When I was eight years old, we had a visitor. My dad asked me
to go rinse two glasses with water. There was a small gin glass, and a big beer
glass (see picture). We had quite a number of those small glasses. I don’t know
of today, but when I was growing up, those glasses were common sights in Isoko
homes. Ogogoro things.
Anyway, after rinsing, I was shaking both vigorously to get
them dried faster and the small gin glass slipped off my hand. Without
thinking, I threw the big beer glass away to go catch the small one. Both
glasses shattered.
When 2019 dawned, I almost replicated that scenario in my
business.
A New Year dawns with a lot of expectations, because we come
into it loaded with plans and projects made before the previous year ended.
The January we get and how we embrace it is usually the
reality of what we didn’t pay attention to a few days before the New Year
finally hits. You see, the Christmas season has a way of veiling what January
will look like especially if before the close of businesses for the year, plans
didn’t fall into place the way we hoped. This is one of the reasons why
somebody will say January is slow, or started slowly.
It hit me very hard at the beginning of the year. The plans
did not become waterproof before 2018 ended so January came and settled, with
it confusion on which way to turn. I kept staring at the plans on paper and
wondering … nothing was jumping at me. The clients weren’t forthcoming and this
will affect one of my major goals for the year. I was depressed and my
spiritual life as well as my work was affected. I needed activity but I just
couldn’t pull myself out of the dump to create any.
One morning I desperately reached out to a friend and praying
partner. She heard me out and said “Uzezi, keep cultivating your seed. Keep
doing what is in your hands at the moment and don’t let your obvious present
reality shake your sure testimony that will work itself out in your life.”
That was what was missing that wasn’t jumping at me! For me
to focus on what is in my hands at the moment! I was motivated.
“Our change will meet our dedication,” she continued. “God’s
got our backs and He alone knows the path He is taking us through. Trust Him in
these low moments…”
And she went on to remind me what Pastor Sam said at one
Sunday service “The devil has a way of magnifying the few things in our lives
that ‘seem’ not be working, taking our eyes off the numerous blessings that we
should be grateful for.”
We know these things, but we forget them when our boats are
rocked just a little. We need constant reminders that we should focus on what
is before us. Why was I in the dump? I was there because some clients didn’t
come through, neglecting the jobs of other clients that came through. I was
about to throw the ‘big’ that I had going for me in my business away, chasing after
the ‘small’. And He used my friend at the right time to pull me back to safety.
I am grateful I followed His leading to reach out to someone. Now I am buried
in what is in my hands.
Everybody should have someone to reach out to in such
moments. I hope you do.