Gifts can be a snare to the receiver and a door to the giver. If there is anything that I learnt from the Holy Bible, then it must be, The gifts of a man maketh way for him. This rule is true for everyone irrespective of your religion. But it’s also practically applicable to relationships. That is why ladies need to refuse expensive gifts from guys whose motive is to build a highway to their hearts.

You might never have known, but gifts is the fastest way to win one’s heart. It’s one of the five love languages, the others being:

Acts of service
Words of affirmation
Quality time
Physical touch

The 5 love languages tell us how to easily win the heart of others. Among the five gifts has proven to be the easiest to exhibit. A little reminder of the Greek mythology and you’ll realize that it was a gift called the Trojan horse, that Greece deceptively used to attack the people of Troy.

If a gift can be a weapon disguised enough to ambush a nation, how much more dangerous will it be to a lady.

Does it therefore mean that all gifts from guys should be refused? No.

Rather what it means is that as a lady, you must exercise caution when accepting gifts from guys, most especially guys who you know have profound interest in you for a relationship. This does not play down the need to welcome favors when you’re in need. It also doesn’t mean that every guy who presents you with a gift does so with an ulterior motive at heart.

Nah. There are lots of good guys out there who sincerely love to help others without attaching any string whatsoever. But how easy is it to differentiate between these sincere guys and the cunning ones? You just need to have it at the back of your mind that every favor may be repaid someday.

It’s always better to have others owe you favors than to owe them.

1. Expensive gifts take away your power to say NO

Gifts makes a dog crow and makes a lion meow. The more expensive gifts you receive from a guy, the more difficult it will be to say no to his demands. Guys understand this principle. That’s why they are always quick to flaunt their cash and luxurious cars around unsuspecting ladies.

They believe every lady has a price. And at the right price, you will succumb to their desires. Gifts work like bribes, they make you lose your sense of reason and judgment. The more you receive, the more corrupted you will be in judgment.

2. Expensive gifts make you indebted

Can you draft a chart of all the guys making advances towards you? Draw a column showing the worth of gifts you’ve received from each of them? Rate how much you like each of the guys on a scale of 1 – 10?

Now, which of them do you think you would not want to disappoint on the basis of expensive gifts received? Most likely, it’s going to be the guy that has lavished on you the most gifts. You feel you owe him something. You feel it’ll be bad of you to tell him you don’t love him after “all he has done for you.”

On the long run, you may end up entering a relationship with someone you don’t truly love simply because you want to return a favor that was done to you via expensive gifts.

Ladies, your heart is too expensive to be bought with gifts. Remember that.

If you must accept expensive gifts, meticulously resolve in your heart that you’re not indebted to repay the favor in any way.

Visit link to read more: http://notemast.com/ladies-refuse-expensive-gifts-guys/

Emotion forms the intrinsic makeup of humans. One beautiful thing about it is that, it’s not a respecter of social status, gender or age. Everyone has emotions and once its tap has been opened, it is always difficult to close. It is the integral element that fuels an intimate relationship.

It’s actually more difficult to break up from an Intimate relationship than any other form of relationship due to the high surge of emotions that has been injected into it. Besides basic emotions, an intimate relationship is highly romantic. You can’t separate it from romance. That is actually the main reason why it is more difficult to call off.

Come on, it’s definitely not easy to let go of someone who has had the best understanding of how your body works, as well as being the holder of the remote that turns on your sexual sensitivity. You’ve given him/her total access to your emotional psychology and revoking such access is practically difficult.

However, the good news is that it’s not totally impossible to breakup from such relationships. One of the first things that is needed to actualize this goal is determination. You must be determined to do whatever is rationally possible to accomplish this task. Without the element of determination, the following steps will amount to nothing.

1. Don’t Be In A Hurry

The mistake most people make is to hurriedly call off intimate relationships immediately they find the need to. Funny enough, such people hurriedly go back to those relationships almost immediately after they called it off.

Once you’ve identified the need to call the shot, gradually think things through. Take a couple of days to ensure that you’re not calling it off because someone else advised you to, but because you’re truly fed up with it. If the decision is externally motivated, it won’t successfully pull through. Ask yourself, “what do I really want?”

2. Open Up To Someone

The emotional tsunami that you will be ushered into immediately you call off an intimate relationship may be too heavy for you to bear alone. It is also very difficult to pull it through on your own without the backup of someone dear.

I know it may be difficult to trust people. You may not want people to have access to information about your love life and challenges. But trust me, this is one of those times when you need to trust someone. Such a person can be a mentor, family, counselor, spiritual head, or close friend.

Opening up also gives room for accountability. You would want to stay true to your decision because you’re sure there is someone that will definitely ask you about it.

3. Approach Your Partner

Book a meeting with your partner and inform him/her of your decision.
WARNING: For best results, don’t meet him in his/her apartment or yours. Most preferably meet at an open place where there will be no room for intimate activities like kisses, smooches and deep hugs.

The reason is that, it’s possible for you to get so emotional and fall pray for another romantic escapade that will eventually keep you trapped in the relationship once more.

Rid yourself of every emotional weakness and if possible, don’t even allow a tear drop from your eyes. Make your decision known with sincere reasons. Also make it known that you’ll keep your distance considerably until the heat it down. Don’t give room for much discussions afterwards, leave immediately you’re done.

4. Cut Communication Wires

At this point, the guy or lady whose heart you just broke will start calling on phone. Most likely, you’ll receive a number of text messages that will try to remind you of the good times you guys shared. The aim is to make you have a rethink and eventually change your decision.

No matter how strong you can be, such beautiful words may eventually cut deep into your heart. Like a virus it will affect your entire emotional system, weaken your bones and leave you depressed. After which, you’ll come running back with a tearful apology.

To avoid this from happening, cut off every form of communications with him/her. Don’t take calls, don’t read messages and don’t respond to any invitation for a meeting. You can block the phone number if the calls becomes incessant.

Hey, I’m not asking you to make him/her an enemy. Rather, you just need to play safe from a reasonable distance until the heat of the breakup is down.

Never forget that intimacy grows via communication.

5. Get Your Mind Occupied With Something Else

Don’t wet your pillow with a river of tears. You need to be strong and move on with your life. Nonetheless, you don’t need to pretend that nothing happened in your life. No. Pretense won’t help you.

Rather live your life with the consciousness that you just made a big decision with futuristic benefits. Look at the big picture. Place everything about the relationship in an archive in your past. Whenever it pops up in your head, simply remind yourself that the relationship and its pleasures have been locked away in the past. Get something else to occupy your mind in the present.

Remember that:

An idle mind is forever the devil’s workshop.

If you don’t engage yourself with something more productive, you’d see yourself going down the valley of depression.

Something productive could be fun time with friends, timeless study or dedicated time at work. The summary is: Be Busy!

6. Avoid Things That Will Remind You Of The Past

Things like romantic movies should be archived because they will tempt you to take a glimpse of your ex-lover. Also delete romantic texts and close up pictures that has to do with your ex.

7. Put yourself in better companies

No one is an island. You will definitely need people to fill up the vacuum in your life. This time around, be careful not to give in to intimacy and romance. Beware of people that will want to take advantage of your single status to win you over. Allow yourself to be in the company of sincere friends with no strings attached.

A lot of people survived breakups, and I believe you can do same too. Yes, you can!

Click Link To Read More:
http://notemast.com/breakup-intimate-relationship/

Have you ever asked yourself that question before? Can you draft out 10 tangible reasons why you should throw a party for your next birthday celebration? Don’t answer me yet, just keep thinking.

My short sojourn on earth so far has taught me that loneliness is very real and it kills. But family can be an effective cure. One of my sweet cousins visited me a couple of weeks ago just before my birthday. She came to salvage me with the curative powers of her care and attention.

She is not only beautifully and wonderfully made by God on a day when HE was exceedingly happy, she was also designed to be a perfectly crazy cook. We had a nice time together and I ate a good home made meal for the first time in a long while.

While our chins were growing fat in laughter as we saw movies after movies, she reminded me of something that threw me in an avalanche of despair.

That wasn’t the first time I was hearing what she told me, but it was as though the effect it had on me that night was bitterly overwhelming.

What she said was something everyone should get happy about, but surprisingly, I wouldn’t say I was.

Away from the suspense, in paraphrase, she basically said,

“Wow, Nonso, so you will be a year older by March 25th?”.

That was all she needed to say to give me an unprecedented mood swing.
I literally got lost just as it happens in Hollywood movies.

And like a modern domino effect, I lucidly saw my thoughts wandering far beyond the shores of my room.

She had no idea what was going on in my mind. It was practically difficult for me to flow with the tides of the discussion afterwards.

Let’s just say, I’m very grateful to God for life, but beyond that, I kept asking myself if my new age was worth celebrating.

READ MORE: http://notemast.com/birthday-worth-celebrating/

Have you ever been in a situation where you have a myriad of choices to choose from–each with its risks, rewards and repercussions–that you ended up being very confused as to what choice to opt for?

I guess you must have been in such a situation at one point or the other. Even if it wasn’t as severe as I painted it, you certainly must have been in a crossroad that demands decisions.

One of the things we do most times in the face of decisions is to seek for the opinion of others. As good as that may sound, we may not eventually get the best choices from them. Sticking with the ideas in our head may also turn out to be misleading.

Desperation kills. Experiences have taught me that the best things to do when making life decisions especially decisions that are bothered around career, relationship and finances is to sleep over it, then these steps follow:

1. Form A Deaf Ear To The Outside World

One of the worst things you can do to yourself is to live a life someone else designed. Listening to advice from other is good, especially those that have gone ahead of you in life. But after listening to those pieces of advice, close your ears to the world and ask yourself what you really need.

At the end of the day, it boils down to you. You need to weigh those advices on the scale of what you truly need and also weigh the ensuing results. You can never be able to do this if you always rely on others to make decisions for you. Be the captain of your life, but give ear to the suggestions of your crew members.

2. Sail To The Direction Of Your Passion

As the captain of your own life, it boils down to what you really want. When you’re done weighing the thoughts in your head and the advices of others, it’s advisable you go with where your heart lies. In issues of relationships, don’t do anyone a favour by sticking with him/her, you’ll lose your happiness.

In the same vein, don’t stick with a particular job for life because the pay is good. If you don’t make deliberate plans to go with your true passion while you’re still gathering resources, you’ll end up in regrets and depression on the long run.

The course you want to study in college may not be “lucrative”, but will you find fulfillment in it? This is one of the best question you must ask at this point, What gives and will give me fulfillment?

3. Study The Patterns

Meticulously observe the series of events in your life as regards a particular issue. Where are the events pointing towards? Hey, I’m not talking about failure. Failure often tries to block our visage from the true realities behind the walls.

Ignoring such hindrance, where has your life been headed all the while? What are the good landmarks you’ve arrived at throughout the journey? The events that happen in your life can give you vital clues as to the right way to follow.

Please follow the link to read more: http://notemast.com/essential-nuggets-making-difficult-decisions-life/

Success if often equated to money, and people tend to define success around it. As popular as that mindset may be, it’s not totally true. Success is basically finding true accomplishment in a chosen path. It’s about discovering purpose and satisfactorily achieving it with the needed results.

This means that the definition of success is relative, and it’s predicated upon the goals that one set out to achieve. A man can be very successful, yet he’s not a billionaire. Someone else on the other hand may have so much money and lacks fulfillment.

Is money good? Certainly; but the earlier we stopped equating success to money, the better we focus on our visions for life.

Successful people understand that their success is dependent on the decisions and actions they take, so they are very careful when sifting out the wrong actions. These are 6 things they’ve refused to do in a bid to consolidate their position at the top.


1. They Don’t Allow Anyone Pull Them Down

By virtue of how high they’ve attained in their pursuits, people tend to flock around them. However, it’s not surprising that they are quick at laying people off too.

The kind of persons around you can determine where you’re going to end up. Pessimists and vision killers are the worst kinds of persons to keep in your cycle. But, funny enough, they always keep coming.

Successful people are not apologetic when laying off such people. It’s not pride, neither is it arrogance. It’s a relevant decision one must have to make on regular basis in life. If you really want to be successful, then you’ve got to sift your cycle.

Get positive people that will pull you up and let go of the negative ones.
Tough decision = tough impact.

2. They Don’t Allow Others To Design Their Lives

No one knows your vision for life better than you do. Hence, no one should dictate your path. On the short and long run, it’s remains your life and the consequences of any mistake are there for you to bear alone.

Successful people are good at listening to advice on how to be more successful. They’ve got mentors and life coaches. But they never forget that advices are people’s suggestions and must be weighed on a scaled before being accepted or dropped.

One of the worst things that can ever happen to you is to live a life that someone else designed for you, except such a designer is God himself.

Successful people follow their blueprints for life and they not allow themselves to be caught up in activities that are not in alignment with their purpose.

3. They Refuse To Limit Their Vision

Here is a popular saying: “if your dream doesn’t scare you, then it’s not big enough.” Why would you see a blueprint of city and resolved to build a village because you are scared that the resources to build a city won’t be forthcoming. Who told you that the resources are gonna come in a day?

Successful people know that there are phases in a vision they seek to pursue. They aim for the biggest picture, but start with a step at a time. Call them crazy, they will smile and continue. Discourage them and they’ll relegate you in their friends list.

You need to understand that whatever vision you receive is yours. Although people can help you to see it through, but don’t allow anyone (you inclusive) to limit those big dreams of yours.

Please click the link to read more: http://notemast.com/6-things-successful-people-refuse/

The first question I probably have to answer is, “Who is Toby Nwazor?”

Toby is one of those silent leaders whose works have spoken volumes of him even in his absence. He’s a contemporary life coach, speaker, blogger and ‘writepreneur’ whose works have been featured on leading blogs such as Huffington Post, Good Men Project, The Entrepreneur, Addicted2Success and a host of others. If you call him a formidable authority in the ‘writosphere’, you won’t be wrong.

I’ve known him for a while, but got closer to him only about a year ago. I was privileged to spend three nights in his apartment. That was for sure three of my most enlightening nights ever. This article is based on what I learnt from him within a period of one year and precisely during the three precious nights at his abode.

1. Success Is A Decision

Success doesn’t just happen to you. It’s not magic, neither does it obey the principles of coincidence. It’s basically “preparation meets opportunity.” He made it very clear from his lifestyle that every second we live is a choice. And the actions thereof can determine whether we’ll be successful or not.

2. Remain Where You Are Celebrated And You’ll Remain A Local Champion

I had always been a writer in various spheres. Not professionally though, but I’ve always been expressing myself in good flow of words. I was always on Facebook writing poems and articles for birthday celebrations. It was quite great, stressful but lovely.

I needed to explore a wider sphere but didn’t know how to start. I never really saw myself as a professional writer either. I was caught within the borders of a mediocre local champion. My situation changed immediately I placed a call across to him about a year ago. The result was that I started Notemast Blog.

He taught me that I can never win new territories if I decide to build a castle in my comfort zone.

Explore, stumble, rise and dominate.

3. It’s More Blessed To Give Than To Receive

While I underwent a 3-day mentorship class in his apartment, I was able to catch a glimpse of his giving culture. Toby has a percentage of his income that is devoted to others. He gives to those in need and those he looks up to — God inclusive.

To him, there is no influence without giving; and it transcends beyond finances. Time, knowledge and other resources can be sown too.

4. Always Make Out Time To Mentor Others

I had to do a little secretive survey of the number of people around me that are being directly and indirectly mentored by Toby. The result was a shocker.

Don’t get too busy that you have no time for others. Always learn to give back to the society. It is one of the surest way to expand your sphere of influence.

5. “The Market Is Not Saturated”

Those were the exact words he told me the night he asked me to start a blog. According to him, “as long as you have value to offer, you’ll always have an audience to listen.

If you can locate a suitable niche, settle there, solve a need, offer something irresistible and innovative, you’ll discover that the market is not saturated.”


6. Consistency Challenge

The writer’s block is an issue that every writer can identify with. Whenever it happens, writers lose all forms of motivation to write. Well, Toby taught me that you can break every jinx and remain consistent in whatever you do. You must create a strategy and escape route for yourself.

He writes at least an article on Facebook every day and still has time to meet up with other writing requests. The consistency challenge is one that every success-minded person was take. Locate that inconsistency bug in your life, chart a plan around it and ensure you beat it at it own game.

Click link to read more: https://notemast.com/15-things-toby-nwazor-taught/

The resources available to man are very limited. We have only 24hours in a day, our knowledge bank isn’t filled up, that’s why we read books and our bank accounts are never going to be fat enough for us to stop making more money. As a matter of fact, the reason why we use the word, “dreams” to refer to aspirations is because they cannot be actualized now due to the unavailable resources. This is where the 80/20 rule comes in.

The 80/20 rule states that for many events, roughly 80% of the effects come from 20% of the causes.
– Vilfredo Pareto

This rule otherwise known as the Pareto principle was coined by the Italian economist Vilfredo Pareto and has been observed to be true in every works of life.

In simplest of words, it means that 80% of the results we achieve in life are often dependent on only 20% of our efforts; and 80% of the things that happen in life are caused by only a selected 20% of the world’s population. This means that to get maximum results in life, we must channel our limited resources to areas where there will be maximum productivity.

It’s noteworthy that the 80/20 is not rigid. At times, it can be 90/10 or 85/15 or something within that range. Nonetheless, the reality behind that rule holds true for every works of life. In this rule, the two dominant keywords are causes and effects referring to actions and results respectively.

These guidelines can be practically applied through the following ways:

1. Identify Your Productive Time And Maximize It

Everyone is different. The earlier you realized that, the better productive you’ll be. Some are night crawlers, while others do very well in the day time. Stop struggling to be like someone who always work into the night. I know it’s good to develop stature in all areas, but just stop it. Identify the hours of the day when you are most productive and maximize it. If it is 5am to 10am, then ensure nothing distracts you during those hours because 20% of your work time gives 80% of the results.

2. Devote More Time To Read A Few Important Books

There is no point wasting your time reading every book published by every author. Come on, I know you want to gather so much knowledge, but for the sake of maximum productivity, channel more time towards reading certain kinds of books that will make you a lord in your niche. Reread the most important ones of them all. You can allocate the remaining 80% of your reading time to other books in diverse categories.

3. Read Only The Important Parts Of A Book And Skip The Rest

As an author, I shouldn’t be telling you this, but it’s the truth. Your time is limited, know what you want in a book and go for it–our usage of dictionary taught us that. You obviously won’t have to read the entire dictionary, would you?

4. Devote More Time To Nurture Your Most Important Relationships

You might have a cycle of 1000 friends. Bravo! That’s a good figure, but how many of them are really productive? On Facebook, I basically interact with less than 5% of my over 4000 friends, because I get the best results from them. Build relationships, network properly, but nurture the most fruitful ones of them all because 20% of relationships give 80% of the value.


5. Focus More On Creating Memorable Moments In Your Relationships

Think about your most cherished relationship. How many memorable moments can you remember in it? Juxtapose those moments with the remaining moments shared in the relationship and you will realize that the beautiful moments were just a minute fraction of the entire moments. What you did to create those moments. Focus more on those things and build the quality of your relationships drastically.

Please follow the link to read more: http://notemast.com/8020-principle-11-ways-improve-life/

moscobabs:
So you want me to be shot dead when I buy any of these Cars?

Wicked man

Exactly o... You may just get gunned down by one angry and pathetic fan of any of the opposing stars

ct2:
congratulations, may God also provides for those seeking, if u believe ,Pls like

Oga, must everything be turned to prayer points.

Even if it means shouting it over the rooftop, I’ll reiterate it over and over again. Frankly, talent is not enough. It can never be a match for true professionalism.

Recently, I was discussing with a friend about the Christian music industry. I realised that there are lots of “upcoming artistes” in the church. They can download great songs from heaven.

They are fantastic at leading the church in worship, and some of them are the best in their local churches. These guys are good with amazing potentials, but sadly, they are never heard.

I kept wondering why it’s so until I remembered John C. Maxwell’s words — “talent is never enough.”

You can argue all you can, but I remain opined that Cristiano Ronaldo is not as talented as Lionel Messi, yet Ronaldo is currently the best footballer in the world simply because he realised that talent is never enough.

Two of the major differences between those good worship leaders in our churches and the amazingly popular songsters out there are skills and influence.

Skills

For you to be set apart from your contemporaries, you must develop skills. Many people built a residential apartment around their talents and failed to improve it.

You can be the best writer in your community for all I care, but if you don’t develop the needed skills for writing, the best you can ever amount to in life as far as writing is concerned is a local champion.

Why? This is because there are lots of other local champions out there that are working tirelessly towards becoming the next Brian Tracy or Chinua Achebe.

You think you’re a good rapper. Do you know there are better rappers around the globe that are painlessly fighting for the global stage?

Do you even know you’ve got competitors from all nooks and crannies of the world?

This is painful but true:

If you fail to invest in your talents, you will always sit before the television to watch those who invested in theirs.
— Nonso Nwagbo

Each day I spend on social media, I see people with crude potentials that are yet untapped and they are totally oblivious of the need for it.

Skill is the difference between your high school classmate who is a seasoned software programmer and you who is just a regular internet user, even though you were better than him back then in college.

The big question is, how far are you willing to go to develop yourself?

Draw an action plan immediately:

What steps will I take to get better?
What are the necessary courses I must take?
What YouTube channels should I subscribe for best tutorials and guide?
Who are those in my niche that I should follow on Facebook for my personal improvement?
Who should I meet for mentorship?
When should I make the move for a mentor?
When should I actualize these goals?
What progress must I make before the end of this week?

Answer these questions and develop your talents into formidable skills.

Influence

Having skills without recognition leaves you no where also. Influence is your ability to build a fan base who respects and trusts your abilities and skills.

Do you find it difficult to believe that there are footballers out there far better than Messi and Ronaldo, but are not known?

Follow link to read more:
http://notemast.com/talent-not-enough/

One basic daily truth is that the way you are adjudged or classed by people is obviously dependent on their perception of you.

This fundamental reality was the premise upon which my friend and I struggled last night to appreciate the thought patterns and parameters that have meticulously shaped the way we perceive people in our societies.

Perception in turn is a functional prerequisite that enables people dish out honour, respect and attention to others. This means, if you perceive someone to be undeserving, you’ll certainly give him/her the exact dose of honour due to the level your perception classed him/her.

The reason why you pass beggars on the streets without taking selfie-shots with them is because you feel they are probably not in your league, they are too dirty or such a picture will be an embarrassment to your personality — right?

Whether the options I spelt out are the correct reasons or not, it doesn’t change the fact that it is a perception issue, because you won’t fail to take a selfie-shot with Rihanna or any music star if you should see them walking on the same streets.

This brings us to the two basic components of perception — stature and status.

Status

Status can easily by identified as your portfolio, academic qualifications, titles, social class, influence, fame and the fatness of your bank account. This is what people look out for almost immediately they meet you.

For the beggars on the streets, people don’t give room for second thoughts before concluding that they are paupers. For the Catholic priest in his full regalia, the single story you might have of him is that he is pious and “holy”.

And for the sex workers in the brothels, they are considered to be outright sinners with no sense of dignity or morality.

Now let me stop there. I believe you now understand what I mean by status.

Stature

Stature on the other hand refers to your inner make-up. It is the totality of your capacity and capabilities. Beyond the single story people have of you, stature defines you.

It’s your content and knowledge base — a proof of your investments on human capital. It is the summation of how well you’ve groomed yourself and who you are in the secret — your character. Simply say, it is the “real you” which others probably might not have noticed.

Everyone on the face of the earth is wearing a mask called status. When these masks are removed, what is left is stature.

Now, I’ll pose the question again, What influences your perception of people — stature or status?

During my discussion with my friend last night, the struggles we had in a bid to appreciate people’s judgemental systems and their modus operandi was appalling.

Do you know that the society of today has given credence to things that shouldn’t have been considered worthwhile? My attention is primarily on our over-rated education system.

Please follow the link to read more
http://notemast.com/influences-perception-people-stature-status/

I’ve studied the lives of most successful men like Bill Gates, Warren Buffet, Aliko Dangote, Michael Dell, and drawing insights from authors like Jack Canfield and Les Hewitt, I was able to conclude on this amazing checklist that everyone must consider before setting goals.

The trick is when you study, think and act like a billionaire, you’re more likely going to end up being a millionaire if you don’t end up as a billionaire.

1. Your Most Important Goals Must Be Yours

This may sound crazy and obvious at first thought, but at a second thought, it is not. On the average, everyone should have career, relationship, financial and health goals. Nonetheless, one salient question people have failed to answer is What do I really want?

Answering that question is the very first step to setting goals. Failure to answer this question correctly will make you set and prioritize goals that are not consistent with your utmost interest. There are a lot of things that influence goals. The media for one has done a very good job at making us set goals that we never thought was necessary.

Because of media publications, a lot of people bought the iPhone X even though they never needed it and was never in their budget. Such decisions have been made by a whole lot of us.

A friend of mine has been starving for over a month just to lose weight. Why? Simply because the society doesn’t want to accept her the way she is?

If you keep setting important goals because of what people think or say, or to impress others, you may end up being depressed on the long run.

2. Your Goals Must Be Worth It

While I was interning at an ICT firm in Lagos a couple of years ago, I realized that my knowledge on core ICT enterprise solutions was poor. The internship was to last for just 6 months, so I had to set important goals for myself.

Twice every week, when other employees have gone home, I’d stay back at the office. Sounds awkward right? Well, that was the way it sounded in my heart when I started it the first time. Each of those nights, I watched YouTube videos and read e-books related to those software I wanted to learn.

Also, since the organization was empty, I had all the time to experiment with the servers in the organization. After a couple of months, the results started trickling in, I became very proficient in systems administration and a couple of enterprise software.

Being important is not enough. If your goal is not worth it, you’ll not see the need to go an extra mile. Mark Zuckerberg dropped out of college because Facebook was worth it. Learn to focus on things that matters. Prioritize them and sacrifice your time and other resources for them.

There are two pains in life. One is the pain of discipline, the other is the pain of regrets. DIscipline weighs ounces, but regret weighs tons when you allow your life to drift along unfulfilled
– Jim Rohn

Avoid regrets tomorrow by meticulously going through the school of discipline today.

3. Your Goals Must Be Specific and Measurable

A lot of people miss it at this point. You’re being very unspecific if you say that your goal is “to be successful.” Success means different things to different people, so you need to define it. For some, success means having a new car, or having a comfortable home or better still having a million dollars in your bank account.

Don't be in a hurry to leave, read more by following the link:
http://notemast.com/top-10-goals-checklist-aspiring-billionaires/

I have spent a good part of my life trying to appreciate the beauty of animals and how they’ve meticulously planned their lives.

You might think it is impossible for ants to outsmart you, but wisdom taught me that there is a high dimension of life hacks that some seemingly unimportant creatures have adopted which have made their lives.

Whether it is red ants, fire ants, carpenter ants, weaver ants or any of the 14,000 species of ants, ants remain those tiny creatures we’ve all known over the years that can make your skin sore when bitten. And trust me, they’re way smarter than a whole lot of humans.

1. They’ve got the “sixth sense”

I know you might have seen a lot of Hollywood animated movies on talking ants with globe-like eyes. Well, the truth is that most ants are blind. But they’ve got the sixth sense.

Not technically the “sixth sense” per se, but they have a heightened sense of smell, and antennae that helps them to feel things around them.

Without an intelligent sense of sight, these tiny creatures have well mastered their terrains and can detect food, obstacles and enemies on the way.

If you have keenly observed the red ants, you’ll notice they walk across a defined pathway without missing their ways. This is achieved using their antennae.

Most humans who are vision impaired or who have one form of disability or the other have settled for begging or worse still, feel they can never amount to anything tangible in life.

But these tiny creatures keep teaching us that even though the creator made them vision impaired, they still have lots of smart ways to get things done.

The secret is to find a way even in the most difficult of times. If you keep seeing you insufficiency and disability, surely, you can never get any result.

2. They are hyper-organized

An entire ant colony starts with a single reproductive female ant known as the queen. Through her, other members of the colony including the female workers and soldiers are born. The most remarkable thing about the organization of ants is that no one tells the other what to do.

There is no central control department that dishes orders. And like you’ve known, they don’t have functional eyes. But these guys achieve great results without having supervisors over them.

They know what to do and when to do it. Procrastination doesn’t exist in their lexicon and their efficiency is thought provoking. Call it stereotyped, but you cannot deny that their system is totally organized.

Being smart entails using minimum resources to get best results while avoiding every form of loss whatsoever. If you need someone to Wait on you before you take important actions in your life, then you are certainly not as smart as an ant.

Ants are literally the best time managers and they don’t waste resources. Once an opportunity for food opens up somewhere, the scouts will smell it and go for inspection. When they return with tangible intelligence, the necessary number of ants that are needed to move the food will immediately leave to pick it up.

Click to read more https://notemast.com/may-sound-unbelievable-ants-probably-smarter/
For them, complacency and negligence is a crime.

Grab a bottle of coke, relax and think of what successful people do as against losers that always whine and complain. Success doesn’t come by chance. It is the reward of concerted efforts aimed at a definite goal.

While sipping your coke, can you think of what some of your friends did that resulted in unfathomable success in their lives? The basic truth is that they did a whole lot of things. They changed their habits, changed their way of thinking, took life more seriously and they also gave up on a whole lot of things.

You can’t expect different results by repeating the same thing. If you can give up on the following things, you too can be as successful as they are.

1. They’ve given up carelessness

It may not be news for you to know that successful people are not careless with life. They’re planned, meticulous and organized. Your successful friends have obviously taken life more serious than you can imagine. They’re disciplined and they’ve placed boundaries around their lives. For them, it’s no longer business as usual.

2. They’ve given up believing on fate

Disasters and happenings are not determined by fate. Your successful friends have learnt that the situations in their lives are not predicated upon fate. They’ve stopped blaming fate for every bad thing that happens to them. If you must be successful, you must learn to take the bull by the horn and stop that crazy mantra of “what will be, will be.” No! Life is garbage in garbage out. It gives you whatever you give to it.

3. They’ve given up on luck

Luck is as bad as fate. Why would you live your life waiting for the day luck favours you to win a lottery? Waiting on luck will make you grow old and weary in laziness and failure. Your wise friends have understood that nothing happens by chance, and coincidence is just a word used to identify a complex situation with no immediate explanation. Life has principles, when you apply the right ones, success will locate you.

4. They’ve given up on blaming others

You are the architect of your success and misfortunes. The only mistakes in your life are the ones you permitted. If you look intently, you’ll realize that all the disappointments you got from people could have been avoided one way or the other. They might have occurred due to your ignorance, indiscipline, negligence to details, consistency or commitment to a cause.

You must learn to see life for what it really is: Your Business. Yea, that’s right! It’s your business and you alone can make decisions that are beneficial or detrimental to your success. It’s high time you quit the blame game.

5. They’ve given up on believing they can’t change the world

Martin Luther Jr. King as a black man had a dream that changed the tides of racism in America. It took Nelson Mandela 27 years to cure South Africa of her apartheid and break the chains of colonialism significantly.

So what makes you think you can’t change the world? Failures? Thomas Edison had to try 1000 times before he could give us the light bulb which we so much cherish. Is it uncertainty or fear that can hinder you from changing the world? You’ve got to believe in yourself and look at something bigger than now.

Your actions and in-actions are capable enough to cause a paradigm shift in certain dimensions on life. Think of something you can do to impact your life, immediate society and the world at large. There is a drop of greatness in every man.

6. They’ve given up on the status quo

Your successful friends are certainly tired of the way things had been. They are tired of going round and round the pepper tree. The status quo refers to the way things have always been. It entails the manner with which you invest in your life and it is also the way life has always treated you. For you to amount to something tangible in life, you must get fed up of bulls**t and aspire for something greater than the norm.

7. They’ve given up many bad habits

Letting go of habits can be difficult. I totally understand. But each bad habit you let go of draws you closer to the dome of success. Bad habits can be detrimental to health, relationships, business, career and all you can think of. You are as good as the number of good habits you have.

Visit link to read more: http://notemast.com/24-things-successful-friends-given/

The American society and the Western world generally has infamously made the term, divorce a household name. Funny enough, it seems like the number of celebrity divorces are more than marriages.

Once celebrities get married, their fans unconsciously start looking forward to their divorce.

This trend makes me wonder if people really understand the meaning of commitment. Commitment is a serious business and should be treated as one. It is an agreement that one makes with determination in view of a definite result.

Making any form of commitment means you’ve weighed the pros and cons and you’re ultimately resolved at seeing that things work out positively. Commitment is not a decision that should be made emotionally.

As a matter of fact, when you make great decisions in tears, the consequences will dawn on you when the tears are dried up.


Marriages, relationships, partnerships, deals, bilateral trades and truces fail every now and then because people fail to understand the basic requirements of commitments.

1. Don’t Get Emotional

I need to resound it again and again. Don’t get emotional with commitments of any sort, most especially marriage and business deals. People often say that “love is blind, but I believe challenges will restore the sight.” Ensure you are psychologically, mentally and emotionally alert when making commitments.

2. Don’t Be Sentimental

Your Yes should remain Yes. Don’t allow circumstances to force you into making decisions that you’ll finally regret. If you are making a commitment to deliver a job to someone at a set date and time, ensure you’re not doing so because you were “sweet talked” into it or because you want to please someone.

Don’t allow yourself to be coerced into making commitments. On the long run, you and your loved ones will bear the bulk of any repercussions.

3. Do your research

Have you done your background study? This is one of the first things to do. A whole lot of things look good at first sight, but you need to understand that there are depths deeper than the depth of a building’s foundation. Ensure you do your homework before you say Yes to anyone.

4. Sleep Over It

Stress, disposition and environment can directly affecting decision making. Learn not to say yes until you’ve properly thought about it. Most times, the weight of a matter always dawns upon us hours after we first heard of it. So why don’t you wait until you’ve taken a nap before you give your final decision on a matter?


Any commitment that is not worth thinking about may not be worth making after all.

5. Plan Your Sacrifices

Commitment require sacrifices. Yes, it will come in one form or the other. If you’ve not identified the sacrifices you are going to make in that next big decision, that is a pointer that you’ve not really thought about it properly. Sacrifices can be huge or tiny. Either ways, identify it and see if it is something you’re expressly willing to offer.

READ MORE: http://notemast.com/understand-meaning-commitment/

It won’t be an act of exaggeration to say that respect is one of the most craved desires of man. Everyone wants respect but not everyone obviously deserves it.

As good as wealth and power are, they can only give you attention and make people fear you, but they are not sufficient enough to earn you respect.

Respect is a product of people’s judgement of you. It depends so much on your character and qualities. This means that people respect you to the extent of your attributes they appreciate.

In order to earn respect easily, you need to possess the following qualities:

1. Authenticity

You need to be original and real. You shouldn’t be the guy that is living someone’s else. Authenticity means you’ve got your own voice, you’re unique and you’re not living in the shadows of others. You must be proud of yourself, have a high self-esteem and strongly reject any intimidation.

2. Compassion

Showing love is not a duty reserved for people in a particular social class. You need to sympathize and empathize with people who are in need of it. Try to feel the pains of others and make them know that you sincerely understand what they’re going through. Little acts of kindness and encouragement can do more magics than you can imagine.

3. Comportment

Keep your calm at all times. Don’t be too quick to react or raise your voice. Think before you speak and not the other way round. It makes everyone think you are a boss when the tension in your environment does not seem to have an effect on you or your actions.

4. Honesty

Honesty may not be the easiest quality to maintain. In our society today, it easier to live a lie than to be straightforward and true. So anyone who lives against the odds will certainly earn himself a good dose of respect. It entails being totally open, transparent and not double sided.

5. Humility

Only a few persons would want to hang out with someone who thinks too high of himself. Pride will easily get people offended. Don’t sing your own praise. In spite of your affluence, portfolio or societal status, be calm and don’t force everyone to recognize you. When they finally realize how “big” you are in your silence, their respect for you will be off the roofs.

6. Impartiality

You’ve got to be fair and impartial to win someone’s heart. Being sentimental and biased may grant you immediate love and attention from those you favoured, but an act of impartiality can earn you an honourable name for life.

7. Integrity

You are as reliable as your words. A fool can easily be known by his words and actions. Irrespective of the situation, live your life in a way that you’ll maintain high ethical values and remain true to your beliefs.

Click link to read more:
http://notemast.com/13-ways-earn-respect-easily/

As an entrepreneur, there is an undying enthusiasm to build startups that will solve problems in the society. One of the biggest setback to the realisation of this vision is the unavailability of funds.

As a matter of fact, fund raising is predominantly the chief worry of startups. Founders often spend more time sourcing for seed rounds than they spend on other issues that partains to their startups.

These are proven sources of funds for your startup.

1. Non-Dilutive Capital

Non-dilutive capital refers to funds that don’t require the sales of your startup’s shares or dilution of the shares of existing shareholders. The best source of this kind of funds are entrepreneurship foundations that are existent in most countries.

There are lots of non-profit organizations that give free grants ranging from $5,000 to infinity. Accessing such grants means you need to be aware of their existence and you need to produce documented proofs of the viability of your startup’s idea.

2. Angel Investor

An angel investor is a successful entrepreneur who has made so much money that he can afford to diversify by investing in new startups. They get convertible bond or startup’s equity in exchange for the capital injected into the startup.

Funding from angel investors is pretty easy as long as the startup owner can convince the investor of the viability of the startup. An example is Mark Zuckerberg’s $24million investment in Andela, a startup that is dedicated to the training of young tech savvy entrepreneurs.

3. Hustles

Building a startup is obviously demanding and costs a lot financially and otherwise. It requires a large chunk of time and dedication. You certainly don’t want to go hungry while looking for investors.

A sure way of funding your startup is to get a side job or gig while you nurse and plan towards your vision. You can have a day job, while you dedicate your night to your startup and also push some of your salaries or wages to it.

4. Venture Capital

A venture capitalist takes high risks by injecting seed rounds into startups. A venture capital is seed capital from venture capital firms or funds in exchange for equity in the startup. One must ensure that he has his negotiations right when getting venture capital. You certainly don’t want to erroneously lose a large chunk of your company’s equity, do you?

4. Business Partners

You’ve got the idea, someone else has the cash. Bring him in. Business partners are sure sources of funds. They are not just financiers but also stress-partners, hustle-partners, managemtnt-partners and co-founders. This means you’ve got their backs to lean on when things go south. Utmost care must be taken when choosing partners, because one’s team is crucial to the survival of a startup.

5. Banks

Commercial banks, banks of agriculture, banks of technology and banks of industry, gives out low interest loans to entrepreneurs in dedicated industries. The policy for loan acquisition differs from countries to countries. Most often than not, loans are easily made available to entrepreneurs that are investing in choice sectors that are dear to the heart of the government.

6. Government Entrepreneurship Funds

Apart from banks of industry, the government of most nations have direct influence on the entrepreneurship growth of their citizens. They offer grants and zero-interest loans through various entrepreneurship programs. Most times, these funds are not accessed annually because people are barely aware of them. Make use of Google and you will be glad you did.

Follow this link to see more:
http://notemast.com/10-proven-ways-raise-funds-startup/

Do you know that fishes can fly?
Yes, it’s possible, but figuratively.

Incentives can make fishes fly

Incentives is one of the most popular forms of motivation that yields tremendous results. This is because, the average human wants to know what he stands to gain for doing more.
There are often a number of times when team spirit goes down and there is hardly any results after lots of efforts. As a matter of fact, when team morale falls below threshold, it won’t be surprising for members to take their jobs as a normal routines.

When jobs becomes a mere routine and less of an exciting adventure, productivity will certainly stagnate or even decline.

Have you ever wondered why most marketers are not given “normal pay”. This is because their motivation is proportional to their results. They know also that without results, there is no pay.

Hence their pay is their incentive to work.

Thus, each new day is a new adventure to hit a new marketing milestone.

Researches have shown that humans are naturally lazy.
In 2015, I interned at an ICT firm in Lagos while I was still in College. Although I was working with the Pre-sales (technical) department.

I and every other intern and staff members of the firm were asked to market “Ikarus”, a German anti-virus.

The firm had the sole distributing rights in Nigeria. Sales target were not being met, hence all employees were mobilized to push it aggressively.

The power to reject “No” for an answer is a rare gift that has made a lot of people give up prematurely in life simply because they lack it.

I used to think it persistence is annoying until I realised that success is not dependent on how tough the journey is but on how resilient the sojourner is.

This is a hard lesson that I learnt a few years ago from one of the most hated insects of all time – mosquito.

The Mind
In my third year at college, I was faced with a nearly insurmountable academic pressure. The lectures were getting overwhelming. Assignments and projects were off the charts. At a point, I decided I was going to drop out of college if my grades didn’t improve as I felt the clouds of social isolation gathering around me.

In the heat of the entire pressure, I was invited for a camp meeting at a location quite far from my campus. I initially didn’t want to go, but I eventually showed up because I needed some “fresh air.”

There are certain points in life when nothing makes sense. The normal melodious music on your phone suddenly turns to noise, and everyone around you becomes irritating. Remaining in that atmosphere can drive one crazy. A change of environment is often what people need to clear their minds off the clogs of frustration, depression and misguided anger.

The legendary Bob Marley once said,

Life is one big road with lots of signs. So when you’re riding through the ruts, don’t complicate your mind.

The mind can be likened to the RAM of a computer, when it gets used up at any given point in time, the performance of the system drops. Everyone that is success-driven must ensure that his mind is always free and decongested because the most important battles in life are the battles of the mind.

The Battle
I reluctantly went to the camp meeting solely to get some “fresh air”. Little did I know that I was signing up for a realtime battle.

After the evening session at the meeting, I sat at a corner of the meeting hall, trying to think things through. Almost immediately, I noticed a mosquito hovering over my head. I quickly dismissed “him” by flinging my hand against “him”.

I guess the pressure I asserted against it was not much because it was back after a very short time. Once more I dismissed it with a fling of the hand.

In less than 15 seconds, I heard a popular song playing in my left ear. It was a song I couldn’t mistake for anything else. And trust me, it is the most annoying song ever. I’ve heard it hundreds of times, and it didn’t take me a split second to recognise that it was the popularly infamous rhythm of mosquitoes – the guy was back again. There was no way I could have identified his face, but I knew he was the same mosquito that I had dismissed 15 seconds earlier.

Once more, I sharply dismissed it, but with a high dose of anger. The mosquito made me restless and my anger level was hitting the roof. I swore to kill him the next time he crosses his boundaries. Reluctantly, I tried to focus on my thoughts, but my eyes were on the lookout for him. I chose to refer to him as a person, because he eventually won my heart.

It wasn’t up to 10 seconds and he was back again. This time around, it was my right ear. I tried killing it but ended up giving myself a painful slap. The pain I felt was the pain of frustration – the pain that has been locked up in my heart due to my failure to get results.

to dawn on me that I wasn’t dealing with just an ordinary mosquito, rather I was been tormented by an hungry, aggressive, determined, persistent and result-driven mosquito. He doesn’t want to take No for an answer. The word “impossible” doesn’t exist in his frame of reference. It was my blood or nothing else, and he was ready to die for it.

Right there at the spot, I saw myself being educated by wisdom. A lot of questions started going through my mind. If a mosquito would damn the risk of being killed and go after what he wants, how much more of me, a right thinking human.

A lot of people have given up in life too quick even before their battles began. They felt it wasn’t what they signed up for, but guess what?

Success isn’t breakfast. It’s not a tray of mouthwatering burrito served with oatmeal and chilled strawberry yogurt that will be placed at your bedside while you’re making a return from dreamland. Wake up! You’ve got to work for it.

At least that was what the mosquito taught me. He was no ordinary mosquito, I could have sworn that he whispered that into my ears. I had to stand up because I had poor chances of winning against an enemy that is airborne while I was sitting down.

Most times, what one needs to make a difference is to stand up. You’ve got to stand up against the challenges of life. You’ve got to take stand against the failure knocking at the doors of your life. You certainly have to take a stand against depression, self-pity and their cohorts.

In a world of over 7 billion people, it’s practically impossible to survive if you’re not dogged. How far will be too far for you? What can you give in exchange for results?

The Victory
While I was brooding over these things, I slowly looked at my left arm…

http://notemast.com/beautiful-life-lessons-mosquito-taught/
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Do you know that Facebook has not been totally sincere with us. This was a shocker for me as much as it will be for many. Most of the users including me uncannily signed up on the platform without prior knowledge of what we were getting themselves into. I actually discovered late and I’m certainly making amends duly.

I used to be one of the greatest lover of the social media platform, until some other users took over my position. I joined Facebook in 2010 and tailored my friend list to about 4,800. I wanted a little tolerance should in case I met new friends. It has always been fun for me until I recently discovered that the following have been stolen from us by the social media giant.

1. Privacy
Facebook and the entire social media has made us lose the importance of privacy. These days it’s very easy to track someone down.

Months ago, Facebook introduced a featured called “Friends Nearby”. A user need to turn on the phone’s GPS for it to work. It means that whenever you enter a locality, ALL your friends who has that feature turned on will know you’re there.

This is the height is self orchestrated privacy invasion. Data about your frequently visited locations can always be accessed by Facebook when needed. Your favourite restaurants, hotels, gyms and the likes are no longer secrets.

A lot of users especially the females, post all their day to day activities on their timelines. You can actually know when a user bought her first car, when her cat died, when the fiancée proposed, when they broke up, what led to the break up, when she was arrested for drunk driving and all sorts of personal details.

350 million photos are uploaded on Facebook daily. Those pictures are the records of our private lives with family and loved ones.

We are making our entire lives bare on the internet. And guess what, they never get deleted. Even after pressing the delete button, someone still has copies. I suggest you take out time to read Facebook’s Privacy Policy. You’ll be shocked.

2. Time
Facebook has been designed to be very interactive and addictive. On regular basis, new features are introduced to ensure that users get glued on the screen each time they opened the website or mobile app.

An average user spends 75 minutes on Facebook daily. But some people are quite above average.

Such people literally leave their Facebook and Messenger app running all day. They end up spending as much as 2 – 4 hours on Facebook daily.

The addiction is more among users between the ages of 18 and 24. 50% of them go to Facebook immediately they wake up. It is now a part and parcel of their lives.

Employers and Employees can’t stay a day without visiting Facebook. While I was interning at an ICT consultancy, I caused a uproar in an organization when I mistakenly blacklisted Facebook on their network.

Even the most serious employees were on my neck as though I committed a very serious crime. It shows how rooted they are in Facebook in spite of their busy schedules.

3. Family
A lot of users are currently suffering from the “Social Media Addiction Syndrome”. If you can stay one week without using and social media site or app, then you’re safe.

Facebook users are gradually losing touch of family intimacy. The social media is a responsive virtual community. It has its own intelligence which positions the right stuff to each user. The idea is to keep every user engrossed.

A great percentage of users have reduced the time they spend communicating with their immediate family.

This time has been diverted towards sharing, viewing, liking & commenting on posts. Others are always very thrilled when they chat with new friends on the platform. The ladies love it when they get pinged by random guys.

These days, parents rush bedtime stories with their kids so as to go back to their exciting chats. Youths can miss the holiday camp with family and won’t bother because they’ve got some virtual friends who will always keep them company.

Follow this link to read more
http://notemast.com/the-shocking-facebook-deception-what-facebook-has-been-stealing-from-you/

Yesterday was really a busy one for me. I stopped by at the nearest ICT hub in my neighbourhood, and I ran into a number of buddies. We spent a large chunk of time having fun. We talked about a whole lot of stuff like career, family, business, faith, the society and a bunch of other stuff. What inspired this article was my time with those amazing guys.

One of them worships with the House On The Rock, Lekki, which is led by Pst. Paul Adefarasin. He narrated a scenario the pastor painted for them sometime ago. The pastor stopped by at a popular mall to pick up a couple of things. On seeing him, some of his church members who were in the mall, ran towards him and took loads of selfies with him. He happily posed for the shots with them before he continued with his shopping.

Pst. Adefarasin is a renowned preacher in the Christian circles and I wouldn’t have failed to have a shot with him too, but the minister showed us a flaw in that mentality. In as much as he was happy he saw members of his congregation, he expected more from them. They don’t have a personal relationship with him beyond the regular “pastor-congregation” connection and they’ve not had a time with him outside the confines of the church. So he was expecting that the occasion was a rare opportunity to establish a better relationship with those youths. Though, he is their pastor, but he hoped that they would have asked for something more challenging than a selfie, perhaps a question regarding career, family, academics or just anything impactful.

Mark Zuckerberg was in Lagos last year, many entrepreneurs got inspired, Andela (a tech startup) got a whooping $24 million investment from his foundation. A host of young application developers got sponsorships for heightened trainings, yet some other persons after struggling through the traffic in Lagos, got close enough just to take selfies with him that were eventually uploaded on Facebook.

We were thought in elementary science that one of the ways of making a new magnet is by continuously rubbing a metal against the poles of a magnet. Gradually, the metal starts to gain the magnetic properties. A metal that chooses to take a selfie with a magnet, will only have the picture as a souvenir of an encounter that would have transformed him into a king in the dynasty of magnetism.

Please follow the link to read more

http://notemast.com/secure-that-relationship-and-dont-break-up/

“The potential of an average human is like a huge ocean unsailed, a new continent unexplored and a world of possibilities without limits”— Brian Tracy
In the school of success, one’s ability to set goals and achieve it is the MASTER KEY to the attainment of the highest degree.

Goals unlock your positive mind and release ideas, energy, creativity and ingenuity for success attainment and unlimited achievements. Clear goals provide focus, develops confidence, increase competence and becomes a driving motivation to achieve success in any endeavour of life including relationships, career, academics, entrepreneurship, business et cetera.

In summary goals are the fuel in the furnace of achievement & enables one to unleash his full potentials for personal and professional success.

Like other subjects, goal setting is an art and it takes mastery to reap maximum dividends. It might sound ambiguous but trust me, it’s really no big deal if only you can master and internalize the ABC of goal setting and actualization. I have decided to arrange them in a reverse order:


C – Conceive (Create Your Future)
This is the first stage of Goal setting where the conception of your ideal future takes shape in the womb of your mental chambers. It involves designing the final product and creating the ideal result mentally, some will call it building castles in the air. It is the ability to project several days, months or years into the future like creating a fantasy. It is the process of practicing idealization without limitation. “Visualizing your Ideal future”

Here the vital questions are what and where.

--What do I want to achieve in the next 5 years?
--What grades do I want to hit at the end of the academic semester?
--What kind of relationship do I want?
--Where do aspire to be in few years from now?


B – Believe (Reprogram Your Mindset)
As a man thinks in his heart, so is he

Thought patterns has so much effect on our performances than we can imagine. After visualization comes the reality. At this point you need to draw the realities of the future in a blueprint in the present. This stage is the hidden seemingly inconsequential stage, yet it plays a critical role in goal-setting and actualization because what you believe is what you eventually become.

Change your thinking, Change your life

One’s life is a reflection of his beliefs while one’s outward attitude and behaviour are reflections of his inward beliefs and values. The core of a man’s personality is his values and his values constructs his belief. Ultimately, one’s belief is not inherent. It is a product of varieties of information and experiences acquired in his life time. Therefore, it is his responsibility always to learn and unlearn at every stage in life because beliefs are the bed rock of one’s self-esteem.

If you must actualize your goals then, you must believe,
--in yourself,
--that you are capable of getting it done,
--that your abilities are equal to the task,
--that the process is worth it,
--that the risk is worth taking,
--in the ethics of hard work & discipline,
--that the goal is achievable.

Please follow the link to read more:

http://notemast.com/the-abc-of-goals-setting-and-actualization/

The dream of every parent is to see their children rise unto stardom and relevance. As such they avail the child with every love, care and education they can afford to be relevant in the future.

Education— This is my bone of contention.

Nigeria’s educational system is arguably one of the worst ever. I’m opinionated to make this claim irrespective of statistics that proves otherwise.

I’m not making comparison with war torn Sudan and Somali. Rather, I’m comparing the oil rich Nigeria with her counterparts with equivalent stability and resources.

It is obvious that we’ve not lived up to our educational expectations. Under the subsequent subheadings, I’ll be pointing out how parents have unknowingly teamed up with teachers and school managements to make the life of their children miserable.

Primary School
I can vividly picture my primary education days. Those days, I trekked long distances of about 30 minutes with a heavy back pack to and from school each day. I leave home as early as 7:10am because school resumes by 7:45am and closes by 2pm, but we were mandated to remain in school for evening lessons till 4pm.

On getting home, the time would have tilted towards 4:40pm. That entirely accounts for more than 9 hours of my productive day. I get home tired and worn out. I often hurriedly take a bath before diving on the meal prepared for me.

There was never time to watch enough TV because I have tons of home works to do on my “Ugo C. Ugo” gigantic workbooks. If you never came across those Encyclopedia-sized workbooks, you may never comprehend my plight.

I won’t be exaggerating by saying that the next one and half hour will be used to tidy those home works. Funny enough, I’m also expected to read all my notes before I go to bed.

Failure to do that will warrant my inability to answer the teacher’s questions in class the next day. It’s also to my parents’ accolades that I’m “very studious”.

It’s always surprising how I managed not to sleep till 10pm. Nap was never really possible. Playing with friends was also often impossible, unless I intended to do my homework late into the night.

This is identically the plight of the average Nigeria kid in my time even in this very dispensation. Funny enough, parents are always happy to see their children go through this heartbreaking crusade all in the name of education.

Kids basically have no time for themselves, no time to explore the potentials in them and basically no time to develop a talent or skill.

Secondary School Bondage
The entire anomaly always gets worse in Secondary school. Getting admitted into a private secondary school was quite wonderful for me. I was determined to meet up with all the schedules and activities lined up for me in school. School resumes by 7:45am also but closes by 5pm. I was offering 15 subjects in all including the boring and mind paralyzing ones for that matter.

Follow the link to read more.
http://notemast.com/how-nigerian-parents-and-teachers-have-jointly-destroyed-the-future-of-many-children/

It’s no longer news that at the beginning of every year people get so engrossed in making “New Year Resolutions” that they may never keep. A lot of people have so made a ritual out of it that even kids now recite those words like nursery rhymes.
Resolutions are statements of strong intents. They define what has been determined to do. Contextually, they can be referred to as plans or goals. The problem is not often the willingness to make plans, rather it is the successful execution of the plans.

I guess you might have seen a lot of write-ups on planning and goal-setting already, so let’s drop that aside a little.

The essence of this article is not to further inspire you to make sweet and ambitious goals, but to enlighten you on practical and effective steps to take in order to fulfill any realistic goal that you are focused on this year.

These steps are proven to be effective for just any kind of person with a touch of discipline. Trust me, a 9-year old can follow this through fruitfully.

1. Forget About New Year And Think Of New You
If your resolutions are motivated by the euphoria or vibes of a season or by people, then such resolutions will not survive a journey of two weeks. Focus less on the “new year” and more on you, your development, challenges and growth.

2. Have Realistic Goals
Don’t try to impress anyone by having very bogus and “difficult to actualize” goals. You’re not in a competition with anyone. It’s better you “snailishly” crawl your way to success than run your way to failure.

Take out time to think your goals through. Like I said earlier, the aim here is not for you to be inspired to target lofty goals, but to be empowered to execute any reasonably targeted goal.

3. Pen That Stuff Down
Ink lasts longer than thoughts. Get a nice looking book where you will pen down your New Year resolutions and all that pertains to it. The idea is that, even if you brain mistakenly loses track of any detail, you will always have something to fall back on. Also that book will be used for your resolutions’ appraisal.

Please follow the link to read more
http://notemast.com/how-to-successfully-fulfil-your-new-year-resolutions-without-excuses/

Apart from the joy and social applauses of having a university graduate in the family, one of the things that unconsciously spurred parents who saw their children through the university walls, is the hope of reaping enormous benefits off the children when they eventually get good jobs after graduation. That’s basically the ideal expectations from every well-meaning parent.

But in real case scenarios, it is observed that getting a job or being engaged through entrepreneurship is not as easy as anticipated. The bitter truth is that, most graduates remain unemployed and unemployable years after graduating from the university. Below are eleven reasons why Nigerian graduates remain unemployable:

1. Poor Educational Curriculum
It’s no longer headline that the Nigeria education curriculum is a pig in a “pool”. It tends to further pollute not just the messed up educational system, but also pollutes the hope of achieving an academically and technologically advanced society. My heart was broken beyond repair in 2014 when my lecturer had the guts to lecture us on a three credit unit course using the same lecture note I believe he used as far back as the year 2001. The topic was “How To Dial A Telephone.” It got me thinking. Why should we be coerced unto learning how to dial a telephone, whereas, Nigeria as a nation has gone far beyond the usage of the kinds of Nokia 3310 and BlackBerry QWERTY phones. Even the Android touchscreen phones that are in vogue are at the verge of extinction due to the gradual introduction of Hologram technology. But our sweet Nigerian education curriculum and bunch of professors are still teaching her potential engineers on how to “dial” a telephone. Is there any job that such a knowledge can afford us?

2. Waste of Industrial Training (I.T.)days
The only green leaf most of us ever had in school was our 6 months compulsory I.T program. It afforded us the opportunity of learning things that our lecturers never taught us. It is a rare chance for the categorized students to apply the little truth they gathered in the classroom and also realise how much years they’ve wasted in the classroom using outdated curriculum. For those that are wise, they go back to campus with transformed minds towards their academic pursuit.

They learn real life applications of their courses and thereafter continue their personal trainings in those areas. But on the average, most students waste this opportunity. They see it as an avenue to gather enough money in order to live large in the next session as final year students. With that mentality, they end up not benefiting academically and practically from their only chance of reality escapade in school. Such students may struggle to fit into the labour force after graduation.

3. One Year NYSC Program Without Plans
The woes continue in the one year mandatory NYSC program. I’ll forgive Nigerian for sending us into primary schools to teach for a year, but I won’t forgive the graduates who do so without a proper plan for their lives. That one year service is an avenue for self discovery for those who still don’t have headways.

It is also a portal through which people can attain levels of personal developments, cook up strange business ideas and life hacks while they patiently await their full absorption into the labour market. Against the ideal, studies have shown that a majority of corps members see it as a mere postgraduate extracurricular activity.

Follow this link to read more:
http://notemast.com/11-reasons-why-nigerian-graduates-remain-unemployable/

Facebook has not been totally sincere with us. This was a shocker for me as much as it will be for many. Most of the users including me uncannily signed up on the platform without prior knowledge of what we were getting themselves into. I actually discovered late and I’m certainly making amends duly.

I used to be one of the greatest lover of the social media platform, until some other users took over my position. I joined Facebook in 2010 and tailored my friend list to about 4,800. I wanted a little tolerance should in case I met new friends. It has always been fun for me until I recently discovered that the following have been stolen from us by the social media giant.

1. Privacy
Facebook and the entire social media has made us lose the importance of privacy. These days it’s very easy to track someone down.

Months ago, Facebook introduced a featured called “Friends Nearby”. A user need to turn on the phone’s GPS for it to work. It means that whenever you enter a locality, ALL your friends who has that feature turned on will know you’re there.

This is the height is self orchestrated privacy invasion. Data about your frequently visited locations can always be accessed by Facebook when needed. Your favourite restaurants, hotels, gyms and the likes are no longer secrets.

A lot of users especially the females, post all their day to day activities on their timelines. You can actually know when a user bought her first car, when her cat died, when the fiancée proposed, when they broke up, what led to the break up, when she was arrested for drunk driving and all sorts of personal details.

350 million photos are uploaded on Facebook daily. Those pictures are the records of our private lives with family and loved ones.

We are making our entire lives bare on the internet. And guess what, they never get deleted. Even after pressing the delete button, someone still has copies. I suggest you take out time to read Facebook’s Privacy Policy. You’ll be shocked.

2. Time
Facebook has been designed to be very interactive and addictive. On regular basis, new features are introduced to ensure that users get glued on the screen each time they opened the website or mobile app.

An average user spends 75 minutes on Facebook daily. But some people are quite above average.

Such people literally leave their Facebook and Messenger app running all day. They end up spending as much as 2 – 4 hours on Facebook daily.

The addiction is more among users between the ages of 18 and 24. 50% of them go to Facebook immediately they wake up. It is now a part and parcel of their lives.

Employers and Employees can’t stay a day without visiting Facebook. While I was interning at an ICT consultancy, I caused a uproar in an organization when I mistakenly blacklisted Facebook on their network.

Even the most serious employees were on my neck as though I committed a very serious crime. It shows how rooted they are in Facebook in spite of their busy schedules.

3. Family
A lot of users are currently suffering from the “Social Media Addiction Syndrome”. If you can stay one week without using and social media site or app, then you’re safe.

Facebook users are gradually losing touch of family intimacy. The social media is a responsive virtual community. It has its own intelligence which positions the right stuff to each user. The idea is to keep every user engrossed.

A great percentage of users have reduced the time they spend communicating with their immediate family.

This time has been diverted towards sharing, viewing, liking & commenting on posts. Others are always very thrilled when they chat with new friends on the platform. The ladies love it when they get pinged by random guys.

These days, parents rush bedtime stories with their kids so as to go back to their exciting chats. Youths can miss the holiday camp with family and won’t bother because they’ve got some virtual friends who will always keep them company.

Follow this link to read more
http://notemast.com/the-shocking-facebook-deception-what-facebook-has-been-stealing-from-you/

Do you know that for every one startup that succeeds, four fails? I believe it’s no longer news that more than 79% of startups do not survive their first 18 months and a higher percentage fails before the first 12 months. In spite of this alarming statistics, millions of startups rise into glorious successes annually.

No one starts a startup to fail, but the success of any startup can never be guaranteed without the availability of these basic requirements.

1. Great Idea
Not just an idea, but a great idea is the herald of a successful startup. Let’s just say it is the foundation upon which the edifice of a startup is built. That means a weak idea cannot essentially carry the burden of a great startup.

In the light of this, it is expedient that quality attention is dedicated on the development of an idea. Ideas don’t always come fully formed, as truthful as that may sound, it’s not a licence for one to hit the roads with an idea without properly beating it into shape.

Once the foundation is great, the possibility of erecting a skyscraper is sealed.

When thinking up an idea, it is important to put the market into consideration and to consider what the potential customers really want. The error people make is that they think more of themselves and less of the market.

Also one of the beautiful things about great ideas is that they are easy to explain. If it takes you so much time to explain your idea, then it means it is too complicated. A great idea should be simple to comprehend and it is best when it is unique.

2. Great Product/Service
What do you have to offer? Every startup must have a product or service to offer. Having a great idea is not a guarantee that your product or service will be equally amazing.

Not having a great product is one of the reasons startups fail. Sales and marketing is good, but no one has time to patronize junk. If you like, get your startup advertised on all the billboards in California and let it be viewed by on CNN by everyone, if the product is a junk, it simply won’t sell. A lot of entrepreneurs are very passionate at receiving seed capitals, running adverts here and there, but they’ve got nothing tangible to offer.

I tell my friends here in Nigeria that it is better you are prepared without opportunity, than to be unprepared in the face of opportunity. I know of a guy while I was in college that always urge people to download his debut song. He was passionate about it and was even running ads for it. The hype for the track was so much and I decided to listen to the song only to discover it was wack. I thought I was being unreasonably critical about the guy’s track, so I had a couple of other guys listen to it. But they said the same thing. The song literally sucks.

In the same vein, over the years, millions of startups have been founded and many didn’t survive the light of 6months simply because their products/services weren’t great. Though that’s not the only reason why startups fail, but great products sell themselves. There are often referred to as “investor magnet.” It’s always easy for investors to spot them out.

Follow the link to read more.
http://notemast.com/4-requirements-for-starting-a-successful-startup/

hmmm

romeo1000:
D tutorial z nt workin 4 me

same here

owoleola:
Still don't know how to create a topic

same here