Recently, I noticed that telling some people about your progress or dreams is not always the best thing to do. Telling those who already think you should remain at your current stage in life was my greatest mistake during my school days.
Some will say:
"Bro, maybe God wants you to remain where you are."
"Why not stop stressing yourself?"
"Maybe that path is not for you."
Then they begin to suggest smaller dreams for you.
The painful part is that these are sometimes the same people you expected to encourage you.
I'm not saying you should put God aside — no. But there's a difference between godly advice and words that slowly kill your motivation.
After certain conversations, you suddenly feel sad, tired, or ready to give up on your goals.
The best thing to do is to protect your vision.
Not everybody deserves access to your dreams while they are still growing.
We do go through tough times. We are built different, we are stronger. We go through the storms with mindsets that even in the storms of life, we won't go down. The storms are there to make us stronger and mightier.
There are ways to break through the storms of life — with boldness, calmness and happiness. Going through pain with a smile is something great and it obviously is God's doing.
Don't fade, don't wither, stay sharp even when you are down. Remember, the ones who win were the losers of yesterday. But what they do better is not giving up.
Look at the likes of Muhammad Ali. He didn't budge until it was painful. And how long he could endure those pains is what he counted as progress.
Situations come and go. You don't react to situations, you respond to them. Situations are not what define us, but how we respond tells us about who we are. They can also make us who we are or what we are.
Situations are there to build us. Situations are there to mould us. Even if we feel punished, don't look at the punishment, just the goals.
I consider myself to simulate the mindset of Joseph.
Even in difficult moments — from the pit, to slavery, to prison — Joseph remained faithful and focused. When Potiphar's wife tried to tempt him, he refused to let sin take over his mind and destiny.
In the end, the same Joseph they looked down on became a prime minister.
While I was in school, there was a course called Community Medicine. It was considered a simple course, yet many students failed it repeatedly.
In fact, students from my department, Anatomy, failed it far more often than students from the Physiology department.
Some seniors would always tell me:
"Pamilerin, during my time, 30 out of 100 students failed."
"That department is messed up."
"You can't pass that course."
Those words were everywhere. Day after day, all I heard was negativity. At some point, I almost gave up.
But something inside me kept saying:
"Joseph, keep pushing. Don't give up. You've worked too hard to stop halfway through the journey."
So I cleared away the distractions and stayed focused. I stopped listening to the noise around me. My only goal was to move to the next phase successfully.
I burned the midnight candle. I ignored the naysayers and kept studying.
And when the results finally came out, I passed.
Meanwhile, about 50% of the 120+ students had carryovers.
It wasn't funny at all.
Many people began asking me:
"How did you do it?"
And honestly, I even began asking myself the same question:
"Was it really me?"
Never give up simply because people say you cannot make it.
Pamilerin writes.
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