HAMZ MUSINGS: FINDING PURPOSE

FINDING PURPOSE.

Readers they say are LEADERS.
So, Dear Leaders, welcome on board to Hamz's Musing this beautiful Thursday morning.
Today Let's talk about FINDING PURPOSE. Shall we?

You see, One of the MOST INFLUENTIAL and DEEPEST advice I have been blessed to come across in my existence is one given several millennia ago by a wise king, Solomon. (Yeah! I read the Bible as well)

He said, "Seest thou a man DILIGENT in HIS BUSINESS? He shall stand before kings; he shall not stand before mean men."

The sheer importance and greatness , the immense profundity of this counsel is enough to write several books on.
“DILIGENCE”

Let me begin with a story.

About 8 years ago, I joined Facebook. Of course, I had heard quite a lot about the Facebook and, like the bandwagon, I signed up.

I remember that day like it was yesterday. I went to that cyber-cafe. I went online and signed up. Of course, after I signed up, I promptly forgot about it for a couple of months afterwards and switch back to another platform then which was 2Go.

When I came back on, it was to put pictures of my bare chest and absolutely nonsensical posts. I really didnt have any reference point, so I did all that the crowd was doing.

"I am eating bread and tea", "See that guys big head!" "Time to sleep"…

At the time, it made perfect sense to me to use Facebook as a platform to inform the world of the gravity of the situation of what I was eating, or the size of someone's head, or that I wanted to sleep.

The gross idiocy of my position did not occur to me. My online presence was a pity.

But then something changed. I found PURPOSE. And with that I found FOCUS. One result was that I began writing.

If you haven't been paying attention since the beginning of this. Now would be a very good time to do so.

My Zambian aspiring writer Charles Zult once asked how he can up his game and become really establish in writing. I told him something inter-alia which I’m about sharing with you now.
It is “FINDING PURPOSE and TREADING on it with focus.
You see, when you find the fire of discovered PURPOSE; when you realise that what you are about to start doing is what you should have already STARTED doing years ago, you have two options. Get dejected and give up. Or be seized with fervour and double up.
*******

Back to the story. I doubled up.

Now, this is where things get interesting.

Of course, after I discovered that I wanted to write, I began. There is a difference between KNOWING what you should DO, and DOING what you should DO.

My posts began to find congruency. And I discovered that Facebook was a platform. A platform is for display. You can either display idiocy, or display wisdom. It was one of the first platforms I found. And, like my friend Emmanuel advised, I showed RESPECT to my PLATFORM.

Now, I want you to get this right, before I continue.

If folly is the product you want to display on your platform, you will definitely find a host of clowns ready to be entertained by your offer. But PURPOSE will not CHANGE to suit the whims of a CROWD that celebrate the elevation of misdirected PASSION, no matter how large it is.

Purpose will not change to suit the expectations of a crowd that does not understand WHO you really are, WHERE you really should be, HOW you really should get there, and WHAT is required that you should be doing in this space and time in order to get there.

Some people are tempted to think they have found PURPOSE by the number of LIKES and COMMENTS, BACK-PATTING and PRAISE they receive.

But, If a thousand fools sing songs of how wise you are, it does not bring the melody of wisdom to you.

As i always says, "If a THOUSAND FOOLS call you wise, it does not necessarily mean you are wise."

The emphasis is not in the "THOUSAND", it is on the "FOOLS". It is not necessarily in the QUANTITY, but in the QUALITY- or lack of it.

And some people, because of the LACK of LIKES and COMMENTS, BACK-PATTING and PRAISE, are tempted to think they are not in the place of purpose.

I honestly cannot count the number of people who have told me something similar to this,
“I am a so-and-so. But nothing seems to be working out for me. Maybe its my location or maybe this is not what I should be doing. I have attended seminars and tried to network. I have tried things I read in books. I have applied things that other people have applied. Nothing seems to be working. My parents are already worried. They are telling me to go and look for a job with a steady income. Everyone is telling me that if what I have done so far has not yielded any results, I am not likely to get any results. The sooner I changed course, the better. You know, I cannot continue to do the same thing, in the same way..."

And I wonder.

Because all I can hear is what King Solomon is saying, "Seest thou a man DILIGENT in HIS BUSINESS…"👊🏼👊🏼
Perhaps, I should go a little bit further.

I doubled up. The fire was strong within me. And it was like cocaine. I was intoxicated. I had to write. I had to deliver value. I had to use my platform.

But, I had a small problem. Actually, it was a big problem. I did not have a better phone or laptop. I only had a phone that did not have a qwerty keypad (Nokia C1 to be precise). It was a multi-tap phone. The manufacturers called it a smart phone. I didn't think so.

I would write tons of articles and poems on A4 sheets of paper. In one year, I had bought up to three packs of A4 papers.

With candle light, I would write. When the candle finished, and as I did not have any money to buy more, I would use the light of my phone. When my phone died, and as there was no electric power to charge it, I would use a torchlight.

As far as I was concerned, I must write. It was madness. It was abnormal. But I was abnormal. So I accepted that "madness".

But let me put this story in proper perspective.

I had caught an eye disease sometime in 2011. And it stayed with me for about months. My parents used up a fortune in drugs for the eyes. They would go so red, had puss all over them, and itched really badly. I started wearing shades- even at night.

Everyone who knew me during my secondary school days at GSSS Lokoja in SSII [and more than half the school knew me] can testify to this.

Of course, an optician warned me to stay off several things, including reading in bad lighting conditions.

I honestly thought I was going to go blind very soon.

And If I didn't get enough sleep, they would hurt me so badly for the next couple of days.

So, there was AMPLE reason for me to stop writing.

BUT I CONTINUED.

And then I faced another problem.

Everything I had written, how do I put them on Facebook? Remember, I didn't have a computer system? I took that big load of papers to a typist and asked her to type them for me. The price she told me was my upkeep for two months.

Starving to death did not look like a good option for me.
I took my papers back home with me.
*******

Fast forward a couple of years later.

And, though I still did not have a computer system [one young man whom I trusted, played a fast one on me and made away with my money], I had got other phones that I used.

For me, the utility of any phone I possessed was in its ability to compose lengthier articles, have a larger memory and be able to connect to the internet.

I kept writing.

And then my diligence started paying off.

I have been paid in the 6-digits for writing a single A4 sheet for a government paper here in the North Central.

I have been paid very handsomely for editing books. I have stood before and with men of great standing within Kogi,Nigeria and beyond borders

I have met people with awesome potential, both my peers and older, who are daily delivering immense value in the Nigerian and African space.

It has become a NORM for me to be called out of the blues by persons I have NEVER met to put together articles. I have sealed huge deals with great financial incentives without meeting those I sealed the deal with.

I actively mentor and am involved in the lives of young people growing and wanting to get better in their writing- some I humbly direct to others as a result of the time demands.

I say all these with the highest sense of responsibility and deepest sense of humility.

These are just a few I am willing to share. And all of these are just a tiny fraction of where I am headed because, as far as I am concerned, I am just WARMING UP. I have not even started.

I want to repeat something very important here.

The LAST BLOW of a hammer that hit the wall before it came down, was not the ONLY BLOW that brought the wall down. It was EVERY SINGLE BLOW from the hammer that had done the SAME THING of hitting that wall in the SAME WAY for a long time.

It was not ONE post that paid off. It was not ONE Facebook note that paid off. It was not ONE article that paid off. It was ALL I had been doing in the wilderness when I thought no one was watching.

Fela Durotoye says, "PREPARATION is the PERIOD where PERFORMANCE is NOT PAID for".

A time will exist where you will perform and no one will pay. No one will even come to see you.

You will spend money on "MEGACONFERENCES" where only TWELVE AND A HALF people will show up [half- standing for a child].

You will design awesome clothes that only your mannequin will wear. You will have times where you work in a place that pays you less than you know you deserve.
These times will exist. And they will hurt.

It is a fact.

But if you will be DILIGENT in YOUR BUSINESS, eventually you will EMERGE. Glorious. Victorious. Prosperous. Celebrated. And before KINGS- not mean men.

If you hang in there, I make a solemn promise today, I will join the world to celebrate you!
[The End]
Post By:  Suleiman Abdul
Connect With Me on >
Facebook: Esoteric Hamz
Twitter:  @Hamson_Skillz
IG: @HamsonSkills1

                     The Tellrhodes blog!

Check out our other Amazing sections on the left side Bar.

IG: tellrhodesblog

FB:The Tellrhodes Blog

YouTube: tellrhodes

Gmail: tellrhodes@gmail.com