The Sunday Mail
You do not need to have supreme intellect or laser analysis of world and personal events to realise that wherever you are on this world, there is chaos.
Anything that is not managed tends to chaos. Do not despair, lose heart and succumb of cynicism. Whenever you see chaos never assume hopelessness and helplessness. Chaos does not mean that there are no possibilities and that there is no underlying order.
There is order that underlies any crisis and confusion. Change is always feasible and every situation is always pregnant with infinite possibilities. Your attitude in any situation is more important than the situation. What you think about the chaos is more important than the chaos.
When chaos is left unchecked it multiplies and possesses. Chaos should be confronted with clear thinking and bold confidence. Confronting chaos with negativity, defeatism and despair is like approaching a fire with a fuel tank.
Running away is not solving anything. Suicide is a suicidal decision and ultimate cowardice. Do not run away from your chaos because without your illuminating and persistent light, chaos will reign supreme. Unless you are a beneficiary of any chaos, it should make you very, very uncomfortable. The first change in any situation is a change of self. Remaining passive and approaching any chaos with a palsied makes you a victim statistic. Unless you change your thinking nothing much changes. Decide to take personal responsibility in your space. It is the thoughts you hold that determine the way you see and behave.
Chaos is highly productive and colonising. Chaos always begets more chaos, until a new order prevails. You are the silver bullet that you are waiting for. Nothing changes until you do. The more you live in chaos the more you adapt yourself to it.
Decide to rebel against mediocrity. Your experience of life can be different if you so choose. You are not as powerless and you may imagine. A small determined step you take thunders into any chaos you face. Work with the chaos you find, but do not get comfortable and hopeless.
Face your brutal realities of the moment but do not lose faith that one day you will prevail. Stop christening the abnormal as normal whatever its sophistication. You have to claim your stake in life or forever be a slave of your chaos. Chaos brings uneasiness, welcome that uneasiness and let it jolt you into action. Wherever you see anyone who did anything great or became great, know that at one time that same person was staring at chaos in the face wondering if there ever was a way out.
Wherever you see chaos there is abundant opportunity to make a difference and unleash your greatness. Avoid places without chaos, they are bereft of opportunity. Chaos is an opportunity for exploration, growth, innovation and creation. You are the light, perhaps your absence or mindlessness could be the cause of the chaos you so eloquently describe. Change your narrative about chaos.
Be humble
Be humble enough to explore, not just to blame and bleat. You are a play maker, a mover and a shaker. Never let present reality make you doubt your potential. Whatever you do not understand may easily looks chaotic to you. Sapan Saxena once said: “Every chaos has an order hidden in it. What we see as a chaos, is actually driven by a very disciplined and dedicated order of things. What we need to do is focus on the stuff before us, make our way through this chaos, and that order will sort itself out for us.”
What you see as chaos has an order that you need to start appreciating and understanding. Whenever you are confronted with what you see as chaos, be humble enough to learn. Present chaos could be evidence that the model that you were using has outlived its usefulness.
One of the most interesting studies in higher levels of Mathematics is Chaos Theory. It has its models, its definitions and theorems. It is the understanding of chaos theory that has made many advances in physics, computing and financial modelling possible. Nothing that you see as chaos has no pattern. If the pattern is not understood, its time to research for new tools of analysis and thought.
Your chaos is an opportunity for learning new things and approaches. What you do not understand easily looks disorganised to you. Anything that goes beyond the bounds of what you know looks chaotic. Basic arithmetic may have worked in the past but its time to do something a little more advanced and interesting. Big goals requires great bandwidth to manage chaos on multiple fronts.
Try reading text in a language that has letters and script that you do not know, immediately you are confronted with chaos. Try reading Hindi written in Devanagari script and you will know what I am talking about. Whatever you are not willing to learn will always look confusing and empty. Do not stop learning. What is confusing you today, should not continue to haunt you if you are humble enough to learn. Your comfort zone should never be the bounds of your learning. Let your chaos turn you into a scholar.
Bring order
Chaos is not just a lack of order. It is merely the absence of the order that the observer is used to. Go beyond your current experience and exposure.
Travel a little and you learn that the world is not the same everywhere and that what you know is not the world. There are more possibilities and realities beyond your current boundaries. Bring order to your life and things will be less chaotic. Stop thinking victim thoughts and looking at everything that you are going through like a set-up.
Break your boundaries and you will see differently. Bring order and focus. When your bring order with you and things start being different and assuming a new colour. Take responsibility and the turbulence in your world will subside. What you do or do not do matters. Embrace chaos in your space as a friend and message to restore order and focus, first in you then in your spheres of concern. Chaos is your friend waving at you and calling attention to the actions that you need to take.
Do not run away from the chaos, stand with an eye for order and bringing a difference. When discipline is lacking, chaos takes reign. When disciplined thinking is absent, mental turbulence erupts.
When everything looks chaotic, disciplined actions are lacking. Restore order and chaos will vanish. At the root of it, chaos is a state of mind not of the world you see. Stop blaming and start ordering what you can order. Organise your world and change will come. Stop running away and hiding from reality.
Be Intentional
Fighting whatever type of battle is real chaos. To be a fighter and winner you have to be prepared to handle chaos and see through it. Stop looking for greatness at bargain prices. Hold on to your mind when others are losing theirs. Be intentional and focused. Times of chaos and confusion are not times to be confused about your life’s agenda. Be intentional and focused. You fight chaos with focus and a clarity of vision.
Do not amplify your chaos, amplify your faith. Do not magnify confusion, shine the spotlight on your vision and destination. Beyond the thunder of chaos there is a harvest that is waiting. See order in and beyond chaos. This is not the time to give up or lose heart.
This is the time of opportunity. In times of chaos and confusion, new opportunities are emerging for those who are intentional and visionary. There are opportunities in any chaos that will never come again. Stop running away from your greatness. Do not join the idle complainers, join the crusaders that are seeing opportunities in the storms. When you are intentional and you have order within, you can laugh at your storms. When you confront chaos with order you disarm it. When you face confusion with clarity of thought and soundness of vision you are grounded.
It is the lack of clarity that creates chaos, despair and frustration. Do not let these evil emotions poison your goals and dull your motivation. Be so determined that no one can get you down. Be so focused that even if delayed you are unstoppable.
Chaos can be found everywhere and in anything, let it be absent in you. What is important is not the chaos but the person who can turn chaos into miracles. Chaos is a miracle waiting to be born and a feat to be accomplished. Chaos is greatness in motion, waiting for manifestation.
Looking for greatness where there is no challenge is futile and idle imagination. Great athletes are born and break records under the most trying circumstances. So it is with any arena. It is when things seem most chaotic that there is maximum opportunity for greatness and growth.
What masquerades as chaos is just perceptual limitations. Chaos is a sea of opportunity embedded in a maze of challenges.
The Great Napoleon Bonaparte summed well when he said: “The battlefield is a scene of constant chaos. The winner will be the one who controls that chaos, both his own and the enemies.”
Committed to your greatness.
Milton Kamwendo is a leading international transformational and motivational speaker, author and coach. His life purpose is to inspire greatness. He can be reached at: [email protected] and Twitter: @MiltonKamwendo or WhatsApp at: 0772422634.
