Article 09: If you want to follow your gift, here are some things to adapt to
The following are things which I believe you should know and quickly adapt to once you start playing in the realm of your gift.
You will be a slave to your gift
Being a slave to your gift is one of the most challenging dilemmas that you will face. After graduating from university my wife and I moved to Pretoria where we got married. I had already discovered this gift concept at university and I promised myself that after I graduate I will sit down and write a book about it so that school children don’t make the same mistake. So then I would come back from my job and go straight to writing. This left my wife feeling neglected and unloved. I didn’t understand my urge and the slave that I was becoming due to the need to write. Of course now I know how to work while spending time with her and she also now understands that my gift requires me to work long hours, meaning that I have to spend time alone. So, it is completely normal to work abnormal crazy hours at trying to refine your gift because you are a slave to it.
People such as Donald trump and Elon Musk suffered divorces in marriages when they became slaves to their gifts.
In an interview (SA, 2018) Vusi Thembekwayo asked former FNB CEO Danny Jordaan a simple question as to how did he manage his family while working. Noticeably he doesn’t really answer the question. He ends up saying that you cannot have it all. In my opinion he meant that you cannot have a high demand of your gift while having a healthy family lifestyle (unless of course your family really understands the demands of your gift).
While Jesus’ disciples were debating on who will sit on His left and right in the Kingdom, He told them the following:
“But Jesus called them to Himself and said: You know that the rulers of the Gentiles have absolute power and lord it over them, and their great men exercise authority over them [tyrannizing them]. It is not this way among you, but whoever wishes to become great among you shall be your servant, and whoever wishes to be first among you shall be your [willing and humble] slave”
What did Jesus mean when He said that the biggest and greatest person among them will be a servant and a slave respectively? Your gift serves people, and if you will serve people it immediately implies that you are a servant. In order to serve them your gift you have to practice it privately and work hard for your audience while they sleep, while they are spending time with their families or while they are enjoying their weekends – that is the slavery you have to perform.
You don’t own yourself; you belong to the demands of your gift. If your gift is in demand you have to go and perform it whether you like it or not. If you are a comedian and people love your show that you just performed Friday night and they demand you to do the whole weekend YOU WILL DO IT due to the demands – you don’t own yourself, your gift does and the people have a say on how much you work. If you are a programmer and an urgent program is needed to for a customer, you won’t sleep until you write that code – the customer needs the code and thus your gift to program controls you.
Your gift is not about making you happy
Do we like the fruit trees? No, we just want the fruit from it. So it is with you - once your gift is refined just know that people don’t like you, they like your gift (they love what you can offer them). So, quickly learn to be sober about it and understand that whatever fame you get as a result of your natural talent is very fickle; it will be here today when people need it and gone tomorrow when people don’t need it. Proof: Why do some of the most refined gifts in the world die unhappy, poor, broke and broken? Why do some commit suicide and die lonely deaths? I believe it is because they thought that fame that they received through their gift would make them happy and content and unfortunately it didn’t.
Adapt to change that your gift requires at a particular time
When the winter season comes, everything around cooperates with it – leaves of the trees fall, seeds lie dormant, some animals hibernate to warmer areas and we wear warm clothes. You can hate winter, be angry and resist it but you cannot stop it. You can decide to openly resist it by putting on your swimming costume but it will still occur and the cold weather will kill you. Even though you love summer it’s either you put on warm clothes and adapt to it, or rebel against it and die of the cold. Likewise, while in the process of discovering and refining your gift, and going after your purpose there are certain areas in your life that will require you to change.
For example, you might be required to do the following:
You might need to be brave
You might need to sacrifice something in order to be effective
You might need to communicate with people when you are naturally an introvert.
You might need to slow down and not act impulsively (which is my weakness which I am still battling with).
You might need to stops being lazy and start working harder.
You might need to learn to accept criticism.
You might need to stand up for who they really are.
You might need to learn to be patient
You might need to manage a season of nothingness (the dark places where nothing seems to be going the way you envisioned).
You might need to work for money in order to fund your gift.
You might need to change your friends due to the new person you are becoming
The only way you can get to where you want to be is to leave where you are - basically you can never become what you want to be unless you are willing to change into something you are not. Every new step and opportunity will require a new version of you, whether the opportunity is in tune with your gift and purpose or not. There is a level of refashioning, remodeling, reshaping, revamping, reworking, redoing, reconstructing, reorganizing that you must do consistently.
Let go of tradition
May I inform you that the world is run by visionaries. These are the people with original ideas of what the future could be like, who are not afraid to try new things and not afraid to take risks. Your gift is your area of being a visionary, thus original and improvement ideas pertaining to your area of gifting will be a constant norm to you. In fact they will haunt you almost everyday!
In most industrial companies there is a department called Research and Development (R&D) where the work is directed towards the innovation and improvement of products and processes. Even though the company might have a successful product but the R&D department is there to make it better. This is because they know that what worked in 2020 might not work in 2021. If companies are clever enough to know that past success and old traditions they used might hinder them from making new success, why are you afraid to change something in your life that might have been a tradition? Tradition is actually frozen success: it worked well here but will not work there.
When it comes to your gift or natural talent there is no traditional way of how things should be done. You are in a freestyle zone where your mind will be creative in ways that were never thought of or done before. In fact this is how we know something is authentic: when it is genuine and not a copy of anything.
One of your biggest opposition is tradition. If you do not overcome, overthrow, overpower and overwhelm it you will not reach your purpose. Be bold and break traditions that do not work. Do not be afraid to do something new, something unique and something that challenges you in ways never heard before.
Perform in any environment under any circumstances
If I remove a mango seed from the ground here in South Africa (one of the best economies in Africa) and grow it in Zimbabwe (one of the poorest economies in Africa), it will still grow. The seed is completely oblivious and blind to the fact that it is growing in Zimbabwe. All it knows is that it has a purpose to grow into a mango tree and it will grow no matter its location. With the gift you have, you can be of influence just about anywhere under adverse circumstances
In 1521 Martin Luther was hidden away in a castle by his ruler for safekeeping after his rant against the Catholic Church. Luther settled down and translated Erasmus's Greek New Testament in only eleven weeks. This was deemed “a phenomenal feat under any circumstances” where Luther had to face dark days, poor lighting and poor health. What is your excuse?
Johan Sebastian Bach had 20 children (I am sure they distracted him) but could still develop probably the best music ever written by a human being. What is your excuse? Conditions don’t have to be perfect.
You will outgrow certain people
WARNING: When you step out into your purpose very few people in your life will understand you. People who you trusted will turn against you because you do not conform to the normalcy and routines anymore. And if you are not careful they will cause you to abort your brain child (your purpose). Thus, choose your company based on destination. The positive people are those that will fuel you to reach your purpose, while at the same time their positive traits will rub on you.
Who are the people that suck the life out of you? Who are the friends that waste your time? Who are the folks that need you all the time while they pour nothing into your life? Who are they that do not challenge your mentality in any shape or form? Who are them that always focus on the bad things in their lives causing you to do so too? Take stock, do inventory and throw all of the negative people out of your warehouse. It is okay to leave people because it is possible to outgrow them.
You will fail!
During my time at university after an unsuccessful semester I sent an enquiry in the form of an email to the Department of Education in KZN. Here is the actual email:
Mr Bheki Ngubane, the manager to the Head of Department promptly replied with the following email:
I was happy that I got a platform to finally share my ideas on why the government should be hard at work to let us find our gifts before we reach tertiary.
3 November 2014 was the day where I was called to come and present my preposition. During the session there were four government officials whom I presented my PowerPoint presentation to. Although my idea was good, it wasn’t set, organised and well primed at that time in my life (it was not refined). I was very nervous and failed to get my point across.
Among the officials was one girl who I would assume was a student or an intern. She couldn’t hold back and burst out laughing at me as I flicked through the presentation I had prepared. The other man who was seated at the meeting had nothing to say when I finished the presentation, while Mr Brijlal comforted me and said that I should go back to my community and motivate the young kids because President Zuma is a very busy man.
I felt so confused by all of this because firstly I came with a brilliant idea and nobody understood it. Secondly, “was I that bad that she burst out laughing at me like that?” Thirdly, “why am I seen as a motivator? This is a big idea that can save our world and Mr Brijlal says I should go to a small scale of people in my community? I am not a motivator!
I had failed!
My dream of changing and transforming our education system to better us was gone because I had failed on the biggest stage at the highest office of education in KZN. From that day I decided to leave the project alone and proceed to finish the degree so that I could buy myself a nice 2013 BMW 325i coupe.
Although I had failed the idea never left me because this was where my gifts and talents lay.
Failure is a constituent of success and an ingredient of purpose. All successful people have failed at one point or the other in their lives, which is why you should never be afraid to fail! Even if you fail, your gift will remain and the purpose for your life will haunt you. It is up to you to go back to your failure, your defeat or your frustration and correct your mistakes. Every successful person has failed in the bid to go after their purpose.