The world by nature is designed in such a way that humans and other creatures must of a necessity fight and contend for their needs and wants. Nothing in life is free. You must pay a price or fight to get what you want.

Your fight is not necessarily against other people, your fight is against life itself. If you don’t fight for what you want in this life, life wouldn’t release it to you. Even what is already yours if you don’t fight to keep it, life would take it away from you cheaply.

This fight that I’m talking about is not physical. It’s actually the battle of your soul against the attacks of life. Whether you want to fight or not, life will fight you, situations would attack you and occasions would challenge you over your rights, your place and your possessions. If you refuse to engage in life’s battles you’ll lose everything and fail in life. Life, as it were is a series of unending battles.

These battles are not physical, they occur at the level of your soul. Your soul comprises your mind, your will and your emotions. These three work together to make you an overcomer in every battle through life. If your mind is weak, you will lose many battles, if your emotions are tender, you will lose many battles, if your will is fragile, you will lose many battles.

Your mind, your will and your emotions are the weapons of your warfare in life. They are not physical, they are not canal. These weapons can be made powerful enough for you to pull down scary thoughts, wild imaginations and the lies of life. If these weapons are weak, you will not go far in life.

Your mind is empowered through knowledge, your will is strengthened through discipline and your emotions empowered through purpose.

When you lack knowledge, when you lack discipline and you don’t define purpose for all you do, you may not amount to much in life.

An overcomer in life has a sound mind, this comes through knowledge, has the spirit of love; this means the care and concern for humanity, solid emotions, and of course, has no fear for anything; this makes solid the will to do the necessary.

Many of us don’t understand how to win battles in life. Many of us don’t even know the weapons of warfare as the mind, the will and the emotions, and many do not even know how to effectively use these three weapons for successful battles in life. Hence, they a beaten, bruised, battered and bashed every now and again in their battles through life.

In physical battles, if a soldier has got weapons but didn’t even know, or can’t even use them, he would most likely think up a reason why he keeps losing battles every now and again. He would naturally think up whom and what to blame for his losses. He would never think it’s him since he isn’t aware of his weapons and the potentials he’s got for consistent victory.

Many of us are like that in life, we are not even aware of the power of our mind, our will and our emotions in winning battles in life, hence we blame our upbringing, our parents, relatives, people who wouldn’t help or assist, our employers, our bosses, the government and even God for our losses through life’s battles. We don’t know our weapons, can’t use our weapons and in fact abuse and misuse these weapons.

Again there I was, trying to counsel another woman in domestic distress. A mother of three and employee working very hard to support her family – that’s her husband and kids. She’s unfortunately married to a laidback, indolent, confused and purposeless husband. A man full of excuses, always blaming the system and everybody for his situation and unwilling to work or do anything to generate income. For four years, he’s not worked a single day, this wife has been paying all bills including his own bills. House rent, the car, school fees, clothing, feeding and other needs has been catered for by this loving wife. According to her, initially she couldn’t handle it but after several quarrels she’s decided to live with it. The problem now is, her husband is cheating on her with some girl somewhere and has become quite violent, the physical abuse has become more frequent and intense and she needed advise on what to do.

Of course I didn’t think far about it, I advised her to move out with her kids and give her husband some time to gather himself and grow up, afterwards, they can talk and agree on some terms and conditions for a reunion.

This woman was shocked at my advice. Knowing I’m a Christian she probably assumed Ill advise her to pray about it and keep enduring. She is quite religious as well. She didn’t like my advice at all, she was uncomfortable with it. “Mr Afolabi, I can’t”, she responded. “ What will people say, my parents and siblings won’t like that at all, my pastor will be unhappy with that move and my friends and church members won’t support the idea at all”. My husband is very good looking, charming and active in church, everyone loves him. Everyone will fight me if I leave him”

I looked at her, felt irritated and sorry for her at the same time. “Well I hope all these people will be happier to attend your burial if this charming and religious husband kills you accidentally very soon”. For better for worse is not in the Bible and whatever we set lose on earth is set lose in Heaven. I replied. She froze, looked at me funny and remained quiet.

Ladies and gentlemen, this hardworking and committed wife is stuck in this dangerous marital situation because she doesn’t know her weapons of war against the challenges of life.  Her mind is deprived of knowledge, her emotions are too tender and her will power lies with other people. She will suffer much if she doesn’t recognise.

Dear friend, to win many battles in this life, the first victory you must record is in the battle with yourself. You can’t conquer life if you’ve not conquered yourself. You can’t conquer yourself if you don’t know who you are and who you want to be. To win many battles in life you may want to consider the following:

1. Define who you want to be in life. You must know who you are and who you want to become. You must know where you want to go and remain focused on your journey. Your purpose is more important than anything else in this life, remain focused on your purpose.
2. You must conquer your five sense. Your eyes, your ears, and the rest, never respond to your feelings you must do what is right even when it’s hard. The interesting thing about temptation is, immediately you say no, the urge subsides and eventually disappears.
3. Make your own decisions. Always choose to do what is right not what you like.  Happiness and progress in life are the outcome of choices. Weeping may endure for a night but joy comes in the morning. Pay the price of right choices so that happiness and progress would be the reward, not regret and dismay.
4. Stick with destiny helpers. Don’t be emotional or sentimental about the kind of people you allow into your life or choose to spend time with. Time is too valuable to waste it on selfish people and friendly enemies. If you’re spending time with anyone not helping, teaching or improving you, let them go. Though there are some people you can’t walk away from especially relatives and spouses. Just disconnect emotionally from them and focus on your own destiny and purpose. Only you will give your account to God on judgement day, they won’t be there.

Dear friend, if you’re not losing many friends, you’re probably not growing fast enough. Ladies and gentlemen, your power is in your soul, your mind, will and emotions. Master these weapons, stop blaming other people and situations and you will win many battles and succeed in life. Your first victory must be in your battle against self.