The Pain of Change

Season’s Wishes for You

Welcome to the New Year my dear friends. My prayer and hope are that you are thriving in spirit, soul, and body. A new year is something we all cherish, primarily because we inwardly hope that our fortunes will change. We deeply look forward to a better year and a better season. A New Year, for most of us provides us with the opportunity to pick up the broken pieces so that we begin again and begin to excel. Sometimes I feel we are victims of utopia thinking where we do a lot of air castle building and life fascination. We are even guilt of reducing life to a soap opera while neglecting that it is a heavy dose of solid reality.

You Must Use Your Sound Mind

Sometimes our sense of over-optimism will lead us to a sense of personal illusion where we become prisoners of foolishness. How do you explain the fact that someone does not change a single variable in their lives, yet at the same time keep hoping that things will be different? This is the height of folly, until you do something about your situation you are always going to be having what you have. There is madness in certain folk who believe that God should do everything for them. That is the height of irresponsibility. Why would God give you brains if he did not want you to think? The fact that you have brains is evidence that God wants you to think and reason in life. No wonder the scripture says you were not given the spirit of fear but the spirit of love and a sound mind. A sound mind means that your mental faculties are intact and are able to process and pass reasonable and logical conclusions over matters of life.

Take Responsibility for Your Life

I hope and trust this year is your year of practical change and transformation where you will be able to take charge of your life and stop abdicating responsibilities by passing all your chores in the to-do basket of the heavenly father. There is a danger of failing to take responsibility for the lives of many people. Bluntly speaking, I am annoyed with the person who coined the phrase ‘common sense’, my bone of contention is that sense and sensibility are the two less common aspects of life. So I wonder why somebody covers the breadth of the earth trying to establish that common sense is common. This is why as a Christian man I teach people to be practical in their faith walk. I strongly teach that after getting on your knees to pray get back on your feet and work! God will not do for you that which you can do for yourself.

Miracles Demand Human Cooperation

I have also observed some very interesting scenarios whenever Jesus Christ executed growth or multiplication miracles he always used elements that were on earth and combined them with the metaphysical aspects to produce miracles. In his first miracle, Jesus Christ asked people to fill pots with water which he turned into highly matured first-grade wine. When he fed the multitude he also started by getting five loaves of bread and two fish. Interestingly he had also set the multitudes in smaller groups, obviously to avoid a stampede. Just observing these scenarios will tell you that even in order for a miracle to take place certain groundwork needs to be in place. If a miracle is to take place, there has to be a human contribution coupled with the touch of God.

God Expects You to Have Written Goals

As we start the New Year my heart yearns to see you changing so that your results change. Without a change in your attitude and mindset, nothing will ever change. One of the things that God has instituted for our success is goal-setting. The matter is stressed in the book Habakkuk 2:2 Then the Lord replied: “Write?down the Vision and make it plain on tablets so that a herald may run with it. If a vision is to be written, then by extension the goals should also be written with clarity and understanding. Clarity in goal setting ensures that goals are both understood and implemented. Goals in our lives when well executed will be able to give us the necessary results.

Dispelling the Myths of Success

Have you ever wondered why some people are so good at achieving their goals and fulfilling their dreams and living a life of purpose? What is their "secret sauce" for success? Some people would say that all you need to do is work hard to achieve what you want in life. Working hard is a part of the equation but it is not all of it. Other people may think it is about whom you know or what you have.?Yet others feel there are those born with access and that they are given all the headstarts and favorable breaks in life.?The truth is, statistics demonstrate that those who create goals and have a regular and consistent goal-setting process are much more likely to achieve their life’s dreams.

Turn Dreams into Reality

Dreams on their own can be easily turned into nightmares. But dreams when coupled with a strategy will get elevated to goal status. Goals are the true blueprint of where you need to go and how you will know that you have gotten there. The good news, however, is that there is a formula for turning your dreams into reality, and it is not dependent on whom you know or proving yourself.?The goals success formula, as given by personal development guru, Brian Tracy is:

?Goals + Commitment = Dreams Come True

Turning goals into reality is not child’s play, it is a highly taxing initiative whose roots are deeply anchored in the discipline. Discipline is the single major component that will see the vision translate to goals and goals translate to work.

This is why in this season I am demanding that you show up and you work on your dreams and be unrelenting in your pursuit of the Holy Grail. Good and great things come to those who persist.

Christ remains the Avogadro Constant towards all leadership success. He is the way the truth and the life. You were born to win, but you should remember strategies that will necessitate victory. May every lid of limitation be lifted up in your life. May the leader in you rise to conquer, even as you remember that in leadership, Jesus Christ is the benchmark. He is the beginning and the end . Pursue him to lead like him.

Dr. Ted Msipa is a leading voice in personal development and Strategic leadership in Africa. He is the Founder and Senior Pastor at House of Refuge Global Ministries. He is also the Chief Human Capital Officer at Patted Financial and Management Consultancy. He is a published author, Marriage Master Mentor, Business Coach, and Leadership Guru. He is also a celebrity on Vodacom and Econet where people subscribe to hear his daily inspirational messages for 2-5 Minutes every day. You can access his messages on Vodacom by dialing *118*4*4# or Econet by dialing *156*4*4# to subscribe

Ted Msipa is also an expert in Strategic Planning and Tender Development. To contact him:

?Email: [email protected]:+266 63177309 +266 57859680