Happy New Year to you. Thank God you made it to 2016. There is something quite interesting about life- it is a never-ending cycle. Towards the end of 2015, there was an excitement about ending the year. We all looked forward to it as though we had lived the entire year just to see it end. We spent a lot of money traveling, celebrating and buying gifts. It was undoubtedly a delightful holiday. Now, 2015 has ended and we have entered into a new year. The race has begun again. A few minutes before 12am on January 1, 2016, we waited and prayed. We held our breath as though awaiting the unveiling of a special package. Now the package has been unveiled; it is time to make the best of it.
Believe me, 2016 is worth the wait, because this is your year. If you’ve ever dreamt of achieving something great, this is your opportunity. There is something special about beginnings. The foundation of a building determines how high it rises. This is the opportunity you’ve always prayed for. Don’t think my intention is to stir up your emotion so that you can feel good about yourself. If you feel good after reading this, consider it a bonus. What I hope to achieve is to make you see that you have a fresh opportunity take the right steps that can take you to a desirable destination.
A lot of people pray for miracles to change their fortune, unfortunately, they are expecting a magic. People want their lives to change without their commitment to do something about it. You can’t succeed without your involvement. Les Brown, one of the world’s leading motivational speakers, told the story of a young man who walked past a family sitting on a porch, with a dog groaning at their feet. Out of curiosity, he went back and asked, “Sir, why is the dog groaning?” “Because he’s lying on a nail” the man answered. “So why didn’t he get up?” he asked, confused. “Because it doesn’t hurt enough for him to get up” the man answered. Have you ever met people who were not satisfied with their lives, jobs, relationships, etc, and they did nothing but moan about it? I am yet to meet the first person who changed an undesirable situation by complaining.
A world class author and speaker, Zig Ziglar, said he spoke to people in Psychology, Psychiatry and Ministry who had experience in counseling, and they all agreed that not everyone who came to them with a problem wanted it solved. A lot of people just wanted to tell someone about it to elicit sympathy. Zig said that if you solve the problem, you have spoilt it for them because they can’t tell people about it anymore. According to him, “They want the attention that goes with the problem”. In case you think that is extreme, I have heard of people who preferred to be ill because they got the attention of some people they felt had previously ignored them. The big question is this: “are you complaining about something you can change, without the will to change it?”
This is your year, but you must be ready to do what you have never done. How can you keep doing the same thing (or actually do nothing) and expect a different result? You may not be able to change other people, but you can change yourself and how you react to circumstances.
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Greetings. Thanks so much for this piece. I know somebody who is ever groaning and complaining but in this case this person has a terrible problem. I will explain. This person never wants to get up and make a change. Numero 2, she starts exhibiting that she is envious and starts slandering the object of her envy. To crown it all, she starts blaming the subject of her envy for her own backwardness. When we are discussing about news and current affairs, she will start getting envious of people who speak articulately and contribute meaningfully to the discussion. No matter how much I motivate her to read, she never wants to read or learn anything. Instead she will start blaming me for making her feel small when I am analysing issues during discussions. So how do you solve a problem like this? This person can slander and backbite terribly
Thank you for your comment. Sometimes, people react the way your friend does out of low self-esteem. A lot of times when people feel they are not good enough, they turn their anger against anyone they think is better than them. It is a mental process of reducing the value of other people to their own or even below their own level. That is where they get their own sense of self worth. It is of course a dangerous attitude. This is how i think you can help her. Don’t ever call her attention to her limitations again because she is terribly aware of them. Start to call her attention to her strengths. From there, start to gradually paint a picture of how she can be a lot better if she makes simple efforts. It may be a slow and long process but I hope you are willing to hold on. A bad attitude is build over time so it will take some time to reach deep into the mind to uproot it and replace it. She has to understand that how good or bad she is has nothing to do with other people. She determines it all by herself. I wish you the very best as you try to help your friend. Best regards.