. Take natural fruits instead of some of those carbonated drinks and juices.

4. Avoid Capital Projects for now: As an individual, what you need now is what can supplement your income, not what will tie your income down. So as much as possible, don’t embark on projects that will tie down your money for a long while, rather invest in projects that are self sustainable and that can repay you. This of course depends on your income size, if it is big enough to accommodate both capital and recurrent projects, then you can go for both. But remember job security is at the lowest now, so don’t be too certain of that income.

4. Avoid borrowing by all means: Borrowing will limit your expansion capacity. You will be bogged down with the burden of servicing the loan. Interest rates are even too high now to encourage borrowing. If you must borrow at all, let it be for projects with early returns (not capital projects)  and check your cash flow to be sure the income streams from such projects can repay your periodic obligations and still leave enough for the projects and you.

If you try to dance to every music played by everybody, you will never get to play your own music, let alone dance to your own music. So learn to be yourself, especially in this trying period.

We will continue this discussion tomorrow.

God bless us all.

Good morning and have a great week.