The world wants to make zombie of you, – to drop your brain and follow; God wants you to use your brain, create, dominate, subdue the earth…else, He wouldn’t have given you one.
I am just like a man pointing you to the sun – Dr Tisser , Cryptogamic Botanist
It took me a decade plus to thoroughly understood what the quote above meant, a rhetorical statement of a lecturer of mine. Simply put, when you have a man pointing you to the sun, he’s showing you the source of light, that you walk out of darkness and embrace your path to destiny. The man pointing you cannot fulfil your dreams, you make it happen!. Light conquers all (lux omnia vincit) so does knowledge. When you embrace the Light, you gain revelational insight and unravel things hidden or unknown.
I once told a ‘pastor’ that he needs knowledge of project management, he looked at me and said, “but I am not into construction business”. It took another 10 minutes to outline how project management could make his ministry better and effective.
You walk into a hospital and you see the nonchalant attitude of the registering officer, I say, “you need a customer service development training”. You walk into an establishment and you see the disarray and disorganization of things, “I say you need training on project management”. When a delivery or courier service fails regularly to deliver on due period, then the need for time management course. When a fashion designer doesn’t not adhere to the work defined by his clients or has added materials or pattern beyond documented design (gold plating) I say, “he or she has no understanding of scope management”. Ineffectiveness of a system is a pointer to an area for adjustment, remedy, modification and development. No knowledge loss as long as it makes your profession, product(s) or service(s) better. The exposure to industry standard/process gives the edge sooner or later.
There are courses I recommend for everybody e.g. design thinking, project management, customer care, strategic management, leadership management regardless of the office you are occupying or your designation.
We are always lacking in one area or the other, the remedy is to seek knowledge and improve our effectiveness and services to others daily.
If you want something new, you have to stop doing something old – Peter Drucker
“My mum will not knit at night”
“My Boss said the files must be kept at 45 degree angle”
“Our tribe doesn’t dance when the fire goes off ”
“When I was your age, we weren’t allowed to voice our opinions ”
From the tribal display of an antiquated society to running a company in the 21st century, there is the disputation over our cultural system(s), the acceptance of status quo, the upholding of ‘the way we are,’ the revolt and defiance to the existing institutions. The question is, who designed those systems? How effective are the systems? What is the cost of such system? Why was the system institutionalized with these evident parameters?
Time, handlers of information & experiences are the weavers of behavioral exhibitions, the very liability of our passivity; with systems, life is either regimented or adventurous, consequential or disconnected, frivolous or realistic, profitable or obligatory.
The optimal solution is to ‘root out’ unfavorable ideologies and embrace the disruptive approach. The disruptive approach gives rise to new innovation, better ways, modernity, new perspectives, shift in paradigms; we should bear the consequences to find our aspirations. Even when a system is tested, tried and trusted, there is always room for improvement.
It is happening. It is happening now, the loss of vital information needed to connect the dots of time and space.
It was a hare-brained beast that ordered another madcap to set the scrolls in the library of Alexander on fire and tons of works became a mound of ashes. It is happening now. How can Gilgamesh’s fame survive his death if it was not a devotee of knowledge that etched it for posterity? Was it not the guard Yinxi, the famous sentry who appealed to the old master to record his wisdom for the good of the country hence Tao Te Ching? The Bhagavad Gita? Marcus Aurelius gave meaning to his life through his stoical writings and meditation, someone published it. ‘The Sayings of Epictetus’ his teachings written down and published by his pupil Arrian. Lucretius’ Book ‘on the nature of Things’ was discovered in the Monastery. It is happening.
It made headline news, “A Marabout strangled by a group of bandits…because he knew too much”. “Timbuktu attack, a revenge for an unaccepted, unacceptable ideology”. It is happening now. One person preserved the Dead Sea Scrolls, another found it. Atlantis became a myth because of no traceable manuscript.
Piece by piece time can be documented to understand and solve the riddle of our existence. But how can we when we are losing our heritage, our stories, our origin, the cord between man and divinity? How can we when a madcap is destroying our evidences, our relic, our facts, and our antique? Someone somewhere is documenting life, another planning to destroy it (sighs).
It is happening now, “ISIS blew up monuments in Syria”. Someone somewhere in Nigeria is fighting against the advancement in Technology, not because a phone-making company is exploiting “planned obsolescence” but because the better part of his mind is ignorance.
Shhhhh…an arsonist lurks around ‘Gutenberg’s Press’ because Jesus Said, “I am the Truth” and Peter quoted…it is happening.
I woke up this morning to realize that I haven’t/never checked (on) certain people’s blog/site and not ever bothered to take a peep at Bill Gates’ very own, I decided to hunt the link down.
You will find a beautiful timeline of his life and achievements on his biography link (http://www.gatesnotes.com/globalpages/bio). Check on his “improving education” link as well and read his reflection on ‘what teachers mean to me’. Can you recall the names of the great and good teachers that had had influence on your life? Gates did.
I love this page most, an overview of what he had read and what he is currently reading. See how many of these books you have fed your eyes and mind with.(http://www.gatesnotes.com/Education/TEACH). Be cognizant of the fact that he mentioned Steve Jobs’ biography written by the wry and quintessential biographer Walter Isaacson. (We all have something to learn from one anoother 🙂 . Abundance (by Peter Diamandis) is a great book. If you have never read Outliers by Malcolm Gladwell rush to the store, don’t ask for the price, get one and start readin’.
Did you find Mills and Boon on gates’ reading collection? Best of luck on that.
This title is already a great advice, you don’t have to read it (work hard, be nice by Jay Matthews).
I will recommend you flip through his book too ” Business at the speed of thought”. You will find patterns helpful in the thinking mechanism of this great man. The book for me many years ago was futuristic and prompting. Oh, he didn’t pay me to do this, just thought it might be helpful to you or for someone.
I saw a man this morning, his shoes half-worn-out, the base eaten up by the earth; he wore a garment stricken by the sun, bleached to fade while his face thirsts for the dew of mercy and grace. So I asked, where is he coming from? Where is he going? Does he know where he is?
What tale is your shoe telling?
Our shoes have tales to tell. It might be partly damaged but it should tell the tale of a man marching to his utopia. In the words of J.R.R. Tolkien, “Not all who wander are lost”. Our shoes should connect the dots of the past, the present and the future. The past might have been hard but that doesn’t mean we should lose sight of where we are going. Now is pertinent. The clarity of now vanquishes the mystical haze of the future.
Tie the lace of your shoes on whatever path you have chosen. Worry not about the past; the past only must be told and serve as a reference of correction.