Just Breathe... and Persist!

The first quarter of the year is over and various parts of the world have come to a brief halt in celebration of a number of religious festivals and traditions. It is during this time of respite that I encourage you to take a time-out and re-evaluate where you are currently and what you have managed to achieve in the 2015 year to date. Yes, there might still be a lot of items on your “to-do list” for the daunting year ahead, but these challenges are certainly not insurmountable.

It has been some time since writing anything new on social media, but recent events have prompted this latest article. My world has become a whirlwind of brutal “life shocks”, impacting on my thoughts and emotions, creating a turbulent mush of nonsense in my mind; some facts and a lot of irrational rubbish. Of these life shocks, many have made me question peoples’ humanity, greed and willingness to extort others for every little bit to the detriment of their victims, whom like the slaves of multiple generations, have in fact been facilitating the comfort and luxury in which the “abusers” lounge.

These experiences have left me feeling raw; abused, manipulated, shocked, angry, helpless, disgusted and thoroughly disappointed in those whom I once respected. Some may call me na?ve and that “this is just how people do things”, which is disheartening, yet realistic. On the flip side of the coin, what I have gone through has done nothing but to fuel fire and passion towards fighting for not only justice, but most especially to uphold the sound ethical and moral values to which I hold myself.

Warren Buffet, whom I often quote, stated that he only looks for three things in people: Integrity, Intelligence and a high level of energy. However, of all of those qualities, if a person does not have integrity, he will not do business with them. This is a very valuable lesson which I encourage everyone to take heed of.

Further to what Warren Buffet says, my father, being the phenomenal and supportive human being he is, today sent me a very interesting article called “7 Habits Of Highly Persistent People” by Harvey Deutschendorf (available: https://www.fastcompany.com/3044531/7-habits-of-highly-persistent-people). The article echoes Buffet’s “high level of energy” characteristic, and to some extent the integrity, but specifically elaborates around the following seven points:

1. An all-consuming vision
2. A burning desire
3. Inner confidence
4. Highly developed habits
5. Ability to adjust and adapt
6. Commitment to lifelong learning
7. Role models that act as guides and mentors

Point 7. is pretty straightforward as I tend to quote the likes of Buffet, my dad, Richard Branson, Robert Kiyosaki and many other successful people constantly. But, regarding the rest of it, I actually had to read the article a couple of times to fully understand the crux of the matter and how it applies to my life. Thus, what I would like to share with you relates back to why I said one should take a time-out to evaluate things at this point in time and includes the following thoughts:

An all-consuming vision:

Remember your New Year’s Resolutions? What was that goal you were trying to achieve? You can’t remember having a goal? Has the Friday after-work drinking session turned into the Wednesday, Thursday, Friday and Saturday routine, with a Bloody Mary every Sunday to calm the throbbing temples? What happened to your vision?

We all lose direction at some point. Some people are really lucky and have their very own built-in personal GPS. Meanwhile, the rest of us struggle to focus on any one particular thing. We get lost in the buzz and the next thing you know it, it’s 2016! Maybe something terrible has happened; a personal loss; an opportunity that seemed too good to be true; a relationship gone bad; or an investment gone sour. Who knows! But that is life. If you don’t refocus yourself, no-one else is going to do it for you. And, even if your loved ones did try to refocus you, you’d probably just get annoyed at them for pestering you! You are your best friend and your worst enemy. If you really want something, stop procrastinating and move it!

A burning desire:

Further to the all-consuming vision above, if you really want something, YOU need to make it happen. So, take a deep breath and think. Make sure that what you are doing now and where your energies are focused is YOUR goal and not that of someone else.

My husband’s mother has on multiple occasions encouraged me to get going on my PhD. However, at the same time, a very good piece of advice she has stated is that when I do finally commit to doing the PhD and choosing a topic, I must make sure it is something I’m 110% passionate about. Afterall, any vision that one might have is probably not a walk in the park; that’s what makes it a vision. It is valuable time, effort and learning on your part. It is a challenge.

With regards to my mom in law, she knows me well and admittedly I’m a bit of a jumpy person. One day I’ll absolutely throw myself into something and the next day I’m on a completely different tangent. Yes one might have the passion and the drive, but if you do intend fully committing yourself to your vision, you better make sure you can continue to fuel the embers of that particular burning desire!

Inner confidence:

The recent events in my life have taught me a lot about confidence. There are many types of confidence, from arrogance through to a quiet, observant power; i.e. those people who listen and then seem to ask the most interesting, well-thought out questions. In my opinion, arrogance and the belittling of others in order to inflate one’s own ego is not confidence. It’s actually a form of very low self-esteem. In fact, I would go as far as to say it is one’s yearning and desire to have what others have, to constantly rely recognition by others, material rewards and acknowledgement. And when those individuals don’t get what they want, they lash out at others in an attempt to make what they have seem less. But that’s not inner confidence, that’s behaving like an obnoxious bully who always has to be Number 1. And most people will recognise it for what it is.

Inner confidence is a very rare quality and those who have it ooze a type of silent awe-inspiring power. When you have inner confidence, you are able to take deep breaths and sort through the clutter; to find and make sense of a situation, and, to enable oneself to be led by logic and not by emotion. I have met very few people whom are able to harness that power and I highly admire their ability to overcome the need for approval.

My words of advice to you: only once you are able to give yourself a pat on the back and only once you are able to say to yourself, “Damn! I’m pretty good at this!” will you be able to persevere in reaching your goals. If you continue to look for the approval of others at each and every step you take, you will eventually lose interest in your vision. Why pursue something if someone isn’t going to give you an “A” for effort? One has to be one’s own best friend and devil’s advocate. But, be careful and draw the line at negativity. It’s one thing to say that you will do better the next time and another thing to call yourself useless! Maintain positivity and believe in yourself; in who you are and the many things you are capable of achieving!

Highly developed habits:

There are countless thought leaders, motivational speakers, religious leaders, businessmen and women whom continually go on a rant about developing habits. On this particular topic, my advice is: go back to basics! Will your current habits enable you to achieve your vision; are your habits and your vision aligned? If not, why? And then change.

For example, the after work drinking session or the daily series “sloth-mode” (yes I am guilty of this one!). These are not constructive habits, but destructive habits. Ok… ok…! We all need a break sometime I agree. The problem is, it is so easy to become caught up in the exhaustion of the rat race and to turn to a daily form of escapism. However, if you want to reach your vision, then only YOU can fix those behaviours, turning them into something productive and constructive.

Ability to adjust and adapt:

People, people, people! Change happens all the time – get over it! My generation and younger are the kids of the new age. We thrive on new technologies, new trends, new this, new that! It never ends. How is it then that when other things in our lives happen, whether changes at work, home or in our relationships, we become useless beings for a period of time?

Sure, we all need time to recover from life shocks, but if you want to stay on track and reach that vision, you cannot just give up when the *beep* hits the fan. We would certainly not be so blessed to have all the different and dynamic Apple or Samsung devices we have, if it weren’t for a little change (and healthy competition!). And guess what: every time things change and adapt, they tend to get better and better! Now imagine applying that principle to your life!

Commitment to lifelong learning:

I always like to say to my team, be a sponge and soak everything up! He or she who tells you that they are the best, an expert without any flaws, desperately needs a reality check. My recent experiences are a testament to this learning. In fact, my friends and family have continually told me over the last few months, “at your age you can’t buy these types of school lessons!’ or “you should be lucky to be paying these school fees now!”. In addition, even reading the article on habits of persistent people is just another way in which I am absorbing information.

The second one thinks they know it all, is the second before failure strikes. The more information you have, the more informed your choices will be going forward. No joke! And yes, with new information your vision may change. But, just don’t give up and keep nurturing the vision until it becomes a reality.

In conclusion to yet another one of my rants, I’d like to illuminate one last point which grand slam tennis player Andy Murray recently made. It was one of the huge international grand slam tournaments and Andy was in the final. He played a magnificent game against his opponent for the first half of the match and it really looked like Andy was going to win. But, come the second half of the match and Andy’s opponent annihilated him. After the match reporters asked a very distraught Andy what happened; what had suddenly gone wrong? With a level of enormous maturity Andy answered something along the lines of, “I stopped focusing on my side of the court and focused on my opponent’s side of the court.”

Andy lost focus and he was able to admit it. He stopped focusing on the things within his control and started worrying about the things out of his control. It cost him dearly and each day we also pay the price in our own endeavours. We are the only ones who can bring back our focus to our side of the court.

During my primary school days I won an award for “Diligence”. At that time I wasn’t yet much of an academic, although I had a voracious appetite for reading. In hindsight I now realise that what they meant by diligence was in fact persistence. I was a very annoying, but persistent little kid! No, I wasn’t the best in the class nor was I the best athlete either (although I tried to be!), and, I was a horrible loser. But I never gave up. Thanks to the patience of my dear husband, I’m a much better sport these days.

Persistence should not to the detriment of anyone else. There is far more value in enabling others to greater heights, which will regardless enable oneself. So don’t give up. You might still be struggling with a whole number of the points mentioned above, or you may be way ahead, but just don’t give up. Ask yourself: “What is in my control and what can I do about it?” And remember, if you give up on your vision, you are giving up on yourself. Only you can fix that.

In the immortal words of Martin Luther King Jr:

“If you can’t fly, then run. If you can’t run, then walk. If you can’t walk, then crawl. But, whatever you do, you have to keep moving forward.”