How do you stay focused and not get carried away by the shiny objects that litter the streets of life?
Sometimes, these shiny objects are glaring and loud, other times they are subtle, and you are unaware that you have deviated and got carried away from your goals.
What are some of the things that can cause you to lose sight of your goals? Fame, fear, success, low motivation, and the opposite sex. These can make you lose focus on what you want to achieve in life.
Most teens are caught up in this quagmire when trying to discover a path to follow in life. One of such teenagers was Spencer, who was my former neighbor.
He was caught in the allure of fame displayed by football (soccer) stars such as Ronaldinho, JJ Okocha, Kaka and the rest of them in their prime and wanted to be like them so that he can enjoy the fame and drive posh automobile, without recourse to whether his talents aligned with being a football.
Spencer dropped out of high school and started hanging out with kids and his mates who wanted to be footballers, not because they have the aptitude for football, but because of the fame and wealth they hoped it would bring to them.
Out of curiosity I went to the field where he and his cronies were training. After watching him for 15 minutes I knew football was not for him. He may never become one because it was clear he could not play football.
However, it took him a while to come to the bitter realization that he wasn’t made to play soccer.
But, like the proverbial fly who refuses to take advice, and surely ends up in the grave with the corpse.
Spencer, again changed course and wanted to be a musician like Whizkid and Davido. This time he changed his circle of friends and started hanging out in music studios churning out discordant lyrics and dressing like gangsters.
Like his first love soccer, he wanted to be a singer not because he has the talent for singing, but because it is a shortcut to fame, women and riches. Although in his mid-thirties now, the last time I heard of him he’s still looking for the next big thing, never achieving any of them.
ALL THAT GLITTERS IS NOT GOLD
The unpardonable mistake many people make is believing that anything that is shiny and bright must be more valuable.
Many young girls fall for guys with the sugar-coated tongues, who always wear bling bling around their neck and walk with the gait of a peacock.
The society gets carried away by the thieving politicians who drive in big cars and live in large mansions. They set a bad precedent for the youths as they emulate them and see them as role models.
However, gold is not found on the street, you have to dig thousands of feet into the earth crust to find one, and when found, it has to pass through hundred degrees of heat to become fine gold.
If this is true of gold why do you mistake every gold-plated object to be gold.
We have succeeded in ditching the culture of hard work in the society, looking instead for shortcuts.
When you always look for an easy and fraudulent way to achieve goals, you tend to get carried away from the ideals and known principles that lead to success.
Examples of people who shortcut the system are replete in life as most of them are cooling their ass off in jail.
Think of the stock broker and hedge fund manager who indulges in insider trading, the startup founder who lied about her business to get false valuation, and the businessman who thought he could escape the taxman by declaring false figures about his business. All of them are cooling off and doing time in several federal prisons.
When you get accustomed to living the fake life and view life with a rose-colored glass that distorts reality, the end game is jail.
Try to live within the confine of the principles of success and not get carried away by the trappings of living the fake life.
THERE’S ALWAYS ONE MORE RUNG IN THE LADDER OF SUCCESS
The reality of life is that there’s always a plus factor. There’s always room to get better and to attain some new level of success.
You cannot afford to get carried away by yesterday’s success. If you stop growing because you think you are now successful, in time you will wither and die.
Example of a person who refuses to rest on their laurels is billionaire Warren Buffet, who despite his age has continued to do his best to conquer new frontier in business and investing as well as in his personal life.
In an interview this is what his best friend and vice chairman of Berkshire Hathaway Charles Munger said about Buffet “He’s continuously dedicated to learning and gaining greater knowledge. He’s one of the best learning machines on earth. The turtles who outrun the hare are learning machines on earth, if you stop learning in this world, the world rushes right by you. Warren was lucky he could still learn effectively and build his skills, even after he reached retirement age; I can report that if he had stopped with what he knew at earlier points, the record would be a pale shadow of what it is’’.
Read Also: How to run your life better using inner guidance
There’s one more rung on the ladder of success, keep plugging away, don’t stop learning, don’t get carried away by the peck of success. This will ensure you maintain your verve for living and stay relevant in the scheme of things
POPULAR OPINIONS DOES NOT NECESSARILY VALIDATE A THING
We believe that something is better when it’s endorsed by the majority, and so we rearrange our lives to conform to societal norms. But right in front of our noses we have seen several non-conformists do wonderful things with their lives.
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Many people get carried away by certain belief systems and are afraid to smash the ceiling and walk out from the cage.
However, you may have seen people who live life in opposition to what society expects of them, proving in the process that you don’t need popular opinion to get your idea validated and that it’s okay to be a loner and not conform with the majority.
Whilst it’s important and necessary to get a college education, we have seen people who took a different path and still make it using unorthodox ways in the part less traveled.
I have seen people who were not given a chance to survive a certain ailment, make it through and went ahead to live normal lives.
These people know the intrinsic value of digging deep to discover a well of power and strength many never knew existed within them. These people are unlike Spencer mentioned in the intro of this note above whose motivation comes from some superfluous sources outside of themselves.
Just because music and football are widely endorsed doesn’t make them the only pathways to fame and riches.
Read also: 8 Steps to experience the joy of living
Sometimes you have to retreat to the dark recess of your heart away from the hullabaloo of the crowd to find your calling.
DISCOVER NEW PASSION AND DO YOUR BEST TO MASTER IT
In life you have to reinvent yourself in almost every department of your life. We have seen people who got to the apex of a particular career and began to witness diminishing returns.
While some people are able to navigate this phase of life, others find they are stuck in the grind. This calls for reinvention of self by being able to discover a new passion and direction that will increase your outflow and get your creative juice flowing again.
That’s why it seems most individuals are multi -dimensional, they can be founders of companies, writers, martial artist and travelers.
They are highly focused individuals and never get carried away by a few wins. They are alive when they have their plates full.
Read also: 5 Amazing Silver lining lessons
REMEMBER YOU ARE MORTAL AND NOTHING LAST FOREVER
Life is characterized by change. In fact, it’s the only constant. Let it be rooted in your heart. You have a limited time here on earth.
Are you going to waste it or expend your energy to give service to life? You can make the world better by doing your best in your own little corner of the world.
Don’t be the man who struggled to make money for the sake of making money, so that you can enjoy the best things and acquire prized trophies like cars, women, jewelries, houses and at the end leave the world without leaving your footprint in the sands of time.
I urged you to emulate the life of British millionaire Felix Denis who dedicated his life to planting trees and by the time he died in 2014 the man-made forest he planted has over one million trees. The forest is known as the Heart of England Forest.
The nature of life is such that everything is forever moving, that’s why the scriptures say there’s a time to be born and a time to die.
If God blesses you with wealth, use it to further the course of the universe and not get carried away by the useless things beckoning for your attention every day.
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