The Sunday Mail
The search for comfort and the easy way to greatness are a trap and snare.
It is haunting and kills many dreams. It is always better to search in the maze with vision, tenacity and focus than to sit still in empty and resigned uneasy comfort and hopelessness.
It is better to dare something that is lofty and challenging. The risk of failure is ever present, but taking that risk is better than succeeding at doing nothing.
Sometimes it the small morsels of early success that douse out the flame of desire. Keep that flame burning.
Do not arrive before the journey has come to an end. Stay hungry and hurry on to greatness. Stay motivated and keep on the move. Stay focused and be busy with your life.
Stay engaged and great things will happen for you. Do not stop dreaming and trying. Do not stop hustling and moving. The impossible is the unattempted. A single attempt is never enough.
No failure is ever a sufficient excuse for suspending thinking, trying and being in the game. Do not retire yet, it is still game on so long as you are breathing.
Courage over Comfort
The comfort zone is a zone of danger and a threat to progress. Fear becomes real when it is not confronted. Choose to confront your giants and great things will happen. Courage is not the absence of the emotion of fear, but choosing to act despite feeling the emotion of fear.
Choose courage not cowardice. The challenge is not going far, but being too afraid to do anything and therefore never venturing beyond the familiar.
Your popularity in your village is never a reliable yardstick of greatness.
Try something you have never done before. If it does not work, keep on trying and tweaking your approach. If that does not work, try some more, but change your strategy a little. If that does not work, change your model and try again. All the while, keep seeing what works and what does not work.
Keep trying, learning and trying. You only stop when you succeed, otherwise, keep trying. Keep moving. To do great things, keep attempting great things.
You grow whenever you confront challenges that are bigger than where you were yesterday. Do not be stuck on history. Threaten the things that threaten you with relentless action. There is no growth in retreating into your shell and choosing to do nothing.
Faith over fear
Leveraging faith is choosing to tap into the infinite abundance that is your birthright. Prioritise your day so that God is first in your life and day. Martin Luther once said: “I have so much to do that I shall spend the first three hours in prayer.” Here is a man who knew that the secret to power is in the secret place.
The more one succeeds, the busier one gets and the harder it is to nurture spiritual vitality.
Yet, a number of champions will testify that the busier one gets the more important spiritual vitality becomes. My friend Justin always says: “Business is 110 percent spiritual.”
Connect to the ultimate source —God. Your spiritual vitality is a runway and launchpad for your faith.
A strong inner core and conviction gives you staying power in a turbulent, volatile, unpredictable play-field. Having your life anchored on a changeless rock gives you stability and strength. Challenges are there, giants exist, pressure comes, but it is hard to keep down a person who knows where to bow and where true power comes from.
Someone once said: “Faith is less like your arm and more like your heart. It is not supplementary to who we are but integral.”
What’s next
Whenever you hit a rock, do not park, move on to the next thing. Develop a deep passion for what is next. Keep asking, what is next for me? Do not park on your yesterday, develop a hunger for what is next. Sketch out your tomorrow. Fall in love with the beauty of your dreams. Set out goals that get you excited, passionate and moving. Keep going, trying and moving.
In 1985, Steve Jobs was dismissed from the company that he founded, Apple. He did not sit for long brooding over his loss and ranting obscenities.
He immediately founded a new company called NeXT Inc.
Jobs got to work and had goal to build a super performing computer. NeXTunveiled its first product, the NeXT Computer, at a gala event in 1988.
It combined powerful hardware and software in new breathtaking ways.
First, NeXT based its machine on the Motorola 68030 processor that was running then at a screaming speed of 25 Mhz and coupled it with the first built-in Digital Signal Processor.
NeXT’s ambition was to be better than both the Macintosh and PC. NeXT then developed the UNIX operating system and added its own elegant, proprietary graphical user interface. The NeXT Computer was packaged in a stunning one-foot by one-foot black magnesium cube and offered a number of fresh offerings that were not being offered by other competitors.
Although the NeXT boxes were bought by a few specialist users that valued reliability and security, Steve Jobs was not deterred.
He invested a lot of his personal funds into the development process.
He kept thinking, next, next, next.
Over the following few years, NeXT kept innovating and improving. It brought out a number of products. By 1996, Apple Computer was floundering. Its Macintosh operating system was seriously lagging behind. They could not catch up fast enough.
What to do then? They had to turn to NeXT.
They purchased NeXT, who brought into Apple a more stable and robust operating system and Steve Jobs took the next shot by his second coming to Apple.
The Steve Jobs who came back to Apple was different from the Steve Jobs who left in 1985.
He was wiser, more focused and clearer. He had scored successes and failures. All the time, he kept asking what next. NeXT Software is now the heart of the Mac Operating System.
Become an expert before you need to
Think, work and behave as though you are in the position that you want next. Act, read, lead, dress and work like you are in the position you aspire for next. Unless you show it you may never be chosen for it. Always punch a level higher.
It is not about where you are now, but the mindset that you have. Before you can achieve the greatness that you aspire for, you must think at that level, talk and conduct yourself as would a person that is at that level.
To be promoted, start displaying the responsibility of a manager. Just working because you are being inspected is cheating yourself and your future.
Pretending to work will not work in the long term. Whatever you sow you will surely reap. Suggest ideas for improvement and put your heart to your work, regardless of how humble your work might be. There is not big work or small work, all there is work. Take on more responsibilities without complaining, screaming and thinking that you have been marked out for embarrassment. Show initiative, work with passion and heart; constantly improve and you will be unstoppable.
Stop handing around those who think heroism is working as little as possible while complaining as much as possible.
That is not the way to the top.
Position yourself for opportunities that do not as yet exist and they will exist for you soon.
Milton Kamwendo is an international transformational and inspirational speaker, author and coach; and a strategy, innovation, team-building and leadership facilitator. Feedback: [email protected], Twitter @MiltonKamwendo, and WhatsApp 0772422634
