What do you do when the chips are down?

An eagle is known for soaring to the high skies, presumably where the air is cleaner than lower skies. Eagles thrive on eating fresh food and would not even bother to eat something they did not kill themselves unlike vultures that thrive on dead matter. To be able to eat fresh daily, an eagle has to stay alert and on the hunt, ready to strike when opportunity presents itself. In fact eagles create their own opportunities; such is the nature of hunters. Most birds and animals run away from raging storms, but an eagle flies into the eye of the storm.

When the chips are down, an eagle reinvents itself many times over to be current and to remain relevant. Each one of us is endowed with creative abilities to be innovative and daring to go where no man has gone. While we pursue these great strides we move away from situations that keep us down trodden and in the rat. All this requires discipline and observance of order on our part. Authority has to be honored and due respect rendered to deserving principals. Small hinges open big doors wide. It is the little principled steps that we take that make the world of a difference. Successful individuals respect order enough to make changes as required but contented people sit on laurels.

Accountability keeps us in check that we are doing what we are charged and are being responsible. A person who lacks accountability is like an athlete on a relay team. Each member on the team is accountable to one another and owes team mates their selfless commitment to win it all. Now if one member of the team decides they will not run straight ahead with the button in their assigned lane and instead runs as humanly possible to the nearest candy booth, in the process while setting a world record speed, they disqualify their entire team from winning. The problem is not that the team was not fast enough, but one member was out of principle and spoiled it for everyone. Success comes to disciplined individuals who are responsible over their new found fame. Once in a while, rules of engagement changes, but principles remain the same. Times and seasons changes as well, you don’t have to see snow flacks to know that it’s winter. They are enough signs to show your seasons have changed and would require a different set of clothing. When chips are down, it’s a season for renewal.

For me, the past week was very difficult in many ways, chips were down and I had to take a leaf out of Thomas Paine who wrote, “The real man smiles in trouble, gathers strength from distress, and grows brave by reflection”. Never has my faith been tested so strongly. Faith to know that the sun will rise, the rain will stop, the pain will go away, and God, our God, has not left me nor forsaken me. He is here for me, and He will uplift me. To know that I’m not my job or my paycheck, I am so much more. I am a strong, resourceful, resilient man, and like those who have struggled before me, I will not only survive, but I will flourish.

Seeds of Greatness

Water the seeds of greatness in your heart. Feed yourself with good diet of the mind, thought and emotion. What you read, think on and look on affects you in both ways; good or bad. Give a chance the seeds of greatness to grow in you by focusing on the positive and reducing negative tendencies. Everything begins small. The skyscraper began with a single brick, the giant oak tree with a tiny acorn. You are just a portion of what you will be tomorrow.

The Chinese have a proverb that says ”a journey of a thousand miles start with a single step”. You may not look like the finished product yet, but if you focus and stay the course you will surely become the vision you have in your mind. Job, a man who suffered so many negative experiences wrote in his book “Though your beginning was small, yet your latter end would increase greatly” Job 8:7.

William Shakespeare, a revered writer, in one of his books wrote, “There is a tide in the affairs of men”. He was reflecting on his observation of the turning pages of history and their influence upon our lives. There have been eras in the history of the world in which multiple tide-like influences have impacted our civilization and way of life at nearly the same time. These tides come in like an elevator in a building; they either take you to the penthouse or to the basement. At such times, this is when the seeds of greatness become an asset. The way you respond will either create a monumental benefit where you reach to the pinnacle or be swept by the tide and become a wreck for not exercising due diligence.

Network Your Way to the Next Level

To go to the next level, one needs to hear through different ears and see through different sets of eyes. It is important to be willing to listen to others. We are all endowed with different skills and abilities. God created us so we may be complete through our interdependence. There is no single complete human being who has all the answers of the world. We rely on each other and we need to learn skills of effective delegation.

Networking with people of all backgrounds propels us forward to our next level of achievement. For indeed, there is always a higher place of achievement that where you are. Constantly prepare for opportunities that do not presently exist, dream in broad-day light with your eyes wide open. Ask others around you to do the same and combine the dreams for greater critical mass.

When we do not expand our paradigm from a laurel we lose out. The Swiss well known for their mastery in mechanical watch became so obsessed with that invention to the extent that they failed to embrace the new discovery of battery-operated quartz watch. Because of their stance on battery operated watch at the time of invention, their market-share plummeted from eight out of ten watch buyers in 1968 to one out of ten watch buyers today. The market share was taken up by others who saw potential in the new battery watch and the Swiss have since regretted their missed opportunity.

There is always a higher place than where you are presently. Paul, an apostle of the bible says “forgetting those things that are behind, I press towards the mark towards the high call of God”. Paul could have been content to settle on a few books of the bible he had written so far, but he decided to keep on pushing. His desire barring getting him into trouble with local authorities, he also got audience with the highest authority of the time-Caesar-to him he appealed his case.

Failing to Plan is a Plan to Fail

Everything around us is planned for, someone had to sit down and write blue prints for your house or apartment. The car you drive was planned and the food you ate today started with a plant geneticist/plant breeder who designed and worked on a particular trait to be expressed by that seed akin to Gregor Mendel’s pea plant experiment. After that an agronomist had to design a crop production system in which the tender seed was to be cared for and worked with a farmer who actually planted the seed, watered and ultimately harvested and safely stored the seeds before presenting them to a food specialist. The food specialist prepared the seed(s) in such a way that when you get to the food market/supermarket they will be readily usable by the kitchen technician---who in most cases is your mom. The food technician dresses or cooks the food, which no longer looks like a seed but more like a powder or other forms and sets it on the table.

The whole food value chain had to be planned to function well and to deliver food on the table because food matters so much. Some countries have had a change of government as a result of poor food planning. World economies are planned to deliver basic necessities and luxury goods. Poorly designed economies render their citizens to the dustbin of poverty and they become forgotten citizens of the world. Poverty has never solved any problem and breeds a dependency syndrome.

Planning is so important to the extent that even our designer had to plan your day to be born, body frame, looks, speech and future. He says, for I know the thoughts that I think toward you, says the Lord, thoughts of peace and not of evil, to give you a future and a hope (Jeremiah 29 v 11). Planning usually involves writing things down, the preceding extract from Jeremiah was written down so we can share it with others. You also need to do the same for your life, because what you write down, you can accomplish. Planning should be your second nature; even mundane things require planning, such as your sleeping and waking up are planned events. If you don’t give yourself enough rest, sooner than later your output starts approaching mediocre standards. Relationships are planned events, you don’t just relate with someone when you can’t give them your attention, time and goodwill. Thus, failing to plan is the only sure plan to fail.