Don' t get stuck in half-time!

The first half of a rugby game is a good indicator of which way the game is likely to end, but it is hardly the determinant of the final score. Any number of incidences and opportunities may arise in the second half that can change the course of a game from an obvious result. The fact is the first half has to be played before the second. This means that half time is only a marker of progress towards an outcome. Some people go into the changing room with a sense of destiny, while others come out of the mid-term with an attitude that the game has just begun! How do you use your talk time at half-time. Do you call it quits, recommit or just take a rest? Your discussion will either prepare you for defeat or condition you to come out a winner. Kofi Annan was set to leave the UN on retirement just before he was appointed Secretary General of the world body.

What we are talking about here is not a game. It is about life. When you move from one job to the next, when you retire at the end of the day, when you are fired or when you are hired. Halftime can come around when you are retired or take time to consider your future. I have looked around me and noticed that half time is a mode of existence. It is a neither here nor there for many people considering their future after the first half of a life struggle of one kind or other. My challenge to all half-timers is that it is limited. Lick your wounds quickly, but don’t dwell on the past because the future awaits and the game can actually restart without you. If you are stuck in halftime recognize that that was just the first half. The second half is do or die - so give it your best!

You learn nothing in school; until you teach yourself.

You learn nothing in school; until you teach yourself.

I want to be a millionaire... do you?

A friend of mine reminded me that he wanted to be a millionaire by 2017. That was two years ago. He would have been fifty five. That year his business collapsed. He could not pay salaries. He put up the family home as a security for a loan, but the bank would not give him the money he needed. He had to borrow from friends, family and even neighbors to cover his debt. Two years later he says “I am not out of the woods, but I am still on track. I don’t know when the reality will come, but I have refused to let go of the dream. I know that someday it will come”. I don’t know what your goals are or what you are going through, but what matters is that you are still on track.  

A leader is to a people what a manager is to an organization...

A leader is to a people as a manager is to an organization just as an  entrepreneur is to an enterprise. Each is key, each is essential and yet each is core. All can be one as the need determines success. When among people, be a leader, when in an organization be the manager and when in an enterprise be an entrepreneur. The key to success is to understand the difference.

Eliud Kipchoge's Run...

Today, as you make your run, you are running for everyone who wants to achieve something in life. I guess that we all have our excuses, but you have shown that the gift is in the courage to try. Considering the number of us behind the line, you are already a winner! God Speed!

Leadership is...

Leadership is what you do when you want to get people from here to there.

Two principles of family finance

Inflows and outcomes

The structure that regulates family expenditure is a budget. A budget is a useful tool of resource allocation but it is not the ultimate in terms of determining wealth and success. Indeed, a budget will do no more than you tell it to do. Like the “garbage in, garbage out” principle of computer operations, people use budgets to justify their actions. While those who do use budgets should be commended for making a more than an amateur attempt at managing money, those who will succeed in creating wealth will step up to the principle of managing inflows and determining outcomes. If you appreciate that money has to come in before it can be spent, you develop a tremendous amount of respect for those who make the time an effort to generate income. Given that inflows are not a matter of visiting the bank, income is recognized as created capital some of which needs to be retained if the family is to accumulate wealth. It with this in mind that specific outcomes can be designed into the process of budgeting and the usage of those funds to facilitate family success. Principles that emerge from this understanding include; spend less than you earn, multiply what you earn and grow your savings

Seasons

Though the financial origins and circumstances of your family beginnings are unique, your destiny is determined by how well you manage the seasons of family life. Every family moves through a predictable life cycle. However, unlike the ups and downs of a normal business as a going concern, the seasons of family life are a growing concern. In other words, the concerns grow gradually and predictably over time. At the start of a family there are two youthful people with a great deal of energy and only their careers to deal with. As time moves on children and family concerns grow into rising demands of urgent attention. By middle age you family members employment or enterprise may no longer be guaranteed yet family needs are at their peak. Shortly afterwards society begins to sideline your participation in the economy and your basic needs become a crisis of continued existence. Poor preparation for seasons ahead leads to a great deal of family frustration and regret. But understanding the principle and authority of seasons will enable you to order your family life, make wise financial decisions, invest in long term priorities, build your house early and implement a strategy to earn passive income. Start sowing and saving early and by God’s grace you will harvest sustainable returns in later years that you will hand over to generations to come.   

Also read

Two Principles of Family Finance

Family Strategy

What is Family Strategy

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Family Strategy - Green Pastures

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How to use the family strategy toolkit

The Art of planning a future for your family