After hearing different testimonies about the deliciousness of antelope meat, a young man desired to hunt down and taste antelope meat. He found some old bullets in the family house, which his grandpa had been using for hunting. After inspecting the bullets, he searched for the type of gun that can accommodate and fire those bullets before hunting his target. He hunted continuously for days before he succeeded in killing some antelopes. Like hunting specific animals or shooting specific targets, fulfilling your mission in Nigeria requires its bullet, gun and time.
Many Nigerians are religious people, who believe they are sent into the world to fulfil certain missions or destiny. Early in life, we are touched and profess commitment to reducing poverty, sickness, ignorance, injustice, wastage, disorganization and bitterness in Nigeria. However, the difficult social and economic circumstance can discourage you from fulfilling your mission in Nigeria when growing. You are discouraged by the enormity of the problem, government agencies, policies, mockers, economy, deceivers and even ungrateful victims. After several frustrations, you gradually lose zeal, and settle for survival cycle of eat, work, mate and brag.
Despite the obstacles and excuses, we still feel touched by the pitiable situations. We feel challenged when other people achieve some level of impact, which we had hoped to achieve. We begin to imagine how they are able to make impact even in the discouraging circumstances.
We have identified three stages for fulfilling your mission in Nigeria. This process may best begin from an early stage, but can also be applied whenever the person feels.
1. Find your target: no matter how terrible we think we are, there are aspects of the society that touch our lives. Some of the problems may have affected or still be affecting us in our personal lives. These problems, limitations or obstacles that deeply catch our attention in the society point to our missions in Nigeria.
At this point, we are concerned about what we wish to accomplish in the society, than what we want for ourselves:
I want to ELIMINATE IGNORANCE IN NIGERIA, not I want to be a lecturer;
I want to SUPPORT JUSTICE IN NIGERIA, not I want to be a lawyer;
I want to ENSURE GOOD HEALTH IN NIGERIA, not I want to be a doctor;
I want to CURB WASTE AND MISMANAGEMENT OF RESOURCES, not I want to be an economist.
I want to CONSTRUCT BEAUTIFUL/HELPFUL STRUCTURES AND MACHINES IN NIGERIA, not I want to be an engineer.
I want to CLOTH AND BEAUTIFY NIGERIANS, not I want to be a fashion designer or tailor.
I want to ELIMINATE EXTREME HUNGER, not I want to be a farmer or food businessman.
I want to EMPOWER NIGERIANS, instead of I want to be a social entrepreneur.
I want to CONTRIBUTE TO THE SOCIAL REORGANIZATION OF NIGERIA, instead of I want to be a politician.
The purpose-first mentality determines the tool (bullet) for impact, but the tool-first (bullet) limits the work output.
2. Discover, evaluate and sharpen your bullets: the bullets you require for fulfilling your mission in Nigeria are both the internal and external resources at your disposal. These resources include your talents, professions, skills, strengths, connections and possessions, which you must develop for optimal impact. In order to fit into the purpose, you continue developing and obtaining more bullets (resources) for steady impact. This development requires a lot of training, learning, discipline, resilience, self-motivation and focus to attain.
3. Get an appropriate gun for your bullets: the gun you require for fulfilling your mission in Nigeria is a group of people with similar targets as you. There are different societies, groups and institutions that may be dedicated to your target. Even if you do not find such groups, you find and link with people who have similar thoughts with you. It is necessary to link with other people such as colleagues, mentors or juniors with whom you share idea and motivation. By linking with other people, you form a synergy that ensures fulfilling your mission in Nigeria.
You do not have to be the best in your profession, nor have the highest resources before you link with other people. The more you upgrade your bullets, the more you upgrade your guns and the better you hit your target.
Without finding your target, you may not know the role of the bullets you have, or the ones you can get; Without developing your bullets, you may not know the type of gun you require, and without getting the appropriate gun, you may never hit the target. Hence, you may continue wasting your bullets in different directions without proper focus on social accomplishment.
Excuses about the discouraging and hopeless situation in Nigeria are true, but not enough justification for not fulfilling your mission in Nigeria. Nigerians have within themselves all they require to turn Nigeria into one of the greatest places on earth. By individually discovering their targets, developing their internal and external resources and collaborating with one another, Nigerians will rebuild Nigeria.
Nice one.