SOW THE SEED Many of us today are not doing or accomplishing much in life simply because we lack the humility and patience to start small. As humans we all have dreams, Irrespective of our backgrounds and childhood experiences we all have very exciting and lofty dreams of greatness and success in life. Many of us desire ownership of certain kinds of businesses, we desire certain levels in career, we long for certain awards and recognition and at least a degree of wealth and comfort. We want to live in certain areas, travel to certain destinations, drive certain cars or even own private jets! The interesting part of these dreams lies in the fact that we see the end of the dream and focus on it much more than the beginning. Let me explain, if you have the dream of owning a car manufacturing company, your imagination will dwell more on the end product or finished product. Youll most likely think of the various brands of cars, the colours and how people would walk into your show rooms and make purchases and how much money youll make in return. You would hardly dwell in your imagination on how exactly you intend to start the business – the beginning of the dream. Most of us keep visualizing our dreams from the ultimate end and hardly from the days of little beginnings, hence we rarely want to pay the price of growing we simply just wish for the end to happen on us suddenly without us lifting a finger. If also you have as a dream a fashion line, a brand of clothing to be worn by important people globally; youll hardly dwell in imagination and meditation on the first day youll start building the fashion empire – from the day youll buy your first machine, learning how to draw, design and cut fabrics. Your mental attention would always be drawn to the fun side of the dream where youll be making sales globally and holding exhibitions and making good money. The ultimate end of our dreams are the most pleasurable to imagine and dwell on, the beginning is always an aspect we would rarely want to think about. Incidentally, the beginning of every matter is always the most important; the way you start will go a long way in determining the way youll end. Even in matters like marriage, intending couples would always think and talk more about the excitement and fun of the wedding day and living together without inhibitions. They talk and plan about the wedding day, the wedding outfits, the entertainment, the colours, and the guests – they talk about how colorful the wedding would be, they also dream of their first wedding night together and how many children they would have together and all the sweet aspects of marriage. Hardly would single individuals plan on how to handle misunderstandings, financial challenges, ego issues, weakness issues and maturity matters. The intending couples dont really think of when the babies come and they cant sleep at night and the woman begins to lose her cute shape and the man begins to grow pot belly. Laughs Naturally in dreaming, we love the good and sweet parts and well rather dwell on that. But may I say to you this morning that in life nothing just happens. Every great achievement is a product of time, effort, investment in resources, time and energy. Every business empire today started with just one dreamer on a particular day. Every multination exists because one day a dreamer decided to sow the seed for his dream. No multibillion dollar business fell from the sky, someone toiled very hard to plant, nurture and grow the business to maturity. In life everything grows. Nothing just appears. Everything you see today started with a seed, on a day by a person. Many of us are not progressing or achieving anything great in life because we are too impatient and arrogant to start small. We want everything to start big. You want to earn hundreds of thousands monthly from the very first day of employment. You believe you deserve and official car from the very first year of employment, you also believe in starting your own business you need millions and a beautiful business premises. You want your office to be located in the prime district of business; you want the office fully furnished with the best in class office furnishing, an official car to move around with, and a particular number of staff including a secretary, office assistant, driver and security guard. Yet this business is yet to generate one naira to afford all these desires. You keep looking at your start up from this perspective and you conclude you cant start your business without enough capital. Would it interest you to know that I started my own company from the dining room of my house and I was the MD, the secretary the cleaner as well as the messenger at the very beginning? Today the story is very, very different. To move ahead with your dreams in life you must be willing to start small. You must see your dream as a seed requiring time, nurture and patience to grow and keep growing. Life is not about wishes, its really in the doing. You must work out your dreams, it must begin one day and one time if not it will forever remain a dream. Everything grows with time even human beings; you cant have a baby in one month by making nine women pregnant at once. Many today are doing nothing because they dont want to start with doing little, they cant wait, theyre inpatient; they want it now, now! Little effort massive returns, this unfortunately contradicts the law of God and nature which says what you reap is what you sow, if you sow sparingly, you reap sparingly. Your current place of employment was once upon a time someones dream. Youre employed there today because that person decided to start small and sow the seed for this business. Be willing to wait for the harvest my friends, stop eating your seeds because its relatively little compared to the harvest youve been dreaming of. Its the seed that will bring the harvest. Do small things in big ways, commit to excellence from the very beginning, dont overrate your worth, know what strengths you have and dont be too proud to ask for help. Dont get emotional, dot over price you. All kites fly because of the tail, real success is in the details, its the little things that count the most. I believe a major advantage of starting small is the ability to make your mistakes anonymously. When you miss it when youre still small its much easier to bounce back. Whats really worse than starting small is not starting at all. My friend, that great idea is your seed, dont disdain it, dont ignore it and dont be ashamed of it. Make up your mind to start small today. Whatever you desire, whatever you dream to accomplish, start small and let time and persistent make your dreams come true. Enjoy your day! By Muyiwa Afolabi - Producer of FRANKLY SPEAKING HAVE A SPLENDID DAY
Posted on: Sat, 13 Dec 2014 21:29:10 +0000