ADJUSTMENT

“It is possible to intervene to make your life move in a direction that suits your desires and expectations.” - Terry Mante

WISHES are not horses. Many times, we find that our prevailing realities do not line up with our desired outcomes. If your life is not going the way you desire or expect, will you just put your hands on your head and wallow in a pity party? If your spouse is not happy because of a particular shoe, will you complain or change the shoe? If you desire to lose some weight but you find that you keep gaining more pounds, are you just going to be embarrassed or will you alter your regular lifestyle practices so you could achieve your desire?

You see, there is nothing in life that happens which is not made to happen. Things don’t just happen. If you don’t like how your life is moving, you can intervene to make it move in a direction that suits your desires and expectations. You can alter the circumstances of your life. For you to make those alterations, you must understand the concept of adjustment.

According to the Encarta World English Dictionary, adjustment refers to the act of making “a slight change intended to make something fit or function better.” Sometimes, the steps you need to take to make your life better may not be so big but they could be little actions that produce big results. Nevertheless, you have to learn to take those steps.

Adjustment is an imperative. It is extremely important and cannot be ignored. It is perhaps the only sensible and logical way to change undesirable outcomes in your life. If you don’t learn to adjust, you cannot change your life.

As important as adjustment is, it must be deliberately engineered. Adjustment is an alternative course of action that is pursued to make a desire become real. If you throw a pity party after a bad business deal, it will not necessarily lead you out of indebtedness. Merely wishing that the next semester will produce better grades will not change the grades for you. There has to be a carefully crafted strategy that will help you to achieve the outcome you desire.

In making adjustment, you have to be careful not to allow the status quo to get in your way. Don’t permit the usual to bar you. The purpose of adjustment is to produce new results. New results come when you do things you have never done before. Thus if you are adjusting, you are displacing some current practices with new practices. It implies you are creating new experiences; you are doing things you have never done before. Adjustment requires shifting your paradigm.

Adjustment is a tough call. It is not done lightly. It may be contrary to your senses. It may be unreasonable. But you must see the need to amend your ways. The price may be high but the value could be priceless. You have to be able to defy your senses to make the adjustment necessary for you to reach where you want to be. You have to be willing and ready to resign from your comfort zone. Delivering the keynote address, Anthony Cudjoe remarked at DECISION that “Comfort is the enemy of significance.” You can’t have a significant life if you are not ready to swim against the tide.

If you want to see a change in your life, you must be prepared to make changes. You must live as if you are an engineer. You must design, plan and construct your life. At any point in time, if you don’t like something about the condition of your life, make a move. Initiate a new process and effect a change.

© 2011 Terry Mante
PEDNET
Accra, Ghana

INDECISION IS DECISION

“The risk of a wrong decision is preferable to the terror of indecision.” - Maimonides (1135-1204)

DECISIONS form a strong basis in every person’s life. Our lives follow the paths charted by the decisions we make. Our decisions determine our actions and our actions carve the outcome of our lives. Every moment of life is a moment of decision. There are decisions we make consciously and those we make unconsciously. And for every single decision we make, there are consequences.

It is thus critical that we take charge of the decisions of our lives. We must be deliberate about our decisions. We must take responsibility for our decisions. We must be alive to the consequences of the decisions we make.

DECISION
DECISION is a choice made out of possible or alternative courses of action. This implies that there are always options in life. In life you never run out of options. Usually, when people say “there is no option,” they actually mean the other option is a tough one and they are unable or unwilling to bear the risks and consequences that reside in pursuing that path.

Every decision has risks. Risk is the probability that the decision you make may not lead to the desired or expected outcome. It is the price you are likely to pay for your decision. Many people shy away from making decisions when they realise that the risk is high.

Another thing to note about decisions is that they have consequences. So consider your life as the outcome of past decisions. Decisions you made by yourself and those made by other people on your behalf. Your future will be constructed by the decisions you are making today. Your legacy after you are dead will be a reflection of the decisions you are making today. Hear Tony Robbins, “It is in the moments of decision that your destiny is shaped.”

INDECISION
IF YOU hesitate to make any kind of decision, you suffer from the cancer of indecision. People use indecision as a tool to recuse themselves of the responsibility to make decisions. I hope you are not one of those people. I hereby bring to your notice that indecision is one option in decision-making. That means there are consequences for indecision. There is a price for indecision. And I have noticed that the price is mostly higher than the price you pay for your decisions. Hence the thought of Spanish philosopher Maimonides (1135-1204) that “The risk of a wrong decision is preferable to the terror of indecision.” Trust me, indecision is a notorious terrorist.

If you refuse to take charge of your decisions, you lose control of your life. You relinquish your destiny to forces outside your realm. It’s easier to be indecisive than make decisions. But it is easier to live with the consequences of your decisions than your indecisions. You know why? George Canning says “Indecision and delays are the parents of failure.” Thus if you want to avoid misery in your life, you have to learn how to make decisions that give you success, significance and substance.

© 2011 Terry Mante
PEDNET
Accra, Ghana

A CASE STUDY ON INFLUENCE

“Strive not to be a success, but rather to be of value.” – Albert Einstein (1879-1955)

Lula da Silva of Brazil

LUIZ Inácio Lula da Silva. Everybody calls him Lula. He served as 35th President of Brazil (2003-2011). At the time of his presidential mandate, Lula was regarded as the most popular politician in the history of Brazil. Greeting him at the G-20 Summit in London, UK in 2009 United States President Barack Obama endorsed him saying, "That's my man right there... The most popular politician on earth." Call him “saviour of the poor” and perhaps no Brazilian would debate you.

Uneasy path
He was the seventh child of Aristides Inácio da Silva and Eurídice Ferreira de Melo in the midst of eight children. Lula’s childhood was quite tough and challenging. Just two weeks after his birth in the Brazillian Caetés district, Lula’s dad moved to another state with Eurídice’s cousin named Valdomira Ferreira de Góis. At age seven, when his mum decided to rejoin Aristides in São Paulo, they arrived only to discover that Aristide had started a second family with Valdomira. After sometime, Euridice decided to move Lula and his seven other siblings from Aristides’ home since the two families were not coexisting peacefully. They found a place in the back room of a bar. And since then Lula scarcely saw his father.

Being raised by a ‘single’ mother who was not well-to-do had its bouquet of limitations for boy Lula and his seven siblings. His formal education was quite limited. He didn’t start school until he was ten and by the fourth grade had to quit in order to work to support his family. From age twelve Lula worked in various capacities as street hawker, shoe shiner, lathe operator in a copper processing factory, press operator in an automobile parts outfit and union leader.

Leader, not just president
In the course of time Lula got interested in politics, teamed up with a group of intellectuals and union leaders to form the Workers Party. After three failed attempts at the presidency, he eventually won the elections of 2002 and served two terms as president from 2003 to 2011. He was a president without a university degree; the first such person in Brazil. Lula was also the first working class person to lead that huge South American state.

In spite of his coarse background, his presidency saw the Brazilian middle class grow by 29 million people enhancing the purchasing power of many Brazilians. Another 20 million people were lifted from deep poverty. Remarkably, Lula so improved the Brazilian economy that by the time he was exiting office, Brazil had become a lending nation to the IMF making available up to $5 million as loans to other nations. Not only that, before Lula left office, Brazil was awarded the hosting rights for the 2014 FIFA World Cup and 2016 Summer Olympics in Rio de Janeiro. Together with Ghana’s former president John Kufuor, Lula was awarded the World Food Prize 2011 for his role in curbing poverty and hunger in Brazil.

Undoubtedly, Lula made an indelible imprint on his nation. Coming from highly challenging circumstances, he was able to rise to become a very influential person in Brazil. Like Lula, each one of us can be influential. We have the capacity to make a difference in the world. We have what it takes to influence the society, or at least an aspect of society.


© 2011 Terry Mante
PEDNET
Accra, Ghana