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Food For Thought

2020 it is finally. Happy New Year 2020! What I call the teen years are now behind us and boy, didn't they behave like true teenagers?!? In case I've lost you, I'm calling the years between 2013 - 2019 teen years because of the "teen" element in the pronounciation i.e. thirteen, fourteen, fifteen..... I am also saying those years behaved like true teenagers because like it has often been said, the years between 13 - 19 in a child's life are both disorienting and full of self discoveries. This is usually the make or break time or most people. For me that's how the just concluded "teenage years" have been to me. I'm glad they are now over and look forward to the exciting 20s; after all, don't they say the 20s are the best decade of anyone's life? Anyway, that's a blog for another day. I don't know about other religions but I know a good number of Christians crossed over to the "20s" while in church, with their spiritual leaders making declarations about what to expect in 2020.  I too... [Continue reading]
Imagine if all the 7 Billion plus human beings on this planet each decided and purposed to look out and lift up anyone who needs a "lift-me-up". What a wonderful world this would be! Well, you don't have to be financially rich to help someone, sometimes all someone needs is a genuine friend asking them how they are doing, or just smiling at them from the heart, or just a big bear hug. Or, it could be a business strategy that could change the trajectory of an otherwise dying business. There is always something you can do.   I have learnt (from my own experiences) that you never know what someone may be going through, though they may be smiling at you and laughing with you. Deep inside themselves, they could be dying and feeling helpless. When you have an opportunity to touch their lives, please do so without expecting anything in return. The more people you lift up, the higher you are likely to rise yourself. Why? Because what goes around comes around eventually.    Be Ignited. Be... [Continue reading]
When a woman conceives, her body changes as the pregnancy grows. She experiences several discomforts and changes in her body all throughout her pregnancy, and when D-Day finally comes, she goes through the ultimate test of being a woman: childbirth.    Today I was thinking and I realized that our destinies and purposes in life are more like being pregnant. Everyone knows that for a woman to carry her pregnancy successfully, she has to be prepared for the changes she is going to experience physically. Similarly, if you want to go through the process of realizing your destiny successfully, you have to prepare yourself or the  challenges up ahead.   A woman goes through many challenges while she is pregnant. You too will go through many challenges while pursuing your destiny. Question is, are you ready and willing to go through all that for the sake of giving birth to your given purpose?   Preparation is never an enjoyable process, but its fruits are sweet when you start enjoying them.... [Continue reading]
  Nobody loves being disappointed, I mean, you would be crazy to. Today I just want to share with you a few tips I have learned over the years on how to deal with disappointment when it happens to me. Accept it has happened - The number one step in dealing with disappointment is accepting that it has happened. Trying to ignore it will not help. Like Tina Gilbertson, the author of Constructive Wallowing; How to Beat Bad Feelings by Letting Yourself Have Them, says, "When you get bad news, take a moment to let it sink in. Also, find a word for how you feel, such as disappointed, resentful, or fear. Labeling feelings helps us make sense of our experience." In other words, allow those feelings become part of you. She also adds, "Experiencing your feelings will allow you to make a cool-headed decision about what to do next​".    Be Objective - Once you have allowed yourself to feel the disappointment and all other negative emotions that come with it, take some time to look inward and ask... [Continue reading]
One day, a professor entered the classroom and announced a surprise test. Hearing this, all students got anxious and started thinking about what would come up in the test. The professor distributed the question paper, with the front side facing down. After handing over the papers to all the students, he asked them to turn the page and start the test. To everyone's surprise, there were no questions on the test paper. There was just a black dot in the center of the page. Everyone was startled and looked at the professor in awe. The professor told the students: “I want you to write a few lines about what you see on the paper." All the students were stupefied but since they didn’t have a choice, they started writing the answer. Once everyone was through with the test, the professor collected all the answer sheets, and started reading out each answer aloud in front of the whole class. Without an exception, all the students had written about the black dot, mentioning about its position,... [Continue reading]
A story is told of how one man remained stuck in a past he found too painful to move on from.... here's the story as narrated by my favorite motivational speaker, Les Brown. There was one particular person that all of us knew. The children and adults and everybody used to pick at him when he came by. We called him chicken man. He had a feather in this heart, a feather on top of his car and he would drive around blinking his lights and occasionally blowing his horn and when he got out of his car he would walk down the street with a baby carrier with two dolls in it and a picture of a woman. And if you came near him or listened to him, you would hear him making the sounds of a chicken. All of us used to laugh at chicken man. We didn’t know his story.   Chicken Man woke up one morning, around 3am and his house was on fire. He panicked, and he got out of the window, left quickly, only to get outside to hear his children and wife screaming for help. He ran back to the door to go in to save... [Continue reading]
I once had a boss who used to tell me this, "Liz, it is good to trust but it is best to doubt". I never quite understood him them and I actually thought he was being mean, but many years down the line I now fully understand what he meant by that. I have to admit that this has not been one of my strengths, but as I keep learning from my mistakes, I now understand why it is important to test before trusting.  So, what can we learn about testing before trusting from the female eagle? Here are a few facts that might astonish you if you never knew about them before today.... The female eagle during courtship always takes a male eagle into the air after picking up a twig from the ground and dropping it from a certain height for the male to chase it. Once the male catches hold of it and brings back, the female flies into a higher altitude and drops it in the same way. This is repeated until the female gets an assurance that the male has mastered the art of seriously picking up the twigs in... [Continue reading]
I am not sure what the parents of this kid did to her when they found out what she had done. I am not sure where they were when this was happening in the first place. I am not sure whether by the time they found her, whether she had already meticulously cut out the heads from the notes and nicely arranged them on the table, being very keen to ensure the heads were all on a straight line. All the same, none of that is relevant right now; what I don't get is what the person who took this picture was thinking when s/he was taking it. My friend, if this child was an African child, and especially one with a Kikuyu Mother, she would have lived to tell what happened to her that day. I might not know what the person behind the camera was thinking, but here is what I am thinking….. So many people are like this kid! How, you might be asking? Here's how… See the girl in the picture above? When she looked at those notes, it is quite clear she just saw some nice colored papers, papers that looked... [Continue reading]
Except for those who live to eat, everyone else eats to live. Similarly, just as we NEED food in order to live, we need GOALS in order to stay alive. Our goals inspire us, they ignite a fire in us that keeps us alive on the inside. I have always said this and I will say it again; each one of us was born to accomplish a very specific task here on earth. Nobody was born a seat-filler. Unfortunately many people breeze through life without ever knowing what they were born to accomplish and as a result they live very mediocre lives, contratry to what they what their lives would have been. “The way to enjoy life best is to wrap up one goal and start right on the next one. Don’t linger too long at the table of success, the only way to enjoy another meal is to get hungry.” ~ Jim Rohn That quote says it all. Success should not be your reason for being complacent. Like Jim Rohn said in the quote above, the moment you hit one level of success, you should quickly start looking for another level... [Continue reading]
We are already in the second week of this quarter, which also happens to be the second week of the month of April. What would you say you have done differently from the fourteen weeks that have already passed so far?  Well, here's something I 'd like to share with us this week.  For you (and I) to move on to another level, few things must happen: There is who we must be or not be There is what we must do  There is what we must stop There is who we must drop There is who you must be: You cannot expect to become the CEO of an organization while you have the mentality of a fifth grader. Whatever level you want to ascend into has to be accompanied by your growth into that level. There is what you must do: Like I always say, what brought you here will not take you further. For you to move from here to the next level, you need to grow yourself, you need to have something of value that you will be taking with you to the next level, otherwise why bother trying to climb higher? Do something... [Continue reading]
Life Lessons From President Xi Jing Peng of China:   When I was a small child , I was very selfish, I would always grab the best for myself. Slowly, everyone left me and I had no friends. I didn’t think it was my fault so I criticized others.   My father gave me 3 sentences to help me in life.   One day, my father cooked 2 bowls of noodles put the 2 bowls on the table. One bowl had one egg on top and the other bowl did not have any egg on top. He said ”My child. You choose. Which bowl do you want”.   Eggs were hard to come by those days! We only got to eat eggs during festivals or New Year. Of course I chose the bowl with the egg! As we started eating. I was congratulating myself on my wise choice/decisision and eat up the egg. Then to my surprise, as my father ate his noodles, there were TWO eggs at the bottom of his bowl beneath the noodes! I regretted my choice so much and scolded myself for being too hasty in my decision. My father smiled and said to me, ”My child. You must... [Continue reading]
"It's just the way I am", or, "that's how we've always been in this family" are words I got used to hearing so many times from members of our clan and immediate family that it somewhat registered in my mind that they were just a bunch of "peculiar" people. I am sure you too have heard your fair share of similar words, if you aren't the one who has been using the every now and again.  It is not bad to be known a certain way, espeically if that way is good, but it should be a concern if you are known for something negative. Say for instance someone who is known for never completing assignments on time, or for being vulgar in his oral and written speech, or for being a cheat and a liar, such a person's reputation is so likely to preceed him that sometimes he ends up losing great opportunities because of that. I know someone who lost a major contract simply because someone in the interviewing panel knew his history from before, and no matter how much he presented a positive outlook, that... [Continue reading]

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