Some 22 Facts about Your Life Purpose

1. It is the key to your greatness
2. It is not determined by your past or present location
3. It has nothing to do with your family background or standing in the society
4. It may have nothing to do with your present career or the job you are doing now
5. It helps you to set your priorities in life and identify what is really important and what isn’t
6. It helps you to apportion and make use of time more productively
7. God will require an account of stewardship from you on what you do with it
8. It takes an accountability system to continually live and fulfil it maximally
9. It is what you will do with joy and look forward to doing everyday
10. It will bring you great contentment in life and give you a sense of fulfilment
11. It helps you to identify your destiny partners: e.g. who to marry, who to be friendly with, who to go into business with, who to hire as workers, who to submit to etc
12. In the field of your purpose, you are a king and a celebrity
13. It is in the Word of God
14. It takes God and His resources to fulfil it
15. You are not really successful if you are not fulfilling or living it
16. It guides you to make the right choices and decisions in life
17. It is not something you learn in school, seminars, workshops, or conferences
18. It has been in/with you all along, merely awaiting discovery
19. You might have been fulfilling it without knowing
20. You don’t have to leave your present job or career to start fulfilling it
21. You can make a career out of it
22. It can be commercialised to fetch you money and make you very rich

Conceive. Build. Sustain: How to Successfully Navigate the Triad

Every entity begins as an idea. However, it takes more than idea conceptualisation to see that idea become a reality, for it to thrive. As easy conceiving an idea may seem to some, to sustain what you started over a period of time with the same gusto with which you started and an increasing, progressive outlook is another kettle of fish entirely.

Even if you have conceived the right business idea and you have all the capital you need or the repertoire of resources at your disposal, there are certain attitudes, skills and key factors essential to taking a business or project from infancy to maturity. The absence of these essentials is largely responsible for most grand ideas that never transit from birth to growth. You don’t want that to happen to you.

This month at Thrive Academy, we will be discussing the topic:

Conceive. Build. Sustain: How to Successfully Navigate the Triad

Now, you can’t afford to miss this session!

Venue: 1A, African Church Close, off Coker Road, Ilupeju, Lagos.

Date: Friday, Nov 24, 2017

Time: 3:00pm

Attendance is free, but pre-registration is compulsory. To book your seat, please click: www.bit.ly/ThrivewithBabs or call: +2348110832280, +2348188708026.

10 Simple Ways To Know You Are In The Job You Are Naturally Cut Out For By Babatunde Oladele

Dear friends,

I found myself in the meditation mode not long ago and the object of my rumination was why some people seem to derive so much fun in their jobs – bubbling in their productivity therein – while some only do the required rounds, watch the clock and tick the day.

I know this is a much-discussed issue in the career industry worldwide, with various postulations and sophisticated theories. So, I was under no illusion that I was going to come up with a groundbreaking solution that would land me a Nobel Prize for solving a nagging human problem. However, the Pilot of my flight of consciousness was not discouraged, but kept on conducting me to a point where I was able to capture some bits on what usually separates an excited worker from a placid one.

The distinguishing factor is interest – borne out of the natural configuration of each individual. It is a fact that we are not all wired the same way; even identical twins may not have identical emotional sparks. Therefore, individual interest plays an important role in job gratification, which in turn results in productivity. That does not discountenance some external or psychological variables that may facilitate or hinder job performance, such as remuneration, work environment, and self-esteem, to mention a few.

So, on the fulcrum of interest only, I came up with the following 10 submissions that will help an individual to ascertain what kind of job s/he is naturally cut out for, and if s/he is presently engaged in one. I’m not sure the list below can be described as authoritative, neither is it exhaustive; so, I’ll welcome inputs from you guys.

Ok, now to the titbits: how do you identify the job you are naturally cut out for or ascertain the one you are doing now is it?

1.    You will enjoy doing what you do, and it won’t be a drag or drudgery to you.

2.    Time will not be “of essence”, and you will not be watching it, since you can start whenever you like and end whenever you like. I agree that this one may be a hard pill for the apostles of structure to swallow. But, check it out in the lives of those who are all fired up about their job.

3.    You flow seamlessly into the work, with minimal or no friction anytime, any day, and in most places. You also hands off your work with a teeny feeling of reluctance, but a soothing sense of accomplishing something.

4.    You are doing something by which people generally hail you or associate you whenever they see you or thoughts of you pop up on their mind.

5.    Money is not a major consideration for doing what you are doing. Although it is a necessity of life and a viable motivation factor, your primary drive is derived from your sheer involvement in and satisfaction with what you are doing.

6.    You want to learn all you can about the vocation, or certain aspects of it where you feel you can still be better.

7.    You want to make everyone who comes into contact with you an artisan in the vocation. You want to teach them, help them, guide them, and/or instruct them on how to do it. And you will be willing to do all these, even at no fee.

8.    You want to passionately defend, justify, or clarify certain notions about the vocation, or its operational aspects, that you feel is wrongly bandied or misconstrued by people.

9.    You are agitated when you see people who are similarly engaged doing the same work the way it ought not be done, either by underperforming, under-delivering, or not conforming to certain norms and standards pertaining to it.

10. You eagerly look forward to getting up from bed every day you have to work to get on the task or an assignment you have in hand. And you won’t mind sleeping late engaged in what you are doing. In the event you are busy doing something else, you are not so excited and you can’t wait to be done with it to get back to your love vocation.

Like I mentioned, this list is neither authoritative nor exhaustive. You may be presently engaged in the job you are naturally cut out for and not find yourself in any of the above bits. We will like to learn your own slant to this.

Cheers!

About Ideas

No one can replicate your original idea as uniquely as you, because a lot of intangible personal mix goes into the execution of ideas that the other person cannot grasp. In most cases, the idea thief will struggle to express it. It's only in rare cases that s/he would execute it better than you; and s/he must be a super intelligent person to do that.

So, don't just sit and bemoan the theft of your idea, get up and pursue it. And let's believe your personal mix would prove superior to your counterparts in process, execution and package.

To your success!

- Babatunde Oladele

14 Questions to Help Clarify Your Steps After A Flash of Inspiration By Babatunde Oladele

We all get a flash of inspiration or an idea to do or run with something from time to time. If you don’t get on it right there and then, some of these ideas thaw in intensity and later disappear into oblivion, some remain subdued at our sub-consciousness, while some are nagging and clamouring for immediate treatment.

It seems there are more cases of the first two categories above than there are the third. And even in the event of the persistent third, it takes some process to transport an idea from the realm of intangibility to the sphere of concrete reality. A course of action is required to transform an inspiration into an expression, a move into a movement.

Below are 14 questions that will help you to clarify your thoughts and define your steps on what to do after a bout of inspiration:

1. What is the assignment?

Answering this question will help you to clearly define and have an insight on what exactly you are required to do.

2. What are the tasks?

This will help you to identify the tasks that are involved in the assignment. The tasks are the bits and pieces of things you will have to do to ensure that you are on track of executing the assignment.

3. What is the purpose?

Knowing the purpose of your assignment will give you a sense of location and direction. It is soothing to the mind to know that one’s actions are premised on a motive that is considered noble or charitable. Knowing the purpose of your assignment gives you a sense of significance for being a contributor to the advancement of the mankind. And when the chips are down, it also gives you reasons to go on.

4. Who are the targets?

You must be able to define your audience, your market or the class of people whom your assignment (campaign, products, and services) will benefit. This is a very critical aspect because the success/failure of your offering, nay your fulfilment/frustration as a pioneer, are largely dependent on identifying the group of people who need your idea or would benefit from your assignment, and then taking your campaign to them.

5. What is the scope?

Knowing the scope of your assignment will also save you a lot of stress and frustration. The scope of your offering may the within your locality, it may also be within your state, region, nation, or continent. Knowing this will help you to plan your move and your scale of operations.

6. What is the platform?

The platform is the means/channel through which you want to execute your action or pass your message to your audience, target, market etc. You need to determine what platform is most suitable to reach your target. And you can’t determine this until you have taken time to study your audience very well that you know their tastes and preferences.

7. What are the modus?

You need also to take time to plan your modus operandi. How do you intend to pass your message across in a way that it would be effectively understood? How would you deliver your offering so that it would be warmly received by your target? How…? How…? How…? The modus questions help you to take care of all matters pertaining to impact in your delivery.

8. When is the time?

Timing is a strategic factor in all endeavours that can either make or mar its outcome altogether. Knowing the time to start, the time to move, the time to charge, the time to pause, the time to withdraw, the time to quit et al requires more than an average thinking.

9. What is my source?

Knowing what gives you inspiration, energy and drive will help you know what to do/where to go whenever you are running dry and need to replenish. So it is in your best interest to identify your source of creative energy before launching out so as not to get bewildered and cut off in the middle way. You should also be able to identify how best you access your source of creative energy.

10. What are the resources?

Knowing the resources that are needed to effectively perform your tasks helps you to know what to look for and what to spend on. By having a holistic inventory of all you need to fulfil your assignment, you are better positioned to kick off on a sure footing. Even if you don’t have all of them at the moment, you know when you would need what and what you can do to improvise along the way.

11. Who are my mentors?

A careful consideration of all the factors above would help you to identify who you need to seek for counsel in your set assignment. You would have also determined what you need to take them on so that you don’t get there and start rambling on irrelevances, wasting both their time and yours in the process. It is always advisable to have highlighted all the other factors before rushing to mentors.

12. Who are my partners?

Taking time to answer all the questions above will also help to determine the kind of people you would need as partners or running mates. Knowing your own areas of strengths and weaknesses is also a critical factor to determining who you seek to partner with you and what skills set you require to deliver on the assignment.

13. What preparations are required?

You will also need to determine the kind of preparation you would need in order to deliver effectively on your assignment. What skills you need to acquire, what training you need to do, what habit you need to acquire/shed etc etc.

14. What knowledge is required?

Acquisition of relevant knowledge is an aspect of preparation. But it deserves to be treated as an independent factor so that it is not abandoned altogether. You need to know the range of information you will require to execute your assignment successfully. You also need to know where you can access this information, whether they are formal or informal settings. What are those things you need to know even before you start? What are the ones you need to acquire on the go?

All these are the questions you would have to answer verifiably to insure your inspiration and ensure that it does not end as “one of those ideas” we all have and don’t give attention to until we see someone else thriving with it.

The Keyword to Personal Growth By Babatunde Oladele

Personal growth, or self-development, is a field of study that crystallised into an industry some decades ago. Ever since then, volumes of thoughts have been expressed on it in various forms, such as books, essays, CDs and multimedia tools, among several others. And many persons have risen to the status of expert in it, and thereby earn their living.

Personal development, in all ramifications (spiritual, mental, emotional, physical, social), is the foundation stone for all accomplishments. Many people are bewildered about how to pursue personal development because they tend to see it as an end in itself, and do not realise that it is the means to an end – be it success, wealth, promotion, balance etc. Adding credence to this, James Allen in his all-time classic, As A Man Thinketh, says, “Men are anxious to improve their circumstances, but are unwilling to improve themselves; they therefore remain bound.”

Jim Rohn, a leading authority in the field of self-growth, says that the key to wealth and happiness is to ‘work harder on yourself than you do on your job’. He then expatiates thus:

What you become is far more important than what you get. The important question to ask on the job is not, “What am I getting?” Instead, you should ask, “What am I becoming? “Getting and becoming are like Siamese twins: what you have today you have attracted by becoming the person you are today… Income rarely exceeds personal development. Sometimes income takes a lucky jump, but unless you learn to handle the responsibilities that come with it, it will usually shrink back to the amount you can handle… It is hard to keep that which has not been obtained through personal development.

The word of Jim Rohn sheds light on the importance of self-grooming toward attaining those ends that are the target of the daily pursuits of most men. Success, wealth, promotion, balance and the rest should therefore not be your focus; rather you should be committed to a disciplined and sustained cultivation of your person.

To achieve this, you need to break out of your comfort zone, query some of your traditional mindsets and stretch beyond your imaginary limits to the realm of can-be. One word that must be your driving force – which I call the keyword to personal growth – is “more”, “more”, and “more.” To this end, you would need to:

See more: open your eyes wider and see on a larger scale. Open your inner eye and see beyond the present. See the big picture. See opportunities. See options. See avenues. See possibilities. See greatness. See seeds. See potentials. See, see, and see!

Ask more: ask more questions. Seek more information. Request for more explanation, more clarification. Increase your curiosity. Double your inquisitiveness about everything. By asking more, you get to know more and be more.

Read more: if you do not have a habit of reading, you need to cultivate it. And if you already have, then you need to read more, read wider, read over, read beyond your field. By so doing, you would be cultivating your mind for sound reasoning and better decision-making.

Learn more: you need to increase your bank of knowledge by consciously seeking information on different things, from different sources. Go out and learn more on what you already know, update your mind with the latest information. By learning more, you will become more.

Try more: you might have failed in an endeavour, try again. Explore more options. Try your hands on new things, you don’t have to get it perfect at first or even at all, just do something. Try this, try that, try here, try there. Don’t stop trying, it’s the key to growth and the best way to increase your capacity.

Work more: do more work than you are wont to do. Organise your life and time in such a way that will enable you to get more work done. Do more work than you are paid for. Whatever you are doing, work more at it and don’t rest on your oars.

Do more: take more actions. Expend more efforts. Do one percent more of what you are doing. Increase your action ratio. Go an extra mile; and you are on the path to self-development, happiness and success.

Give more: give more of yourself, give more of your time, give more of your resources to your family, your friends, your work, your church and your society. Don’t stop giving, it is the secret of getting and becoming. So give more.

Be more: be more than you are to yourself, to your family, to your friends, to your company, to your church/society. Be more than “me” to yourself, be your own resource person. Be more than a husband/father to your wife/children, be their mentor. Be more than a wife/mother to your family, be their inspiration. Be more than a friend, be a motivator. Be more than an employee, be a value-adder. Be more than a colleague, be an encourager. Be more than a member in your church/society, be a contributor. Do you understand now? So break out of the status quo and be more to all!

The keyword to personal growth and development is “more”. Always ask yourself ‘what more can I do?’, ‘What more can I be?’, ‘What more can I learn?’, ‘What more can I give?’ etc. You will be amazed at how fast you would grow as well as at what you are able to accomplish.

How can you Discover your Potential?

¡By self-examination and reflection

¡By self-expression or applying yourself in various activities

¡By being adventurous, learning from trials and errors

¡Through informal interactions with families, friends, colleagues etc

¡Through divine revelation

¡By chance and unpremeditated happenings

¡During a coaching or mentoring session