10 Life Lessons I have Learnt so Far

1. The quality of my relationships will determine the quality of my life! 

2. No guts, no glory. My success in life is as big as the challenges that bring it about.  

3. The world is diverse, bigger than the prism i build around it. I need to understand that diversity. 

4. My religion should be more of a VERB than a NOUN. 

5. Like someone said, life is like a ball, the beginning might be the end,  and the end might be the beginning. 

6. I am as big as the people i surround myself with. 

7. Contrary to popular opinion, time is not scarce (life is what is scarce). I am only in want of what to do in time. 

8. It doesn't always have to be the way I planned it. 

9. I will think my father's farm is the biggest until i see someone else's. 

10. There are different dimensions of God and there are different dimensions of spirituality.

The Nigerian Paralympic Team - Lessons in Competitive Advantage

The Paralympic team of Nigeria has consistently put out far better performances than their mainstream counterparts.
Since Barcelona '92, they have sustained their pedigree as the most successful African team at the games.
The recent success of the Paralympic team in Rio de Janeiro once again came in sharp contrast to the performance of the mainstream team. While the later could only muster a conciliatory bronze medal, from the football team coming 78th in the world on the medals table, the former amassed 8 gold, 2 silver and 2 bronze medals to come 17th in the world and 1st in Africa. Commentators have had their tongues wagging as to how far better the Paralympic team is compared to the main Olympic team; with some (ignorantly and jokingly) suggesting the Paralympic team represented the country in the next main Olympics.
The big question has remained this: How come the Nigerian Paralympic team seems to be more successful than the main Olympic team given that both teams are subject to the same shenanigans and disorderliness in sports management in the country? The answer is not far fetched, the Paralympic team has over the years concentrated attention on their area of competitive advantage - Powerlifting.
Of the 12 medals from the last Paralympic in Rio, 9 came from Powerlifting, a trend that goes back to the first Paralympic outing of the team in Barcelona '92.
On the African continent, countries in East Africa, led by Kenya, have defined their successes in sports meetings not by what others could do that they can't do but by what they could do and are doing well- long distance races.
The Nigerian Paralympic team and competitive advantage. Here's what I think:
1. You are not successful as an individual or organization by comparing your achievements with that of others without understanding your individual peculiarities. The United States was the most successful team in the main Olympics in Rio however, Kenya was satisfied with their total of medals (6 gold, 6 silver and 1 bronze) and counted themselves successful because they played well to their area of strength. Do all you can in other areas but when it comes to long distance races the world stands up for Kenya. At least for the moment, they do not have as much resources as America to develop other sports but do not consider themselves as failures in a gathering like the Olympics.  On the other hand, China felt defeated by Britain because they taught they could match the British in all sporting competition but didn't at the Olympics.
2. Costs are cut when firms and individuals strategically invest in their areas of competitive advantage. This in turn yields greater returns on investment. Had the main Nigerian Olympic team concentrated attention on improving their areas of strength, wastage in other areas could have been curtailed and savings appropriately channelled.
3. In your area of competitive advantage, you don't have the feeling of inferiority. Yes you might not be as big as the competition,

but you can carve a niche for yourself. There is an area where you can still win. The Nigerian Paralympic team might not necessarily be compared to China's, but they didn't feel inferior because they shined in their own light.
4. Challenges are easily surmounted when organizations and individuals play to their strengths. Like I noted earlier, the Nigerian Paralympic team faced the same challenges that the able bodied athletes faced (if not worse because of their physical challenges) yet they came out better among their peers. In contrast, trying to be all will amount to throwing of effort in different directions.
No organization or individual can do all and be all. Hence, one of the keys to being successful (a word with different yardstick for measurement) is in emphasizing your core competences, more like strengthening your strengths.
Once you have learnt how to do a thing better than anyone else, concentrate on maximising it until you learn another.

Don’t Loose it Like Locthe!

Before the 2016 olympiad, the host city of Rio-De Janeiro was painted with all shades of colours. While some gave it the shade of crime and insecurity, others painted it with unpreparedness and lack of capacity to deliver. With all said and done, the 2016 olympiad has come and gone but memories of it will be mixed for one athlete, Ryan Lochte.
Lochte, a 12 time Olympic swimming medalist from the United States had come to Rio-De Janeiro to paint himself in glory but ended up painting the city with the brush of robbery. He had alleged that the taxi he was in with three other swimmers was pulled over and robbed at gunpoint. It turned out to be false. He and his team mates had actually vandalised a gas station and were charged at by the security in the station and made to pay for the damages they caused - this was the incidence they redefined as robbery. Unfortunately that was not the story they told. With their pumped up ego and overhyped American selves, they told the story of being robbed at gun point thus adding another slant of burden to the organisers of the show who wanted to assure spectators that Rio would deliver a world class event devoid of social tensions and mishaps.
To proof these guys wrong, security agencies swung into action nd before long truth came out of its hiding place.
Lochte and his colleagues were forced to tender apologies but it came little too late for Locthe who had forgotten that he was not just representing himself at the sports showpiece, but was an 'ambassador' of his country and the various brands that have supported his rise to be one of the most celebrated olympians of all time. Subsequently, he lost the sponsorship deals he had with no less a sponsor as Ralph Lauren and Speedo (and more).
Was the claim by Locthe and his team members a deliberate smear campaign at Rio?
Were they carried away by their Americanness and thought they could get away with it?
Did Locthe forget he was a brand ambassador?
The truly great get greatness and keep it; the transiting great get greatness and loose it.
Treat people with respect everywhere, they are as much human as you are. When you threaten the dignity and self worth of others (like the Brazilians felt with the actions of Locthe) in whatever guise, they'll respond with equal measure.
Don't get drunk in the wine of success or you'll fall into the ditch of ignominy.
Don't loose it like Locthe.
RESPECT!!

LESSONS FROM LUCIUS SENECA

“It’s not that we have a short time to live, but that we waste a lot of it”. Lucius Annaeus Seneca, in his book, ON THE SHORTNESS OF LIFE.

This lesson and the following extracts that follow, are some of the very powerful lessons I learnt reading Lucius’ book. I hope to start the New Year on this note.

It is not that we have a short space of time, but that we waste much of it. Life is long enough, and it has been given in sufficiently generous measure to allow the accomplishment of the very greatest things if the whole of it is well invested.

The part of life we really live is small. For all the rest of existence is not life, but merely time.

In guarding their fortune men are often closefisted, yet, when it comes to the matter of wasting time, in the case of the one thing in which it is right to be miserly, they show themselves most prodigal. And so I should like to lay hold upon someone from the company of older men and say: “I see that you have reached the farthest limit of human life, you are pressing hard upon your hundredth year, or are even beyond it; come now, recall your life and make a reckoning. Consider how much of your time was taken up with a moneylender, how much with a mistress, how much with a patron, how much with a client, how much in wrangling with your wife, how much in punishing your slaves, how much in rushing about the city on social duties. Add the diseases which we have caused by our own acts, add, too, the time that has lain idle and unused; you will see that you have fewer years to your credit than you count

You will hear many men saying: “After my fiftieth year I shall retire into leisure, my sixtieth year shall release me from public duties.” And what guarantee, pray, have you that your life will last longer? Who will suffer your course to be just as you plan it? Are you not ashamed to reserve for yourself only the remnant of life, and to set apart for wisdom only that time which cannot be devoted to any business?

How late it is to begin to live just when we must cease to live! What foolish forgetfulness of mortality to postpone wholesome plans to the fiftieth and sixtieth year, and to intend to begin life at a point to which few have attained!

I am often filled with wonder when I see some men demanding the time of others and those from whom they ask it most indulgent. Both of them fix their eyes on the object of the request for time, neither of them on the time itself; just as if what is asked were nothing, what is given, nothing. Men trifle with the most precious thing in the world; but they are blind to it because it is an incorporeal thing, because it does not come beneath the sight of the eyes, and for this reason it is counted a very cheap thing—nay, of almost no value at all. Men set very great store by pensions and doles, and for these they hire out their labour or service or effort. But no one sets a value on time; all use it lavishly as if it cost nothing. But see how these same people clasp the knees of physicians if they fall ill and the danger of death draws nearer, see how ready they are, if threatened with capital punishment, to spend all their possessions in order to live! So great is the inconsistency of their feelings

Finally, everybody agrees that no one pursuit can be successfully followed by a man who is preoccupied with many things—eloquence cannot, nor the liberal studies—since the mind, when distracted, takes in nothing very deeply, but rejects everything that is, as it were, crammed into it. There is nothing the busy man is less busied with than living: there is nothing that is harder to learn.

Be Inspired!

Remain Motivated!

Reference:

Lucius, A.S On The Shortness of Life