the s-H-i-f-t series …to living truly and fully

However good we get, we can always get better, and daily raise into higher ideals, PERPETUALLY SHIFTING INTO HIGHER REALMS OF CONSCIOUSNES…

…it is a good place to be; a state of CONTINUOUS SHIFTING rather than PERPETUAL SINKING.

I have here collected little bites into what a SHIFT starter pack would look like, feel free to add what else you feel fits..

1. S-SELF

2. H-HUMAN: In one of those my lazy moments (and I seem to have a lot of them lately) I went on social media, and I have a recollection of a certain statement because of the weight of the truth it carried.  A student asks a wise man and a philosopher to tell them which field of professional undertaking would guarantee them a place in the success wagon in our shifting times. I imagine the wise man scratched his beards (aren’t all wise men supposed to have white beards), and the response was, “that field is that of BEING A GREAT HUMAN BEING, there is no competition there.” And I totally agree.

We are living in a time of emotional disconnectedness and internal discontentedness, leaving a great majority emotionally drained or internally empty. My sociology professor may have been joking when he said we are born as beings, but we must all grow to be human, yet that is such a serious joke that I have not heard anyone laugh about it. And before you become the first one, just think about it ...how human have you been in your being? How many souls go to bed with a smile on their faces because of your selfless acts of kindness? Is there anyone anywhere whose path is illuminated by your HUMAN light? And have you made anyone’s burden lighter today?

“What does it mean to be human?” you may still be asking. If I may rephrase what I already almost said; “Today, and every day, be the reason someone smiles. Be the reason someone feels loved, be the reason why someone believes in themselves, and the goodness of people” And so the second way to staging a SHIFT is to REDIRECT ALL YOUR ENERGIES AT BEING HUMAN; caring about, empathizing with, putting on other people’s emotional boots, walking a mile in them, and GENUINELY BEING MINDFUL OF AND CAREFUL WITH HOW YOU MAKE OTHERS FEEL. Remember;

“People may forget anything you said, did or gave them, but they will never forget how what you said, did or gave them, made them feel”

I do not remember who won any of last year’s Olympic marathons. However, I still remember the Zhengkai International Marathon in China; Kenya’s elite athlete, Jacqueline Nyetipei Kiplimo, helped pass water to a dehydrated disabled Chinese runner, slowing her down, and costing her the first position and the $ 10,000 price money (And that was way back before Kenya owed china anything). She gave up winning to help a needy athlete. Yes, it’s not all about winning. She did not win the Gold, but she definitely has a Golden heart, and she won our hearts too. This act received more media attention that the winners of the marathon. The Sunny Skyz wrote:

‘This act of selflessness ultimately cost her the race, but her second-place finish will never replace the first-place finish she has in our hearts’

…be a brother’s and a sister’s keeper! Be deliberate on the ‘i-motions’; the internal movement of thoughts and feelings that you stir in others, for by them, you activate ripple effect of the emotions that get stirred in you. This has a great influence in the direction your life flows. This concept is so profound that in the Christian religious literature, it is recorded that whatever is done genuinely and lovingly to another needy person, it is done unto God. I know we have conquered gravity to fly heavy crafts and the water to float high density metal, but we need to frequently visit earth and be human. As my brother GG Muriuki once wrote; “curve out your name in people’s hearts not on tombstone. It is more satisfying!”

It starts with you, you could start today, now, with a text, a call, or undivided attention to someone seated next to you!

the S-H-I-F-T series …to living TRULY and FULLY

Once in a while you wake up and realise that the reality of your life demands that you do something about somethings. That the current direction of your life may need some deliberate directing …and that is not even the main thing. The issue is, sometimes, often times we do not know the button(s) to press in order to achieve the kind of transformation we aspire and hope for, and with this state of affairs, we first feel stuck, then when that feeling isn’t checked, we begin to sink into heaps of unresolved issues upon heaps of internal struggles. I have been there, actually, we kind of are always in that state, of getting out of something and/or into something. Yes, our century has experienced immense shifts in the way things are done ...how we travel, communicate, transact, etc, ...and the one way to keep up with the demands of our time is a enter a place of continuous SHIFTing. Knowing that however good we get, we can always get better, and daily raising into higher ideals, PERPETUALLY SHIFTING INTO HIGHER REALMS OF CONSCIOUSNES…

…it is a good place to be; a state of CONTINUOUS SHIFTING rather than PERPETUAL SINKING.

I have here collected little bites into what a SHIFT starter pack would look like, feel free to add what else you feel fits...

1. S - SELF: When it comes to SELF, you are all faced with the choice of sitting in restricted cubicles, flushing the hours of your life down some social, corporate or religious toilet or going against the grain to DEFINE and DEVELOP your TRUEST SELF! It is ascribing to the Shakespearenic philosophy of, “to thy own SELF, be true.” I have always asked my audience to name their best places to work. The answers are as varied as my audience in the last few years. Only a handful ever said "the best place to work is at SELF" Yeah, that for me is the BEST PLACE TO TOIL! 

People have been deluded by the idea of job security, higher salary and huge benefits, etc, which are okay, who doesn't enjoy that? But first things first; an investment in self is the best security since, by investing in your mind (reading, deliberate and continuous learning, emotional intelligence, people skills, etc), body (healthy daily practices and exercise) and soul (issues spirituality NOT RELIGION, but the ability to marshal peace within yourself; to know that no matter what happens, things somehow work out. To know that the universe is forever conspiring to help you, and finding the ways to align yourself with it, and learning to let go), then you SHiFT from looking for and waiting on outward resources to being resourceful by utilising the many attributes you are endowed with WITHIN YOU... …and there is nothing as secure in our century as being resourceful. 

After having to deal with the tragedy of coloured papers and faded people, current investors are looking for individuals who have discovered and are illuminated by their unique internal spark/light, where previous investors looked for external paper qualifications whose light continues to dim in gloom.  At a cognitive level, investing in yourself is telling yourself and the world that “the value and potential I possess is important enough that I am going to give it the energy, space, and time to grow and create results.” …THEN, and this is a big THEN, the universe begins to reward your EFFORTS TOWARDS A BETTER SELF with amazing results. How well you IMPACT AND INFLUENCE SOCIETY hinges on how well you DISCOVER AND DEVELOP yourSELF! 

SHIFT at its core is about working towards A STATE SUPERIOR TO YOUR FORMER SELF. True shift is about SELF-GROWTH, or if you like, PERSONAL DEVELOPMENT.

2. H-HUMAN 

In the Words of the SEER

When the doorbell rang, I knew it was him. We had talked the night before, and he was visiting us in this place where he had helped them rewrite the scripts of their lives. I reached for the door, turned the knob, and my lower jaw fell! I stared at a man on a wheel chair, trying to adjust his oxygen mask. Before pity could register on my face, Jon spread his hands, inviting me for a hug. He had a broad smile, well arranged white teeth, and was not surprised at the shock each of us registered upon seeing the man behind the cool, calm and collected voice on the other side of the phone. He had a tight and warm embrace, after which he wheeled himself through the door, strategically stopping at a place he could see all the five followers would had come to listen to his wisdom. Jon looked at each one of us, from left to right, scanning each of us with eyes that seemed to infiltrate our minds! He began to talk. His voice as steady and confident as he always sounded on phone…

“If you want to know the value of time, ask a man who doesn’t have a lot of it!”

He reached for his oxygen mask, took one long break, let it hang from his neck and continued; “Sometimes we live life so casually that we never take time to meditate on the beauty and grandeur of this terrestrial ball in the middle of space that we live on called earth. Having lived casually, we become casualties of unfulfilled dreams, and so live unhappy lives. We live on a constant spiral of measuring life by how many expectations meet, and that leaves us with zero treasurable experience. We fall in the trap of collecting the ever elusive material things, at the expense of creating memories that last. Are you surprised that depression is a leading condition, and suicide rates have increased” Jon reached for a bag that hang on the back side of his motorized wheelchair. He pulled out five electric bulbs and asked each one of us to collect one. We did. “Every day, ONLY at the TOP OF EVERY HOUR, WHEN YOU REMEMBER, day time or night time, you are to put TEN pebbles of sand into your special bulb” We nodded. “You will later get to know how special this bulb is” He placed a manila envelope on the ground, turned his wheelchair, and headed for the door. “Right now it is exactly noon. That envelop contains the sand, you can start with this hour if you want” Joh said waving his left hand in the air, as the right hand steered his wheelchair to the door. He paused at the door, placed his gas mask in place, too a long breath, and off the mysterious man went.

The bulbs had a small opening that allowed only one sand particle at a time. We added each their ten, shared the sand, and headed out of this place that Jon meets his followers.

Six months later was our next meet up. We came with our bulbs. To my surprise, two of the bulbs were lit, except mine and Leo’s. Jon showed up in his usual style. “I see what you have accomplished with the bulbs. Three of you still have the bulbs as I gave them, only with some pebbles of sand. The other two have turned their bulbs into lamps” He said with loud claps amid his infectious smile. “Tell us what you did, uuhh, Phil.” “I set my watch to remind me consistently every hour for six hours from 5 am, and on the fourth month, as I added the last particles, my bulb lit” Explained Phil. Netto had a similar story. “See, this bulb is about consistency, even if it is three hours a day. But consistently, every day. I knew where I had gone wrong. I had added my particles at least six times a day, but there were no definite time, it would be in the morning, sometimes  other times midday. I explained that to Jon. “And that is the lesson. Consistency. Get a plan an even if little specific things at particular times every and one day, these little things will light up for tire life. If not, you will end up like the many people who have amazing bulbs given to them by the creator in various forms, but which, due to inconsistency, and the interruptions of the noise of your digital age, never turn into colourful lamps to our feet” He said, pointing at Phi’ bulb which was now turning blue and making even the old furniture in this room look beautiful… And Jon left!

…it is 2019; forget competitiveness!

I am in no way a millennial. I still own a Kodak camera that requires an exposure roll of flexible film which is later used to develop photos in a darkroom. To-date, I would rather a manual car than an automatic car, and the last time I saw someone with a selfie stick I wondered why a young girl, whose name I later learned was Slay Queen, needed a walking stick. I was born and brought up in the last century in a small and not so quiet village called Matwikani in Makueni County. I say it was not quiet because in this village lived a medicine woman, and people travelled far and wide to seek her assistance in matters health and ‘protection’ from evil that had befallen them, or that which they FEARED might befall them.

Oh fear, why do your illusional teeth bite so bad, then reach so deep?

But then, there was something else about my village. The few, and I mean the very few young people who competed well enough in high school and made it to the university were the best examples. They were adored. Falling in love with them was not a choice, especially if you had ‘chosen’ not to make it to university. You had to love them, the whole village did. And for sure, we kind of thought that they were the true essence of BRAINS OVER MATTER, because those who competed well enough to make it to ‘campus’ MATTERed, the rest were just MATTER; they had weight, and they occupied space! …and they didn’t seem to have a place in the world …then

That for me was the greatest delusion of my century, but hey …the world has moved on, so should you and I

We live in a different world now. In this century, a peasant can find their place at the palace, and the poor can sit at the high table with the Prince. This SHIFT is based on a not so new, yet not quite embraced concept. I DO NOT BELIEVE in COMPETING for WHAT I WANT, I believe in CREATING WHAT I WANT! THE BEST WAY TO SECURE YOUR FUTURE IS NOT TO WORK HARD TO BEAT SOMEONE ELSE AND GET WHAT THEY HAVE, BUT RATHER TO WORK SO SMARTLY TO CREATE WHAT YOU WANT. If I was a millennial I would say #CREATIVITYisBAE. I am not, so I will say it this way. If there be anything like a COMPETETIVE EDGE, then it would be CREATIVE EDGE. Your ability to bring creativity to your business, relationship, career, passion, studies, innovations, inventions and any other venture you may engage in, THAT IS THE BEST WAY TO PREDICT YOUR FUTURE!

Disclaimer: I have amazing millennials in my life, and one in particular, Brian Kasaine a.k.a B.K has been giving me some millennial jabs against my will. I will end this as B.K would…

…SCREW COMPETITION!

When all work gives only money, that work is costly

In their waking hours, men and women are constantly preoccupied with activities that are supposed to help them ‘make ends meet.’ In that ‘making ends meet’ desperation, individuals are willing to do anything to make that all elusive shilling. In the process, ABLE MEN AND WOMEN ARE MADE TO DEVIATE FROM WHAT IT REALLY MEANS TO WORK, TO WORKING JUST AS MEANS.

Imagine you didn’t have to make money …what would you do?

Suppose you didn’t have to please any one …what would you do?

What if you were fearless …what would you do?

WORK ought to be viewed as A CANVAS UPON WHICH THE WORKER EXPRESSES THEIR BEST SKILLS AND ABILITIES, WHILE EMPLOYING THEM TO CHANGE THE WORLD IN SOME WAY, HOWEVER SMALL. Yes, work ought to make more than money for the worker. When all that one earns from work is money, then their ‘work’ is costing them a lot.

The workplace ought to be a place to express your innate abilities, pursue passions, fulfill dreams, and build meaningful relationships. And so the next time you are heading for a job interview, and take on the job offer, pause and ask yourself ‘…would I take this job if I had just won the lottery and didn’t have to make money?’ If the answer is a genuine yes, then go on and work work work …you might as well have found your task match. Pick tasks according to the characteristics of the task as they relate to your own characteristics

But you must first fall in love... the first rule of everything

One of the greatest sales principles that all salesmen and women should ascribe to is the concept of ‘underpromise and overdeliver’

Well, let’s get one aspect of the preceding statement out of our way. “But I am not a salesperson” I have heard people say. But let me tell you something. You are daily selling yourself to something. Whatever it is …an employer, a possible financier, a client, or the young man pitching himself to a possible partner …name them, we are daily selling ourselves… The problem is only one, as pointed out by Abraham marslow

“The story of the human race is a story of men and women selling themselves short”

There is a different way that we need to learn and walk on, then we begin to change the script of the human story, and that starts when we can set for ourselves worthy targets, meet them, then exceed them.

In my short sojourn on planet three, I have observed two things that are a precursor to ensuring we don’t sell ourselves short...

1.     You must fall in love: There are few things that make men and women act crazy. One of them is love. We all have crazy stories of how we went the extra mile to please, put ourselves in awkward positions to win a heart …THERE IS SOMETHING ABOUT LOVE, and I haven’t met anyone who succeeded, and was not in love. Well, I don’t know what you are imagining right now, but the point is, you must FALL IN LOVE WITH YOURSELF FIRST, then FALL IN LOVE WITH A COURSE, an undertaking, a trade …a PASSION …that is the love I am talking about. Nothing takes away excellence, and the ability to meet and exceed targets than men and women engaging in passionless pursuits.

Let’s pause here for a moment: are you in love with YOU, and the things you are pursuing as study, work, business …are you? Because when we talk about positive energy, genuine love is the purest of positive energy, and the moment you fall in love with your chosen pursuit, nothing can stand in your way …TRUE LOVE MAKES US DO CRAZY THINGS! GENUINE LOVE KNOWS NO BARRIER… IT IS THE TRUE WAY TO DELIVER TARGETS AND EXCEED EXPECTATIONS WITHOUT EXTERNAL PRESSURES!

But again:

2.     You must fall out of love: Remember there are distractors, there are those things that cannot go together with excellence in delivery of agreed targets, I know you know many of them. But here we want to fall out of love with our comfort zones. Failing to meet targets is humankinds default fallen state, meeting targets is the beginning of excellence …EXCEEDING THEM IS THE REAL MEANING OF EXCELLENT DELIVERY!

It is better to underpromise and overdeliver, yet the majority of people overpromise and under deliver

When all work gives only money, that work is too costly

In their waking hours, men and women are constantly preoccupied with activities that are supposed to help them ‘make ends meet.’ In that ‘making ends meet’ desperation, individuals are willing to do anything to make that all elusive shilling. In the process, ABLE MEN AND WOMEN ARE MADE TO DEVIATE FROM WHAT IT REALLY MEANS TO WORK, TO WORKING JUST AS MEANS.

Imagine you didn’t have to make money …what would you do?

Suppose you didn’t have to please any one …what would you do?

What if you were fearless …what would you do?

WORK ought to be viewed as A CANVAS UPON WHICH THE WORKER EXPRESSES THEIR BEST SKILLS AND ABILITIES, WHILE EMPLOYING THEM TO CHANGE THE WORLD IN SOME WAY, HOWEVER SMALL. Yes, work ought to make more than money for the worker. When all that one earns from work is money, then their ‘work’ is costing them a lot. I agree with whoever said;

Working hard for something you don't care about is called STRESS,

Working hard for something you love is called PASSION...

The workplace ought to be a place to express your innate abilities, pursue passions, fulfil dreams, and build meaningful relationships. And so the next time you are heading for a job interview, and take on the job offer, pause and ask yourself ‘…would I take this job if I had just won the lottery and didn’t have to make money?’ If the answer is a genuine yes, then go on and work work work …you might as well have found your task match. Pick tasks according to the characteristics of the task as they relate to your own characteristics

You grow most tired when standing still: City Jam Lessons

The jam in my city is crazy, but once the traffic slows, and engines stall, your eyes are opened to other phenomena. Some road rage here, some impatience there. Then there is passive aggression. On the other lane, a beggar approaches a driver, and before they can declare their intentions, the driver is shaking their head to indicate they have nothing to offer today. The red break lights in the car in front go off, and the cars seem to move for a few seconds, then stops. People hoot, as if that would help, and as you think about that, a motor cyclist sandwiches themselves between the vehicle you are in and the one beside it, almost going off with the side mirrors. And before that scenario is cleared, a street boy is washing your windscreen, and you are forced to raise the lowered windows. In a few, the lad is done, and comes to the now closed window screen asking for a tip for doing what you didn’t ask them to do. The guy behind the wheel refuses to look in that direction, and the lad on the outside gives up and moves to the next ‘client’ and repeats the same. But then, when he is half way through the windscreen, the traffic begins to move, and he lets the motorist go with raised wipers, and windscreen half dirtied. However, in all this, you begin to notice something. Motorists are continuously scouting ad joining the lane that seems to be moving, and when what seemed to move stops, they ‘jump ship’ and join the moving lane. That gets you a lil’ philosophical. For the same concept applies in the highways and byways of life.  

MOTION IS ATTRACTIVE. People want to be with people who are in motion, people want to join companies that seem to be doing well, GROWING, and even at a personal level, people tend to associate with you to the degree that they feel you are progressing. So the next time you wonder what happened that your friends don’t call anymore, don’t want to be with you any more, ask yourself whether your lane is moving. Remember you are like a bicycle, you are never stable (physically, psychologically, socially and otherwise), until you are in motion. The 21^st century market and personal space leaves us with only two choices, to progress or retrogress …for if you attempt stagnation in the busy byways and highways, chances are, you will be knocked, and sometimes you don’t even know by who!

Then someone hoots behind you and realize you had begun to sleep on the wheel…

Be AUTHENTIC, the alternative is PATHETIC

When you shun self doubt, you begin to shine in self confidence.
When you quit comparing yourself with others, you begin to win at your uniqueness.
When you succeed at self acceptance, any other success will accept you.
When you believe in your dreams, soon you live in your dreams.
Be yourself, its the one place you are sure of no competition.
Be yourself, they say, everyone else it taken.
Be yourself, unless you are contented with being a second grade copy.
Be AUTHENTIC, the alternative is PATHETIC...

YOUR MIND …a warehouse or a factory?

Among the functions of the brain is to encode, store, and retrieve information. This memory function is important as retained information may guide and/or influence future action. Information acquired, stored and referenced in future may also blind our eyes from everyday opportunities to be productive. The question that needs urgent answers is; “what are the sources of the information your brain stores and references every time you make decisions and take action?”  Of this memory/’warehouse’ part of the brain, care needs to be exercised, about the information we accept and store there. One must check its quality, interrogate its premise, assess the value it adds, and never allow space for information whose only validity is that it has been passed to us by generations past. Most education systems emphasize on memorizing and regurgitating information, and the more one remembers, and not necessarily uses the information stored, the higher they are rated as good in class. However, it is better when information stored in the ‘warehouse’ is seen PURELY as RAW MATERIALS THAT CAN BE USED TO CREATE SOMETHING PHENOMENAL, This calls us to engage a different part of the mind…

The creative function of the mind is the one that is rarely exercised. We get caught up in the way things have always been done, and individuals who try other means are ostracised, yet, the best innovations came from people who decided to break the rules in the face of criticism and play by their own terms. INFORMATION STORED IN THE WAREHOUSE OF OUR MEMORY SHOULD STIR OUR CURIOSITY TO CREATE. This begins when we start to question! Any source of information, whether professional, religious or cultural must allow for questioning. The custodians of such sources must also learn to accept when the premise of their tenets are challenged, and instead of defending their space, explore new information that is always available to the seekers of truth. That is how information helps us to manufacture new ideas, new means, and helps us remain relevant in a word that is constantly changing, and with discoveries that are opening our eyes to new horizons...

So, to the question of whether you have a warehouse or a factory for a brain needs to be considered. Grounds must be established where the two work together with the ‘warehouse’ being a place where we store the raw materials inform of knowledge, and which we need to use to create the beautiful things that we want to fill our live!

Yes, I fired the bullet that killed her, and friends, this is why

My hands were shaking. My heart was racing. I could feel the sweat beads form on the palm of my hands. The metallic grey revolver in my hand now felt warmer than when I picked it. My mind was wild with thoughts. I KNEW I WAS READY TO TAKE RESPONSIBILITY, but I had to GATHER THE COURAGE. I reached in to my pocket, and drew one silver bullet. Slid it in place, and rolled to cock. I was sure I wasn’t going to miss this time …MY LIFE DEPENDED ON IT

She had been a seductive beautiful goddess, hungry for attention. Her eye lashes spoke louder than her lips. The sparkle in her eyes made the yellow sunset over the Himalayas look bad. It was tempting to just sit and gaze at the glow below her eyebrows. My progress was in jeopardy, and my family was jinxed. And when I wanted to do something about it, I was met with the IRRESISTIBLE ROMANTIC IDEA THAT TOMORROW WAS THE IDEAL DAY. This came with AN ELABORATE PLAN FOR THE MORROW, and so we watched a movie, had a chat on social media, watched repeat news, which were always bad news …or just lay there, and DID NOTHING …I knew I was in a fix, and I had to fix this. And it was NOW or NEVER. And since she wasn’t going to just let me go …I REACHED FOR THE TRIGGER

The deafening sound of the shot was accompanied by a flight of frightened birds in a nearby garden. It was such a relief. I my defense, my lawyers argued that it was in self-defense, BECAUSE PROCRASTINATION IS A KILLER, AND I NEEDED TO SILENCE HER BEFORE SHE SILENCED MY DREAMS, ASPIRATIONS AND PLANS. I was given a not guilty verdict

…WHEN PROCRASTINATION DIES, PROGRESS SEEMS TO GROW WITHOUT WATERING...

…and that is why…

Lessons from the Photography Master …of uncomfortable chairs and amazing poses!

Its is 23rd of Dec, 20-something, and the Christmas mood, combined with my previous days event, and under immense peer pressure from Chelule et al., I end up in a photo studio sweating under camera lights and blinding flashes. We came here to do what they called professional photos taken by a professional photographer in a professional photo studio …we had just graduated. Before this, I had been ok with the few photos I had taken with my y6pro Huawei (or ‘uuuuui’ as my KAOcasian kinsmen and kinswomen would call it)
Well, that’s not the story. The story is what I learnt from the photography master.
The philosophies around photography have been around for some time now. First, you have heard it said that THE BEST PHOTOS are DEVELOPED from NEGATIVES in a DARKROOM (for those who remember the village camera man with a camera tethered around his neck, and kodak films bulging from their pockets …and always taking photos on a bended knee). And gain you have heard it said; WHATEVER YOU FOCUS ON YOU CAPTURE! You cannot keenly focus on my feet and clearly capture my face …NO! However professional you, your camera or your studio is...
Then now this day, this photography master requests me to sit on a chair for a shot. First was a nice rotating leather chair with a shining silver foot rest. We tried all possible poses, postures, …everything. The photos weren’t looking as good. Then this master quips; COMFORTABLE CHAIRS NEVER ALLOW FOR GREAT POSES! And right there, he got me a metallic, non-rocking chair that FORCED my back in the right place, and my head and shoulders up straight!
…so is life’s discomforts.

No longer a secret …the law of attraction

A simple Google search on ‘the law of gravity’ yields about 265,000,000 results in 0.54 seconds. A similar search on ‘the law of attraction’ yields about 383,000,000 results in 0.58 seconds. The picture painted by such a trend is ironical. Even with fewer search hits, the average person gets to hear about the law of gravity earlier than they get to hear (if they ever do), about the law of attraction. Why would such a crucial law, with direct impact on quality of life, be taught or self-taught, if ever, long after the other laws of the universe?

According Rhoda Bryne, such a state of affairs has been by design, not by default. The law of attraction has been SECRETELY passed down through the ages, highly coveted, lost, stolen, and bought for vast sums of money. It has been understood by some of the most prominent people in history: Plato, Galileo, Beethoven, Edison, Carnegie, and Einstein along with other inventors, theologians, scientists, and great thinkers. But that is not the case in our time, the law of attraction has been revealed to the lovers of knowledge to pursue and put to test.

WHEN YOU FOCUS YOUR MENTAL POWERS ON SOMETHING, NO MATTER WHAT IT HAPPENS TO BE, WHAT YOU ARE DOING IS, YOU ARE CALLING IT INTO EXISTENCE.

Like other laws of nature, the law of attraction is impersonal and it does not see good things or bad things. Right from Wrong. True or False…

When you focus on the things you don’t want, you are calling the very things you don’t want into existence…

WHEN YOU FOCUS ON THE THINGS YOU WANT, YOU ARE CALLING THE THINGS YOU WANT INTO EXISTENCE...

The complete order of your life is determined by the law of attraction.  Everything that comes into your life and all you experience is so through THE MAGNETIC POWER OF YOUR THOUGHTS. Through the Law of Attraction; THOUGHTS BECOME THINGS, and LIKE ATTRACTS LIKE. The law of attraction is the law of creation, creating after the pictures you display on the screen of your mind. WHATEVER YOU PICTURE IN YOUR MIND WILL FEATURE IN YOUR LIFE. WHERE YOUR THOUGHT FLOWS, THERE YOUR LIFE GOES. Each time you engage in a chronic way of thinking, you are engaging the creation process. So make those chronic thoughts noble, good, and healthy. Begin to cautiously and consciously choose thoughts that empower and uplift you, and soon, the very things you thinks about you will bring about! 

THAT IS NO LONGER A SECRET!

BESTIR your S.E.L.F!

Today YOU must BESTIR your S.E.L.F 
...by PLACING A DEMAND on YOUR POTENTIAL
By making WHAT you KNOW you SHOULD DO be what you MUST DO... 


Today YOU must BESTIR your S.E.L.F
...to REACH THE DEPTHS OF YOUR POTENTIAL ...
to REACH DOWN TO THE WEALTH OF YOUR PERSONAL POWERS 
...to awaken those talents in you that lie in you latent...

Today YOU must BESTIR your S.E.L.F
... For only you can TAKE YOURSELF TO THE HEIGHTS OF ALL YOUR ASPIRATIONS...
Only YOU CAN PUSH YOURSELF TO THE PINNACLES OF ALL THAT IS POSSIBLE FOR YOU...

Mental barriers are stronger than metal barriers !

As a man was passing the elephants, he suddenly stopped, confused by the fact that these huge creatures were being held by only a small rope tied to their front leg. No chains, no cages. It was obvious that the elephants could, at anytime, break away from their bonds but for some reason, they did not.

He saw a trainer nearby and asked why these animals just stood there and made no attempt to get away. “Well,” trainer said, “when they are very young and much smaller we use the same size rope to tie them and, at that age, it’s enough to hold them. As they grow up, they are conditioned to believe they cannot break away. They believe the rope can still hold them, so they never try to break free.”

The man was amazed. These animals could at any time break free from their bonds but because they believed they couldn’t, they were stuck right where they were.

Like the elephants, how many of us go through life hanging onto a belief that we cannot do something, simply because we failed at it once before?

Failure is part of learning; we should never give up the struggle in life.

Your word, your bond

When with excitement I picked Michelle Obama’s current top selling book ‘Becoming,’ I expected real serious content from a woman who, at the time of this post, is the world’s most admired woman. Well, I wasn’t disappointed. And whereas I am still reading this book that has defied gravity (because I can’t put it down), one thing came out so simply yet strongly. KEEP YOUR WORD. As we daily make commitments to ourselves and others, we must be conscious to follow them through; it is part of integrity, earns you respect, and shows you respect the other person too.

It is always better to under-commit and over-deliver than over-promise and fall short…

In the current world of cutthroat competition in all spheres, the greatest currency is when others can trust you to keep your word. Whether in business or in relationships, nothing beats trust. People want to be with people they can trust, people want to do business with people they can trust even before they think about quality they can trust (but then you can’t do a low quality job and hide behind trustworthiness). People are willing to pay more and do more for people who they can trust. A VERBAL PROMISE IS A MORAL OBLICATION. People who are trust worth command some level of respect, they have a bounce in their step, authority in their utterances…

Your ability to or not to keep your word soon affects your world

And so, the million dollar question; CAN YOU BE TRUSTED to do what you said you will do, to give what you said you will give, to call back when you say you will, to pay up when you said you will, to respect others and yourself by respecting your word? Before you make a promise, ask yourself if you can keep it. As the Gaelic goes, THERE IS NO GREATER FRAUD THAN PROMISE NOT KEPT. The reason why your word is your bond is because you are under bondage until yo have kept your word, only after then are are you free!

“Broken vows are like broken mirrors. They leave those who held to them bleeding and staring at fractured images of themselves.”

-Richard Paul Evans

IMAGE-IN, IMAGE-NATION, IMAGINATION

In one of his witty posts, Gilbert Amatta wrote; “The word 'bed' looks like an actual bed.” This sentence might be mistaken for another quip of a status update, but it got me thinking. We think in pictures, past and present, but what is more important is that we should evolve to a state where we LEARN HOW TO THINK IN CLEAR PICTURES OF THE FUTURE NOW.

The things you imagine, soon begin to emerge

“Where do you see yourself in the coming years” is a classic question, but unfortunately one that never to spark our imagination once it is posed. Yet, our answers every time that question is thrown our way only expresses our fear filled hopes, our vague aspirations, and desperate ‘prayers’ but rarely a clear picture of the future we want. Our challenge is that while we hope for the best, we keep ‘seeing’ the worst that could happen, and we wonder why it keeps happening. One of the greatest messages I listened as a young man was a speaker who stood up, closed his eyes and in the calmest yet confident voice began; “I AM SOMEWHERE, SOMEWHERE IN THE FUTURE, AND I LOOK BETTER THAN I LOOK NOW” Can you do that?

I ascribe to the wisdom of the eyes being useless if the mind be blind!

The ability to imagine, or rather IMAGE-IN the future in its details, colours, emotions, joys, the people in it, the scent, environments, is an ability that draws us faster to our dreams and aspirations. When you can synthesise experiences in your mind about spaces you have never occupied, but wish to, places you wish to go, but never been, things you wish to have but never had, you begin to create such experiences, and soon they manifest. Imagination is KING, and if I was a millennial, I would say imagination is bae! Refuse to depend only on the two eyes that see what you are facing when you have a mind that can see places you have never been.

You are an artist, your imagination is the canvas. Make your best impressions of the life you want on that canvas, and do not hold back, epic living is possible for you …yes YOU!

When ‘LOGIC’ gets in the way of LIVING…

The time between the idea and its implementation is very crucial. When there is too much ‘logic’ loaded on it, enthusiasm runs out, negative self-talk kicks in, and soon you begin to justify why you couldn’t do it to the very people you had enthusiastically told your brilliant idea. Then one day flipping through the TV channels or the pages of the newspaper, you find someone doing exactly what you had in mind. You come to this point where, the only claim you have to the fame of the greatest innovations, inventions and ideas, is that you thought about them first, but then on second thought, talked yourself out of your own brilliant ideas.

A swimming instructor once mentioned to me that it is easier to train a child how to swim, than it is to train an adult. His explanation was very simple; adults think too much about everything; drowning, embarrassment, being seen by expert swimmers in the same pool as novice, without remembering that every novel began as novice, and the bulldog was once a puppy! …but not so children. When you tell a child what to do, they don’t put much analysis into it, but trusts that it would work, and jump into it, and especially for the fun of it. This reminded me again of what one coach mentioned. That most adults suffer from the Paralysis of Analysis. They over-analyze everything before they try it, and by the time the analysis results are out, someone else has already done it.  

So we shouldn’t think through our ideas? That is not the spirit of this article, but rather that MOST OF THE ‘THINKING’ WE PUT INTO OUR BRILLIANT IDEAS IS INFLUENCED BY OUR PAST CONDITIONING (our past failures or other peoples failures, experiences, learned but never proven theories), ANXIETY AND STRESS AND OR/WORRY ALL OF WHICH ARE MENTAL STATES THAT NEED TO BE OVERCOME BEFORE WE BEGIN TO MISTAKE THEM FOR LOGIC, then they get in the way of our living!

Another shot at life ...give yourself another chance

In this one lifetime, shift happens, and often, the ‘f’ is silent. Yes, life happens. And when you thought the worst had happened, ‘BANG’ and the little that was left leaves you only with sweet memories of how amazingly great your life used to be; Hearts are broken, betrayal happens, we fail an important exam or interview, a marriage breaks, a business runs down, an investment leads to debt, the termination letter finds its way to your mahogany desk …and the list of the tragedies that strikes our one life existence is as long as there are humans. So the question is not whether or not things will go wrong, the question is, how do you handle things when they go wrong, because at some point, even after we have done better than our best, things just seem to flow south.

When things go wrong, don’t go with them (Elvis Presley)

I have learned two things: First, even when things go south, it helps to keep eying north. The good thing with hitting rock bottom is that at that point, you are left with only one place to look – UP! And there are high chances of heading in the direction you are facing. And as Les Brown puts it, “If you can look up, you can get up.” Second, even when in the darkest of rooms, it helps to keep your eyes open. Keeping your eyes open even when you can’t see helps keep you in balance as you find your way. The idea here is, do not give up looking for a way out even when there doesn’t seem to be a way out.

Keep asking, keep seeking, and knocking, and one day, an unimaginable door will swing open before you …just don’t give up asking, seeking, knocking…

You see, I have met men and women who have given up on God, education, the government system, relationships, business, adventure, name them; but when you feel like giving up, just spare this one person, the guy in the mirror, and whatever you give up on, NEVER GIVE UP ON YOURSELF. For as long as you still have YOU, you can give another chance to relationships, business, faith, trust, and all the things that may have frustrated you before …it is time to GIVE LIFE ANOTHER SHOT!

The 3-3-3 Model Personal Development Challenge

Men and women have sought to understand what makes the stars in different fields shine so blindingly bright in a short time in the very places and spaces where others are barely visible even after many years of blood, sweat, and tears. What really raises some to extraordinary levels while a majority live and die in the ‘ok’ level, a place of complacency and false contentment with less than average lives devoid of enthusiasm, passion, and basic human privileges? Even the 21^st century, with all its technological advancements has not hinted as to what really separates world-class performers from everyone else. Whereas this short article may not give the answers, let’s begin with what studies seem to point as to how achievers seem to organize their lives.

In the art of living, we express ourselves differently, and I would be lying to say that there is one way, or two-three-four ways to make the best of our short sojourn on planet three. However, being a believer in the science of logic and inductive reasoning, several observations strongly suggest a 3-3-3 model of organizing our lives in a way that we can fully express our potential.

First, in what three (3) ways can you be creative? It takes courage to be creative in a world of copy cuts trying to compete and outdo each other. Yet, the beauty of life lies in the simple realization that you do not shine the brightest by outshining others, but by DISCOVERING YOUR OWN UNIQUE LIGHT, and shining in your own element. It is living by the Sunday school rhyme mantra “this little light of mine, I will make it shine.” I agree with DeGrasse Tyson, that may be, our cosmic curiosity is a genetically-encoded force that we illuminate when we look up and wonder. Question what has been said to be normal, use a different method to achieve a new end. What if the gadget you are using now could be designed differently? Risk some curiosity, accept the idea of doing something that wouldn’t be labelled normal. Embrace the wonder of wandering off where others have for so long followed other people’s footsteps, and leave your own trail. It is creativity that causes a piece of creative writing, a design, an innovation to break through and become a sensation.

CREATIVITY IS KING, and the question ‘WHAT IF?’ is KEY!

Second, in what three (3) ways can you remain fit? Before his death, Jim Ron, the great American entrepreneur reminded us to take care of our bodies, for they happen to be the only one place we have to live in. Have a fitness plan. This could be things you start to do, things you stop doing, and being consistent with those such commitment. You see, regular exercise has been linked to better cognitive performance, inner-happiness and general well-being. Toughening the body has been shown to smoothen the spirit. Walk to or/and from work, use the stairs, ride the bicycle, enroll in a gym, take swimming classes, join a karate club, join an online fitness platform. Whatever it is, choose at least three suitable ways to exercise, majority of things in your life depend on your physical fitness for AS THE BODY IS, SO IS THE SOUL.

Finally, in what three (3) ways can you make money? Let’s address the elephant in the room by undressing it. It has been said that the love of money is the root of all evil, I have no reason to dispute that, however, lack of money is also the root cause of all evil. Indeed, most problems can be traced back to money problems, but since I am no expert in matters finance, let me say what you may already know, GIVEN A CHOICE BETWEEN HAVING MONEY AND BEING BROKE, CHOOSE MONEY, it makes you approach problems that can’t be solved with money in style. So, think of at least three legal ways you can make money. What about from your creativity? Can you make a product? Can you sell a product? What are you good at? What needs are there in your community that you can solve. Money has no problem with problem solvers. Are you one of them? What problem have you solved in the last few months? (Especially the problems you didn’t cause).

Work these three in silence, and soon your success will make the noise