What’s Your Time?

By Vusimzi Ishmael Faku VI

What is your time? “The Power to know exactly what to do” is one of the few books which emphasize the significant role which the time plays to the individuals. As we know, time is crucial, vital resource, especially when one is able to use it effectively.

Learning to use time effectively can increase the chance to identify many ways to reach your target achievement and purpose of your life.

Using time effectively can benefit one to deal with things which concern his goals and identify specific ways to reach a success.

Being successful is the matter of sharing your time with others and empowers them by equipping them with skills to realize and recognize their purpose in life.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Vusimzi Ishmael Faku VI
• Release date: Jul 11, 2017
• ISBN: 9781370121656

Book preview

Preface

In this book I do not intend to make a mockery of Africa or to offend anyone, but it is my hope that the ideas discussed here will open discussions about those ideas and open minds to them. I want to see people talk about these things at an individual, family, societal, governmental, political, organisational national and even international level. Friend to friend, parent to child, teacher to student and leader to follower, people should talk about these ideas and develop them further. It’s time to stop thinking in the same old ways and to stop doing the same old things yet expecting to get better and to get different results. I want us Africans to be great and for us to do that we need to open our minds to new ideas. The other purpose of this book is to challenge people to stop settling for less. It’s time for each person to stop and asses what he or she is doing and ask him/her self if it is the best he or she can do and to ask him/her self if they can’t do better. Each person should get better for himself or herself and for others too. The ideas in this book might seem common but I decided to put them in one place, as a book, so that it can be an eternal reference and through it, we can continue to be reminded to aim at getting better. Actually when ideas seem common, people overlook them and procrastinate on them yet such ideas make the difference between success and failure. The ideas in this book are not conclusive but open ended. They are more like introductions so that people talk about them, think about them and play around with them. In this book I primarily target the individual because there is so much potential in the individual. If individuals adopt these ideas, change their behaviour and then come together, they will become a force to reckon with. It’s a divide and conquer approach where I’m breaking down Africa to an individual level so that people are first dealt with at this individual level. Therefore, most of the writing is directed to the individual. There is vast potential in the individual so the individual has to get better and better. These are my intentions with this book because I want Africa to reach its full potential. So enjoy and also spread the message.

Acknowledgements

I would like to thank my mom and my dad for their support, financially and morally, in getting this book published and for the wisdom I got and still get from them, which has shaped me into being able to make such a work. I would also like to thank Reach Publishers and the Reach Publishers’ crew for all their work on the preparation of the book. Last but most important I would like to thank God almighty who ultimately made me able, by His providence, to do this work.

Introduction

How much more urgently should we adopt efficiency since we are already behind? Yes, how much more? Africa, we are truly behind, but we don’t seem to feel any urgency about it. Everyone else has woken up - the Europeans, Americans, Chinese, Russians, Indians, Japanese and so on. Remember, the Europeans went through the Dark Ages and emerged from them, remember the Americans revolted for their freedom and remember their massive industrialisation which got them to the very top. Remember that the Chinese were once backward, when the rest of the world had industrialised, but today they are a power to be reckoned with. The Russians began as a nation of peasants as well but, due to massive industrialisation, they have also risen. All these countries have woken up, but we sleep a little longer. When I look at the efficiency and urgency of top-performing countries like the USA, Britain, Sweden, Japan, Germany and others, even though they are at the top, it makes me wonder how much more serious we should be. We seem to take our time, to procrastinate, to take things lightly and dismiss principles that work.

For example, just basic time-keeping; we are poor at that. Communication and transparency is a problem, too, as well as our ability to adopt necessary change and to do proper paperwork and accounting. Research and development, documentation, forecasting and thinking long-term are also some of the areas which testify of our inefficiency. This inefficiency is there because of the lack of desire to see and implement efficiency and effectiveness. Logically, of course, when people are asked, they will say that they want to see efficiency and effectiveness but, in effect, they obviously do not have that desire, if their actions go against it. I observe this when I talk to people and share ideas of growth and development. Most people I meet are bored by them, they are not interested. They would rather stick to inefficiency and rigidly adhere to habits that are not taking them anywhere, anymore. It is accurate to say habits that are not taking them anywhere anymore because, for some people, their habits did take them somewhere at some point but, because they did not adopt new ideas and change, since then they have stopped advancing and have hit a ceiling which they cannot go beyond. Unfortunately, when you hit a limit, the next thing is to go down. Some have just developed wrong behaviours or habits from the start, so they just don’t go anywhere; however, the statement includes them as well, which is why it is accurate. So, as I observe this lack of ‘going-forward’ in people at an individual level, I also realise that it does not end there, but cumulates to every other aspect like business, politics, government, leadership, religion and society, because how you do anything is how you do everything. So, basically, we should realise our backwardness and be urgent about addressing it.

1

Things That Do Not Concern Your Path, Your Mission in Life!

I see that people are busy with different things, petty or big, meaningful or non-meaningful, silly or clever, but the problem is that a lot of those things do not concern their path, which is their mission in life. You are on your path when you live according to the things that are inside of you, things that you feel inside i.e. your gifts, talents and abilities. Because of the craziness that is all around, it is easy to overlook or discard your natural talents and stick to being ‘safe’, even if it means being bored and unfulfilled in life. One of the main reasons why people do things that do not concern their path is just to be safe, for example studying a programme that you don’t like in school and then getting a job that you don’t like. People normally do this because they are ‘indoctrinated’ that it is the only path that matters, or that it is their only and best hope of survival. Society is ‘guilty’ of propagating that idea, so people become narrow-minded and aren’t able to discover their ‘true’ abilities. Speaking of true abilities, the question is, which ones are the untrue abilities? There are things that you can do and be good at, yet those things are not part of who you really are. For example, you find that a whole class of people can study and pass a medical programme, Accounting, Law or I.T, but not all of the people in those classes will feel a connection with that area of study. Not everyone connects with it internally, although everyone - or most of the people - will pass the programme so, in that case, it will be a false ability for those who have passed but are not passionate about it or not naturally gifted in it. People actually get stuck in things that do not concern their path just because they are fairly good at them, and therefore think that they should just continue with whatever it is. However, the problem is that such endeavours or pursuits usually don’t grow you to your full potential, which your true path would, and therefore you don’t give out the kind of value that you should be giving to the world, and thus you end up holding the world and yourself back. False abilities basically waste our time. You need to determine that you are not going to do things just because you are good at them, but only if they concern your path. Another reason people are not living according to their paths is laziness to search within themselves for what their path is. You have to search yourself in order to discover yourself and your path.

It takes calmness and self-searching to find oneself and one’s mission in life so, for this reason, some people think it is too much work and too boring and they are therefore just not interested. They feel this way because they are too impatient, they cannot calm their minds and hearts down to undertake this self-searching process and this is made worse by how fast-paced the world has become. That is why I say there is craziness around that can affect you. Another reason is the things that surround people - like society, the media, their peers, pressures, current responsibilities and so forth which may weigh heavily on them, confuse them and lead them away from being consciously aware of their true paths. One has to be aware of one’s mission before one can live it, so all this craziness around one takes that focus away from that path and one loses sight of it. Not everyone though has their focus taken away innocently, but some let it get taken away. We can understand those who are innocently battered, but not those who let themselves get battered when they can do something about it. These are some of the ways in which people waste their time on things that do not concern their path, but the question is how is it holding back Africa? There is a lot of value in everyone that the world needs. Look at how a few people have changed the world by their work, people like Bill Gates, Henry Ford, Thomas Edison, Walt Disney and others, and imagine how much more greatness would there be if more people would step up and give out the value that they have in them. This can only be done if people live out their mission in life. So, Africa is held back because not enough people are living according to their missions in life. People are bowing down to things that do not concern their missions in life. Why would you wholeheartedly do things that keep you mediocre?

2

Taking Time Just Because There Is a Lot of It

People have a tendency to take their time just because there is a lot of it. That is what they usually say, that there is plenty of time, but there really isn’t plenty of time. How can one ever say there is a lot of time? Time can seem to be plenty if it is being seen in relation to one or a few things that need to be done, but then if it is measured against everything that needs to be done in the course of one’s life, you then realise that there isn’t really that much of it. People live in a state of self-deception when they think there is plenty of time. Since there isn’t enough of it, it is normal practice to borrow time from other things in order to do other higher priority things. So, because people are not aware that there is a lot to be done and there is limited time in which to do it, due to their misconception that there is plenty of time, they tend to take time away from other important things and squander it by being slow, all because they think there is a lot of time. Whilst you are thinking that there is plenty time and taking it slowly, you are using up the limited time that should be spent on other important things.

Do you get the picture? There is no such thing as a lot of time, so discipline your mind to know that the thing that you are calling a lot of time is the sum of the times of other things which you are wasting. When you discipline your mind like this, you become aware of that bad habit and you drop it. Being aware of that habit helps you to treat time plus the things that need to be done, with more urgency. So, yes, this is a thing that a lot of my African brothers and sisters do; they speak of a lot of time and they do things slowly, thus further plunging Africa into ‘backwardness’. A lot of people do this, from the lowliest individual all the way up to the top leaders. There is procrastination about time at all levels - individual, group, organisational, political, societal, country, continent, and so forth. Here are some ideas for a wiser use of time: Try to do each task in the shortest time possible, and even in less time than has been allocated for it, so that you free up time from it to give to other very high-priority things in your life. Also, doing things quickly frees up that time for you to legitimately schedule in the relaxation that you want and need in your life, and by so doing, you avoid doing it at the expense of the other important things that you have to do. To put it in simple terms, I’m saying hypothetically that, let’s say you have five things only that you have to do in your life and you have twenty years in which to do them - that means four years on average for each task. Now, let’s say that two of those things are critical and the other three are less urgent. In that case, try to do the less urgent things in less than four years, so that you free up those extra years to add to the critical ones, which will also allow you to factor in time for that desired relaxation. It is good practice to be this urgent with time throughout one’s life. From this analysis we derive the idea that, in life, there are things that have a higher priority than others, so free up time from lower-priority things, so that you can add it to those higher-priority things in order for your life to become of the highest quality it can be. A lot of these brothers and sisters of mine have a tendency of subconsciously believing that time can create itself somehow for them, so they allow themselves to relax. Unfortunately, time is very practical and real. It is what it is and does not create itself. You either use it wisely or waste it; that is all there is to it.

3

Cell Phones, Television, Internet, Games, Social Media

These things distract a lot of people. They have a great negative impact, especially on young people. Our young people are the future, because they have high energy levels and a freshness which can be used to develop, build, create, innovate and carry burdens. Being young is a time when one should move swiftly to create value, as well as give it, because youth is of short duration and yet it’s also the best time to do all these things. Instead of giving value, their time is being taken up by these things, which actually are very enticing. They keep a person busy, but busy going nowhere. You can spend a lot of time being occupied by them but, afterwards, there is nothing of substance you can point at and say That it is what my time spent on those things has produced, at least for the most part. Africa does not need ‘busy-ness’ which does not go anywhere. It needs to get a move on, since it is already behind. This is not exactly a call for everyone to stop being distracted by these things, but for at least more people, i.e. more than the current number of people, to stop being distracted by these things and focus on contributing the value that they have within themselves. Others might as well continue to be distracted by those things, since we can’t solve all the world’s problems but as long as more people step out of it. When more people begin to do so, then Africa will be helped by that increased value. A call for more people, and therefore more value, makes sense because, in order to have a different result, you need to do something differently, or do a different thing. In this case, more people would be stepping forward to focus on giving value, instead of wasting their precious time and energy on these things. More and more people, generation after generation, just come and plunge into being distracted by these things, which means that either the situation has been the same, or has actually been getting worse, so getting people to change in that regard would be a positive initiative towards creating a change in the right direction.

Interestingly, there is another aspect of creating change apart from avoiding or minimising time on these distractions. You can actually produce something of substance with those things (i.e. Cell phones, Television, Internet, Games, Social Media), if you are a highly productive and wise human being. You can use them to your advantage in order to ‘win’. They are called distractions because naturally they waste people’s time but, with effort, you can actually get usefulness out of them. For example, you can use TV for inspiration by watching things that present ideas that are useful for success. With regard to myself, I like programmes that present ideas on strategising, ambition, making something of yourself, fighting to win, and so forth. I don’t spend lots of time watching these programmes, only a few a day, but when I do, those are the kinds of ideas I look for, because I get inspired. Another example is with games, that’s if you are young and really love games like many young people do. You can actually use them as a motivator by challenging yourself to say that if you complete a certain task - a productive, high-value task - then you will reward yourself with a game and thus you will work hard, and with excitement, to achieve that reward. The cell phone is also very instrumental. Apart from wasting time on meaningless chats, you can use it to make progress and to win in life. You can use it to be aware of time, so that you speed up your actions and do things with a sense of urgency, thereby raising efficiency. You can time yourself on various tasks. You can use it to record ideas in writing, or by voice. For example, I use WhatsApp more to type and text ideas to another line of mine, so that I do not lose those ideas. So, wherever I am, be it in a queue in the supermarket, walking in town, on a bus journey and or at a delayed function and so on, I immediately type in or voice-record the ideas that ‘hit’ me. Ideas are very ‘slippery’, so if you do not take great care to record them somewhere as they come, you lose them quickly. In this way, many people are actually letting the world down by not recording, keeping and following up on the ideas that they receive in their minds. It is a God-given gift that is supposed to help us humans - to receive ideas in our minds. A lot of these ideas are going to waste because people don’t take great care but, like I said, you can take advantage of the cell phone since you always have it with you. Now, because of that system, I have pages upon pages of ideas I