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January 2024

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 Avoid Possibility Blindness.

In Musings 9 Mins Read By

“All men dream: but not equally. Those who dream by night in the dusty recesses of their minds wake up in the day to find it was vanity, but the dreamers of the day are dangerous men, for they may act their dreams with open eyes, to make it possible.” – T. E. Lawrence 

American politician and author Les Brown is one of my favourite motivational speakers. His speeches were among my favourite things to hear during the COVID-19 pandemic lockdown. Les is hilarious and shares memorable stories to pass his messages across. He often talks about “possibility blindness,” which is the tendency of others to project their limited vision and fear on people with dreams. A story about a little boy and the power of self-belief exemplifies the “possibility blindness” concept:

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Success is not Guaranteed.

In Musings 6 Mins Read By

The road to success is not straight. There is a curve called Failure, a loop called Confusion, speed bumps called Friends, red lights called Enemies, caution lights called Family. You will have flat tires called Jobs, but if you have a spare called Determination, an engine called Perserverance, a driver called Will Power, you will make it to a place called Success. 

Everything worthwhile is uphill, the climb is steep, and the journey is the reward, as success is not guaranteed, but the struggle is. To make your wildest dream come true, you must be willing to sacrifice, endure, persist, persevere, commit, and relentlessly execute. Whether it is building a business, running a marathon, learning a foreign or programming language, following through on a fitness regimen, becoming financially independent or any other goal you set, it will require a lot of effort, self-discipline and dedication. Success is not guaranteed, and it is also never an accident. As author and motivational speaker Jim Rohn often said: “Success is nothing more than a few simple disciplines, practiced every day, while failure is simply a few errors in judgment, repeated every day. It is the accumulative weight of our disciplines and our judgments that leads us to either fortune or failure. Failure is not a single, cataclysmic event. We do not fail overnight. Failure is the inevitable result of an accumulation of poor thinking and poor choices.” 

Success is the sum of small efforts, repeated day in. and day out. – Robert Collier.

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First Things First.

In Musings 6 Mins Read By

First Things First provides you with a compass, because where you’re headed is more important than how fast you’re going.

Learning to put the first things first is a lesson that most of us learn late or never until it is too late. First things first is a phrase that signifies the need to do the most important things before doing other activities. It is synonymous with the word priority, which is something that is more important than other things and needs to be done or dealt with first. Knowing the first things is a question of your priority, value system, life philosophy and goals. Whenever someone says they don’t have time to read or go to the gym, they announce their priority. To achieve any worthwhile goal, one has to keep the first things first. Exercising should be a priority to give yourself a fighting chance to be alive for a long time. To change the direction of your life, reading, studying and getting things done should be a priority.

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Podcast Summary: The Diary Of A CEO with Steven Bartlett interviews Mental Health Doctor, Dr. Aditi Nerurkar.

In Podcast Summary 4 Mins Read By
  • Podcast Title: The Mental Health Doctor: “Sitting Is Increasing Your Anxiety!”, Your Phone Is Destroying Your Brain, You May Have ‘Popcorn Brain’!
  • Podcast: The Diary Of A CEO with Steven Bartlett
  • Guest: Dr. Aditi Nerurkar, Harvard stress expert.
    Aditi Nerurkar, MD, MPH is an internal medicine physician, public health expert and medical correspondent with an expertise in stress, resilience and mental health during the Covid-19 pandemic and beyond. She currently serves as the Co-Director of the HMS Clerkship in Community Engagement with former HMS Dean of Students Dr. Nancy Oriol. 
  • Guest Book: Dr. Aditi’s New book, The 5 Resets: Rewire Your Brain and Body for Less Stress and More Resilience.
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Focus on the BIG picture.

In Uncategorized 3 Mins Read By

The big picture is the entire perspective on a situation or issue. The big picture concerns a broader perspective or outlook on current events. Focusing on the big picture is getting more challenging as we are readily distracted by the short-term instant gratification of our internet-powered world. In a micro-wave world where we are more excited about sharing a goal on social media than focusing on the mechanics of actually getting the goals executed.

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Quitonomics 101: Comfort Zones, Cognitive Dissonance, Legit vs Shit Quit.

In Insight 6 Mins Read By

Knowing when to quit is as important as having the will to keep pushing when the going gets tough. When you are constantly pushing and challenging yourself beyond your comfort zone, there will be points where you feel you’ve gone beyond your breaking point. Not all quits are created equally, as some quits are needed for your overall well-being, while some quits are just a strategy for your brain to justify your excuses or bullshit. It is not a matter of if it is going to get tough, but would you be able to recalibrate your mind to push through the pain? To be an athlete, you must have a higher pain tolerance than non-athletic minds. It is tough training for endurance sports such as marathons, triathlons, ultramarathons and ironmans.

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Addictions, Compulsion, Dependencies, and Obsessions.

In Insight 4 Mins Read By

One of the hallmarks of highly successful people and athletes is going the extra mile. To get the results that the most admired people eventually get, one needs to be somewhat obsessed, dedicated and all in. The top 1% in any society are the people who usually give their all, create their luck, consistently show up daily and embrace the struggle. Knowing the difference between addictions, obsessions, compulsions, and dependencies is very important on the path to becoming successful. I have participated in and finished 15 full marathons in the past two years. I trained consistently to achieve my target goals. Knowing the difference is becoming more critical as there is usually a line between the four terms.

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What Got You Here Won’t Get You There.

In Musings 5 Mins Read By

To get what you have never gotten, you have got to do what you have never done. It will require hard work, persistence, mistakes, roadblocks, breakthroughs, and a rollercoaster of ups and downs. The road to success in any endeavour requires going the extra mile, from consistency to intensity, and one might need to become a little bit obsessed. Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates once said, “Success is a lousy teacher. It seduces smart people into thinking they can’t lose.” What got you successful in the first place might be a hindrance to scaling or getting to the next level. Hence the need to stay hungry, curious, teachable, adaptable and flexible. Getting to the top is not the hard part of the success journey, it is staying at the top for a long time that is hard.

“The reasonable man adapts himself to the world: the unreasonable one persists in trying to adapt the world to himself. Therefore all progress depends on the unreasonable man.” ― George Bernard Shaw

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Better Days Ahead.

In Musings 2 Mins Read By

Although it might not look so right now, better days are ahead. The world might seem on the verge of armageddon; the funds are low, and the office politics and family drama are not decreasing. Hope is a luxury, but trust me when I say better days are ahead. I have been through my go-through, and all I can say is that the sun will shine tomorrow, you will be fine, and everything will be alright. This is not Pollyanna-speak but a belief that life is to be lived forward cos whatever will go wrong will eventually go wrong. The key to navigating the vicissitudes of life is to keep it moving no matter what.

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The Eighteen Early Maladaptive Schemas.

In Insight 11 Mins Read By

Schema Therapy 1 is an integrative model of psychotherapy developed by American psychologist and founder of the Schema Therapy Institute, Jeffrey E. Young that combines proven cognitive and behavioural techniques with other widely practiced therapies. The main goals of Schema Therapy are to help patients strengthen their Healthy Adult mode, weaken their Maladaptive Coping Modes so that they can get back in touch with their core needs and feelings, heal their early maladaptive schemas to break schema-driven life patterns, and eventually to get their core emotional needs met in everyday life.


The 18 Early Maladaptive Schemas are self-defeating, core themes or patterns  that we keep repeating throughout our lives.

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You cannot change people, but changing YOU is enough.

In Musings 9 Mins Read By

I used to want to change people through insights, advice-giving, lessons learned, and strategies garnered. But I realized that If I wanted to change anyone, the only person I needed to change was myself. Most of us don’t like being told what to do. We want to buy but we don’t want to be sold to. As author John C. Maxwell puts it “People change when they … Hurt enough that they have to, Learn enough that they want to, and Receive enough that they are able to.” Sometimes the only way we change is when we have hit rock bottom and change is not something we wish for but we have to swim out of the hole or we sink. It is a constant battle to stop myself from giving unsolicited advice. I try to read as much as possible, and the more I know, the more I realize that I still have a lot of work to do.

People change when they hurt enough that they have to change. People change when they learn enough that they want to change. People change when they receive enough that they are able to change.  – John C. Maxwell

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The Joy of a Strong WHY.

In Musings 4 Mins Read By

I have been trying to learn to speak impeccable French since 2011, and I am still not there after a decade-plus of trying. It has been sometimes frustrating, and I often want to give up on the goal. I have tried almost everything to become proficient in my French communication skills. I have attended multiple classes in different formats, including residential (Nigerian French Language Village), formal classroom (daily lesson), watching French movies and documentaries, listening to a French podcast, reading French books, blogging in French, and even moving to a French-speaking city. It’s been a rollercoaster of breaks, progress and grit. The main thing that has made me stay consistent with my French Language learning goal is my WHY.

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One decision at a time.

In Musings 5 Mins Read By

“Wherever you see a successful person or business, someone once made a courageous decision.”-Peter Drucker

Decision (n.) mid-15c., “act of deciding,” from Old French décision (14c.), from Latin decisionem (nominative decisio) “a decision, settlement, agreement,” noun of action from past-participle stem of decidere “to decide, determine,” literally “to cut off,” from de “off” (see de-) + caedere “to cut” (from PIE root *kae-id- “to strike”). Deciding means to cut off from other options. It is non-negotiable; you have decided where and what you want to do with your life. Making life-changing decisions, especially those not conforming to societal preconceived values, can be tricky. A resolution is a firm decision to do or not to do something. When most of us make New Year’s resolutions, we make a wish that lasts for 4-8 weeks. As the going gets tough, as they would ultimately do, we go back to our old ways.

A resolution is a firm decision to do or not to do something.

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