HARD KNOCK STORIES.

#FridayGratitude - I am grateful for family, connections, and relationships.

Everyone has been playing a vital role in my growth and I have been doing my best to play my part equally in their own growth.

Life is about BALANCE.

I am a social connector and all I do is connect the dots in everything that relates to my future. It is not selfish at all, on the contrary, it is far from this - It has its selfless moments and it has its intentional moment - I am just inclined to it - serving others.

Life is about DISCERNMENT. It is that inner guidance or inner compass we move with - leading us to what is independently ours to cherish alone or mandatory teaching us the power behind connecting with others in a collective and enjoying the benefits of working and living with the team.

BALANCE IS VALUABLE IN A STARTUP.

FIRST THINGS FIRST - AS A STARTUP FOUNDER: DO THIS FIRST - "FIND, CREATE & BUILD A TEAM."

• note to self: "avoid working with close friends, unless you met them for the sole purpose of creating and working together on an ideal company."

Best place to find a potential co-founder or a teammate.

• Visit coworking places, and meet and converse with random people with common interests - possibly online or at offline events - networking events can do wonders for your startup career.
• Join groups and forums discussing threads relating to what you are looking for.
• Attend a seminar or a workshop or an event or a class.

A few years ago - circa 2016 - I was an emerging enterprise creator working behind multiple failed startups that had only accomplished a handful of freelance jobs.

I was hopeful, so I'd still go out every day with my camera bag and expectation of what I was supposed to be doing with my life.

On the 30th of April - 2016 - I happened to be around "Area 10" on Festival Road - Abuja, Nigeria. It was a not-so-windy day and life had not been so fair to my pockets and I was not in the mood for doing "roadside commercial photography" - charging N200 per digital picture. I wanted to document something - I wanted something big to impact my mindset, not my pocket - I already knew I'd be rich someday - I just needed my mind to grow in what I called my purpose. While thinking within and taking a walk, I withdrew my notepad from my camera bag and started jotting down thoughts while walking - I am a Pisces - we can be that dreamy, and in the dream - It is like living in the abundance of cosmic energy 24/7. So far out - I thought and in front of me - I realize I was standing in front of the International Conference Center and there was this huge event taking place called "What's in your hands, Nigeria?" - "What's in my hands, I ask myself - as I walk towards the registration stand praying to God that it's either free or I can freelance as a photo documentary maker/photog and get my photos published in some magazine." Money is important, reputation, however, takes the prize. I get there and I speak with one of the attendants and find out it's free and I could attend - without bothering about taking pictures - just sit down for a few hours and listen to the Vice President and some reputable speakers speak on where Nigeria is going digitally. WOW. What a day!

I register and my life is transformed by "topic 2" - Ali Baba, the speaker - spoke about the untapped potentials in the entertainment industry and where entrepreneurs should look for future growth and avoid these reasons:

• MISPLACED PRIORITIES
• SELFISH REASONS

These reasons can be dangerously harmful to a content creator - it hit me so hard - like a hard knock wisdom pill I needed to swallow.

What was I doing wrong in my career as a content creator?

By the end of April, 30 - 2016 - I was in a full growth mindset, with a clear intention of what I wanted and whom I needed in my future. I began to pay attention to the orchestration happening around me and the role I was playing in becoming the real me and the role other people were playing in my life around me and me around them. Discovering my need for a team and the willingness to make telling my startup story a part of my daily conversation would have to take center stage and in the process, I discovered my need to understand that others around me were also on a journey of personal self-discovery like I was. It was also my tough job to listen to their story and support them as well as I could. Alone we can, together we can do better - working with the right person for the right purpose at the right place at the right time is fulfilling your calling indeed. Discernment is important in discovering the purpose of you - the power in you is important enough to activate and calm and empower and enrich and encourage. We each are each other's priority - my business needs you as a client and as a client, you need my business - it's a team.

DAILY - THE ME WITHIN WOULD ASK:

Are my dreams achievable and valuable to other people's knowledge banks?Am I resourceful enough to add growth to any team or person I collaborate with or partner with? Am I loyal enough to myself to keep going at the vision no matter how many times I get involved in something else that was solely for adding to someone else's goal and aspirations? Am I doing what I can do better than anyone else to the best of my advantage or am I selling myself short because I want to be there professionally for someone else? Yes, I want to add to people, not subtract. It needs to be valuable to all involved. I want to leave people better than I met them and more improved than when I met them. And likewise them me. It has to be a win-win. Will I always get it? Maybe, Maybe not - nevertheless I will never give up on what I believe and whom I believe in. Favor is possible. Patience is a valuable key to a leader leading themself and others. It is not a fairytale - It is an achievable effort and it is happening now with the "RISE OF SOCIAL ENTREPRENEURS" - #socialgoodisPower. Sometimes life can kick you when you are down and all I had was my faith and my willingness to try again. This time is intentional with being selfless and honest to yourself - forget what others will think or say - JUST GO FOR IT. Building a niche social network means engagement and people love it when you serve their interests - you don't have to be a push over and you might only get seriously mad once to make a point - nevertheless - STICK WITH IT.

There is power in you that can be socially good for others.

Sustainability is the power to have the ability to keep renewing and replenishing and resupplying and recycling and reinventing and recreating and reusing - keeping the life of something sustainable is making it rely on its own itself for everything it needs. Let your startup business scream sustainability and the world will pay attention. Build it and it works sustainably and they will come.

"YOUR CANDLE LOSES NOTHING WHEN IT LIGHTS ANOTHER."

People often get a bit mind-boggled when nice people act with a little bit of a mean streak - understand this - "no one should hold you ransom for what they claim they love. If you truly love it - you will work on it - and you will make it to work so it will pay you money when you are sleeping." I am a selfless workaholic, but it doesn't mean I can not be a shrewd creative. It is all about your superpower - the unique you - we all learn differently and are impacted differently. Each hard knock experience can inspire a different you to shine more than another you. Each hard knock experience can independently transform a sector or an industry - what you have experienced can teach a handful of people new knowledge. Everyone has a role to play. Everyone has a hard knock story.

Enterprise creation is in expansion mode and we each can do something socially good for our economy. Energy, Television, Electricity, Finance, Technology, and Communication - every enterprise creator has a unique "YOU" power to do some social good. Every experience is a valuable instructor. A hard-knock teacher.

I understand the hard-knock lessons of my yesterdays and the grooming I am getting from the corrections of today. Life is about balance. Balance in faith and willingness to try again and again delivers authenticity. Great results take patient efforts to become outstanding miracles.

I am not trying to tell you a story about what you already know - I am actually telling you a story of something you are aware of already - the goodness in you.

Entrepreneurs shape the world. Be socially responsible. Be thankful, that someone out there needs a solution you are working on right now. Be thankful to those who had to do the hardest things in life for you - teach with tough or kind love - what you needed to learn most - THE POWER OF YOU.

It's #FridayGratitude and I am grateful for my family, my connections, and my relationships.

The experience of living with them is worth it always.

Thank you for sharing the #powerinyou.