I obviously cannot forget how I have had to walk two hours to galaxy television and walk another two hours back home sometimes because I was going there to make a ten miniute presentation but at the time I turned on my system to write this page I was in the talk academy of the debaters where it was the cameras that were looking for me and an estimated 3.5 million viewers. Will be watching me from tonight on 3 different stations with two of them on cable. My challenges are beginning to help me understand the the impact and beauty of delayed results despite the pains of waiting and the seemingly frustrated expectations.
It did not just happen that I got into a place where cameras are always on me and trying to shoe the world who I am and what skills and talents I have got to offer. Before this opportunity came there were times when I sat at home and needed to go out but there was no money to go out and I taught seriously about my streams of income. At the time I was beginning to think about my streams of income I must confess that it was a temptation about getting money consistently to keep things running. Each time the taught strikes I keep think about my moral justification to back it up because I do not have the daring courage to do things that are not part of my passion. Each time I gave it a taught I alsmost felt as if I had just done something that can betray another person but I needed to pay attention to my finance.
In whatever you do I want to assure you that you can get the best out of it depending on your perception but you must be told or reminded that there are rough edges to smoothen at every point. The people who do no tell you about the rough edges obviously hate you. When I was to go for the national auditioning of the debaters I did not have cash but I had products. A part of my mind was praying for a miracle and a part of my mind was hoping somebody somewhere would buy the quantity of books that will amount to the cash I need. A few days before I was to go for the national auditioning I got a call from my uncle who requested copies of my book and that took care of my expenses to Ikoyi where the auditioning was done. Here was I with the potential to scale through something and the chances were being threated because I did not have enough cash. Amusingly and sometimes annoyingly the amounts needed in these kinds of time are ridiculous amounts that you would have given out a number of times. For reasons like this I kept getting the temtation of seeking a job so that I can leave my house everyday like every other person does and bring some money home. While fighting this same desire the sincerity and genuinness to stay away from employment so that I can help others succeed was strong on in my heart.
The truth is that at some points the things I knew I should be doing and was convinced about doing looked like the things that were wrong because the results didn’t seem to be forthcoming and the input was so much. You experience some kind of agonizing pain while doing what you know is right but you don’t seem to get the needed result. For this reason it sometimes was difficult to continue on the right path. There were times when I simply broke down on my bed and did not feel like doing anything. There were times when what I needed to do was stiring at me in the face but I could not gather enough energy to do it because I had some other psychological debates going on in my mind.
Some of my great challenges include having to take the courage to stick to my path in life. A lot of people cannot stick to their paths in life because they are not getting immediate results and they are frustrated. The problem is not the results that is not forthcoming. The problem is the lack of understanding of what the delayed result was going to do for you. When you have delayed results you end up being a stonger person first with your psycology if you put forth the right perspective and then with your attitude. When you are not shaken by all the little things you are expecting that are not coming immediately you are likely to have more peace in your life.
Through challenges I have learnt not to try to make things happen before their time and not to get to desperate that some other take undue advantage of me because of my desperation which can make the situation worse for me.

I have heard Dr. David Oyedepo, chancellor of Covenant University and founding Bishop of the Living Faith Church also known as Winners Chapel, say again and again, “I am not surprised at where we are in ministry today. As a matter of fact I would have been surprised if we are not there. I saw where we were going to and I put into it what will make it work.” The ministry built a 50, 000 seater capacity hall in 1999 for Sunday services and in 2009 began two services in a 50, 000 seater capacity auditorium. He had conceived the vision that materialized in 1999 in the year 1982. Taking a few other references from the Bible it is important to note that Joseph was called the dreamer because his future never caught him by surprise! He caught a picture of how people were going to reverence him.

Daniel didn’t die along with his friends because his future never caught him by surprise. He knew what to do when no one else knew what to do. He had been preparing for the palace before the king decided to bring some people into the palace to be trained. I was told that the father of Al Gore, a former vice president in Ameriaca, had been training him from childhood to become the president of US. He never became the president of US but he came so close to it because he prepared for it and he saw what to do.

Our Bible did say to us in 1 Corinthians 2:9, 10 – “Eye has not seen, nor ear heard, nor have entered into the heart of man the things which God has prepared for those who love him.” But God has revealed them to us through his spirit. For the spirit searches all things, yes, the deep things of God. The words in italics simply imply that God does not want our future to catch us by surprise. Others may not know what will happen to us but we should but be caught unaware because it is Gods plan to reveal a portion of it to us so that we can start preparing for the place.

God anointed David to be a king but gave him several years to prepare for the throne before he was returned to the palace. To live your life without the knowledge of the things to come is to live a miserable life. What future are you preparing for? What opportunities are you preparing for? What specific time are you waiting for?

Life is like a man who is going somewhere. When he gets to the park he knows which bus to board because he knows where he is going to. He does not know what the place looks like at that time but he will get there because he knows that is where he is going to. He will board the right bus because he is sure about is destination since his destination determines which among the numerous buses he is to board. For a moment I want you to picture a man who wants to go somewhere and does not know where he is going but he insists he must go somewhere. He has no defined destination and he is saying I will board any bus that comes around though I don’t know my destination. You know too well that kind of man will get no where.

That picture of a man willing to travel without a defined destination is the way many of us live our lives. That is why opportunities come and we can’t spot them because we are not prepared for them. You don’t stumble on success, you prepare for it.

Opportunities kept coming my way and something that kept coming with those opportunities were challenges that seem more dauting than the opportunities. They were never as serious as the opportunities but what usually happens is that you may succumb to seeing the challenge as something greater rather than taking it as something that is smaller than the opportunities. What this means is that we are going to get going through the challenges surrounding us because of our opportunities only if we have the right perspective and the dogged heart to scale through.
I had been thinking about the money to run some of the projects that I have on hand and some of the things that happen at the end of the day is that the money shows up inform of an opportunity presented by another person. The only thing I will need to do is probably to go and display my talents to get the money that I need. This time around what came up was the advertisement of a programme called The Debaters organised by Mosunmola Abudu popularly called Mo and for the programme she runs on TV which is Moments with Mo. I was fascinated by that opportunity and I knew it was something that was going to be good enough for me especially because I had been debating before I was ten. I also took the debating skills to secondary school and I became the chief speaker of the debating team which won several laurels including the prestigious Ereke Debate which was done yearly among the secondary schools in Ikenne. It was a resounding victory for us in Mayflower school that year (2003) in company of Chinonso Amaneto as the supporting speaker who, like me, was faced with the fact that our school had lost that debate consecutively in recent years and it was almost becoming a yardstick for other schools to stand shoulder to shoulder with ours.
I read more about The Debaters that Mo was organising on the internet because I wanted to print the forms and put in for the competition but I misread a clause on the site. The moment I did I concluded that I was not eligible for the competion so I forgot about it. A month later when there was just one day left for registration to close I got a call from my friend, Oyinkansola Alabi, who incidentally was about 3 years my senior in Mayflower School Ikenne but has since 2006 when we met in Olabisi Onabanjo University become my friend because we share some common parts in our visions. I told her the moment she called that I was not eligible to participate but she said I was because she had put in for the competition as well. When I heard she was in for it I was spurred but again there was just a day left for registration and I needed to pay two thousand naira (N2, 000) for the forms. I did not even have 2000 cents or kobo anywhere needless to talk about naira and that was what I said to her. She insisted I get the money and register then she hung up. “Call me when you have registered,” she said in her usual authoritative voice and we both laughed about it.
Letting that opportunity go having learnt that I was eligible was the last thing I would do. I started raciking my brain to see what I could do so I went to my mum for some money. She kept saying she had no money until I pestered her and she grudgingly released the money saying, “you are drying me.” “Don’t say that again,” I retorted. “This debate is offering three million naira (N3, 000, 000) and a brand new Toyota Avanza. I am sure she taught about giving me 3, 000 and having 3,000,000 in a matter of months so the next thing she said was, “you are going to win it.”

I got thinking about the morality of getting paid sharing the knowledge I had acquired in the last few years and it became a serious issue for me because I also taught about not violating my conscience. Deep down inside of me there is a part that does not want to charge people who invite me to speak but another part of me keeps questioning how I was ever going to make a living or make the desired impact in life.

I told you about how I sold my mobile phone to make a speaking engagement and there are others where I borrowed money to make the speaking engagements. I was thinking about having a clear conscience. A conscience that wants to give back to the society but another thing, on a second thought that comes really hard on me is that I cannot give what I do not have. The one who gives back to the society is the one who has taken from the society but here is a young man whose feet is barely established in public speaking and is talking about giving back to the society.

There was one fact to face. I could talk for hours without getting tired and without sounding boring. I could talk and pretend I was tired in a way to make you ask for more of the talk but if was going to do free talks as a result of my passion I still needed to have enough in my pocket to spare to other people that I wanted to help. I grew up hearing stories about preachers and some other public speakers being very greedy and demanding outrageous amount of money when called upon to speak. I didn’t like that and I never wanted to be in that category of people that would place money ahead of using their gifts as a form of service to humanity.

As much as I wanted to help I realized I couldn’t because I didn’t have the money that will take the gifts to the places where they are needed. I was constantly broke and sometimes did not even have the motivation to gear myself up so talking about motivating other people was funny to me. I remember being asked to talk in an all night meeting of campus pastors and my subject was money. Here was I standing in front of the people speaking so intelligently about money and motivating others to act in the right direction but that night I had walked down to the venue of the meeting because I had no cash in my pocket. The morning after the meeting I still had to walk back home because the ovation I got after the speaking time did not translate into cash.

I couldn’t pretend for so long that I needed cash but was also doing what I was passionate about so something had to be done and it had to be done quickly if I was not going to be grounded. Over and over again the temptation of taking a job with another company tormented me. While thinking about the companies I could work with as a way to escape from the financial mess I kept remembering that I was a bunch of talent who would just walk into an organisation that has nothing to offer but a pay cheque while I was wasting away. I could not stand the thought of wasting away in another person’s business so I took the bold step to start by saying if you want me to speak in your meeting you will have to take care of my transport by paying a certain amount into my account. That way I stayed out of debt because I did not have to borrow the money I did not own because I want to help others.

For a long time I did business without an account but I knew that I was not going to get anywhere if I continued to do business that way so I decided to work on getting to that level where I could do business with the “big guys” in the society. What that meant was that I needed to open a corporate account because I have seen situations where you have noble ideas but people do not want to be a part of the noble idea because you do not have a corporate account.

This may sound like something very simple but you will know that it is not as simple as it sounds if you have tried to do business with some corporations. The first time I won a cash prize for writing an essay I was given a cheque and there was no way I could reach the drawer of the cheque needless to talk about asking that person to open the cheque. I was left with no choice but to look for a bank that would use it to open an account for. The reason I was looking for a bank is because I was a second year student in the university at the time and the bank where I already had a savings account refused the cheque. They said they do not allow students to run current account. Why they had that kind of policy was strange to me but another new bank on campus jumped at my cheque as soon as I walked into the bank.

Some months later I wrote a proposal and I realized that I could only get paid if I had a current account so I thanked the guys who first gave me a cheque and never opened the cheque. Despite this I needed to move up. I was beginning to consult for organizations and I realized that some of them had reservations for writing cheques in personal names even if they knew you before hand and some of them simply would not do it. What this meant was that we had people who really wanted to deal with us but they were withholding their money because we did not have a current corporate account.

Eventually I had to think about a way out of this so that I would stop shortchanging myself. I had just finished a professional examination at the Institute of Strategic Management at the Time and I was to pay a sum of N10, 000 for the induction so what came to my mind was to convince my mother to pay for the induction long before hand. I offered to pay forty percent of the money if she would give me sixty percent immediately so it was a deal. When she made the sixty percent available I didn’t have the forty percent that I said I was going to add because I was expecting an amount of money that was not forthcoming. I had to re-lobby so that she would release the whole money so we got talking for more minutes until she eventually gave in and released the balance. I went straight to the bank and sometimes I look back and laugh because at the time the bank was only asking for five thousand naira (N5, 000) to open a currant corporate account.

A few weeks after I had open the account with the bank deducting three thousand five hundred naira (N3,500) from my five thousand naira (N5,000) I got a text from the Institute of Strategic Management of Nigeria asking us to pay up for the induction. That got me on my feet because I had used their money to open an account. I had to start running after my debtors and push sales of books during conferences and seminars holding around that time to be inducted as an associate of strategic management.

Fola Daniel Adelesi, ASM

The difference between mad men and ordinary men is common sense so the difference between ordinary men and outstanding men cannot be common sense. If anybody asks you to use your common sense they are simply saying you are already operating below the minimum level required of a normal human being to think. So they expect you to upgrade.

One of the biggest problems in the society today is that it pretends not to have a problem and those who manage to admit that there is a problem say that the problem requires common sense. I will not argue with you if you choose to say that a problem requires common sense but how come a problem requires only common sense and it has lingered on for more than ten years without the common sense forth coming?

Friends to survive here on earth you need more than common sense because if all you need is common sense you will not have the health problems that you have. If all you need is common sense you obviously don’t need a doctor to treat you. If all you need is common sense you shouldn’t have financial problems. If all you need is common sense you should not be wondering how your last pay cheque vanished with no tangible thing on ground to show for the staggering figures on it. If all you need is common sense you should not in any way be failing in school. Do you ever ponder on why people seat for professional exams over and over again when others would have long passed the same professional exams? If all that was needed is common sense then they should have passed their professional exams at once since they are expected to be professionals in that field before qualifying to write a professional exam.

You should think about why some people make little money or not as much as you make monthly and they already have a home but you don’t have one! Does common sense explain that? Now I know you will want to say it is because you didn’t spend your money properly but if all you needed was common sense then you should have known that from the beginning there is the need to plan for your house.

There are so many people who are dying on daily basis and the reason they are dying faster and faster is because they taught all they ever needed was common sense. If you take a good look at the men who have done amazingly well in their chosen field then you will realize that you need more than common sense because these were all men who admitted to something more than common sense. Napoleon Hill was a man who wrote the book “Think and Grow Rich.” While reading the book you will admit that one of the things he emphasized was mediation. In order words he is saying that it does not take common sense to be rich. To have common sense is to know that when an object faces you and threatens to hit your eyes you have to dodge it. You don’t have to think about that because your body was wired by God to sense danger and to take the right action without having to think too much about it. Your eye lids will naturally close when an object is coming too close but you don’t have to think about that! The reason you are able to read this article is that you already have common sense. The reason some people live on the street and do the least expected is that they are thinking up side down and their common sense is not in place.

The difference between mad men and ordinary men is common sense so the difference between ordinary men and outstanding men cannot be common sense. It has to be divine sense. Dr. David Oyedepo said, ‘common sense will only produce common results.’ I want you to know that if you must stand out your sense must stand out.

You cannot be seating while your sense is standing! To be out standing your sense must constantly be standing. The extent to which a man succeeds depends invariably and correspondingly to the rareness of the sense that he carries.

You need common sense to be reckoned with as a human being but it is not common sense that will put you in the memories of people or in the Guinness book of world records. The manifestation of common sense will help us to identify you as a male or a female but we need to see the manifestation of more than an ordinary sense to begin to consult you. You will never become a consultant in any field just with common sense and if perchance you become a consultant you will be a replica of calamity personified to take charge of the issues challenging your clients.

Imagine if your medical consultant has decided to operate with common sense in his field all those who consult him are already “gunners.” He should be referred to as a death consultant and not a medical consultant. If you must shine in life your sense must be a shinning sense. The only reason the star stands out in the sky is because it shines. There are so many objects in the sky that we cannot see and there are some that we see but don’t pay attention to because the star outshines all of them. The only reason you reckon with the sun is because it shines and when it shines you can feel its effect. When the sun shines you can’t neglect it. So you must understand that to shine up to that level where no one can pretend not to see your results you need more than common sense.

Common sense will tell you to eat because you are hungry and common sense will tell you to wear clothes because you are naked. When people greet you all you need to respond to their greeting is the sense that has become a part of you and that is simply common sense. When people ask you questions it takes only common sense to answer but the questions of life cannot be answered using common sense. When life throws you a question you will have to consult divine sense because what is from above is above all.

In every sphere of life the things that have been outstanding are the things that have come by divine sense and this statement is backed up by the fact that every good and perfect gift is from above. I am not sure that anybody with ordinary common sense has ever emerged as an inventor. How you explain the way a mobile phone works that you pick a device and you press some buttons. The next minute you will hear some sounds and somebody you cannot see starts talking to you. It is not that you will not see this person alone but this person can be thousands of miles away from where you are. It was not common sense that did that!

I was flying recently and shortly before the plane took off there was a routine check and repetition of instructions so the instructor said we were flying at 28, 000 feet. Does it require common sense for hundreds of people to enter a big balloon and say that they are going somewhere when there is no road in the air? If you have been traveling by air have you ever seen a tarred road in the middle of the sky? Was there any time you saw a traffic warden or a community police asking the pilot to pull over because his speed was too much? If that sounds out of place let me ask you a more reasonable question. Since you have been flying have you ever seen sign posts or bill boards in the sky demarcating the streets and telling you how many kilometers you have left? How then does the pilot know where he is going to? Now I know you will say he uses a compass but is there common sense in what the compass looks like when compared to what it does? It is more than common sense and because the Wright brothers were able to access the sense needed to provide solution to the challenge of moving in the air we will never forget them.

I studied mass communication and in the first year I was in a class where all the students were taught Traditional African Communication. The essence of the class was to help everyone appreciate the beauty of communication with African symbols and signs, spoken and written codes. At a level the lecturer made reference to what he called “extra mundane communication.” I think they call it mundane because they cannot see the sense in it but what it meant was that it is a process in which human beings communicate with another being that is perceived to be a superior usually when there are challenges they cannot solve. To them it is extra mundane but that was what I referred to as consulting divine sense.

There is no one who has consulted divine sense that has not become relevant here on earth. With common sense you are only one of the numerous people living on planet earth because everyone is expected to have a common sense. With divine sense that I have also referred to as a rare sense earlier you become relevant on earth and you become a point of reference. There are certain things that we do today simply because some people said those are the things that should be done and we do them at a standard. They didn’t only tell us what to do they also gave a standard. The reason some of those standards are acceptable is because they did not emanate from common sense.

So many people have tried to describe life using so many words and they have also used so many metaphors because they don’t really know how to explain the fact that they now know that life is beyond common sense. Bill Gates never invented the computer. He only provided a solution using the computer but he became the richest man in the world for several years consecutively by doing something the people who built computers could not see. It was not common sense that took him to that level. It had to be a rare sense that is not accessible anywhere in this world and, at the time he discovered the secret, anywhere in any book.

The sense of Aithophel or his counsel in Biblical history had to be divine sense because the records have it that he spoke as if the oracle had spoken. He spoke as if it was a divine being that was speaking. In order words the destiny of an entire nation depended on him. What else can the nation do if the king of the nation does not know what to do if this man had spoken? He was not ordering the king around but the king also did not refuse what he said.

When this man turned against the king the king knew immediately that no common sense can save him. He knew that he had to engage a higher frequency of divine sense to win the battle so he offered a simple prayer by the inspiration of divine sense. He opened his mouth and said God turn his divine sense to common sense. When his divine sense turned into common sense he had to hang himself because he could not withstand the shame.

Whenever people say to you that this is common sense then they are pointing at something. When they say common sense is no longer common they are trying to hit a point. If anybody asks you to use your common sense they are simply saying you are already operating below the minimum level required of a normal human being to think. Your level of thinking has gone to sub-zero or minus zero (-0) if someone is saying, ‘can’t you use your common sense?’ The reason is because if it is common you don’t need to remind people to use it, do you?

Elevation is what I see as the purpose
of friendship not limitation. Erosion
does not only take place on earth,
but in people’s lives. Friends have
denied them of their nutrients
(i.e their greatness)

-Fola Daniel Adelesi

Apparently some people have had cause to appreciate the people they associate with. They always have their friends in mind and they don’t want to do anything without their friends’ consent or advice.

Some formed the habit of going out in the same attire and at times you would have mistaken them for either twin brothers or sisters before you are told they are just friends. They dine together, play together, work together, learn together and have no secrets withheld from each other.

The most interesting thing you could find out is that these friends are successful in their endeavours. They know when to work and when to relax and one does not do anything at the expense of the other or to the detriment of the other. Elevation is what I see as the purpose of friendship, not limitation. Erosion does not only take place on earth, but in people’s lives. Friends have denied them of their nutrients, that is their greatness.

A critical observation has shown that most of those who failed ended up failing because of their friends. They have friends that dine with them, play with them, collect what they have, but they don’t have friends that can advise them. I feel so bad when I see people who only have club friends and the only thing they do is to zip at the bar, watch people dance almost naked, throw money all around the place and they are no more friends if the friend has nothing to offer.

Sharing in friendship is not a bad thing, but friendship does not focus primarily on the sharing of material things. The best of my friends are not the people who have given me money when I needed money. The friends I respect the most are not the ones who considered it necessary to buy gifts for me. I really appreciate those gifts because some of those gifts have come in at the most appropriate time but I still respect the people who talk to me.

I like the people who share their vision with me because what makes life worth living for me is in knowing what I can do to help somebody. I also spend time talking to people who like to help and people who want to lean how to get help. As far as I am concerned friendship is achieving success together.

What makes me visit somebody over and over again is not because of the money the person has to offer even when I would have to spend some money to get to his or her place. I don’t mind visiting you fives times in a day provided you have five different lessons to teach me each time I visit you. Sharing in friendship should extend to the plight of your friends. The people who share your money should share your problems! If you have a share in my drink you must wait long enough to share my pains or keep a handkerchief for my tears if you don’t know how to cry. I often want to get closer to somebody so that I can add value to the person or if the person wants to add value to me.

You should not protract the problems of your friends neither should your friends protract yours. You don’t even need to talk to someone who is just ready to listen to you! You are not sharing your problems because you seem to be good at winning people’s hearts over, no! The moment you continue like this it makes your problem appear seemingly intractable and paint it like an insurmountable mountain.

Friends should always look at problems from the angle of solution. You ought to be careful so that you don’t make problem magnifiers your friends. It should be people who can direct you appropriately. You need people who can teach you when to take the next step and when to stop for a rethink. If you don’t do this you will only continue to fail. I have often told some of my friends that we shall continue to fail if we don’t learn from those who have failed.

Meet people who can stretch you a little and not people who would always tell you what you want to hear because they are people who would even see something good about your problem. A lot of people die at a spot simply because they needed somebody to advise them and they go ahead to predict what the advisor would say. If there is any difference in the man’s prediction and the counsel of the advisor, they become enemies but they would be friends till ‘thy kingdom come’ if his expectation tallies with the counsel. Why seek a man’s counsel when he must say what you like to hear instead of what you need to hear.

I have been praised and I have been insulted. I feel good when praised but I learn when insulted. I don’t always want to listen to those who want to tell me what I like to hear! I occasionally want to listen to those who can stretch my patience and emotions because they are my true builders. Those who praise me don’t really build me though I get encouraged to move faster if you give me a nod but if you do it always I may be waiting for the nod the day you forget to give it to me.

By implication I may get offended if you don’t give it or I may want to wait till you give it and that will not help in any way. You need to define your friendship. Know the purpose some one is supposed to serve as a friend to you. You do not just keep friends that will tell you that life is full of “ups and downs” as if they are geography teachers. You friends should be people who are ready to tackle your problems not people who would lay unnecessary emphasis on the problems.

The true friend is the friend who is ready to hurt you by telling you the truth, not the one that will hide the truth from you and kill you gently just because he wants you to feel good. You may as well keep feeling good until the hurt explodes. If a friend desists from telling you the truth, the truth will definitely speak for itself and most probably in the way you do not like it.

I read from one of John C. Maxwell’s collection of quotes that, ‘there is plenty of friends, but there is scarcity of friendship.’ In essence there are a lot of people who appear to be friends, but only a few are offering friendship. I don’t think you should still regard that man who is always getting you into debts as a friend. Do you call that guy or that lady that discusses nothing else with you except sex your friend? Oh, you think the guy that settles your bills at the bar is your friend? Wait till the day you break your leg after being drunk before you ask why he has been paying your bills. He is gradually paying you to get your death certificate issued on time! People who are interested in justifying what you regard as a wrong thing should not be your friend because they will eventually change your orientation.

The best of friends should be of like minds. They seldom present distinctly different ideas when they think. If anybody succeeds in changing you orientation, then your focus would be shifted. Once your focus is shifted then impersonation sets in. You become ‘just okay’ in what you should be the best at. You begin to do things because a friend is doing it. People who tread this path end up lamenting because their own original focus has changed. The steps your friends took to make it in life are not prerequisites for your own success stories. Everybody wants to succeed but we have different routes to our success camp.

Lest I forget friends should always appreciate ideas. That they cannot really grab the idea at first should not make them condemn the idea. Request explanation if you don’t understand somebody’s idea instead of just discarding it like that. There are people who have ideas but they don’t know how to present their ideas. Some can present the ideas but they just muddle up everything. Take time in helping them sort out the ideas.

I understand that ideas could be very great but not clear until you start something for people to see. If you allow your ideas to be condemned by friends then you are loosing your chances of success. It doesn’t bug me when people who stand as friends do not appreciate my new ideas. I just tell them that we have different brains and we therefore would think differently, and on several occasions some of these people have come back to value what has been rejected. This vindicates the text that says, “the stone which the builders rejected has become the chief cornerstone.”

The reason it is necessary for me to say all that I’m saying is because of the compassion I have on your fingers because some people end up biting their fingers for discarding an idea. A friend has condemned the idea so you think it is not a worthwhile venture. Are your friends for your elevation or your limitations?

What are you doing with a friend that doesn’t help you get better? If you have a reason to measure you success would you ever mention this friend’s name? How come you struggle to get some people to help you and you have another person who only spends your leisure with you. The people who only spend your leisure with you wouldn’t know when it’s time for work so they eat into your work time. This is the implication. When anybody eats into your work time that person has cut your input. When your input reduces then your productivity reduces. What sort of friendship eats into your work and still does not add value to you? What are you doing with a friend who cuts your productivity?

When people don’t make you better they are going to make you worse! They can’t keep you in the middle. If you have such people around you I think you should learn to say hi and let them be.

Let’s have a plan and see these issues together:
- What does my friend discuss when he or she calls?
- Is it an important issue?
- If it is an important issue does it concern me? (It could be important to another person, not you.)
- Is the right thing being discussed at the right time?
- Why is this person a friend? (money, looks, personality)
- What do we do together?
- Are we still where we were when we met?
- How far can we go together or what role does this friend play in my future?
- Would people benefit from us or would be terrified by our synergy?
- Does this friend of yours have a vision?
- What are the plans this friend of yours has in place for the next five years

This is not with the intention to scare everyone away from you but you just can’t afford to dance to the tunes played by everybody. This is more important especially when you realize that the quality of your life is a reflection of the people in your life. I have an idea of what your priority looks like when I have an idea of who your friend is.

You also need to take note of the fact that some of the people you need are watching you. They will never come around you until they are sure that the people you have around you are not the type of people that cut your productivity. If you must be together you must achieve together. You need to out grow that stage in your life when you call somebody a friend simply because you were lonely and you needed somebody around.

You don’t have a business doing around the people who don’t have goals. You are going nowhere with people who don’t have a vision! Where are you going with a man without a direction? What are you going to look like in the next few years having kept the company of people who are not thirsty for success?

I expect that the common denominator in friendship should be a passion to succeed; a vision to achieve; a message to be jointly relayed to the society and a legacy for posterity. Life is like a puzzle where everyone is trying to fit in so you cannot be rolling with the people who would blur the edges that make you fit into the puzzle of life!

Winners didn’t win
while sitting on
the spectators’ bench.

-Fola Daniel Adelesi

I
am sure you know that at first the balloon is flat. You could have it in your pocket or in the middle of your book and nobody has an idea of what you are keeping in your book. Sometimes you could hold it in your hands without anybody noticing that you’re holding unto a balloon. But the moment you pick the balloon to blow air into it steadily, it becomes impossible for you to put it in the middle of your book like you did earlier! Once you start blowing the balloon you cannot fold it in your hands as you did before! Everybody around you begins to notice the balloon. They begin to pay attention to its colours and its size.

This is how the life of a man is supposed to be. When you have an idea it is first in your book. It can be on a sheet of paper in your palms and not seen by anybody. But when you begin with your idea, people now see it. It also becomes impossible for you, the visionary, to hide the idea. The idea attracts attention itself. Just like all the balloon needs to begin to receive attention is consistent air, all your idea needs is consistent creativity blown into it. Blow creativity into your idea like air is blown into the balloon.

Air sustains the balloon so long as there is no space for air to escape. Your business and vision also thrives so long as creativity is not allowed to escape.

Your next line of action is to shoot up. The balloon traps air inside to be able to able to exhibit its real size and at the same time takes advantage of the air to move up. The breeze does not often favour the balloon but the balloon still takes advantage of the breeze to dance in the air. You and I know so well that the balloon might be fully blown but it does not move if there is no breeze to carry it.

You do not have to start with money. Start with what’s on your mind. There are people who have ideas and are waiting to get money to start. This is why it amazes me that there are people who also have money who are waiting for ideas so that they can invest their money! If money really gets things started, the people who have money should not look for ideas.

You may as well be interested in the fact that the balloon lasts longer because of its flexibility. When it hits anything its direction changes. When you hit a hard rock while sailing through life, don’t stay put. Don’t say it’s the end of the road. There’s a long way to travel behind the rock. When the balloon is pressed it bends and flips out of pressure. Learn to endure, for sometime, bend and flip out of pressure to the next level. It’s sure isn’t going to be straight because when you have the alphabet written on a straight line, you would have to go zigzag before picking the letters that form success.

I have often found myself thinking about why some people feel so comfortable as spectators. There is no zeal in them and they don’t seem to be bothered about anything. The hustle and bustle of people is like a normal thing to them because they see that everyday.

They just prefer to look, even when they know that ‘a little sleep, a little slumber, a little folding of the alms so shall poverty come.’ The reverse of this scripture will suggest to me that if I lose some of my sleep and lose some of my slumber and keep my alms open to get something done I will be rich! I like the fact that the last thing that was pointed out was the folding of the alms. How can the alms be working when you are sleeping or slumbering? The issue is that many people cannot put their hands to work not because they cannot work but because they have put their minds to rest.

We ought not to forget that the mind is the engine room of innovation where exploit is powered. Many men are limited because they allow their minds to operate based on what is seen around them. The mind is capable of accessing another world entirely and must be given that profitable liberty, only, when the notion is to achieve success.

You would only agree with me that the mind is capable of accessing another world entirely when you take a good look at what happens to men when he is on a spot. A man sits and stops working but his mind does not stop working! On a spot the mind cannot bring the picture of the world to you. Many people understand and agree that the mind can replay the past to a man. Many people understand and also agree that the mind can interpret the present. Despite this, they do not realize that the mind also unfolds the future and is capable of impressing it long enough for a faint picture to become invincible.

Winners didn’t win while sitting on the spectators’ bench! The likes of Ben Johnson, Michael Jordan, Olajuwon Akeem, Thiery Henry, Samuel Eto Fils, Drogba, Segun Odegbami, Obafemi Martins, And Ronaldo could not have been seen as stars in their chosen endeavours if they were satisfied as spectators. No matter how fast your legs can carry you nobody would call you a winner until you prove how fast you are on the track.

The mentality of a winner is that nobody understands what he is saying so he has to express himself with his actions. You would look like a fool if you tell the person beside you that you can dance better than the person on stage having been given equal opportunity to dance and you have refused to dance. It’s not going to be of any news value that you are comfortably poor if you are comfortable as a spectator.

An observation on why some people remain comfortable as spectators revealed that they didn’t want to undertake risks. Now as far as I am concerned you are only displaying a magnitude of ignorance when avoiding risks because it is a risk not to take a risk. Why are you always thinking about, “what if it does not work out well?” why not tell yourself, “it will work out well,” and dare the consequences. If you really want to tell inspiring success stories you have to undertake some risks because the roughest of all roads are the roads to greatness. That is why I often tell my friends to show me a millionaire who does not have a story and I would show them the thief they are looking for. It’s not that thieves don’t have stories to tell but are they stories they can tell boldly for the consumption of the general public? Can they stand with their heads unbowed like a motivator explaining his downfall except when they have had a change of heart?

There are so many people who probably have ten reasons to do something, but one disadvantage in the process is enough to discourage them. They want to be successful but they don’t want to pay the price of success. Tony Olukoyede, President of Purpose Power International said, in his book titled Foundations of Success, ‘you have to pay the price if you want to rise.’

How on earth will anybody write about the blacks without including Martin Luther’s name in the book? Who is Martin Luther aside from the fact that he always advocated equality between the blacks and the whites at the expense of his life? There is hardly any other thing that can stop you from going far in life except your own fears!

Job 3:25 says, ‘For the thing which I greatly feared is come upon me, and that which I was afraid of is come unto me.’ Going by this statement you may permit me to say that fear is also a prophecy! If what you fear has come upon you why didn’t you dismiss that fear before it came on you. We are often afraid because we have a hypersensitive instinct that tells us what can happen but we have forgotten that we have a mind upon which the proposition of instinct is accessed and approved or declined! What I mean is that life can present pictures to our minds just like having several movies. You must not accept everything because that is what some people do. They accept every picture presented by life. Unfortunately life reserves the best of pictures for those who persistently reject the preceding miserable picture. I used the word unfortunately because many people pick from the crumbs of pictures depicting the least they can be. You can become the least you can be even as a spectator.

You may want to keep your money to yourself when you should invest it thinking that it is dangerous to invest in what may disappoint you. Interestingly, I like to tell you that avoiding a risk is a risk on its own. What if the speculated loss does not come into place? It means you have lost business opportunities! Some people want to wait for others who are going through the process to come back and tell them how easy it has been. It’s nice you would have learnt from those who have an experience but you would have killed yourself because you have just denied yourself of a firsthand experience.

The reason I said you would have denied yourself of a firsthand experience and that you would have killed yourself is that there is hardly anyone who goes through an ordeal that the two of you are supposed to go through who would come back and tell you everything he went through from the first step to the last step.

When you finally make up your mind to go, probably after he has told you the sweet words you wanted to hear in place of those harsh words that you ought to hear, you then begin to see things for yourself in sharp contrast to what you have been told. You would have gone through it together but you were waiting for an experience, unfortunately, an experience that will waste your time. Waiting for experience, sometimes, wastes your time!

Do not misunderstand me. I strongly believe in the guidance the experience of others can give me but that’s the experience of those who have gone far ahead of me not the experience of those we ought to have gone through it together because the pains of their ordeal may push them to indignantly mislead you!

You would not be enjoying technology, especially cars, T.V, Radio, Internet services and the likes if the inventors had allowed the risk involved to limit them. I know a little about the development of radio as a broadcasting medium. The man who initially started what led to the invention of radio started with electromagnetic waves that could only reach out to a few meters away.

There were subsequent researches carried out to make it work and the radio eventually came to Nigeria in 1932. It came as the tool the British Empire was using to convince all its colonies that they had one enemy and at that time it was like a box you could only switch on and off or increase and reduce the volume because there were no choice stations. You would only hear a voice talking and that’s why my compatriots would call it Radio ‘asoromagbesi.’ (i.e a speaker who waits for no response).

Nothing, as at then, was similar to infrared rays so you had to link up with the so called power house through a wire that runs directly from their control room to your house. They claim to have perfected it in 1935 but I believe it did not near perfection until recently when other inventions gave room to live broadcast and immediate response to issues raised on radio. Your radio only has to be tuned to any station you choose to listen to instead of running a wire from your house to the control room.

This is such a long process and it has taken so much time but if the inventors had waited for an experience, an idea like this could have been a mirage or most likely picked up by somebody else. There is such a great risk in delay when nothing is really delaying you. Permit me to also tell you that a delay in the pursuance of your dream is a delay in destiny.

Condemnation, as far as the dictionaries of some people are concerned, is the most important word to them. They are not doing tangible things because they spend the whole of their time condemning what others are doing. This has not allowed them think of doing anything reasonable because they spend the most meaningful part of their life (time) picking the faults in what others do as if they get paid by doing that.

There are people who could be better actors on stage or better leaders in public offices but they wouldn’t get there since they are too concerned about identifying the flaws of others while great opportunities would be whispering into their ears. Opportunities only whisper and they leave once they are not heard.

Such people are always unfortunate because they have people listening to them. People feel good when there’s somebody else who is ready to listen to them but they have not come to the knowledge of the fact that whoever listens to you all the time is killing you. The reason somebody would listen to you all day long without uttering a word in response to what you have said is that you are a fool. This doesn’t sound nice but you need to realize that the people who love and respect you don’t spend all day listening to you. They talk back to you and as well take some time to ruminate what you have said. Wise people keep quiet when fools talk so that they also are not mistaken for fools.

It’s normal that you don’t stop talking when you find out that people are interested in what you are saying but you never leave the spectators’ bench because you are satisfied with people listening to you. The irony of life is that people who talk too much are never heard but those who act are overheard. Look up and be sure that you are not a spectator when everybody is interested in what you are saying. They may just take you for a comedian and engage you when they want to unwind.

Spending too much time to think about what one wants is another reason some people would be among the spectators forever. It’s not a bad idea if you want to spend some time planning what you want to do, but a number of people waste too much time while planning. The Yorubas would say, ‘if you spend three years planning madness, when will you go into the market?’ Sam Adeyemi, the Pastor of Daystar Christian Center, Nigeria and the television host of Success Power was talking about life and he stressed the need not to spend the whole of your life for dress rehearsal.

You, probably, do not know that you are not the only one thinking about that idea on your mind at that moment. It’s all about thinking fast and doing what you have to do as quickly as possible. A lot of people ask you to think; think and grow rich or think big but there’s hardly anybody who realizes that you also have to think fast! Thinking is useless when it does not meet time demand so you must think fast. If you are thinking to grow rich you must think fast as well! If you are thinking big you need to think fast. One more thing that is important is that what you conceived while thinking is irrelevant because the thinking was carried out in your mind but what you act that others think about is the most relevant thing.

The story was told of a lady who was supposed to be a psalmist but she would compose songs and use such songs to console herself or uplift her spirit whenever she was down. She was supposed to sing those songs in crusades to affect lives but she was always singing to herself. Something happened one day. She went to a crusade where someone was invited to the platform to sing and that person was singing those songs she kept to herself. The lady who sang the song sang it word-for-word and she even used the same tune for the song. She could only cry because another fellow had taken the opportunity she would have started using earlier to inspire souls or mend broken hearts.

Doing things as quick as possible does not mean you don’t need to plan, but you should know that every idea is for a reason and what ever has a reason is meant for a season. You sometimes blame yourself for not making use of certain opportunities because you don’t find such opportunities coming your way again.

Let’s take a look at the way companies that render prepaid mobile services operate in the country. When you get your PIN on the card and you activate, there used to be a message that tells you the validity period of the amount on your mobile phone. Let there be an assumption that you activated the PIN on 25th of January and the validity terminates on 31st of January. Whatever amount is left on your phone after the 31st of January cannot be used again except you get another card.

It’s exactly the same thing with ideas. Ideas have validity period but the only unfortunate thing about ideas is that ideas do not get activated before the validity begins to count. It starts counting as soon as it is born. The idea becomes invalid if you don’t act on it at the right time. Go back to your desk and pick those ideas you have dropped. Dust your shelves and bring out those proposals. Even if you no longer have a wide margin of validity, get it started. Some people never stop when they start but they have tough times starting.

It’s not unnecessary to say that men without ideas do not have a place in the competitive world. They always end up as a spectator of the end products of others’ ideas! They don’t have a place because when you sell your ideas your ideas will also show you to the world just as the bible says, ‘the gift of a man maketh room for him.’ Ideas rule the world. Those who have ideas would always have their way because people want to listen to those who have ideas.

If you don’t have an idea you would always remain on the spectators’ bench because every invention is the product of an idea and people will always give attention to investors. I once asked, after several rumination, that if the wealthy are the greatest, what about the idealists whose ideas sustain wealth? Create ideas because people are often identified with their ideas.

You are a product of an idea. It doesn’t matter if you believe it or not. If you have an idea you may find yourself participating instead of spectating. You would be comfortably poor if you are comfortable with spectating. That is why the bible says in Proverbs 20: 13 ‘Do not love sleep or you will grow poor; stay awake and you will have food to spare.’

Those who truly lived are those
who have something to leave behind

-Fola Daniel Adelesi

T
he man had a son who after his death wrote about his father, ‘he is a true father.’ Who is this man? It’s Douglas McArthur. This was a man who said he wants to be remembered by his son, not for the many victories he had in battle but, for a simple prayer that he shared with his family and that prayer is, our Father, who art in Heaven.’ What legacy would brush this aside among the legacies that fathers have been leaving for their children, if any?

Martin Luther King, as a young and a well to do clergy man, left a flourishing ministry to passionately fight for the people who could not voice out against their oppression. He wasn’t known for his personal success but for the success he achieved because of other people. At the prime of life he left a dream behind and then he was assassinated. Today his dream can be traced to reality if you remember that Condoliza Rice, a black woman, rose to an enviable level in the US government.

Oby Ezekwesili, A black, from Nigeria, was, at the time she served her nation as the Education Minister, appointed as the Vice President of the World Bank. Kofi Annan, from Ghana, held the most enviable most of the United Nations for two terms. His second term was strictly on the recommendation of the Security Council, which is regarded as a sitting of the world powers! Is Martin Luther’s dream not a reality when we not only have blacks in the forum initiated by whites but it is jointly led and colour was trampled upon. This was the dream someone left behind.

The simple and the most important thing that I’ve found in all great men either dead or alive is that they always give to the society what others withhold. They have come to take life from the angle of what values you can add to it and not the values the life is supposed to add to you.

In the place of the small men the only unfortunate thing about them is that they allow others feed on their ignorance. If an anomaly is in vogue and it’s receiving encomium in the gathering of small minds or mediocres, take caution because it takes only a little shift or unconsciousness to be part of the stupidity that you condemn.

At the time my tenure as the Senior Prefect of Mayflower School, Ikenne was about to expire, a young blind man came into the school looking for a job! You would want to ask, ‘what kind of job will a blind man do?’ This is a young man who lost his eyes when cultists attacked his hall in the then Tai Solarin College of Education now Tai Solarin University of Education.

It appeared as if all hopes were lost and all dreams shattered for someone who was doing all he could to properly coordinate the youthful zeal in him for the bright future he was looking at. By the time he finished thinking he realized there was only a pause to his life, not a full stop. He went round raise some money and he crossed over to Olabisi Onabanjo University to study Guidance and Counseling.

His lecturers marveled at how he still managed to remain in the top 10 list of the class. He received some of his lectures via recorded tapes and he had a brail bible that he took to church in company of a friend, which he studied at will. Instead of resigning to what some people call ‘fate,’ he pressed on and he is still (at the time this book was going to press) the Counselor of Mayflower School Ikenne in Ogun State, Nigeria. By my calculation, that is four years running already.

The eye behind my indignant arrow is set on those who think of taking all the time and never think of adding anything to life. Each time you think of taking, the only thing you are doing is to build the reputation of others and demean yourself or enrich others. Little wonder it is written, “The rich rule over the poor, and the borrower is servant to the lender.”

The beauty of life is in giving more than you are taking from a place because everybody wants to eat; everybody wants to wear clothes; everybody wants to ride a car; we use fluorescent tubes, computers, pens, shoes, bags, and so many other endless wants of human beings but we never think of creating. We simply think somebody should have created what we need. Sometimes I hear some people say, ‘there ought to be something that will do this for us!’ Since there is none or since you haven’t found any why don’t you create one!

Some people have succeeded in the modification of the things others did to suit the current taste and they are making a living out of it! Some others have decided to package what other people created or add colour to the presentation of a product. Either they have modified or packaged, the fact is that they are part of the creation.

I remember, in Nigeria some people, mostly women and some very young boys, used to go around with refrigerated water tied in nylon. Sometimes they got it iced and lots of people were buying but somebody later thought of something different. The person felt water could be better packaged and he went ahead with the sachet water that is now popularly known as pure water in the country. The word ‘pure water’ is obviously the tagline with which the first producer of sachet water used to sell his product. This person obviously made a lot of money before so many other people delved into the sachet water business.

Examine the friendship of two people where one is always giving and the other is always taking. You will agree that the one who is always giving will be frustrated at a point and that, may end the friendship. The one who has successfully designed a tag of “collector” on his clothes instead of “depositor” will continue to scare people away from himself, especially people who don’t want to tell him they don’t have when they have it right in the corners of their rooms. The only alternative is to shy away from him so that they wouldn’t have to lie.

There are so many people you see on the street today that are not supposed to be begging but have unrepentantly resolved to beg because their minds are crippled. I obviously have a giving heart like every other person but a second thought I ask why some people are begging with a perfect body? As much as I do not want to disprove the fact that there could be exceptional cases of people with all parts of the body intact and would still have to bed, it is still obvious that more than half of the people begging are not supposed to be begging! No matter the tunes the pianos and the drums of circumstances are giving, you cannot beg alms if your mind is not crippled! There is still something you can add to life. I know of a group of blind people who went to form a choir. They took to the streets with drums and people gave them money basically because they enjoyed the beats they were playing!

I told you about a blind counselor and I just remembered that I have a blind radio friend. He sounds impressive and obviously intelligent on radio. I only knew he was blind the day I needed to talk to him. Why didn’t he take to the street to beg instead of spotting a passion for which he is being paid?

So many countries are crying out because their geographical locations are becoming overpopulated by the day and there is no job for the people. Unfortunately all of these people are expecting the government to create a job for them. Not even one among them is thinking otherwise.

The irony of the situation is that the local governments, in a Federal System, claim not to be getting enough allocation from the state and the state government also claims not to be getting enough allocation from the Federal government. Consequently, the government wants to cut the number of employees; add a meager amount to the salaries of the ones that have been retained and keep whatever is left so that they can have some money to run the government. On the other hand, they may decide to restrict the grants they ought to give out to people so that they have something left for the projects they want to execute.

Now that the government is more of mathematics instead of being charismatic, according to Sijuade Otegbeye, what happens to those who are depending on the government instead of creating their own jobs and employing others who are still looking for jobs?

Here is a simple arithmetic that I thought of when I was a lone one day. The working class in Nigeria, a case study, falls between 18-65. I want to ‘assume’ that the ages of the parents of any first year University student would be between 45 and 60, though there are numerous exceptions. On the average I would want to put their ages in 50. What this implies is that if you are running a four-year course and you are to serve the government for a year, your parents would only be 55 when you are through with school. Now ask yourself a question. If the retirement age is 65 and our parents who are the employees are only 55, would you wait for another ten years when they would be ready to retire before you get a job?

Congratulations if you want to wait. Some people would say God’s time is the best while they are ignorantly slamming the door on the opportunities looking at them. I believe you would not wait so create the job instead of looking for it.

The mind of a hero thinks of creating what others are going to benefit from and not just thinking of benefiting from what others have created. What makes the earth a lovely one is that you come in and drop something! Don’t come to this earth without dropping anything. Continue to contribute your own quota to the development of wherever you find yourself. Use your brain.

A number of people can only think of what they can see instead of thinking about what they can bring into existence for others to see, and that is why they are not different from mere men. They come into this world and they think somebody must be responsible for whatever they want.

There is nobody who can be held responsible for whatever you don’t have, even the government! That you do not have what you need is a good excuse for the other person not to have it. Often times I hear some people asking why the government cannot do this; why is the government not going to bring this into place and why are there no office holders that are ready to do this? It’s simple! They can’t do it because you have not done it. Who ever thinks of it first should be the one doing it. It should not be a question of who should do it first. The other person you are waiting for may not even be thinking of anything similar to what you are thinking about at the moment. So, think it and do it. The reason it has not been done is that you have not done it. Don’t keep looking for who should do it.

Build your mind to build what others need. I want to be remembered for the problems I solved and the needs of others that I have met through speeches, write-ups, money and all my actions. What would you be remembered for? What it takes to have the mind of a hero is to create the kind of scene that would be when you would be six feet below the earth.

The most important thing that you need to know is that the mind of a hero does not follow a conventional route. They don’t do things because everybody is doing it. They are very critical and analytical about their reasons fro doing things. They see much more. These kinds of people are always taking their problems as challenges or as stepping-stones to their destination.

What makes them really different is that their mouths do not run faster than their brains. That is supposed to mean they rack their brains and plan everything they need to do. They are always making an opportunity out of unforeseen circumstances.

The oldest of all men is not the one
who lived for so many years, but the
one whose influence remains in
people’s mind many years after his
death.

-Fola Daniel Adelesi

Celebration of birthdays over the years has occupied some people’s mind because they feel it is necessary since they are still alive or they are doing it because every other person is doing it.

I don’t have anything against those who celebrate birthdays because they are alive. Birthdays are really worth celebrating if you think of the accidents you have escaped; the sicknesses you have narrowly survived; the threats on your life and some other tough times that didn’t snuff life out of you. Some people celebrate their birthdays because they feel they could have died before that time but they are still living. Fine!

‘It’s not the hours that count but what you put into it,’ was what I saw on the door of one of my teachers. Celebrating your birthday because you are getting older is not enough. What you have done over the years is what you should be thinking of. Some people would be noted for long life and some would be noted for all that they did while on earth.

Someone once said that the measure of life is not a function of its duration but its donation. What’s the essence of living long without doing anything good with your life? You are only going through unnecessary stress if you spend so many years on earth without changing anything around you or changing anybody’s life

If you are celebrating your 40th birthday, ask yourself if you have affected up to 40 lives. Oh yeah! You have spent 50 years on earth but have you affected up to 50 lives? The oldest of all men is not the one who lived for so many years, but the one whose influence remains in people’s mind many years after his death.

One of our national dailies has this to say about a man, ‘by the time he was 50 years old, he had built a conglomerate of businesses. There were five companies, all of them trailblazers.’ 50 years later he was interviewed and only one of all his business was surviving. He actually married 17 wives but none was staying with him any longer. He gave birth to 19 children and he does not know the whereabouts of his children. When he was asked the kind of life he lived he said, ‘I did nothing except work.’

The same man, when asked series of questions about his wives said, ‘if I live my life again, I will not marry.’ His life’s philosophy is, ‘you must be a free man.’ This man who was about celebrating his 100th year on earth said, ‘…before I became a bachelor again…’ What’s the meaning in the kind of life he has been living? All he has is money and I recollect he said, ‘all I wanted was to be an Alhaji and that is what I am.’ 100 years of hustle and bustle without any impact on another man’s life! Hundred years of search for a title and no more!

Having been indebted to ignorance, a lot of people spend more than necessary and some squander all their resources on birthday parties. It reminds me of a friend who said, ‘some people borrow the money they don’t have to buy what they don’t need to satisfy those who don’t like them!’ Spending to please initiates a move in the direction of absolute wretchedness in life.

What could have been invested in something else that you will never regret investing in is allowed to waste on confectionery and tasty drinks. I know of people who see birthdays as opportunities to prove they are rich and they make so much noise about birthdays just because they want to be recognized but after the birthday they run around for the debt incurred to feign what they don’t have. Birthdays are not all about collecting and giving out gifts neither has it been instituted for the purpose of buying new shoes and clothes. I’m not against this, for your information.

How can you increase your blood pressure because you intend to please someone? The people you want to impress are already impressed but you have just got yourself into another problem. The problem you have just got into is that you would strive to continually impress the people you have impressed once. If you attend a function organized by me and didn’t struggle to impress you, I would not have to struggle to impress you after the occasion.

The good book said, ‘teach us to number our days aright, that we may gain a heart of wisdom. (Psalm 90 vs 12: NIV) I feel like there is someone knocking my head against the wall each time I hear people boasting about their age, just to tell the others around that they are older! The only thing they can tell you is how others made history. They know how every wealthy or popular person in the state became wealthy or popular but they are wallowing in abject poverty and they want to be respected for their age! Even kids have people they talk to anyhow and people they talk to carefully because of their perception of usefulness and uselessness. They dare not tongue-lash their biscuit donor

The number of lives I want to influence has been my major concern in life. We all are created for a purpose and birthdays should be days when we ought to think of why we came to this world and what we want to achieve before we leave this earth. You have been celebrating birthdays, have you not been wasting the potentials attached to the life you are celebrating? This is a time to redefine your purpose on earth.

Set a plan of what you want to achieve before your next birthday. Keep thinking of new things you can work on and how to influence more lives. A life that is full of achievement is the life that people will celebrate. When you work on your purpose people will beg you to celebrate your birthdays with you. Some people are dead today but people are still celebrating their birthdays and that’s because they lived fulfilled lives. Note that my clear-cut definition of success now stands as what you have helped others to achieve and what you achieved for them

The greatest of all people think of donation, and not duration; they think of what they still have to achieve, and not what they have achieved. Live everyday of your life as if you are having one more day before death comes. People will remember you for what you do and not how long you live. Most of the people I used to know who are now dead are really remembered for their works. I don’t remember how old they were when they died.

The glossary of nonbiblical people and places in the New International Version of the Bible published by Zondervan Publishing House says, about Martin Luther King, ‘U.S African-American clergyman who received the 1964 Nobel peace prize for his leadership in the nonviolent struggle for racial equality in the U.S.’ It also has these to say about the following men:

Saddam Hussein – ‘The cruel president of Iraq, who led his nation into the Persian Gulf War (1991) as a result of Iraq’s invasion of Kuwait.’

John F. Kennedy – (1917-1963) ‘35th President of the U.S., the youngest man and the first Roman Catholic to be elected to that office; fourth U.S President in history to die by an assassin’s bullets.’

Winston Churchill (1974-1965) ‘British statesman and orator, the great national leader during World War 11.’

Charles Colson – ‘U.S government official during Richard Nixon’s presidency, convicted for his role in the Watergate scandal; now active as an evangelical Christian author and the founder and leader of a prison ministry’ (Author of ‘THE GOD OF STONES AND SPIDERS’).

Robert Frost – (1874-1963) ‘American poet who used symbols from common life to express the values of rural New England, four-time winner of the Pulitzer prize.’

Henry Ford – (1863-1947) ‘U.S industrialist known as the creator of modern mass production, most notably in the assembly-line method of automobile production.’ (One of the greatest men I’ve read about who operated mainly through faith)

Michelangelo – (1475-1564) ‘a native Italian, he is considered to be the greatest painter of the renaissance and the most famous of all sculptors since the time of the Greeks, best known for his statue of ‘David’ and his four-year painting project in the Sistine chapel in Rome.’

Franklin Delano Roosevelt – ‘the U.S.’s 32nd president and only president to be reelected three times, he served during the New Deal era and during World War 11.’

Louis Pasteur –(1822-1895) ‘French chemist and microbiologist who developed a vaccine for rabies and the method of heat pasteurization for liquid foods and beverages.’

Idi Amin – ‘at one time the cruel dictator of the East African nation of Uganda, known for his persecution of Christians.’

The world still has something to say about people like Leonardo Da Vinci, Douglas Mac Arthur, Adolf Hitler, John D. Rockefeller, William Shakespeare, George Washinton, Obafemi Awolowo, M.K.O Abiola, Nelson Mandela, Bill Gates, Bill Clinton, Sir Winston Churchill, Malcom X and many more. What will the world say about you?

Do you want to fall into the category of people whose biographies were ‘Enosh lived 905 years, and then he died; and he lived for 840 years; and he lived for 807 years; and he lived for 895 years; and they had sons and daughters and they died?

Many people do not like to hear anything pertaining to death so they hate people who talk about death indiscriminately. Hating people who talk about death indiscriminately is not enough to stop anybody from dying but the truth is that there is something that scares me more than death.

You would marvel at what scares me more than death and you probably want to ask if anything could be worse than death. If for so many years you have thought there is nothing worse than death I think you should give serious consideration to what I want us to weigh.

When I look around I often see people who do not care about what happens when they are dead. They only want to think about what they can get out of life. When you attend a programme you can always think of what to take to your house but the question I have for you is, “To where do you take all the things that you are struggling with here on earth?”

The only thing that scares me more than death is not to be remembered for anything after my death. It’s amazing to see people who would walk through the face of the earth without footprints like the serpent moves on the rock without any sign. It is my belief that the one who has something to leave behind is the one who has truly lived. Isn’t it infuriating if the only thing people would remember about you is your name by the time you are gone?

I do not like to see people who are just roaming this planet because they have no significant contribution to the society yet they are taking part of the oxygen that the industrious people are supposed to use.

You have a choice either to be useful or to be useless to the society. You have a choice either to determine what happens in the society or to be a victim of what happens in the society. You have a choice to make things happen or watch things happen. You have a choice to decide what kind of life to live or to have it decided for you. You have a choice to be emulated by posterity or to be disdained by posterity.

Just as we differentiate things with adjective, the contributions of a man to life will stand as the adjective to differentiate him from other men. People wouldn’t keep your name in their heads for so long but they would keep it if it were introduced as, ‘Fola Daniel Adelesi, the man who touched many lives through his books, ideas and motivational talks.’ A picture must pop up on people’s minds when your name is mentioned.

The beauty of a life is the adjective attached to it. The beauty of a name is in why it must be remembered by people. The world has potential assets in people but the bitter truth is that a potential asset remains a liability because it costs something to keep it until it responds to demands on it. The only thing that looks terrible to me and as well scares me more than death is not to be remembered for anything after my death. As for me that is impossible, what about you?

Will anybody remember you for the big parties you held in the name of birthdays or what you contributed to the society? Think! ‘Those who think don’t stink,’ says Bishop David Oyedepo.