Finding Expression

Welcome!  I do hope last week’s post was useful to you.  If yes, please do me a favour and leave a comment.  Thank you, the encouragements mean a lot to me.

I thought we should continue from where we stopped last week especially as someone had asked me what the next step should be having answered the set of questions in the previous post.

I was in conversation with some friends this week, and we were talking about how to recognize and define what our life’s work is and how to resource our dreams using those things that are natural to us.  It was in the course of this conversation that it hit me that publishing a magazine is not my life sentence or passion.  Yes, I love what we do with Effectual and can go on throughout my life time doing it without getting tired of it.  But it is not my life work!

I didn’t have to wait for two minutes before one of the ladies asked me what my life work was then, because to them, the magazine had to be it.  I explained that the magazine was just one form of expressing my life work.  My life sentence is to add value to all whom I come in contact with.  The writing, teaching, speaking and coaching are just ways in which I can add that value.

To take it a step further, I am called to add value in a very specific way, and that is to help people recognize, define and live their dreams or life purposes.   What this means is that since I know that I am called to add value in this specific way, I had to strategise and plan on how I was going to fulfill my life work, using my gifts and talents.  Writing, speaking, teaching and coaching come natural to me, so I choose to develop myself in those areas so I can spread the message of my life sentence.

My message is simple, “everyone is put here for a reason, and you are packed with every potential to be able to live it all”.   The point of today’s post therefore, is to ask a follow up question to the ones we had asked last week.

Which is, “what is your strategy for living out your dream?”  How do you intend to make money, if money making is what you are here to do?  Money to what end and for whose sake?  What qualities do you possess that you can develop into skills that can enhance your ability to make money?

Other questions will be, which part of the strategy and plan should you follow through on first?  And in dealing with this, to avoid being discouraged I always advice that the individual deals with those parts of the plan that come easier than the rest.

If we all agree that we are here on earth with something to contribute, then taking the time to define what it is, cannot be over emphasized.  Once your definition is clear and you have the required clarity, wouldn’t it be wise to have a plan? 

Again, I am here to add value to everyone I will come across.  The value I am created to add is to equip people to discover their own role on earth and help them work it out.  My medium of delivering on this purpose, are the talents I have in writing, speaking, teaching and coaching.  These talents, I have developed and I am still developing to ensure that I am able to rise to the occasion every time.

Over to you. What are you on earth for?  What talents do you possess?  What is your strategy? 

In other words, what will you do as an expression of your life sentence?

Till next week, remember that you will make it, NeverTheLess.

Hugs

Sistar B

Define Your Dream: Asking the Right Questions

It is a brand new week and which ever way you want to look at it, it is a good day to be alive, especially when you have a dream to wake up to!  Last week I posted on whether the fact that a business is lucrative is enough reason to venture into it, even if it is not in any way what we are passionate about.

The question now becomes, how do I know that a dream or a business is flowing from my core?  That is why I am posting today questions that should enable us all define properly what dreams we should be pursuing and which ones we should not even touch.  Please see the questions below and use them to define if what you pursue right now is what you should be spending your time, resources and energy on.

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WHAT IS A DREAM?  We all dream that we are living our dream life.  But for most of us, we have never taken time to define for ourselves what a worthy dream means to us.  In answering the question of what a dream is, it will be nice to move away from a dictionary definition of a dream, and be able to tell what you feel when you think about achieving your dream.  What does it look like to you? What does it feel like?

WHY THIS DREAM?  This is another question you ought to be able to answer to ensure that you are living the right dream.  If your dream is to set up a home that cares for the aged, for instance, why that specific expression of care?  Does it have anything to do with your love for aged people, or do you feel a responsibility towards them that you cannot shake off?  What exactly is the reason why of all the things you could be doing, you have chosen this?  Do you have skills that you can use to resource this dream just in case you have to do it all by yourself?

THE PURPOSE QUESTION:  The natural flow from the ‘why this dream question’, is the purpose question.  This question is simply, why do I want to do this?  How does this specific thing I want to do, impact upon the reason why I am even on earth? In other words when I achieve this dream how will it impact upon destiny for me?

THE VALUE QUESTION:  Next question will be how will my achieving this dream benefit my society?  What value does it hold?  Will my society be better off because of this dream?  If yes, can you paint a vivid picture of how?

THE BELIEF QUESTION:  Every dream must also take root in our belief systems, what this means is, you need to begin to ask yourself, how does living and achieving this dream sync with what I believe in?  Again, using the example of setting up a facility for caring for the aged, how will what you belief in support this dream?  If you have a belief system that says that old people are precious and should be cared for, when you set up the facility for them, you will somehow ensure that caring for them is the primary focus, even when you have to earn an income doing that.  What this will imply is that, whenever, there is a conflict of earning versus value, you will always naturally lean towards value.

THE MINDSET QUESTION: Our final question on today’s post will be what does my mindset tell me about living this dream?  Does my mind tell me that this is possible? Or does it tell me that I am not able to achieve it?  This question is extremely important as it is the expectation question.  No matter how well you are able to use the other questions to define your dream, until your mind agrees that you are able to achieve it, you may just be going round and round in circles.

Your dream is the reason why you are, your dream is the reason why even when you are gone in the flesh, you will still be.  Living a dream is great, as long as you are living the right dream, for the right reason, as long as you have the natural capabilities or resources to run with it.  Your dream has to be supported by your belief system, and should always give off value to your society in one way or the other.  Finally, if your mind can handle it, then achieving it becomes a possibility like no other.

Till next week, redefining your dream may seem like going backwards, but remember, every great building must have an enduring foundation, and defining your dream appropriately is the most important step to ensuring that your foundation is a solid one.

Keep dreaming… you will make it NeverTheLess.

Hugs

Sistar B

What really is Lucrative?

Hello,

Something is bothering me this morning.  In the last one week, I have had at least four different conversations with people running one business or the other who are running in my opinion on an empty tank right now.  I have also had the opportunity to speak with a few others getting ready to set up a business who cannot honestly tell why they feel that is the best business for them at this point.

Yes, the business is lucrative is the first thing that I hear when you ask them why.  And this is the reason why I have an issue today.  Is it enough to only set up businesses just because they are lucrative?

I have been told that I am too emotional in my dealings, and while I agree that I may be emotional, I can assure you that my passion for what I do is the only reason why I came out to work today.  The reason I am yet to give up and I may most likely not give up will be because I recognize in my gut that this is what I am here to do.

When will we begin to incorporate the emotional intellect of the individual into what is meant to be his life work?  When will it become okay for us to understand that until a man understands his purpose and crafts his life work around it, he will have more lows than highs in living his dream? When will we begin to recognize that all the systems and modules on “how to” and” steps to” are at best only partially effective until we incorporate the whole man?

A man’s dream or vision is useless if he has to work it only because it is the most lucrative idea around.  I am thinking that what we should be doing is taking into consideration the man for who he is, and lead him to craft a dream, vision or business that flows from the core of who he is.  I can assure you that what will happen is that the man will find extremely creative ways to be able to win no matter how things pan out in the business.

We all are talking about Steve Jobs today, and he will be spoken of for many years more. What makes him stand, out for me, is the fact that he lived from the core of who he was.

Enough of the faking, enough of the imitation, respect will come for your dream as will success, if it is really yours and it rises from deep within you.  I know this is not a great post for the Managers amongst us, but that is the exact point; we are meant to be leaders and leaders are meant to be both original and people with something deep within them.

How do we fix this?  Look out for next week’s post.

Have a great week ahead, being you!

Sistar B

Well Done!

Hiya people!

Trust your week is coming on well.  For those of us in Nigeria my great country, how did you celebrate the Independence anniversary? Fifty one years!  Time flies.  While a lot of us think there is nothing to celebrate, I dare say that we have a lot to be grateful for, having fought a civil war for instance and still a nation?  Come on!  We should be grateful.  A long way to go I agree, but shouldn’t we also be able to say we tried where we indeed have tried?  Do something today, to honor your country, where ever you are in the world okay?

Now to today’s post.  Just like we have been looking at our nation and a lot of us are saying there is nothing to celebrate, today alone, I have spoken to at least three people who are feeling that way about their dreams.  You have done all that you know how to do within your power, yet it seems like, it is a continuous struggle and that nothing is working… I know that feeling, and I have been there a number of times myself. 

Today, I want us to take a look again at how we have fared running with our dreams, and acknowledge the successes we have had in the past.  This is not so we can leverage, this is so we can say to ourselves, “Well done!  You have done well.”  The Africans have a proverb about the Agama lizard, who jumps from high up the sky, and even though his feat is not acknowledged by those around him, he looks at himself and says well done.

So even though this is a very short post, I want to ask you, looking at your past successes; don’t you think you deserve a well done from yourself?  Now let me quickly point to the fall out of taking time to look at your successes, you become aware again, that you have what it takes to do it, and therefore, receive the motivation from yourself to go at it one more time.

So I join you to say, well done! You have done really well, NeverTheless.

Till next week, enjoy and bask in your success, you have earned it.

Hugs

Sistar  B