Inspirational

02
Jun
2018

Is It Wrong To Be Richer Than Everyone Else?

A few nights ago, I was chatting with my friends when an interesting topic came up.  It was about money, taxation – how they charge an “Estate Tax” on the fortunes that wealthy people pass down to their children or whoever is inheriting from them.

It is a very huge tax, especially if you’re inheriting quite a sum.  I was quick to say that it was wrong for the government to be taking a huge chunk of people’s inheritance but, to my greatest surprise, my friends thought it was the right thing to do –they applauded it.

One reason I cherish my friends is that they are always open to reason.  When we have divergent opinions, we discuss and debate them, raise points and counterpoints; very respectfully and intelligently too!

So debate we did, and I want to present the points they raised to support taking away almost half of people’s inherited wealth from them, and the points I raised to counter them.

My aim is to get feedback from you on what you think –am I right to think this way or are they?

So, here goes… Continue reading →

Posted by Akanna Okeke in Articles, 1 comment
02
Jun
2018

4 Wrong Mindsets You May Have About Money

In my last article of 2016 (on BellaNaija), I talked about the five discoveries that ‘blew my mind’ that year.  The last one was that “money explains everything” I explained that how you make and spend money can tell me the kind of person you are.  It can explain to me why you have certain conditions and situations constantly around you.

Your relationship with money simply boils down to your mindset. Money simply reveals (or magnifies) who you truly are, deep inside.

Some people subconsciously avoid making or receiving a lot of money for fear of revealing who they really are. Many of us cannot handle that aggrandized base-self of ours.

You are what you think. So, just as the way you handle money reveals who you are, what you think about money will determine how much of it you will ever have, and how you will handle what you eventually have.

These are four limiting mindsets around money. They are common misconceptions that limit people from either making more money or handling the one they currently have, appropriately. Or both!

Here they are:

Continue reading →

Posted by Akanna Okeke in Articles, 0 comments
24
May
2018

5 Things That May Keep You Poor

Passing Over Opportunities Repeatedly (POOR), is a clever acronym that I once heard for the word ‘poor’.  There’s some truth to it. In fact, there’s a lot of truth to it!  If you think about it; the reason poor people would remain poor is because they continuously pass over many opportunities to become rich(er).

Now, of course, many of them do not recognize these opportunities when they see them, simply because they lack access to the information that helps you recognize opportunities. So we call them “the less-fortunate” because the only reason we seem more fortunate than them is because we’re more informed and prepared to both recognize and seize such opportunities when they arise.  ‘Luck’ is simply when opportunity meets preparedness.

Things that keep you poor, or stop you from expanding your wealth, are usually in your ‘blind spot’; you don’t see them. If you did, you would do away with them. I should say, you see them, but you don’t recognize them and therefore you don’t recognize the opportunities that come by to help you do away with them.

Well, this article is here to help!  Not only is it going to point out those things that will keep you poor, it is also going to open up your eyes to what to do to change them.  We’ll start with 5 of them, and hopefully start a conversation that would lead to more.

Continue reading →

Posted by Akanna Okeke in Articles, 0 comments
15
May
2018

5 Unlikely Situations That Reveal Your Insecurities

I saw a post on social media. It was a video portraying the lifestyle of Nigeria’s super rich in England.  The person who posted it left a sort of warning that said “don’t hate, just watch and enjoy”.  However, the comments I saw beneath the posting did not reflect a heed to that warning.  The ‘commenters’ were seething with indignation over what they thought was an ostentatious display of wealth by the characters in the video.

I later had a discussion with a friend and the topic of the video came up. He had not seen it at the time, but he had something profound to say; not about the video, but about the viewers and their comments.  He said that situations like that usually revealed people’s insecurities.  So those comments were simply people projecting their insecurity onto what they thought was a threat to it; a revelation of it –they felt ‘exposed’.

This got me thinking about situations in life where I have projected my insecurities or have watched others do so.  I came up with this non-exhaustive list with the intent of perhaps helping you to identify yours, and begin to address them.

 

Continue reading →

Posted by Akanna Okeke in Articles, 1 comment
12
Apr
2018

Believe It or Not, These 3 Laws Are Currently Working For or Against You!

If you read my last parable of the two little fish, you would have gleaned that there are laws that govern us in the world, such as the law of gravity.  These laws have, built in them, the consequences and the rewards for breaking and obeying them.  No one will come and punish you for stepping off the corner of the roof of a very tall building.  The law of gravity itself will pay you the consequences of that.

We understand all these things physically.  What we most times don’t realize is that these laws are also in effect non-physically.

I didn’t do so well in Physics back in high school. I remember getting an E8 grade in my first term of taking the subject and my dad was so disappointed because he had a Bachelor’s in Applied Math & Physics.  So, that holiday, he made sure he privately tutored me in the subject of Physics.  I didn’t enjoy it much, but the only things I remember marveling at were the laws.  They were so realistic and applied to everyday life.  I even started doing well in the calculations because, having understood the principles, I could set up the right equations for solving any Physics “word problem” at that level.

“Just master the principles!” He would always yell.

Mastering those principles has helped me master the way the world really works to some degree now.  You see, those laws in physics apply to our personal lives as much as they apply to the world around us.

Let’s take a look at only 3 of them and see how true this is.  I hope that, from here, you would think of more laws and how they apply to your personal life as well; because whether you know it or not they are currently rewarding you for obeying them or punishing you for breaking them. Continue reading →

Posted by Akanna Okeke in Articles, 1 comment
30
Mar
2018

Breaking the Rules But Obeying the Law

There was a little fish named Azu.  He lived in a river with his parents.  As he was growing up, he began to swim with his mates, together as a school.

His parents always told him to make sure he swam along with the rest, and kept formation –stayed in line.  He obeyed his parents but he just found it boring, swimming with the same group and in the same pattern every single day.  He would do this back and forth every day, and return home to his parents in the evenings and they always welcomed him home with a smile.

One day, Azu was at the peak of his boredom and frustration from sticking to the rules without any understanding as to why he had to.  So, he decided to break formation.  He stepped out of line, out of school, and was swimming alone. Continue reading →

Posted by Akanna Okeke in Articles, 0 comments
03
Mar
2018

3 Reasons Why Good Ideas Come in the Shower

The bathroom is a very powerful part of the house.  It is where the pressed find release; where the soiled find cleansing; where the stressed find calm and rest; where the frog-throats sing like birds; and where the insecure feel comfortable in their own skin.

But something even more powerful usually takes place in there: ideas are conceived, ideas that rule the world.  I don’t know if it’s the same for you, but most of my best ideas always come to me in the shower.  The frustrating part of it all is that I can’t even remember most of them when I’m out the shower. It’s like something steals it away from me once I walk out those doors. It is also hard for me to capture them while I’m in the shower. If I’m lucky enough to remember, then I write down the ideas when I get to my bedroom.

But the question is: why do those ideas come when you’re in the shower?  Why do they come so easily and, sometimes, in multiple doses? And you know that they are very good ones, you can feel it! Sometimes, it’s a good article to write, lyrics to a song you’re composing, the perfect answer to a text message you’ve been holding off on replying, or even the name of someone you’ve been racking your brains to remember all day.

I have a theory as to why this happens. Why you get your good ideas in the shower; the shower where you have no paper or pen to capture those good ideas. I don’t know if you would agree with me, but I implore you to give it a thought and see if it makes sense to you.

So, here goes. These are 3 reasons why you get your best ideas in the bathroom. Continue reading →

Posted by Akanna Okeke in Articles, 3 comments
03
Mar
2018

These 6 Things May Be Hindering Your Creativity

Everything we see around us today – the houses we live in, the cars we drive, the phones we use in communicating, even the food we eat – was created twice.

Yes, twice; first in the mind, and then in the physical. Although we only get to see them and use them at the second stage of creation, the first stage is absolutely crucial. Without it, there would be no physical manifestation, no impact, and no contribution to society.

We are all innately creative.  We all love it when we get good feedback on our output. A mother constantly asks her kids how they liked that new recipe she cooked up, a telephone company would call their customers to ask how they find the service (even though they know they might get a “face your work” response), and an employee eagerly awaits his appraisal remarks from his boss to know where he stands in the organization.

Creativity drives us.  It makes us active and passionate participants in life.  One who does not create stays stagnant and passive; very boring.  Worse still, they could do the opposite of creating by destroying things.

Not only does creativity drive us, it drives our economy.  Anyone who puts their work out there consistently enough would usually get a favourable financial feedback.  Therefore, it is never our intention to sabotage this by killing our creativity.  Most times, however, we just don’t know when we are doing so.

Here are six ways, I have discovered, by which we destroy our creative ability, leading to less productivity and ultimately less (self and financial) worth. Continue reading →

Posted by Akanna Okeke in Articles, 3 comments
03
Mar
2018

My Top 10 Books So Far

This is in response to a request made by one of my frequent readers in the comments section underneath my article:“This Year, Do the ONE THING”.

This comment was made by Tutu:

Meanwhile, can you do a post on your all time favourite books. Trying to build my 2018 list. Thank you.

I started taking personal growth and development seriously around September of 2015, and one of the personal growth activities which I’ve avidly participated in since then is reading books – books aimed at addressing crucial areas of life where we all need to develop in order to become better versions of ourselves.

It is from these books – the ones I’ve read so far – that I draw out this list of my top ten books.  I hope that you find my recommendations helpful!

Continue reading →

Posted by Akanna Okeke in Book Reviews, 1 comment
24
Feb
2018

So, This is My Love Language

In my article “What Love Language Do You Speak“, I told you that my girlfriend and I both started the year off reading The 5 Love Languages by Gary Chapman.  It was our book for the month of January as we sought to understand each other better, and learn to speak each other’s love languages.

Before reading the book though, we both took the Love Language Profile for Couples online, individually.  The purpose was to try to figure out what our primary love languages were, even though we hadn’t read the book yet.

It came out that she had 3 primary love languages: Acts of Service, Physical Touch and Quality Time; scoring 7 in each of those, out of 12.

You can imagine how daunting that looked to me.  I mean, the main purpose here was to find out the one primary love language that we could focus on, and pay the most attention to, while speaking the rest every once in a while.  Now, it was looking like I had to focus on 3. Three out of five! Continue reading →

Posted by Akanna Okeke in Articles, Book Reviews, 1 comment