Staying Connected!

In December 2021 as we all went on holiday, Prishani Nundkisun, Head Girl of Wembley College 2003 asked us the simple question - What more can I do to support you?!

Perhaps this simple question has brought with it an amazing season of rain and an enduring Covid-19 Level 1 status for our country. Who really knows what changes in the universe when a school becomes old enough to enjoy the fruits of its labour.?All we know is that it's good. Very good. Wembley College is deeply thankful for the love it enjoys from Old/ Former Scholars.

It is with great joy that we introduce the first in a series of Old Scholar Newsletters written by Prishani with love, this one titled - A New Opportunity to Connect.

Enjoy…

A new opportunity?

to connect?

By: Prishani Nundkisun?- https://www.dhirubhai.net/in/prishani-n-a2499b1b/

Did 2021 feel like a year of blessings upon blessings as if you were Tatjana Schoenmaker who dominated the Toyko Olympic games? Or maybe not. Maybe like the former two-division UFC Champion, Connor McGregor, what you thought would be a year of victory turned out to be a year of pausing, resting and growing outside of the spotlight. Wait, maybe you have a heart and soul as restless as Elon Musk and 2021 was a year of success and failure, more failure and then incredible success but just a pure rollercoaster of going after your dreams no matter the cost.?

We all know that a new year brings new hope, new goals, new adventures and more often than not, new challenges. Having been on this earth for just over 35 years, having worked in Corporate SA for over 13 years and have done training, facilitation and mentoring for just as long, I am no stranger to the reality that a new year can sometimes like feel reaching into a cookie jar with a blindfold on and not knowing what your fortune may be.??

But the great thing about a new year is that you get to respawn. You get an opportunity to press reset – even if just in your mind, even if just for a short while. Like a true gamer, you get an opportunity to wake up, armour up, and reconnect with what it is you really want.?

At the end of 2021, I was certified as a Transformation Life Coach and that reality was the conclusion of many years of choosing to respawn and reconnect with my own dreams and goals. Sometimes our dreams feel so out of reach. Sometimes our goals feel like mere ink on paper. Yet, one of my favourite quotes brings me the greatest call to action to watch my thoughts, and I hope it will do the same for you.

“Watch your thoughts,?they become your?words; watch your words, they become your actions; watch your actions, they become your habits; watch your habits, they become your character; watch your character, it becomes your destiny.”

There is an ultimate connection between your thoughts all the way through to your destiny. Even the Bible, one of the oldest texts we know reminds us that "As a man thinketh in his heart, so is he." So, if the connection between our thoughts, actions and destiny is a reality then the question is – have you spent enough time managing that connection??

When you think of the word c-o-n-n-e-c-t, the dictionary brings up the idea of joining something together. My son who simply loves Lego has a good laugh at me, when I try to join Lego pieces that just won’t fit together. Somehow, over his gentle 8 years of playing with Legos, he seems to be able to quickly identify what fits and what doesn’t…what easily connects and what will need a bit of adjusting to connect.?

So, my question to you right now is: what is your life currently fits, and what just won’t fit? What are you trying with every ounce of energy to make a part of your life that keeps rejecting you?as if you were one pole of a magnet and that part of your life was the same pole on another magnet??

Many of us struggle to get our physical life, professional/school life, relationships and social life into some sort of satisfactory balancing act. We are often left excelling in one area of our life and feeling like a damsel in distress in another.?

Why does this happen? Perhaps it’s because:

• We have lost the connection. Like that moment when Eskom decides there shall be no more power, we lose the thread between our thoughts and our destiny.?

“ A farmer must see the connection between the seed in his hand and a mighty field of a great harvest in his mind's eye.”

• We want to be great leaders, but our thoughts are negative and fear-filled.?
• We want to be world changers and history makers, but we wake up and live undisciplined lives.?

Now, I am not preaching from any pedestal. I have made my own share of mistakes. I have had negative thoughts and emotions that have taken me down what felt like a well with no end. So, every now and again, I reach deep inside and realise the connection between my thoughts and my destiny needs to be much stronger. And the start of a new year is one of those incredible opportunities to strengthen that connection.?

In those moments, I press restart on my thoughts. I spring clean my mind and clear the connections between what I want one day and what I am thinking about right now. The cobwebs of the past need to be found and removed.?

Take a page from the life of a farmer and you will never go wrong. A farmer must see the connection between the seed in his hand and a mighty field of a great harvest in his mind's eye. He must water his days with faith and courage and discipline, and he must stare adversity in the face to get to the other side successfully. A farmer understands patience, a farmer understands the connection. A farmer understands that one year of failure has no bearing on the promise of a new year’s harvest. Have a farmers heart wherever you go.?

In 2018, after years of desiring to have my own company, I started Disruptive Thinkers. Although I did not have a perfect understanding of where the company would go, every step I took forward was connected to my daily thoughts. In 2021, despite the lockdown, we held 29 Leadership Mentoring Sessions online and empowered as many youths as we could live a more purposed life that leads to a more meaningful adulthood. My co-founder and I also became certified Transformation Life coaches. The ingredients were there years ago. It just took daily discipline and a connection to our highest goals to get to our achievements.?

Think about what you want in some of the key areas of your own life:

Take a moment to make the connection between each goal, each thought and each action connected to the goal.??

Here is one example:?

Perhaps your spiritual goal is to be more present at a place of worship this year.

Do you notice the connection that is so key? The connection of thought to an action and a goal leads to an ultimate destiny in each area of our lives. Your destiny. Your journey. Your connected success.?

If you have ever baked something, or at least watched someone do it, you would have noticed that there is quite a balancing act involved. Ingredients, temperature, some judgement, some calculations, some creativity and a lot of patience. Am I right in saying that when you stare at all the ingredients you don’t suddenly see the cake next to it? You do, however, visualise that cake and you have that tiny bit of excitement going on within you of what’s to come.?

This exercise on goals that you did above is the ingredients stage to a well-made life. You have to start with a plan, you have to connect the different parts and you have to have the hope, faith, discipline and passion to see it through to the end. It must start with the right thought.? It must rest on the right goal. And it must grow in an environment that is not built on wishes and could be and would be and maybe’s but rather a world that you have created based on what you truly want.?

So, dear reader here’s to a brand new year and a brand new opportunity to bring out the best of what is inside of you.??

Don’t miss out on the opportunity.?