The arrival of the year 2020 was met and greeted with a different kind of excitement in my observation. Different from previous recent years, I saw and sensed many people than usual, paying attention to themselves and how they can improve their lives and wellbeing.

New rules, new plans, new ideas and agenda. I think the year 2020 for many marked a different kind of beginning, and I assume it’s because it’s not just the turn of a new year, but also the beginning of a brand new decade.

Many people, as usual, will have goals set and plans in place to change and drastically improve their lives, but let’s face it, do you have the capacity to do all you want to do in the New Year and decade? Do you have the capacity?

Many do have the desire to do things, but unfortunately, they lack the capacity to do what they desire to do. So having a will is not enough, having the desire is also not enough, having the ability and capacity is what makes your ambition and goals realistic.

So I was sharing with members of my coaching academy last Sunday, that potential is reality, but not capacity. Many speakers speak to people’s potentials in order to motivate them. But after a while, these people then realise, though they have greatness in them, the greatness is not coming forth or manifesting. Why? It takes more than having it within to make things happen for you, you must develop all you have in you, for it to show forth and tell on your physical life and realities.

A 6 months old baby, for example, cannot read but the capacity to read is in him. So it will be absurd for that 6 months old child to set a goal to start reading in the New Year simply because he has the potential in him. It takes more than the potential for him to manifest that ability, there is a process and a time frame of development for him to truly manifest the art of reading.

Dear friend, are your New Year goals based on feelings of potentials or the reality of capacity? Can you do all you want to do within the New Year? Are you setting goals based on thrill, excitement and sentiments or based on your capacity reality?

Are your business goals, career goals, academic goals, financial goals, marital goals, leadership goals and self-improvement goals based on desire, potential and sentiments, or based on ability, capacity and reality?

Goals are hardly realised when set on sentiments instead of reality. I do not think a six months old baby can read within a month simply because he desires it. Yes, he has the potentials but his brain must develop enough and he must be taught how, before he can read. His wishes and passion are not enough, training and acquiring capacity to do, is critical to any goal.

So your goals for 2020, do you have the capacity, or just a desire and you hope to support this desire without capacity with enough praying and fasting? God cannot be mocked.

My dear friend, thank God for 2020, but all your new rules and regulations, plans and to-dos will mean nothing if you do not have in you, the capacity to make these things happen.

What is capacity? Capacity is simply the power to do something. Power is capacity, capacity is power. Do you have the power?

No matter the power-packed in a 2.0 liter engine Vehicle, it can never outrun a 6.5 litter SUV because of passion and determination. It simply lacks the capacity. It does not have the power.

Are you a Kia Picanto with year 2020 dreams of a Mercedes 550 SUV? Sorry, you lack the power. I’m sure the religious ones may begin to talk about miracles and what God can do. Of course, God can perform wonders, but He does it when it’s necessary, not to help the unrealistic or for entertainment. God set the plans and agenda for process not the devil, Miracles is different from Magic.

Dear friend, what are your 2020 goals? Do you have the power to deliver them? Your business, your career, your finances, your relationships, your marriage, your personal development, do you have the power to achieve set goals for these?

If you do not have the power, why don’t you have the power? If you lack the power, how can you obtain the needed power?

Power is simply the ability or capacity to do something or act in a particular way. If in your life, you cannot do what you want to do, and cannot act the way you want to act, you don’t have power.

Achieving set goals depend mostly on the power to do what is needed and be what is needed. If you lack the freedom to do the needful and be the stuff you need to be, you are not so powerful.

In this life, 2 major factors rob us of the power we need to do and to be what we want to be. Number 1, our needs, number 2, what we fear to lose.

Abraham Maslow, a great psychologist in the forties came up with the concept of the hierarchy of needs of every human. And the fundamental basic needs of every human is the physiological. These needs comprises the need for food, drink, shelter, health, clothing and sleep.

My dear friend, no matter how ambitious you are, no matter how great your goals are, the person supplying these physiological need, the person granting you access to these needs, has the power over you. It is what he wants that will most likely happen to you in 2020 no matter your personal dreams.

The person paying for your physiological needs, your caregiver, your employer to a large extent will control what happens to you and your dreams in 2020.

To set realistic goals, your dreams and goals must be within his dreams and goals before they can be realised.

Until you’re directly in charge of obtaining your food, drink, shelter, clothing, and health by yourself, the person who pays for them has the power. He can control you, confine you, limit you, derail you and even frustrate your personal goals and plan for the New Year.

This reminds me of a senior friend who recently turned 65 and was crying on his birthday. He looked back over the years and had regrets. Blessed with a good job at a multinational and blessed also with three lovely children.  Just when his first child turned 8, he was transferred from Lagos to Niger state as a salesperson. He assumed it will be short-lived and will, in a few months, return to Lagos, but sadly it wasn’t so. And from Niger to Sokoto, to Benue, to Port Harcourt, to Benin, the transfer continued and it was after fifteen years he was transferred back to Lagos. Of course his 3 kids were grown and out of the house. They were almost all out of the university. In 15 years he saw them only occasionally. He never had the sweet experience of raising his kids. The kids were deprived, his wife was denied, and he was the biggest loser at the end, as his family couldn’t relate with him well when he returned, the wife and kids had grown apart and independent from him and were so used to his absence, they couldn’t flow with him anymore. He had lost his family, he had become a stranger to them.

Why? The employer paying for his physiological needs determined his yearly goals and plans. He lacked the power to make decisions, determine his income, take charge of his family, and set goals outside the ambition of the employer. He lacked power and capacity.

Dear friend, we are starting a new decade, where is your power? Where is your capacity?

What great dreams do you have? How tall is your ambition? How has your mind been conditioned? To be in paid employment all your life, or to one day, as soon as possible be in charge of your own business and affairs?

Look, whenever you leave paid employment, you will still have to own your own so why not do it when you still have the energy, time and connections?

There are some cars you can never own, some houses you can never build, some travels you can never enjoy and a living standard that will only be a dream, if an employer is paying your bills.

There is a way you can’t even worship your maker if you’re not in charge of your time, money and plans. There are some humanitarian activities you can only talk about and not participate in, if you’re not in charge of your own life.

Paid employment is good and necessary, it’s a learning school for how to run your own business successfully; it should not be a place to spend the most active parts of your years and days.

As we begin another 10 good years, what are your plans for freedom? How old will you be in 2030?

You are so smart and ingenious, there is nothing you can’t learn, even how to run a business successfully. No one is born with the art, we all learnt it and you can learn too. Your biggest blessings I tell you, are always on the other side of your greatest fears, if you fear self-employment, it’s exactly where your breakthrough is hidden.

As we begin this new decade, take charge, secure your power, learn all you need to learn and promise yourself that by 2030, you’ll be on Forbes list as one of the billionaires of the new decade. Dangote, Otedola, Adenuga were not born billionaires, they became one over time. Can you make this new decade your own season? I assure you, you can! Time is running out. Start that business now, build it up and make history. God has put it in you, it’s time to manifest it.

Yes, you can, take control and smash your goals.

Now, I’ve learnt over time that a major key to learning and applying is beyond the desire to apply, it’s actually by Grace. That’s perhaps why you know so much about the secrets of success but can’t do things you know because the grace is not available. You most times need to activate the grace for application. You need God to work in you to will and to do the things you know. How do you do it? By proving to God, you can be a source of blessing to many others if He blesses you with success. How do you prove it? By demonstrating it. The youths in Nigeria today are mostly deprived, distressed and disillusioned. They lack so many things it takes to be relevant in this new decade. So I’ve decided to offer free training, seminars, workshops and empowerment programs for these young people all over Nigeria this year. All I ask of you is to please sponsor a youth with just a dollar a month. That’s 365 Naira a month.

If what you’ve read or heard today has blessed and added value to you, 365 naira a month shouldn’t be too much to invest in the lives of the youths in Nigeria if you truly care. Simply visit the website, www.atnpower.org and make your donation through our online payment portal. Just sponsor a youth. If you have kids, younger siblings or any youth you care about, you are doing this for them indirectly. Don’t let Asians, Europeans, and American take over our land, our resources and our future because our own youths lack what it takes to lead in this new dispensation, let’s help them retain our economic sovereignty. 

Please visit the website and sponsor a youth today. And let God supply you with grace to apply what you’ve learnt and achieve your goals for this New Year and the new decade.

My name is Muyiwa Afolabi, please enjoy your day. God bless you.