February 2022

Long-lasting success requires grace. You will notice this pattern clearly when you analyse the lives of the most successful people of all time. Some people refer to it as luck or good fortune. Others prefer to use the word “God” directly. The bottom-line is that good success is always going to be more than following a bunch of step-by-step procedures to attain desired outcomes. There will always be events and circumstances that favour us, and we just cannot explain away. We’re grateful it happened, but cannot fathom why it turned out that way. This is why we should prioritize getting in alignment with grace. Make grace work for you. 

The first step to making grace abound towards you is to understand that life should not centre around you and your personal, selfish desires. You begin to understand the power of grace when you understand the need to serve the greater good. Having an ambition to do something is not inherently evil, but we must be careful to align our private ambitions with some greater good. The easiest way most people do this is by giving towards charitable courses. It is good and laudable, but a true watchman goes beyond that. The one that serves as a Steward of the Almighty God strives for complete alignment with the will of God. 

Thinking that all we need to do is to give money towards evangelism or other charitable causes is a gross simplification of this idea. Aligning with the greater good doesn’t mean that you have to run a non-profit. Some of the greatest lights of the world at the moment are actually running for-profit businesses, but they understand their stewardship and serve the greater good. So, you can run a for-profit company and still be in complete alignment with the will of God. Grace abounds towards you in whatever you are doing, when you embrace selflessness and align yourself with the greater good.

One of the greatest and most fulfilling change someone can experience is when their perspective changes from “me” to “we”. Traditionally, we are trained to focus on ourselves and getting what we want. The entire society seems to incentivize you to pursue your goals as ruthlessly as you can without sparing a thought for others. You need to be there for yourself, to protect your own interests and advancements. You want to create income streams for yourself and become more comfortable over time. However, this obsession with yourself and your goal violates a spiritual principle: life should not be about you. 

The most important lesson anyone can learn is to understand that life should centre upon something that is greater than yourself. Especially when you consider yourself to be a watchman, someone that yearns to function as a salt of the earth; light of the world. Principally, you are not lighting up the world for you to enjoy a better life. You’re rather pouring out yourself so that others can enjoy a better life. I like thinking about this as you take it hard so that others can take it easy. 

What will keep you going in life is the sense of purpose you can make out of what you do day in, day out. That obsession to do something that matters, something that will matter, is wired deep into every human being. You’ll realize that life is really about creating meaning, and meaning doesn’t come from what you get; it comes from what you give. When you focus on giving your time, skills and resources towards putting out fires, or crushing the mountains that have hindered the progress of many, you will find purpose and also position yourself for profit. You will eventually get everything you want when you begin to help others to get what they need.

There is something eternal and timeless about a true vision. Your vision comes from a place where there is no scarcity, no time, no limits or restrictions of any kind. Every single constrain around your vision was introduced by your mind on this plane of reality. It is all in your head. If you can develop the capacity, there is no reason you cannot scale your vision globally. This is essential because you get to change more lives that way. It is NOT your vision, it is God’s vision that you are channelling from heaven and actively cooperating with. You have to take it further.

With the proper perspective, you will be able to lay a firm foundation for your vision. A foundation that enables the vision to outlast generations and touch lives positively across the globe. It begins with the understanding that you are not here to merely “do what you can” or even to “do your best”. You want to alter the world forever through your vision. Nothing else would do. The tricky thing about a vision is that because it is being generated from nothing, there is always a chance that we end up constraining a divine vision within our current level of understanding or resources. This is truly a mistake, because your vision has a wider range of application and can bring about much more change than you are thinking. 

I think the top two things a visionary should get done is to give the vision a firm foundation and help it build up  momentum so that the vision can find greater expression. There is no vision that cannot go global, but you must commit to the work. The best way to get into this mind-set is to prayerfully ponder on what it would take for this vision to change the lives of one million people. This is easy to do, simply find out if your vision is applicable to a million people and from practice, we know the answer is more often than not, a yes. Build the capacity to design and execute your vision at the level of millions. 

Do not be in a hurry to see your vision manifest. That haste is bad for business because it will lead to making decisions that look great in the short-term, but are actually horrible in the long-term, all things considered. The vision that will go global would need to slowly develop strong roots first. It is going to take humility and patience to build something that will last. Humility helps you to keep things in proper perspective and that way, you don’t end up stifling the progress of the vision as it outgrows your mind. A vision is spiritual, and its limits are not determined by God. The scope of the vision is determined by us and how far we are willing to sacrifice for this vision.

One thing that separates the dreamers from true visionaries is how the former tends to complain about their lack of resources. This lack ultimately will make them abandon the vision and settle for something lesser. The one that triumphs understand that there is never going to be a time when one would have everything needed to get the job done. Dreamers fantasize about their ideas and the impact it could have, but are not ready to submit to the rigour required to make it happen for real. Real visionaries are spiritually and mentally ready to birth their visions from nothing. This is a core skill every visionary must master. 

We need to separate fact from fiction. It is not helpful to conclude that visionaries actively building out their vision every single day is due to the fact that they have the money. Thinking they succeed simply because they have money is insulting to the resilience, doggedness and ingenuity they display every day. It is not about having money upfront. You have to focus more on the unlimited potentials that exist spiritually over the limited resources you can see at the moment. You need faith – that unabashed confidence that overtime you’ll be able to convert more of that spiritual grace and power as you press forward with gratitude, in prayer and meditation. 

The secret to building out your heavenly vision is to learn to lean more on the spiritual and superimpose that abundance mindset upon this physical realm. You need to realize that visions originate from a source where there is no scarcity or poverty, and one must consistently be in tune with that source for optimal performance. Prioritize spiritual activities and understand that it is more important than anything you do physically. When you engage in spiritual activities like thanksgiving, prayer, reading, thinking and meditation, you will notice how much better you will get at planning and execution of your plans. 

A true visionary must learn how to build something out of nothing. Without this mind set to build from nothing, the vision runners will gradually water-down the vision until it fits comfortably within what they think their resources can handle. When you understand that you are building from nothing, it brings the perspectives you need to succeed, and you can focus on the most important things. How to generate all the daily activities required for a complete manifestation of the vision. And how to attract every single resource, asset or leadership required to move things forward. Building from nothing means you define the vision first and then try to attract everything you need later on.

Every human being can create something out of nothing, but only few of us would ever focus long enough to actually do so. The big challenge here is that most people are conditioned to go through life without any need to create something. They simply follow the path as laid down, no original thought required. Most people cannot create anything because they do not need to. A visionary must be creative and learn to create from nothing. The understanding that despite not having enough skills, resources or assets to get this done, one must find a way. A visionary must realize the need to be mentally ready to create from nothing and to understand how it is done.

How does one draw upon the invisible? How do you draw upon spiritual resources to drive the vision? It is as simple as having to prioritize spiritual activities over physical activities. That will ONLY happen when you have the perspective and understanding that everything physical, every resource or asset available to you, is actually generated from the spiritual. And when you do more spiritual activities, you’ll be able to create even more room for you to succeed. The vision came from above and always requires faith and a dynamic spirituality to keep it going. When you embrace the idea of “create it from nothing”, you’ll be able to open up yourself to greater possibilities unlike ever before.

A lot of God-given visions turn out poorly. The execution fails to reflect the beauty and splendour of the original ideas that got things started in the first place. We usually identify lack of knowhow and resources as reasons for failure, but it is deeper than that. Poor execution is the result of a lack of perspective around vision execution. The visionary who gets the job done is the one that understands that birthing a vision is all about creating something from nothing. Trying to hit a target that no one can even see in the first place.

An avalanche of teaching and testimonies has made seeking out a vision-driven life appealing to many. However, living a life centred upon birthing a vision is not as glamorous as one might imagine and it is certainly not a stroll in the park. There are times one will not have the required resources. There are times one will be clueless, confused and lack clarity on the way forward. This is normal and to be expected as one matures from dreaming up a vision and on to implementing the vision. There is nobody out there, NOBODY that has all the resources and knowledge they need. A visionary sooner or later learns patience and resourcefulness.

Primarily, it is not about having $5 or $5 million, it is about having enough faith in your ideas. You cannot save up money towards running a vision. A real vision will always be mightier than what you can get done with your personal resources. You will always need much more than that to get it done. You will have to approach your work as if you want to create it from nothing. This is a mindset that greatly empowers you for the journey because once you understand this “create from nothing” business, you are unstoppable. Running with a vision requires that you master how to draw upon something spiritual (unseen, invisible) and drive your vision from there. 

In many ways, you could say executing a vision is like creating something from nothing. The structure, systems, processes and institutions that should champion and support the vision doesn’t exist yet. When your daily work centres upon building out a vision, you discover that there is no Standard Operating Procedure (SOP); written instructions that outline a routine or repetitive activity followed by an organization. In fact, there is no organization. That is why working on a vision is not like a normal job, where you’re debriefed on exactly what needs to be done. There’s nothing to be done until you take the initiative and develop the daily activities that would generate the results we desire. 

Following “due process” is a great practice that helps to maintain the status quo. However, if the status quo was good enough, we would not be out here in search of something new. When a visionary gets obsessed with following due process, no revolutionary work gets done. In many ways, “due process” replaces thinking. When you think about it, you realize that there is no need to think when there is a template or procedure to follow. You simply take the template and fill in the blanks – done and on to the next task. Your vision probably can not thrive within existing “due processes”. You have got to reimagine things and actually think about how best to pursue your vision. 

The only way to ensure that a vision continues long after the original visionaries are gone is to build institutions that champion the cause. This is how you go full circle. You begin with nothing more than an idea, and then you scale it up into an institution. Everything has got to get built brick-by-brick, no shortcuts. That is why visionaries are also self-starters. It is up to the visionaries to generate the activities that would produce the change we seek, and then others can be employed to help with the work. If you consider yourself a visionary, but struggle with generating daily tasks and recording some progress with the vision, you might have skipped some critical training and preparatory apprenticeships. If you cannot create something from nothing, you cannot run with a vision. 

We allow excuses to get in the way of important (but not urgent) work required to move things forward. Over time, this comes back to haunt us because without consistent high quality execution, the vision is no good. Execution and excuses don’t mix. You cannot be defined by your vision and your ability to give excuses at the same time. Sooner or later, you would realize that you have to choose: are you going to continue with the vision, or are you going to succumb to excuses?

A lot of times, it is easier to find an excuse to stop going, rather than the will to keep moving. This is why visionaries are usually known to possess a strong will and a healthy dose of stubbornness. The critical activities required to birth a vision rarely carry with it any urgency, deceiving the naïve into thinking execution can wait until a more favourable time. It cannot. There will always be a thousand and one reasons something cannot be done at the moment. To make matters more complicated, most of these things will not come with hard deadlines, only the brave can carry through with the plans.

After all is said and done, the success of the vision boils down to the quality of execution. A vision picks up momentum over time and can snowball into something really special. However, the early days can be slow, and the vision dies if one fails to generate enough activities around it. It takes focus and great discipline to understand that except one makes the time and commit to work on the vision daily, there will be no activity to demand your time daily as well. Excuses make it difficult to build up momentum around your vision and must be eradicated.

“Ninety-nine percent of the failures come from people who have the habit of making excuses.” – George Washington Carver

When you become serious about your heavenly assignment to watch over the world and steer the rest of us towards a better future, you would see clearly that it goes beyond what a single person can do. It does not matter how talented or gifted an individual can be, a true vision will require many people working together with one heart and one mind. You can single-handedly push your ambitious projects across the finish line, but if it is a true vision, you will need people. Jesus famously had more than a hundred disciples, twelve apostles and an inner caucus of three (1).

Do you want to change the world or merely desire to “do what you can”? If all you desire is to do what you can, then you are not bound to this principle. However, if you desire to truly impact and positively transform your world, there is no other way. A husband and wife team is adorable and commendable, but you would need more than that for a global footprint.  If you want to impact the world, you require at the very least four to eight true believers in the idea.

You cannot save, deliver or change the world alone. The principal mistake of Samson was that he thought he was gifted enough to single-handedly execute a vision. He was wrong. Throughout history, there has NEVER being someone that single-handedly changed the world at a meaningful scale. When you go beyond the surface and really investigate great men who seemed to single-handedly accomplish much, you find their team. Jesus had his apostles and disciples. Moses had Aaron, Miriam, Hur and Joshua, then seventy more elders to support, not counting the leaders he instated at various levels as well (2). Gideon famously assembled an army of three hundred. You cannot change the world alone.

If you are serious about changing the world, you should team up with a true visionary or try to get others to team up with you to execute the heavenly vision in your heart.

FOOTNOTES:

1. There were 120 disciples gathered at the upper room (Acts 1:15). Jesus named 12 apostles (Luke 6:13) and it is well-known that he had a smaller leadership team of three within the twelve (Peter, James and John).
2. Seventy elders were appointed to aid Moses at Numbers 11:16-25, and you can see Moses raises numerous leaders to serve in various levels at Exodus 18:14 – 26.

Every day, you hear about some visionary championing a worthy cause only to fizzle out over time. There is such a long list of visions that we can consider to be dead. We have to remember that conceiving a vision and even planning it out counts for little if there is nothing to power the vision. The vision fails when there is not enough to power it up. Vision is powered by the collective consciousness and efforts of a people, and without that, nothing happens. The basic kinds of power required for a vision to find a firm footing are spiritual and intellectual powers.

It is hard to find any activity that is more important to a true visionary than prayer and meditation. Conceiving a vision can be exciting and empowering, however, execution is usually boring and one runs into obstacles all the time. Without constantly drawing from that secret place of strength, love and warmth, the vision fades away over time. So, a visionary that is pushing a vision much bigger than themselves must understand the need for spiritual power. Every success story out there includes some luck or unexplainable circumstances that helped. You will always need some “grace” or “good luck” to forge ahead with your work. If prayer could increase your chances, why not?

You have got to acquire spiritual and intellectual powers. Thinking everything will happen just because you have prayed about it is incredibly naïve. This is where the prayer warriors get it wrong. Prayer, fasting and other spiritual activities generally make grace available for the work. The next thing to do after praying is to figure out HOW TO proceed with whatever you have been praying about. The vision will fail if we do not develop the necessary intellectual capacity for the work. You have got to decide to pursue the best education you can and collaborate with others better than you. As a rule of thumb; you want to pray hard and work hard simultaneously.