A man’s mind may be likened to a garden, which may be intelligently cultivated or allowed to run wild; but whether cultivated or neglected, it must, and will, bring forth. If no useful seeds are put into it, then an abundance of useless weed seeds will fall therein, and will continue to produce their kind. ― James Allen, As a Man Thinketh
Almost everything we do or achieve in life is dependent on our thoughts and the energy we put into them followed actions. Clearly succeours in life heavily depends on these investments; our desires, our imagination, our beliefs and our habits. There is need for purposeful cultivation of these to attain intended goals in life.
But, most importantly, a ‘decided mind’ is key in achieving our goals and especially long-term goals. We need to have vision and set our minds it. There is an introspective journey that we need to embark on as individuals and as a country. What is our vision as a country? What is our goal as individuals? the year 2018 is almost over, what have we achieved?
As a country we sometimes seem to be swirling deeper into a retrogressive maelstrom. As a collective force the country seems to lack the sense of purpose and productivity to achieve the goals that are to benefit its citizens on wholescale.
One of the obvious challenges is what we are focusing our energies on and where are we focusing our energies. Our imaginations, desires, beliefs and actions are invested in all the wrong places. To be precise, they are invested in all the trivial places.
We love trivia and cannot get enough of it. If trivia could feed and develop us, we would be a mighty nation by now. But it doesn’t. We love to laugh at what others are doing and what our leaders are doing forgetting that the time spent on this trivia means we are actually not doing anything productive ourselves but simply being petty and foolish. Even the holy book says foolish laughter is stupid (Ecclesiastes 7:6).
Everything that is trivia is over played and over sensationalized. Whether it is a celebrity’s new hairstyle, the perceived error of a headline in the national paper or the nude images of someone or the latest scandal; trivia rides the day. We love to hold on our negative vibes and feed on the misery of others and the country at large. Insulting the leadership is also a favourite; we do not seem to learn about making our point using our sense of reason.
If we were the ones on the leadership mantle would we really do better? Over-trivializing everything already gives an answer to that question. We are wasting time. And we are not ‘leading’ in our personal lives. In any case, let us start making our way to leadership through our daily actions
We forget that the things we write on our social media accounts collectively reflect on the country to the international community and we turn around and become “offended” when BBC and the international community view us as poor people in both mind, body and soul. Why? We are perpetuating inferiority complexes and throwing them around for everyone to see.
Many have taken advantage of this lack of vision and insecurity and capitalize on it. That is why we find people from other countries running profitable businesses in Malawi and snatching it away from us. That is why we believe someone from another country can lead us better than a fellow Malawian in our organisations.
Where are we investing our thoughts? What do we act on? What do we believe in We have to wake up and realise that we are all part of the whole and we all have the responsibility to forge this country forward through our day to day actions and beliefs. We can say it is our leaders we have lost faith in, but I believe we don’t have faith in ourselves. We do not believe in ourselves. We need to have faith in ourselves and restructure our thoughts.
A man is literally what he thinks, his character being the complete sum of all his thoughts.―James Allen, As a Man Thinketh
I rest my case.
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