Unleash Yourself(Part 3 of 3)

 Here is the last of our three part series on the common things that hold people back from becoming all they can be. you can check out the first two in the posts preceding this one. As you read through, take not of what you identify with so that you can find a way to deal with it and rise to the top. 

Self-Doubt

When God called Moses to go and deliver the Israelites from the captivity of Egypt, the first question Moses poses to God is who am I? Jeremiah is quick to say I am just a youth. Gideon has so much doubt in his ability that God has to prove over and over again that he is the man to get the job done. The interesting thing is that all these men went ahead and accomplished great feats the moment they believed in their ability to get it done.

Self-doubt is a huge limiting factor to the greatness of many people. Many of us don’t feel good enough or pretty enough or deserving of the honor that is being put on us. Like Moses we ask who am I? We have little confidence in our ability to accomplish anything worthwhile. We don’t see ourselves as capable of exploits. We are comfortable getting lost in the crowd.

Until we get rid of this doubt and believe God to be with us like he was with these great generals of the past, we will remain stuck in our predicaments. You need a healthy dose of self-confidence to be able to go out there and do what needs to be done. This should ideally stem from the understanding that God is by your side walking with you every step of the way. Are you a victim of self-doubt? How does it show up in your life? How are you dealing with it?

Lack of vision

When you have no definite chief aim, chances are that you will not go very far in life. Where there is no vision, people cast off restraint. Proverbs 29:18 The possibility of living aimlessly is greatly increased when there is no guiding principle for your life.  If you are keen on living a life of greatness, you must first define what that greatness looks like. There are many competing aspirations in our lives and we must choose where we will expend our energy. Without that, we will be spread thin in many different directions and have nothing concrete to show for our efforts. A failure to decide what we will pursue means we will have very little motivation for life or any of the other things that matter. When you have no vision, your efforts are haphazard at best because whatever results you get are okay with you. It does not matter how many resources you have at your disposal, if they are not channeled towards creating something worthwhile, they will amount to nothing. Resources, favor, luck and all those things we hope for follow vision and not the other way around. A vision keeps the wrong people out of your life. Those who do not align with what you are doing will not find room in your life for as long as it is clear. Part of the reason why we are surrounded by people who offer very little is that we are not yet clear about what we want and as such everyone feels comfortable around us. What is your core business here? That tells you what you should be spending 80% of your time on. You cannot call something a priority when you are struggling to create time and set aside resources for it.

A lack of vision guarantees you a lacklustre life. With scattered efforts, incongruent utilization of resources and no clear outcomes, your activity will not make sense even to you. A lack of vision is one of the greatest leashes used to hold us back from living a life of meaning and significance.

Money

I have put money as low as this because it is not such a limiting factor when you have taken care of a lot of the issues mentioned above. Like I said in my submission above, resources follow vision.

Having said that, a shortage of money can become a huge limiting factor to how much you can accomplish. Many people have great ideas that will never see the light of day because they do not have the money to execute on them. Great ideas require great men and women to carry them out. Great men and women do not come cheap. Money can limit how far you can carry out your ideas. The Super wealthy have the luxury of choosing what to do because their resources give them the liberty. One who is just starting out must make many compromises and sacrifice aspects of what they want to do until an opportune time. This keeps great ideas from being fully implemented. Anytime your ideas are caged, you are put on a leash and cannot move beyond your confinement.

There is a way around it though. You must be quick to embrace the concept of interdependence. Since you do not have all you need, instead of waiting forever to have it, you would be better served by joining forces with others who bring the strengths you don’t have. This is why Venture capitalists and angels exist. If finance is your limitation, look for someone who has it but doesn’t have a clear idea how to put it to work. Such a person will help you bring out your greatness. This brings up another leash that we probably need to talk about as well. Selfishness.

Selfishness.

Believe it or not, trying to make it all on your own is not usually the best strategy. Don’t let the need to call yourself a self-made man keep you from connecting with other people who can be of help to you. The concept of a self-made man is a fallacy. You must find a way to keep your ego in check if you will be able to connect with the missing pieces of your greatness. There were strategic people in the journey of Joseph to premiership in the Bible. Think about all the people a politician needs to surround himself with if he is to ascend to the presidency. From the funders of the campaign, to lobbyists and many other people who work in the shadows to make the campaign a success. You cannot run a one man show and expect to go very far. If you truly want to release your greatness, be willing to accept help from others who have a lot to contribute to your journey to the top. Don’t see yourself as the source of all wisdom and strength. Know what you are good at and what you suck at. That understanding will enable you select people who can come in and complement your strengths. Let’s be clear on the fact that you need a circle around you to reach certain heights and your task remains to choose the right people to be in that circle. Accept the help offered by others who see things in the same light as you. You must also be willing to accommodate divergent views within your circle. If no one questions your proposals or seeks to improve on them, you have the wrong people in the circle. Surrounding yourself with Yes-men is the biggest sign of a selfish individual. You want to have people who bring a different perspective so that the task is accomplished in a manner that encompasses the diversity and dynamism required.

Success/failure

Finally success and failure are both seeds which can either propel you forward or keep you stuck. Failure if it is misinterpreted can define you and determine your action going forward. It is possible for you to get stuck in the place where you are not attempting anything out of your comfort zone simply because you tried something and failed. Failure must be looked at as a lesson. Someone has gone as far as to say in everything I do I either win or I learn. Failure is you finding a way that doesn’t work. Thomas Edison failed 9999 times in his attempts to make the incandescent light bulb. How many times have you failed before you called it a day? You must keep trying and refining your method until you get the desired result. Failure can be a fatal blow if you let it. It can keep you from ever trying again. Failure is a terrible leash because it comes with evidence. Beware of the hold of failure on your ability to move forward.

Success on the other hand can also hold you back. It does so by numbing you. Bill Gates says Success is a lousy teacher. It teaches you to think that you are smarter than everyone else. You must guard against the effects of your success as much as those of your failure. Success makes you take things for granted. As hard as it is to get to the top, it takes a lot more effort to stay there for long. You must maintain the posture of a student if you will remain at the top. Success massages your ego and leaves you feeling invincible. The moment you begin to think you are immune to failing, you have already started your descent. It is wise to manage your success lest it destroys you. The enemy of great is good so they say. You are not kept from greatness by your failings rather it is your prior success that can stand in the way of another attempt at a bigger challenge.

What other leashes can you think of that keep people from reaching their full potential? What are you going to work on as a matter of urgency to ensure that you give yourself the best chance of finishing at the top? Share your thoughts and other contributions in the comments below. I am passionate about helping people break out of their limits and living remarkable lives. If you are keen on that, reach out to me and let's see how I can be of help. 

asenasam@gmail.com, +254725832477

Unleash Yourself(2 of 3)

We continue from where we left off last week. We started a conversation on some of the things that hold us back from going forth and becoming all we can be. We looked at four of them including your environment, the culture in which you grow up, lies you have believed and ignorance. In this week's post we look at four more 

 Beliefs

What we believe greatly influences our action. Jesus says that out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaks. What we believe finds its way to the surface whether we approve of it or not. You can paint a different picture all you want, but your unguarded moments will reveal what your heart is made of. Our beliefs play a critical role in how we live our lives. Limiting beliefs can be a great leash holding us back from all the world has to offer. Liberating beliefs will take us beyond any obstacles and stumbling blocks along the way. A mindset of scarcity will see a dearth all around, a mindset of abundance will see possibilities all around even in the midst of a crisis.

There is an old analogy about how elephants are tamed. The process is simple. When the elephant is young, it is tied on a tree which it cannot pull free from. After several attempts, it is registered in the mind of the elephant that it can never break free from the tethering. At this point, the size of the tree doesn’t. neither does the size of the rope or the elephant for that matter. Because it has been conditioned to believe it can’t break free, even a small child with a rope can lead it anywhere and it will follow obediently.

Limiting beliefs have a similar effect on us. Today is a good day to examine what you believe in about yourself, the world, God, life and pretty much anything. Are your beliefs liberating or restricting? You will never live above your belief. You are where you are because you believe that is what you deserve. If you believed that you deserve more, you would have demanded more from yourself and your surroundings.

Seek answers about what you believe if you want to change levels. What you believe in will not take you to the next level until you change it. Break free from limiting thoughts and begin to see endless possibilities. They are yours for the taking.

Complacency

A lack of ambition can hurt your chances of finishing at the top significantly. Complacency sets in when you think you already have all you need. Are you in a place where you think your life is just fine as is and there is nothing more to strive towards? You could be suffering from a complacency crisis. There is nothing wrong with posing to enjoy what you have built. The only problem is when the pose becomes the final destination. It takes significant effort just to maintain your position as those who have risen to the top can attest. You will realize that even when you don’t have any drive to go further, if you lower your guard for too long, you won’t be able to maintain even that which you have accomplished. Harder than getting to the top is the discipline to stay at the top. Complacency will keep you from becoming all you can be. It will rob you of the exploits that are ahead of you. It will limit your experience of life. As humans we love novelty. Boredom easily sets in when we are not playing at a level that challenges and stretches our minds beyond the ordinary. Contrary to what we believe, you can only bask in your accomplishments for a while. In a few days, what looked extraordinary takes on an ordinary shine and we are left looking for the next frontier. Complacency will take you away from the zone.

What are some of the signs of complacency that you see in your life at the moment? How can you snap out of it before it is too late?

Laziness

A lazy attitude is a sure cause of a mediocre existence. If you cannot rise up and take care of the things you need to, you will be greatly limited in what you can accomplish. If you rise up and give your best every day, it will just be a matter of time before you are at the top. Laziness is a leash that is self-imposed and one of the easiest to cut off. You have a lot of power when it comes to dealing with it because only you can decide how hard you work or otherwise. Laziness has held people from accomplishing great feats. It comes to us naturally to want to be at ease with the things we are working on. We naturally gravitate towards a life of ease and little effort. This is a big issue because what it ends up doing is to leave us in a situation where our choices are limited. Hard work opens up many possibilities and takes us where we never thought possible. Laziness makes us miss out on opportunities and in some cases fail to take full advantage of the opportunities available to us. Laziness will keep us from honing our skills and competencies. It will limit our exercise of our gifts and talents and as a result we will remain stuck.  

Fear

One of the greatest leashes that keeps us from taking action to move us forward is fear. Fear is paralyzing and limiting. It often arises from a false sense of danger. For sure there are many dangers out there that we need to face and sometimes avoid but a majority of the things we fear turn out to be imagined rather than real. One of the greatest fears we have is fear of the unknown. This kind of fear keeps you in your comfort zone. Whenever you hear that you need to step out of what you are familiar with, you cringe at the thought. You have gotten used to the comfort of the crib and are unwilling to step out as a result. This keeps you  caged until you choose to act differently.

There is an interesting analogy about what Mother Eagle does to the young eaglets when she realizes that they want to overstay their welcome in the crib. At first the crib is comfortable with all the cotton and other fluffy material. As they grow, the cotton is removed and what is left is the grass. When it time for them to get out, even the grass is removed and the thorns do their trick. As a result of the discomfort that arises, they are forced to go out and learn to fly. The education goes on out there because they must also learn how to fly the hard way. This could teach us a thing or two about managing the fear of the unknown. Perhaps creating a little discomfort in our nest would push us to get out. We must engineer things such that we are never too comfortable in one place for too long.

Fear is real but even those who accomplish greater feats suffer from it in the process. Many have opined that courage is not the absence of fear but the ability to move forward in spite of the fear. Your desire to succeed must be greater than the fear you exhibit. For as long as that happens, you won’t get stuck in mediocrity.

Do you identify with any of these leashes in your life? How are you going to act going forward to cut yourself loose from these leashes? Are you keen on getting a handle on any or all of them? Make a point of reaching out to us and find help for dealing with whatever leashes are holding you back. You are meant to fly unhindered, don't let anything you can control stand in your way. Talk to  us today on +254725832477/ asenasam@gmail.com.

Unleash Yourself (Part 1 of 3)

 

What is a leash? A leash is that rope used to tie a dog when you don’t want it to wander off during a walk. A leash limits the movement of the dog to a few feet from the dog walker. To be unleashed is to be set free to wander, explore and see the world. It is a good idea to keep a dog on a leash, it is not a very good idea to keep a man on a leash. We keep dogs leashed because we don’t want them getting lost or causing harm to other people along our path. We are also trying to keep them from acting on their wild imagination.

What are some of the leashes that hold us as mankind?

Ignorance

You can choose to believe that ignorance is bliss or you can choose that ignorance is no defence. Either way you are right. Indeed there are times where what you don’t know cannot hurt you. I hear a lot of people say that it is okay when your spouse or other trusted individual is cheating on you for as long as you don’t know. So much so that Mario Winans sung “I don’t wanna know’ The problem with this though is that eventually the truth outs and the hurt is tenfold. It is better to know early on rather than live with the assumption that everything is okay only to get hit with the devastating news late in the day. I can’t honestly live in the school of ignorance is bliss. I am more of a believer in the school of ignorance is no defence. It is clear even in the law that the fact that you didn’t know it was illegal to act in a particular way does not fully exonerate you from the consequences. It might land you a milder sentence but you won’t go scot free. This is clearly alluded to even in the bible.

Ignorance is responsible for a lot of mediocre lives out here. When you don’t know about the better world that is out there, you will be content with your mundane existence. There is an African saying that puts it aptly. ‘He who has never travelled thinks his mother is the best cook.’ A failure to be exposed to the possibilities of the world around and beyond you can limit your options a great deal. I have always joked with my wife about the fact that a woman in Turkana will hardly crave pizza during her pregnancy. Why? Because pizza is not in her consciousness. It is difficult to aspire for the things you haven’t been exposed to. Ignorance is a big leash, perhaps the biggest ever placed on us. While we cannot change where we were born and what that exposes us to initially, as we grow up our options change significantly. Thank God for Television, books, education and so much more. We know a lot more about what goes on across the world and as such we can also dare to dream the same way people from a more privileged background can. YouTube can take you to places and give you experiences that are out of this world if only you take the time to watch. Don’t allow ignorance to be your undoing, not in this information age. Take advantage of all the resources at your disposal to position yourself for great experiences.

Lies

The narratives you grow up with are very instrumental in how far you can stretch. If you grow up believing you can, your reach will be significant. If you grow up believing you can’t, you will have placed the limits on yourself already. Many people have resigned to a life that is way beneath what they can be simply because they believed certain lies about themselves. The way you interpret the events of your life is key to the lies or truth you end up believing in. Two people can go through the same experience but come out with very different results. There are people who have allowed one failure to define them and because of that they have not been able to move beyond it. Others are on the other extreme. They have allowed themselves to be lulled by their past successes and failed to move beyond them. If there is anything you have done in the past and you are living there, referring back to it in present day conversations, then you have become the victim of a lie. You have allowed yourself to be caged by that experience and find nothing interesting in what is happening today. Other lies are built up over time. When you constantly have negative experiences around a particular issue, you will learn to associate it with those experiences and never see them in any other light. I always like going back to the story of how at some point I stopped eating pork because the first time I did, I suffered tonsilitis the following day. It was very difficult for me to separate the two and for the better part of my childhood, I shunned pork. I had become a victim of that lie. I had a similar experience with tomatoes. As a result of being choked by a piece of tomato cover, I ‘broke up’ with tomatoes for a long time. Much later in my teens when I could see things differently, I started eating pork and having tomatoes in my food again. I can tell you for free that I enjoy pork probably more than any other meat today. That lie would have kept me from pork forever if I had not been willing o interrogate it when I knew better.

Such lies keep you from leaving life to the fullest. They are a tight leash around your neck telling you how far you can go and how far you can’t. Some lies are passed down from one generation to another. That is jhow stereotypes are built and established. Stereotypes are lies which have been told long enough that they take on the semblance of truth. They will keep you from marrying from certain tribes, doing business with certain groups of people and so much more. In shot they place limits on what you can do because they are such a powerful hold on your mind.

What lies have you believed in and how are they keeping you from living life to the fullest?  Pose and answer this question thoroughly in your notebook and share a summary in the comments.

Culture

Culture is a beautiful thing. It is a people’s way of life and a great determining factor of how we live our lives. A lot of what makes up our culture is good and meant to safeguard us from excesses and give meaning and identity to our lives. However, there are certain aspects of our culture which if we buy into wholesale possess the potential to rob us of a full life. While aspects of our culture might have been useful in helping us survive in times past, you would do well to question their rationale in light of where we are today. Culture is conservative in nature and this is important because =certain things need to be preserved for posterity. To condemn anyone’s culture wholesomely is a foolish exercise that amounts to nothing. I also want to add that to embrace one’s culture wholesomely without question is also foolish on the same footing.

When your culture keeps you from exploring the world that is beyond and keeps you caged within the confines of your surroundings then it limits your possibilities. Anytime you ask why some thing is and the only answer you receive is that we have always done it, it is time to question that thinking so you can come to a better conclusion. Don’t be one to blindly accept it because it is the norm. One of my Nigerian friends once said that ‘the longevity of an abnormality does not make it normal.’ Think about our pastoralist friends whose ancestors have lived on cattle rustling and it is ingrained in them from, a young age. If someone with a better understanding and intellectual capacity from these tribes still goes ahead to spend his life in the same village engaging in this practice just because it is his cultural heritage, hasn’t this person failed? Would we be right to say that he has wasted his intellect in the process? Well he could be within his rights as an individual to choose that life but the truth is that he has allowed culture to keep him caged though he knows better.

What aspects of your cultural heritage do you think has been keeping you from becoming all you can be? What do you have to celebrate about your culture in that it has made you a better person? Remember more than 80% of your culture has a lot that is good about it.

Environment

Closely related to culture is the environment in which you grow up or operate in. there are always exceptions but more often than not, you are likely to end up like the people in the environment in which you frequent.  It is said that if you visit some of the informal settlements in Nairobi, they can tell you are an outsider. The dress code and mannerism will sell you out quickly. Every neighborhood has certain quirks that distinguish it from others. If crime is the norm in your neighborhood, chances are that you will become comfortable around crime whether you like it or not. Alliance High School has been known to produce a majority of the crème de la crème of Kenya’s society. There is something that environment teaches you that you won’t find in many other places. This is such a big deal because even if you are average at best, being in that environment pushes you to level up quickly. There is a confidence that comes on you when you know that you are associated with greatness. You can’t help but be great. Living in California exposes you to Hollywood and a lot of what happens on the entertainment scene globally that it becomes natural for anyone who wants to make it big in this particular area to find their way there. We coalesce around people of similar interests because we like familiarity. You must choose your surroundings carefully because they will rub off on you whether you like it or not. This doesn’t mean that if you find yourself somewhere not suited to your ambitions you won’t make it. People have still made it but it was way harder. Designing the kind of environment that allows you to bring out the best in you will go a long way in helping you thrive. It is way easier than trying to work against many odds.

How can you change your environment to position you to bring out the best in you? What is keeping you from doing so right away?

We continue next week so be sure to catch us here. 

in the meantime share your takeaways from this first part of or discussion.