What's holding you back?

There are very many factors that could determine your life status and progress and achievements along life's journeys, and top of the list are your village people.

You keep getting fired from every job you hold, it has to be your step mother or that poor defenceless old woman whom society has pushed to the little hut just on the edge of your village.

You can't seem to catch a break, every opportunity is filled just before you have a chance to grab it - your grandmother is a witch, she inherited it from her own grandmother who inherited from her own grandmother (ad nauseum).

You fall in and out of relationships like a carelessly tossed rubber ball, there is this old woman in your village who is so powerful that just by projecting evil thoughts, she can cause random person A (that is YOU), whom she perhaps has never met in her entire miserable life, to keep losing love interests over and over again.

Or so your shaman says.

Interestingly, these old women are never powerful enough to attract the elixir of eternal youth, the fountain of wealth and the assurances of a good existence for themselves and their probably as wretched families. Society needs a sin eater and who else do we blame for everything that goes wrong in our lives than the most obvious, most defenceless suspects.

After all, Nigeria has a white witches association and they meet in Benin - typical!

So, when you find yourself falling out of the umpteenth job or missing the quadrillionth opportunity or reeling out the gazillionth hard luck story, please do not sit yourself down to a private meeting of two (you and your conscience), and take a brisk walk back through the common denominator in all the misfortunes and missed opportunities you might have had - blame your village witches. Perhaps your personal attitude and work ethics have got absolutely nothing to do with why you are where you are.

Like time for instance: what relationship do you have with time? Do you give it as much respect as it deserves or do you treat it as a mere suggestion?

"Let's meet at 9 am", do you interpret that as - "try to be here at least five minutes before the appointed time" or "you know, you can start brushing your teeth at 9 am. Then send me an sms 15 minutes after and then in 30 minutes installments thereafter blaming everything but the culprit - you".

Time, and your relationship with it, can make or mar you.

What about your word? What does it mean when you say you are going to do something?

Is your word something you just spit out casually? Have you developed and honed flippancy to a fine art and dispense generously whenever you feel the need to "keep a conversation going", or is your word your bond?

Pretty soon, people are going to honestly avoid you when they notice that your words have no weight and absolutely no meaning whatsoever. They would rather see an honest attempt to stick to your words however inconveniencing, than rigmarolling around what should to all intents and purposes, be a verbal contract to deliver.

And then attitude - divas are supa, but a team player is best!

I remember someone once asking me in a management training, at what point his own goals should begin to supersede company goals...

"Goals like what"?
"Growth".
"Alongside or outside the company's career path plan"?
"Huh"?

In simple English, check in your "personal goals" at the door. This is a tricky one and I would try to elaborate a bit further.

IF your personal goals are at variance with the company goals, check them in at the door. Your goal is to help the company achieve its goals and beyond. Anything that threatens to derail the corporate goals could be termed a "conflict of interest".

Ambition is good, but how ambitious should you be within a corporate entity? How do you strive to achieve that ambition? Your personal gains and growth should come as a consequence of helping the company achieve its corporate gains and growths and not seek to annihilate everything on your way to personal glory.

So that means you work with a team - not against the team.

It also means you work within the company policy - not at variances with it.

For sure it means you can bend the rules and stretch them as far as they can go, provided you have the results that would prove you right in taking those liberties - don't break the rules.

Most importantly, if you feel the need to take over the position of a CEO, if you find it difficult to be subordinated to, if you are unable to work with a team - then it is time to "move your ministry to the permanent site" - resign and run your own show.

2015 is on its way out and in a few days, we would be ushering in a brand new year. Take a few honest minutes to introspect on what has worked for you over the years and why. If you have also been consistently failing (or failing to meet your goals), then you more than anyone else, owe yourself an honest introspection.

What habits do you need to retain going into the new year and why? Which ones would you need to drop and why? Any habits that need tweaking? Any skills that need polishing?

YOU are the common denominator in all your life's experiences and situations. You just need to be honest enough to realise that first.

And perhaps top on your New Year resolution list, should be giving your village "witches" a break.

Believe it or not, if they had all those supernatural abilities you ascribe to them, they would rather concentrate on finding ways to get Otedola or Dangote to write a will and leave them a huge chunk of their estates; than winching a sorry ass, broke ass churchrat who is not even co-ordinated enough to keep one messenger job in one decrepit organisation or the other.

No be yab, but even village "witches" suppose get ambition.

PS: How come most of the village witches whose flights crashland into high tension electric poles in and around a certain region in Nigeria are women? You mean after the housework and hustling to feed the home and having to put out for oga whether they are in the mood or not, they tumble into bed exhausted at night and instead of sleeping, take off on their brooms for some sort of meeting or the other? For real? Where are the men? No dulling biko. This is an industry you also need to come and dominate please.