The essence of this period of your life on campus is to acquire knowledge in a directed and intentional manner about certain personalities and some concepts that are paramount to life. In addition to your discipline knowledge that would directly get you a job back in society, you must be 60% focus on acquiring those ones that will help you stay relevant in your job after you might have gotten or established one.
So, your focus should be on the following:
GOD
There are so many things that worth-knowing about in the universe, but none has the benefits of knowing God – who by himself is the universe, with whom all things started and will end with. He is the major Actor in the play presenting on the stage called Earth, while our appearance in the play, which is never by chance, nor coincidence, but intentional, is to play a short important minor roles towards a happy ending expected of the play. Therefore, as actors and actresses, it is expected of us to have a proper knowledge of God himself, the owner of the story-line, so that we may know how best we can perform the roles that have been assigned to us to play.
Much of human errors, pains, grieves, regrets and shortcomings are as results of our lack of knowledge about God. No-one properly plays their roles in life play and ends up forlorn.
I don’t know how much you know about God and how closer you are to him, but if your conditions today are not worth talking about in public as a ‘child’ of God that is the consequences of your ‘known’ lackadaisical attitudes towards your studies as an undergraduate and it means you don’t know how much God cares about your success in every aspect of your life. God does not encourage an average victory (talk less of failure). His glorification and praise on earth are associated with our happiness. That is why John Piper says, “God is most glorified, when we are most satisSUCCESS
YOURSELF
I wrote in my book, ‘When Your Purpose is Perfect’ that God knowing us is not as important and helpful in reciprocating the same acknowledgement as when we know some things about ourselves, at least to some extent. God knows us and will always know us better far than we know can about our strength, weaknesses and limitations, but in order to be in peace with Him and to appreciate Him for all those things knowing ourselves is the only stimulant that can trigger such a grateful attitude. […] failure of some people to know the extent and effectiveness of their purposeful strength and weaknesses is the chain that is holding them back within the range of their limitation.”
One major essence of higher institution is to help people (students) discover themselves: what they can do and can’t do; their area of usefulness within the larger society; the extent they can go and can’t go as well as their human materials which God has put in them to operate with. But only few ever discover those things and they are few that are moving mountains in the society. Self-discovery is the mother of all discoveries!
Here are the areas you want to discover about yourself:
Your purpose in life
Your usefulness in life
Your instruments of operation in life; these include your natural gifts and elements of education.
- Your Purpose in Life
- Your Usefulness in Life
Every activity is always okay,
It result to confusion,
It makes one to be visionless,
It makes one’s life ordinary,
It makes one to be indefinite and indecisive, and
It makes life difficult and uneasy, etc.
You purpose in life is the outcome of your usefulness which is what you do and who you are. The place of usefulness is where you get your purpose in life fulfilled.
- Your Instruments of Operation in Life (gifts or talents)
There are two sets of instruments of operation:
Natural gifts or talents, and
Elements of education.
Here, I am more concerned about elements of education, because without them it may be difficult for you to exhibit the natural instruments. Even illiterates do have natural instruments of operation, but elements of education will help maximize the natural instruments.
YOUR SOCIETY
The condition of a society is what determines the conclusion of most people; this ought not to be so. Though, humanly speaking, the reality of your society determines and dictates your actions, but more importantly is how you view your society that will either set you free into a good life or put you in bondage of a difficult poverty-stricken life; for if you always see your environment as a place without opportunity to operate for success, you won’t see any of its blessings even when you are closer to them.
You are standing on the global earth, but you are within your circumferential society in which you are encircled. A mere looking at a society with a myopic eye and mind makes it look as if everyone is trapped, but when one looks deeper they would see there are many doors of opportunities for all round success whose keys are within the possession of those who have proper knowledge of the society.
Every society has their distinctive code that kicks them work; no matter how prosperous a society might naturally be, if you don’t have its code, it won’t prosperously work for you. That is what creates poverty and wealth.
I don’t know the kinds of code that is working with your society, but I am certain and sure that if you get access to it, you will control the society; whatever society may it be. Look around you, do your findings, there lots of legitimate common activities which are not obvious to majority, but making few people rich.
MONEY
My God instructs me, “People who want to get rich fall into temptation and a trap and into many foolish and harmful desires that plunge men into ruin and destruction. For the love of money is a root of all kinds of evil,” and He also tells me, “My people are destroyed from the lack of knowledge.” The truth is that it is not money that is evil, but lack of knowledge about money.
I compare money to a warrior who holds two deadly swords one to the right hand and the other to the left hand. Whether he holds the swords to the left hand or to the right, the fact is that he can destroy and kill with any of the hands, but those who have knowledge and understand how dexterous the hands are will escape their danger.
Often times, people talk more about how money possession can make a ‘righteous honest’ man evil, but hardly talk about how lack of money can make a ‘righteous honest’ man evil. “For the love of money is the root of all kinds of evil.” The kinds of evil partially include: jealousy, envy, orgies, fits of rage, hatred, provoking, slander, false testimony, etc. Friend, can you think of how a lack of money or not having enough as someone else can make a righteous man commit any of these kinds of evil?
For instance, he saw his rich friend or someone else doing charity, doing good things, eating good food and wearing fine clothes and many other things which he couldn’t do, or may be he had tried all possible means to get money, but couldn’t; wouldn’t he be tempted in his heart and thought evil of his friend, and grow to envy, then to slander, and then to hatred, and to harmful desires, and into ruin and finally to destruction. The truth is one doesn’t have to own money before it can make them evil.
The knowledge you want to patiently and intentionally acquire about money is how to make your money grow, how to make it work for you and contribute to your righteousness, and how you can escape the corruption and evil of money and how to invest it wisely.
It is written in our book for undergraduates that money comes to everybody at one point or the other, but the rich are those who have initially acquired knowledge about how to increase it before the arrival of the money.
Knowledge about money will save you from working like an elephant but eating like an ant and guide you, to some extent, from the evil of money. Robert T. Kiyosaki wrote, “Without financial education in schools, students graduate educated on a variety of subjects, but unaware of the game of cash flow – what I believe to be the most important subject of all. Most students graduate and work hard to have incoming cash flow, but they have very little control over it. Every month, more and more money flows out than flows in, which causes them to work harder or get into credit card debt.”
SUCCESS
Success is a seed from which happiness grows and which in turn produces fruit of fulfillment. Which means from fulfillment comes success. Going by this explanation it means success is impossible until one gets to the very end in life – and that is why it is imperative you seek knowledge about success.
There are number of things many think success is, but which John Hagee in his book, ‘7 Secrets of Success for the Graduate’, intelligently and godly refuted, these include, as he wrote, success is not money, success is not reaching a goal, success is not power, success is not having it all, success is not determined by your circumstances, success is not maintaining the status quo, success is not avoiding criticism. And continued to write that, “success is not an event; it’s a lifelong journey. You cannot possess what you are unwilling to pursue. Success comes to those who plan, to those who prepare, to those who are persistent, and to those who are willing to endure pain to achieve their life goals.”
As I know, success determines your happiness beyond this present life, since all activities in this present life will still be brought into judgment, “The dead were judge according to what they had done as recorded in the books.” Revelation 20:12c.
It will worth it if you seek knowledge about success before you ever begin its journey, and how to work and walk into your fulfillment.
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These five concepts, God, yourself, society, money and success, should be your main focus during your days on campus. The essence of going to school is to help you understand these better. Your knowledge of every other thing is nothing without them.
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