It’s a common theme nowadays to have a ton of half-done or unfinished projects.
So many times it’s from bursts of unsustained creativity. Other times it’s just down to a lack of organisation and cluttering an already overcrowded life and schedule.
But focus changes everything.
Focus and an emphasis on purpose totally simplifies your life.
It defines where you direct your priceless enegy – what you do and don’t do.
Unfocused people try to do too much – and this eventually leads to unnecessary stress, avoidable fatigue, and conflict with your inner self and with others.
Focus simplifies your life.
You concentrate your effort and energy on only what’s important. And so, you grow in every area of your life by simply being selective with a few parts of it.
There is nothing quite as potent as a focused life, one lived on purpose.
The men and women who have made the greatest difference in history were the most focused.
“Without a clear purpose, you will keep changing directions, jobs, relationships, churches, or other externals – hoping each change will settle the confusion or fill the emptiness in your heart. You think, Maybe this time it will be different, but it doesn’t solve your real problem-a lack of focus and purpose.” – Rick Warren
Instead of being involved in too many things at once, just simply spending one hour completely dedicated to a particular project could change your life.
Make a decision today to focus on what’s important. Not just only focusing, but also carrying it out to the end.
One of the World Cups with too many wonderful highlights: Ronaldo Da Lima’s haircut(I was rocking something similar, although less bizarre 🤣) Klose scoring all of his five goals with his head. His HEAD only!!!
I remember that diving header against Saudi Arabia. How I described it to whoever cared to listen. I used to tell them he used his head to roll the ball over the line. Lmao
I even tried it a few times and thankfully never got kicked in the head.
But my most wonderful memory of that World Cup was the Turkish team.
That team had incredible ballers like Hasan Sas and Hakan Sukur.
I remember watching the third-place playoffs between them and South Korea at my Uncle’s house. Amazing stuff!
Their goalkeeper Rustu Recber (I didn’t even know his name till this morning) had anti-glare paint under his eyes.
It made him look like Oded Fehr in The Mummy. You have no idea how impressionable that meant to a child.
If you’ve seen The Mummy, you’ll surely remember a Samurai lookalike with pretty tattoos on his face.
So, I woke up last night and couldn’t go back to sleep again.
Somehow, my mind drifted to that team and I decided to do a quick Google search just to relive the experience.
That Google search led me down a rabbit hole and affirmed something that’s been on my mind for quite some time.
I started with Hasan Sas, but what I saw on Hakan Sukur shook me to the marrows!
From scoring the fastest goal ever in World Cup history to being the country’s all-time leading goalscorer to being named as the greatest Turkish player of the last fifty years, he built on that reputation and delved into politics becoming a Member of Parliament.
But guess what?
Nowadays, he’s wanted for arrest in Turkey after he was charged with insulting the Turkish President on Twitter.
It doesn’t even end there.
He’s being charged with being a member of a movement designated as a terrorist organisation in Turkey.
According to his Wikipedia, Şükür fled Turkey in November 2017, taking up self-exile inSan Francisco, Californiaand planning to become a restaurateur in Palo Alto.He left this job because “strange people kept coming into the bar”.
In January 2020, Şükür told Germany’sWelt am Sonntagthat he was working as anUberdriver and selling books in the United States. He also said that his houses, businesses and bank accounts in Turkey had been seized by the government.
Imagine going from the greatest player in a country’s history to being on the run from the same country. Alarming.
This post has nothing to do with Sukur’s political leanings, neither is it a demonstration of sympathy, but it’s always funny when people bash celebrities for not using their platforms to protest against the government, or not becoming the next Fela.
Fela was tortured and imprisoned repeatedly by different governments. His ageing mother was thrown from a balcony by soldiers, resulting in her death, just to prove a point to him.
Being Fela came with a prize.
Fighting a government is the hardest thing any single one individual can do.
It’s always an unending battle.
Ostracism, threat to life (yours and family), alienation, loss of money and property, and the list goes on.
There’ve been reports floating around already of DJ Switch being haunted for her Instagram Live broadcast of the #LekkiGenocide at the #EndSARS protest.
In certain quarters, DJ Switch is a hero.
In some, she’s the ultimate villain. And her crime? Exposing a government that opened fire on unarmed and harmless protesters.
At this point, being DJ Switch has a prize.
From Fela to Hakan Sukur to DJ Switch, the underlying theme is simple: fighting the government sounds easy in theory, but is not for faint of heart.
So, the next time you feel a certain urge to call out a celebrity for not speaking up with their platform, ask yourself if you’d truly do the same if you were in their shoes.
No need to rush into saying yes, self-awareness and soul searching doesn’t happen in a split second.
“Everything I touch may disintegrate into dust/Everything I trust may dishonour me in disgust” – Kendrick Lamar (Holy Key)
Most of the things you’re bothered by right now might not matter in a year – money in the bank, a spouse, a stalling career, your family – not because they weren’t important in the first place, but because time has a way of reordering things.
At every point of our lives we want to be in total control of everything happening to us, so, the absence of a spouse when you are lonely or a career stalling after putting so much time and effort into it makes you feel helpless.
No adult likes to feel vulnerable. One of the reasons people have a hard time falling in love.
Vulnerability and helplessness reminds us of a time in our lives when we were children and had to depend entirely on our parents for even things as simple as feeding ourselves.
And so we build buffers. Buffers for security – financial, mental, emotional et al.
But the uncertainty of life means those buffers might fail someday.
Knowing this, the anxiety goes from an inability to build these buffers (or build them quickly enough) to the ability of these buffers to hold when things go awry.
Worry becomes an endless cycle.
And this eventually spills over into your decisions, affecting everything it comes into contact with.
Do you need my advice?
Two sets of advice actually. Hold on. Let go.
Holding on is a reminder that you should have an unshakable belief in yourself and in your abilities. A reminder that it gets better eventually.
Letting go is a reminder that you can only do so much. A reminder that there are a thousand other things beyond your sphere of control, and just letting the universe do its magic.
And you’ll find peace of mind from focusing on the things you can directly control.
True freedom comes with control. True control depends on knowing what to hold on to and what to let go. Because holding on to what you should let go is you simply creating unnecessary battle scenarios in your life.
The worst battles have to be the ones you intentionally or unintentionally create in your head. Saps all your energy, keeps you anxious, drains you mentally and physically and eventually weighs you down completely.
Better to be focused on what’s in front of you. A better use of your time and energy.
Your life doesn’t have to be in overdrive all the time. It pays to take your foot off the gas sometimes.
