THE CONSPIRACY OF THE COLONIAL MASTERS CALLED CIVILIZATION
It started immediately after independence when our country, Nigeria was officially recognized as an independent state, I still read till today the fanfare that ensued, but what Nigerians don’t know was the thoughts in the minds of the colonial masters. We used to be slaves to them, but we just gained freedom officially, but not total freedom because we were yet to be free mentally, they knew the secret to being truly free which is through the mind, everyman they say is a product of his mind, but they never freed our mind. Hence, as long as we we still carry around that slave mentality we will forever be slaves either to our colonial masters or ourselves.
They kept telling us we were not good enough, nor are we their equal, because they knew we will always be second rated. This slave mentally drove us into believing we have to speak their language to be successful, so we learn trades in their language. This same mentally drove Michael Jackson one of the most fulfilled black man in African history, to change the colour of his skin while his mind wanting always to prove to the whites that blacks are their equal, but it never worked out and I’m sure we all know till date in America the story has only improved, but has not changed.
Back to Nigeria, Our cultural values system has been totally deleted through this same slave mentality embedded right from the colonial master’s invasion into our country, they made our leaders sell our God given nature and culture in exchange for pairs of mirror and other things. We now hardly speak our language; in fact we feel ashamed and sometimes get punished for not been able to speak borrowed languages well. We see it as a thing of pride when our kids know foreign cultures but not ours, we usually call it civilization, we don’t eat our meals any more neither do we tell our kids the story of our generation. We gradually became a lost generation.
Gradually our nation and heritage started dying, but even at that we were unperturbed, so far we still had food on our tables, but quietly Boko-haram and unemployment started eating deep into our society wrecking more havoc than we’ve seen in the last decades. And yet we still haven’t gone back to the drawing board for us to understand how we got here in the first place. We forgot the only item we are producing which is oil, can’t even employ 1% of our employable hands, while the rest the government is struggling to engage in unproductive activities, hence we had a very huge volume of unproductive civil servants whose weight has started telling on the nation’s budget, threatening by the day our co-existence as a nation.
Kidnapping, armed robbery, rape and insurgency has now taken headlines in our news editions, since we had so many idle hands in our society, they eat by the day and so must exert their energy on something or someone, interestingly they chose to destroy our nation, our heritage and value system. Hunger or unemployment is now the excuse of most crimes because they know, that aspect of our society is already a norm, everybody is either hungry or unemployed. Our political system has enriched so many that we now see political offices as National cake where everybody has to have their fair share before it finishes, the saying “survival of the fittest” is now so often used, what happened to being our brother’s keeper, and loving thy neighbor as thy self.
Nigeria, created as a giant even before our colonial masters invaded us is still blessed. Our riches (though we kept losing them to foreigners) are beyond bound; unlimited resources God has placed in our hands. We can still tap from them only if we are willing to change our attitude towards our resources, create products from it and sell them to ensure we create wealth within our society.
Join me in this series as we continue the debate by posting your contributions below, or follow us on @engage me_naija, and on Facebook.
My name is Soyebi Samson, I stand for Positive change in my society, Engage me Nigeria, Engage Change.
Saturday, 26 April 2014
A success story
How Bill Gates and Michael Jordan Met the 10,000-Hour Principle – Darasimi Oshodi
“Champions do not become champions when they win an event, but in the hours, weeks, and months, and years they spend preparing for it. The victorious performance itself is merely a demonstration of their championship character.”
The statement above is credited to Michael Jordan who is arguably the best basket ball player ever.
Jordan’s long time coach, Phil Jackson reveals that it was hard work that made him a legend. When Jordan first entered the league, his jump shot wasn’t good enough. He spent his off season taking hundreds of jumpers a day until it was perfect. He says Jordan’s defining characteristic wasn’t his talent but the humility to know he had to work constantly to be the best.
From childhood, Serena and Venus Williams would go to the tennis court at 6 o’clock in the morning before going to school and when they returned from school, go back for tennis practice. Any wonder then the two of them have dominated women’s tennis.
It is reported that Demosthenes, a great orator of Ancient Greece, stammered and was inarticulate as a youth yet became a great orator through dedicated practice which included placing pebbles in his mouth.
I read that Tiger Woods’ father started teaching him golf at eighteen months. So it should not be too surprising that he took the world of golf by storm at age eighteen.
The Beatles performed live in Germany over 1,200 times between 1960 and 1964 and by the time they went back to England they had become inimitable. Those hours spent performing paid off.
Bill Gates gained access to a computer in 1968 at the age of 13 and spent thousands of hours programming on it. His efforts have been hugely rewarded.
In his book, Outliers, Malcolm Gladwell posited that to become a world-class expert in any field, an individual needs to practice for ten thousand (10,000) hours. It is known as the 10,000-hour rule or principle. His argument is that it takes about 10,000 hours of dedicated practice to truly master a skill. 10,000 hours of dedicated practice in a particular area of interest will make a person an expert. The 10000-hour principle was not propounded by Gladwell though; he only popularised it.
I read in another place that scientific research has concluded that it takes eight to twelve years of training for a talented player/athlete to reach elite levels and that this is called the ten-year or 10,000-hour rule, which translates to slightly more than three hours of practice daily for ten years. I also read that research now shows that the lack of natural talent is irrelevant to great success. Through practice, you can become what you desire to become.
Hope you are getting the drift of this write-up. This is it: the key to attaining phenomenal success in any endeavour is, to a great extent, a matter of practicing or doing a specific task over and over. I am not asking you to start striving towards meeting the 10000-hour mark. All I am saying is that for us to be hugely successful in whatever we have chosen to do, we must do it over and over again. We should not be waiting for lady luck to smile on us.
Before you jump out to begin your practice, listen to what Michael Jordan has to say: “You can practice shooting eight hours a day, but if your technique is wrong, then all you become is very good at shooting the wrong way. Get the fundamentals down and the level of everything you do will rise.”
Did you get that? Though practice or repeated performance is very essential, it should be done the right way. It is important to practice the right way. And I want to add that if you must commit hours to a particular task or activity, such activity must be what you really enjoy or else you will be sentencing yourself to a life of dissatisfaction, disappointment and frustration.
I couldn’t resist the urge to end this piece with another inspiring quote from Michael Jordan: “I’ve missed more than 9000 shots in my career. I’ve lost almost 300 games. 26 times, I’ve been trusted to take the game winning shot and missed. I’ve failed over and over and over again in my life. And that is why I succeed. . . . I can accept failure, but I can’t accept not trying.”
Darasimi Oshodi is a blogger. Read his blogs at darasimioshodi.blogspot.com
Twitter handle: @Aristotle274
The views expressed above are solely that of the author and not of Omojuwa.com or its associates.
“Champions do not become champions when they win an event, but in the hours, weeks, and months, and years they spend preparing for it. The victorious performance itself is merely a demonstration of their championship character.”
The statement above is credited to Michael Jordan who is arguably the best basket ball player ever.
Jordan’s long time coach, Phil Jackson reveals that it was hard work that made him a legend. When Jordan first entered the league, his jump shot wasn’t good enough. He spent his off season taking hundreds of jumpers a day until it was perfect. He says Jordan’s defining characteristic wasn’t his talent but the humility to know he had to work constantly to be the best.
From childhood, Serena and Venus Williams would go to the tennis court at 6 o’clock in the morning before going to school and when they returned from school, go back for tennis practice. Any wonder then the two of them have dominated women’s tennis.
It is reported that Demosthenes, a great orator of Ancient Greece, stammered and was inarticulate as a youth yet became a great orator through dedicated practice which included placing pebbles in his mouth.
I read that Tiger Woods’ father started teaching him golf at eighteen months. So it should not be too surprising that he took the world of golf by storm at age eighteen.
The Beatles performed live in Germany over 1,200 times between 1960 and 1964 and by the time they went back to England they had become inimitable. Those hours spent performing paid off.
Bill Gates gained access to a computer in 1968 at the age of 13 and spent thousands of hours programming on it. His efforts have been hugely rewarded.
In his book, Outliers, Malcolm Gladwell posited that to become a world-class expert in any field, an individual needs to practice for ten thousand (10,000) hours. It is known as the 10,000-hour rule or principle. His argument is that it takes about 10,000 hours of dedicated practice to truly master a skill. 10,000 hours of dedicated practice in a particular area of interest will make a person an expert. The 10000-hour principle was not propounded by Gladwell though; he only popularised it.
I read in another place that scientific research has concluded that it takes eight to twelve years of training for a talented player/athlete to reach elite levels and that this is called the ten-year or 10,000-hour rule, which translates to slightly more than three hours of practice daily for ten years. I also read that research now shows that the lack of natural talent is irrelevant to great success. Through practice, you can become what you desire to become.
Hope you are getting the drift of this write-up. This is it: the key to attaining phenomenal success in any endeavour is, to a great extent, a matter of practicing or doing a specific task over and over. I am not asking you to start striving towards meeting the 10000-hour mark. All I am saying is that for us to be hugely successful in whatever we have chosen to do, we must do it over and over again. We should not be waiting for lady luck to smile on us.
Before you jump out to begin your practice, listen to what Michael Jordan has to say: “You can practice shooting eight hours a day, but if your technique is wrong, then all you become is very good at shooting the wrong way. Get the fundamentals down and the level of everything you do will rise.”
Did you get that? Though practice or repeated performance is very essential, it should be done the right way. It is important to practice the right way. And I want to add that if you must commit hours to a particular task or activity, such activity must be what you really enjoy or else you will be sentencing yourself to a life of dissatisfaction, disappointment and frustration.
I couldn’t resist the urge to end this piece with another inspiring quote from Michael Jordan: “I’ve missed more than 9000 shots in my career. I’ve lost almost 300 games. 26 times, I’ve been trusted to take the game winning shot and missed. I’ve failed over and over and over again in my life. And that is why I succeed. . . . I can accept failure, but I can’t accept not trying.”
Darasimi Oshodi is a blogger. Read his blogs at darasimioshodi.blogspot.com
Twitter handle: @Aristotle274
The views expressed above are solely that of the author and not of Omojuwa.com or its associates.
Success is never too early
Tara Fela-Durotoye (born March 6, 1977)[1] is a Nigerian makeup artist and lawyer. A pioneer in the bridal makeup profession in Nigeria, She launched the first bridal directory in 1999, set up international standard makeup studio, and established the first makeup school in Nigeria.
She is the founder and current CEO of House of Tara International[2] the creator of the Tara Orekelewa Beauty range, Inspired Perfume and the H.I.P Beauty range.
In 2007, She was awarded the Africa SMME Award and the Entrepreneur award in South Africa.[3]
Early lifeEdit
Tara Fela-Durotoye was born at St. Nicholas Hospital, Lagos, the daughter of Mr John Ejegi Sagay, a commissioner at the Federal Civil Service, Nigeria and Mrs Felicia Omaghomi. The Couple separated when She was eight months old; born into a polygamous home, she was brought up by her father's wife Mrs Modupe Agnes Sagay. She started her education at Command Children School, Victoria Island and proceeded to Nigeria Navy Secondary School, Ojo, where she was a boarder. In form 5, she was made the Sanitary and Welfare Prefect. She graduated from the Lagos State University, with a degree in Law and proceeded to fully establish the beauty Company,[4] House of Tara International.
She is married to Fela Durotoye,[5] a Prolific Business Strategist and Corporate Activator; Chief Executive Officer of [6] Visible Impact and blessed with three sons, Mobolurin, Demilade & Morolaoluwa.
Contributions and achievementsEdit
Over the past 12 years,[when?] Tara Fela-Durotoye has been dedicated to realising her vision of building a globally respected beauty company of African origin.
Fela-Durotoye is the Managing Director and Creative Director of HOUSE OF TARA INTERNATIONAL, a leading player in the make-up sector of Nigeria's beauty industry. The organisation has grown into a franchise enterprise with three main lines of business: The Make-up Studio, The Makeup School and the TARA product line comprising beauty products and professional make-up kits.
Tara is widely considered as a veteran in the beauty industry,[citation needed] who has pioneered the bridal make up profession in Nigeria, starting her make-up business whilst an undergraduate in the Faculty of Law, Lagos State University.
Tara is a trained and certified make-up artist of Charles Fox, Convent Garden, London. In a series of firsts, she launched her bridal make-up business in 1998. Thereafter, she launched the first bridal directory in Nigeria in 1999. In 2000, she facilitated the first-ever series of bridal seminars, drawing for the first time in Nigeria celebrated professionals in the bridal industry to speak to brides.
She has franchises spread across Nigeria (branches in Lagos, Ibadan, Port-Harcourt and Abuja) and with emerging footprint on the West African coastal countries of Cotonou, Ghana and Senegal.
She established the country's first make-up school in 2004, and also launched the TARA product line, comprising a range of professional tool kits (such as make-up boxes, brushes and purses) for make-up artists and a wide range of make-up products including eye shadows, eye liner, lip gloss, foundation and powders on a brand platform promoting ethics and ethnicity, by empowering young women for economic independence without moral compromise, just as it flies the proudly Nigerian flag.
In 2008, at a record-setting celebration of her tenth anniversary in Lagos, she surprised the nation with the launch of her first perfume fragrance aptly called "Be Inspired".
She is a highly sought-after speaker at entrepreneurial platforms including conferences, TV programmes, newspaper and magazine publications and electronic media platforms.[citation needed] She is a favourite speaker at women business conferences, youth empowerment seminars and faith-based gatherings, where she speaks on topics ranging from finding your purpose, identifying your talent, building and managing businesses, maintaining a successful career and marriage.[citation needed]
She is also a mentor for make-up artists and small business owners. Through her make-up school, she has developed and trained about 300 make-up artists who are now active players in Nigerian beauty industry. She has also succeeded in empowering over 600 young ladies (most of whom are in the tertiary institutions) with the Tara Orekelewa beauty representatives' initiative that makes them financially independent, improving their self esteem while building their marketing and entrepreneurial skills.[citation needed]
AwardsEdit
Some of Tara's many national and international awards include:
Entrepreneur of the Year (The Future Awards)[7]
Young Person of the Year 2007 (The Future Awards)
Best Makeup Artist (Fashion and Style magazine)
Award for Excellence in the Beauty Sector 2006(City People magazine)
Pioneer Award for Beauty 2006. (Fashion and Style Award)
Young Entrepreneur of the Year (Lagos Enterprise Award)[8]
Wedding Planner Honorary award for mentoring other make artists, January 2008
Award for excellence (beauty), city people
1st lady award for Women empowerment
Under her leadership, House of Tara International has won several awards including
Right Vision Movement Award Creativity & Productivity Make over Outlet of the year 2006.
The Africa SMME Award presented in South Africa and the Entrepreneur of the Year award.2007
Creative business award of the year, success digest 2008
She is presently working on her book How to Turn Your Hobby into a Thriving Business.
ReferencesEdit
Ibukun Awosika, The Girl Entrepreneur
House of Tara International
Africa SMME Award
Official Website of House of Tara International
Fela Durotoye
Official Website of Visible Impact
"The Future Awards""
"The Nation Online"
She is the founder and current CEO of House of Tara International[2] the creator of the Tara Orekelewa Beauty range, Inspired Perfume and the H.I.P Beauty range.
In 2007, She was awarded the Africa SMME Award and the Entrepreneur award in South Africa.[3]
Early lifeEdit
Tara Fela-Durotoye was born at St. Nicholas Hospital, Lagos, the daughter of Mr John Ejegi Sagay, a commissioner at the Federal Civil Service, Nigeria and Mrs Felicia Omaghomi. The Couple separated when She was eight months old; born into a polygamous home, she was brought up by her father's wife Mrs Modupe Agnes Sagay. She started her education at Command Children School, Victoria Island and proceeded to Nigeria Navy Secondary School, Ojo, where she was a boarder. In form 5, she was made the Sanitary and Welfare Prefect. She graduated from the Lagos State University, with a degree in Law and proceeded to fully establish the beauty Company,[4] House of Tara International.
She is married to Fela Durotoye,[5] a Prolific Business Strategist and Corporate Activator; Chief Executive Officer of [6] Visible Impact and blessed with three sons, Mobolurin, Demilade & Morolaoluwa.
Contributions and achievementsEdit
Over the past 12 years,[when?] Tara Fela-Durotoye has been dedicated to realising her vision of building a globally respected beauty company of African origin.
Fela-Durotoye is the Managing Director and Creative Director of HOUSE OF TARA INTERNATIONAL, a leading player in the make-up sector of Nigeria's beauty industry. The organisation has grown into a franchise enterprise with three main lines of business: The Make-up Studio, The Makeup School and the TARA product line comprising beauty products and professional make-up kits.
Tara is widely considered as a veteran in the beauty industry,[citation needed] who has pioneered the bridal make up profession in Nigeria, starting her make-up business whilst an undergraduate in the Faculty of Law, Lagos State University.
Tara is a trained and certified make-up artist of Charles Fox, Convent Garden, London. In a series of firsts, she launched her bridal make-up business in 1998. Thereafter, she launched the first bridal directory in Nigeria in 1999. In 2000, she facilitated the first-ever series of bridal seminars, drawing for the first time in Nigeria celebrated professionals in the bridal industry to speak to brides.
She has franchises spread across Nigeria (branches in Lagos, Ibadan, Port-Harcourt and Abuja) and with emerging footprint on the West African coastal countries of Cotonou, Ghana and Senegal.
She established the country's first make-up school in 2004, and also launched the TARA product line, comprising a range of professional tool kits (such as make-up boxes, brushes and purses) for make-up artists and a wide range of make-up products including eye shadows, eye liner, lip gloss, foundation and powders on a brand platform promoting ethics and ethnicity, by empowering young women for economic independence without moral compromise, just as it flies the proudly Nigerian flag.
In 2008, at a record-setting celebration of her tenth anniversary in Lagos, she surprised the nation with the launch of her first perfume fragrance aptly called "Be Inspired".
She is a highly sought-after speaker at entrepreneurial platforms including conferences, TV programmes, newspaper and magazine publications and electronic media platforms.[citation needed] She is a favourite speaker at women business conferences, youth empowerment seminars and faith-based gatherings, where she speaks on topics ranging from finding your purpose, identifying your talent, building and managing businesses, maintaining a successful career and marriage.[citation needed]
She is also a mentor for make-up artists and small business owners. Through her make-up school, she has developed and trained about 300 make-up artists who are now active players in Nigerian beauty industry. She has also succeeded in empowering over 600 young ladies (most of whom are in the tertiary institutions) with the Tara Orekelewa beauty representatives' initiative that makes them financially independent, improving their self esteem while building their marketing and entrepreneurial skills.[citation needed]
AwardsEdit
Some of Tara's many national and international awards include:
Entrepreneur of the Year (The Future Awards)[7]
Young Person of the Year 2007 (The Future Awards)
Best Makeup Artist (Fashion and Style magazine)
Award for Excellence in the Beauty Sector 2006(City People magazine)
Pioneer Award for Beauty 2006. (Fashion and Style Award)
Young Entrepreneur of the Year (Lagos Enterprise Award)[8]
Wedding Planner Honorary award for mentoring other make artists, January 2008
Award for excellence (beauty), city people
1st lady award for Women empowerment
Under her leadership, House of Tara International has won several awards including
Right Vision Movement Award Creativity & Productivity Make over Outlet of the year 2006.
The Africa SMME Award presented in South Africa and the Entrepreneur of the Year award.2007
Creative business award of the year, success digest 2008
She is presently working on her book How to Turn Your Hobby into a Thriving Business.
ReferencesEdit
Ibukun Awosika, The Girl Entrepreneur
House of Tara International
Africa SMME Award
Official Website of House of Tara International
Fela Durotoye
Official Website of Visible Impact
"The Future Awards""
"The Nation Online"
Our Concern at Engage Me (Nigeria) Youth Initiative
Our
nation, my nation (Nigeria) filled with all requirements of wealth creation but
still languishing in poverty. As much resources we hold so is our level of
poverty. We have the market for any product but yet we have refused to produce, forgetting that wealth only comes when u're selling. We kept on in our impoverished
status till our able youth were lured into taking arms against our nation, all
in exchange for money. We are saying the time is now for us to begin in the
creation of wealth by engaging our youths in the production of goods and
essential services, promoting skill acquisition, as this is the only way we
could close the gap between the rich and the poor in our country. Today, we
provide wealth for other nations of the world that recognized the economic
viability of our nation, but we are still living in the excitement of oil
exploration. We stand tall today by
asking our fellow Nigerians to engage Nigerian youths through the promotion of
local content products. We believe for each Nigerian product you buy you're
feeding a family, so please take poverty away from our society by buying from
Nigeria. I am Nigeria, We are Nigeria, engage us Nigeria so we can help
build this nation with our youthful strength, engage us Nigeria, so we youths can use our strengths in building this nation, engage us Nigeria so we can stand as God’s heritages for
our coming generation, engage us Nigeria so our nation could stand tall
among others.
God
bless Nigeria.
Long
live Nigeria.
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