I AM A.M

UP THE DOSE

- Confidence is defined as a belief in oneself, the conviction that one has the ability to meet life’s challenges and to succeed and the willingness to succeed.

- It is also defined as the feeling or belief that one can have faith in or rely on someone or something.

- Everyone wishes to be confident, but how does one actually get to a place of confidence.

- For most People, it would appear they were born naturally confident but there are many factors that influence how confident a person appears before a speculative eye.

- It’s easy to assume one is confident, but true confidence is measured in a crowd.

Confidence Killers.

1. Upbringing.

- How children are raised has so much impact on their lives as adults.

- Children who are often criticized, never affirmed by parents/guardians even when they error often have a hard time fitting into society and interacting with other people.

- In reprimanding children for their wrongs, it is important to afterwards remind them of their value and affirm your love for them.

- A child’s greatest wish is to make his/her guardian proud and when a child is made to feel this has not been achieved, he/she will grow up with a view of not being good enough for anyone or anything.

- It is vital to raise children accordingly as they are sensitive in every way.

- Certain beliefs that govern behavior in homes like “A child should be seen and not heard, a woman should be seen and not heard, children should only speak when spoken to” and many others greatly influence how individuals function as Adults in society.

2. Status in Society.

- People from a humble background often have difficulties when it comes to relating with people from wealthier families.

- This in-turn affects their confidence in group settings as they struggle to relate with the topics of discussion common in groupings of higher classes.

3. Excessive alone time.

- Whether we realize it or not, people who spend time alone for extended periods of time have trouble relating with other people in a group setting.

- As much as alone time is good, it shouldn’t be the norm for extended periods of time.

- No man is an island and as such we should all be relatable to the next person without any difficulties.

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Things to Consider before taking any Action.

1. Figure out how much time you’re currently spending on your phone on a daily basis.

2. Figure out what content you focus on when you’re actually on your phone.

3. Consider other productive activities you could possibly do instead on having phone time.

Strategies to down size Phone time.

1. Make a written agenda for your day, accounting for every hour of your time.

- You will realize how much you actually need to do.

- When you have a laid out plan for your time, your focus will be solely on fulfilling your tasks throughout the day, leaving you with little room to engage in idle activity like gossip and lazying around.

2. Delete the social media Apps on your phone.

- This way you won’t be receiving notifications from your social media accounts thus lessening the time you spend scrolling past news feeds on your accounts.

- Deleting your apps will ensure you access your accounts through your web browser, which being a task in itself will not make you very enthusiastic about always checking into your account throughout the day.

3. Keep your phone silent or on Vibration.

- When working on your most important and urgent tasks, keep your phone on silent or vibration.

- This will lessen the impulse of having to check on your Phone every five minutes or so when the notification alerts sound.

- It is important to perform your most urgent and important tasks when you have high energy, which according to statistics is normally around 10AM.

4. Switch off your Phone when Necessary

- If you can, it is wise to switch off your Phone when tackling important duties.

- This will allow you to have total focus on your to do list as opposed to checking your phone every now and again.

5. Turn off your data Bundles.

- If you cannot switch off your phone or keep it on silent or vibration mode, turn off your data bundles.

- This will prevent you from receiving notifications from your social media accounts and email, which may distract you from focusing on your tasks at hand.

6. Make Phone Time a reward.

- Make phone time a reward after the completion of your tasks.

- With this view in mind, this will allow you to focus solely on completing your tasks at hand so you can glory in the sweet reward of having phone time at the end of it all.

7. Time table your Phone Time.

- As Phones in our day and age cannot easily be done away with, it may be wise to schedule the time we actually spend on our phones as Phones are an information hub, aiding us in our studies, work, businesses and various developmental projects.

- It is however important not to get carried away with gadgets and schedule the time we spend on our phones.

8. Read a Book.

- It is quite rare to find someone reading a hardcopy book nowadays.

- However, reading books does much to keep us away from the negative and contagious information we come across by using our phones.

- Reading books allows us to focus on ourselves, improve our intellect and have times of meditation and contemplation.

- They give us peace of mind and allow us to discover who we really are.

- In most cases, excessive phone use leaves us feeling drained and demoralized as we often see how other people are faring on social media, in turn making us feel poorly about our own circumstances by unnecessarily comparing ourselves to others.

Members of the Commonwealth are invited to submit their entries for the 2021 Commonwealth Short Story Prize.

The Commonwealth Short Story Prize is awarded for the best piece of unpublished short fiction (2,000–5,000 words).

Regional winners each receive £2,500 and the opportunity to be published online by Granta magazine, and the overall winner receives £5,000.

The competition is free to enter and open to any citizen of a Commonwealth country who is aged 18 and over.

The 2021 Commonwealth Short Story Prize is open for online entries until 1 November 2020.

Please read the rules below and enter your story via the online entry form.

Eligibility rules

(For any entry or eligibility queries not covered below, please email [email protected] for clarification before submitting an entry.)

· Opening date: 1 September 2020

· Entries must be submitted via the online entry form at: www.commonwealthwriters.org

· Entries must be submitted via the online entry form by 1 November 2020 (11.59pm in any time zone). No entries will be considered if submitted after this date.

· Entrants must be citizens of a Commonwealth country or stateless persons currently residing in a Commonwealth country.

· The Commonwealth Foundation will request verification of citizenship status before winners are selected. Entries from citizens of non-Commonwealth countries are not eligible.

· For regional purposes, entries will be judged by country of citizenship. Where the writer has dual citizenship (of two Commonwealth countries), the entry will be judged in the region where the writer is permanently resident.

· There is no requirement for the writer to have current residence in a Commonwealth country, providing that they are a citizen of a Commonwealth country.

· Entrants must be aged 18 years or over on 1 November 2020.

· Entries must be unpublished and remain unpublished in any language until 1 May 2021.

· Only one entry per writer may be submitted for the Commonwealth Short Story Prize - the story must be the entrant’s own work. The story must be original work and should not have been published anywhere, in full or in part, in any language, before 1 May 2021.

· Entries must be 2,000 words minimum, 5,000 words maximum (not including title). Entries should be uploaded in a PDF document. Please save your document as a PDF and use the title of the story as the file name.

For any questions about eligibility or rules, please contact [email protected]

For more information see here

Because the world is comprised of varying characters, it is more than likely that varying personalities often misunderstand each other, thus breeding fights and arguments.

But regardless of the varying personalities in people, there are deliberate steps each of us can take to live in peace with the people around us regardless of our differences.

The five kinds of personalities

1) Conscientiousness

This relates to your work ethic and organisational skills. Those with this trait plan ahead and aim high. They may also take a great interest in one topic, rather than a passing interest in many.

In turn, those who do not score highly as conscientious consider this type of person as obsessive and stubborn.

2) Agreeableness

Friendliness and compassion are among the characteristics of an agreeable person. They are also more trustworthy. Agreeableness is also used a measure of how even-tempered a person is. Those who score low in this may be argumentative, challenging or competitive.

3) Extraversion

Those who score highly for this trait thrive interracting with others. They are extremely talkative, energetic, assertive, and are not fazed by being the centre of attention. On the contrary, a person who scores low on this my regard an extrovert as attention seeking and overly dominant.

4) Neuroticism

A person who scores highly in this area is likely to react negatively to a situation or potential scenario, and will feel more anxious, angry or vulnerable than others. Such behaviour can be interpreted as a sign of insecurity or unstablily by those who get low marks in this area.

5) Openness to experience

If you fall into this category you have a voracious appetitive for learning about new things, are intellectually curious, highly creative and imaginative. Those who are "open to experience" thrive on spontaneous lifestyles over rigid routines and seek out intense moments.

· Personality references: Kashmira Gander (independent website)

· @kashmiragander Top of Form

Maintaining healthy relationships with people.

1. Greet people and acknowledge their presence whenever you enter a room or another person enters a room you happen to be in.

2. Pass genuine compliments to people, but do not overdo it as this may be considered as fakeness by the other party and cause more harm than good.

3. Try to find common ground with people regardless of their circumstances and position in life. This will reduce awkwardness and tension after a mere greeting.

4. In the midst of arguments, do your best to keep calm and speak softly. Should this fail, stay silent and find an opportune time to point out your views and justify yourself with the other party.

5. Realize it is not always necessary to voice out your opinion about certain matters as this may Aggrevate a situation. Give many your smile but few your voice. Silence is golden.

6. Always do your best to build relationships outside your everyday setting with the people you interact with.

7. Most importantly because people are different, take time to analyze people and understand their characters and personalities so as to be able to relate with various characters without unintentionally causing offence.

8. Be a peace maker. When tension is realized, have an honest conversation with the other party in an effort to determine the cause of tension and resolve it before it escalates. When it comes to human interactions, unmentioned hurts breed hate.

There is so much power in keeping projects and certain details about your life confidential. It is not necessary for your life to be an open book as being an open book does more harm than good to a person in the end.

Confidentiality is basically the state of keeping or being kept secret or private.

The Power of Confidentiality

1. Keeping certain details/projects concerning your life confidential safeguards you from your enemies. People who do not like you or are jealous of you focus their attention on knowing every detail of your life so as to point out the faulty areas to make themselves feel/look better before others.

2. Keeping it confidential protects you from criticism from people who inwardly do not want to see you succeed. Whether you agree with them or not, every word someone says to you has an impact on what your final viewpoint will be. This is why it’s important not to be ignorant of the characters we allow to be part of our lives. When we are exposed to something long enough, we will eventually become/adopt the message that thing relays.

3. Keeping projects/details confidential will allow your focus to be solely on attaining your goals as you will have no criticism from others. People often criticize what they aren’t part of.

4. Keeping it confidential will keep you excited over your project in that you want people to be amazed at the end result of your Labor. Work silently and let your success make all the noise.

5. Keeping details about yourself confidential puts your enemies in relax mode. When your opponents do not know what you’re up to, they won’t have time to work against your efforts. This will in turn give you peace of mind as you focus on your life and projects.

6. You remain a mystery and wonder. If your life is an open book, people will easily take advantage of you and thrive on your weaknesses for their own benefit thus your life will become a joke to many.

7. You attain a positive reputation for yourself. People who uphold confidentiality are viewed in a positive light and held in high esteem by others. You attain a trustworthy reputation for yourself.

There can generally be no friendships without their being relationships between two people. Contrary to what people think, the word friend is actually thrown around carelessly in today’s world. Compared to friends, we have more acquaintances, which by dictionary definition is defined as a relationship less intimate than a friendship. And someone we merely happen to know. A friend is defined as a person with whom one has a bond of mutual affection, typically one exclusive of sexual or family relations

- Who qualifies to be a friend in today’s world, let’s look at some characteristic that define who a friend is.

Characteristics of a friend

1. Someone you are in constant communication with regardless of the distance between the both of you.

2. Someone you enjoy being around

3. Someone who celebrates your joyful moments with you as well as sympathizes with you in your sorrowful times.

4. Someone who will tell you the truth regardless of whether we want to hear it or not.

5. Someone who comes to mind when you want to share important news/happenings

6. Someone who sticks by you regardless of your circumstances

7. Someone who will respect your beliefs and not try to negatively influence you

How to know that a friendship has expired

1. When maintaining communication and contact becomes a burden/struggle and interaction itself becomes awkward.

2. When you develop completely different habits from that of your friend so much so that their habits negatively affect you.

3. When you and your friend never seem to agree on anything.

- It may be Gods/life’s way of telling you the purpose of that individual in your life has already been fulfilled and you both need to move on from the relationship.

4. When you find yourself always being the one trying to make the relationship work.

How to be a good friend

- When it comes to friendship, the quality of the relationship is more important than the quantity.

- It is important to maintain as many connections and relationships as possible so as to have many places to turn to when in need but it is vital to clearly define friendships and mere acquaintances.

1. Make time for your friends. Take the time to call them, visit them, accompany your friends to important events regardless of whether you feel like it or not.

2. Friendship is a give and take. You cannot always be the one at the receiving end, you need to invest in your friendships and make the necessary sacrifices when required.

3. Be vulnerable sometimes.

- Expressing vulnerability to a friend makes him/her know your friendship is valuable if you are able to confide in them about intimate/important details about your life.

- This builds trust and a deeper connection between the individuals, especially if confidentiality is upheld.

4. Take interest in your friend’s life.

- Take interest in their lives. Make an effort to know who they are, what they aspire to achieve, what challenges they are facing, take an interest to know their family members, background etc.

Signs you’re in an unhealthy, expired friendship

1. You feel drained

2. You feel judged and criticized whenever you’re around that person

3. You feel like your friend isn’t happy when you are succeeding

4. When your friend is friends with people you do not agree with or see eye to eye with

5. When you friend coaxes you to engage in activities you aren’t otherwise comfortable with

6. When your friend is only present in your life when things are moving well for you and absent in your lowest moments

THIEVES OF TIME.

-Time is a constant in life, it never changes. It keeps going on and on, never halting or slowing down for anyone or anything.

- Because of this, many choose to view time as a merciless enemy, but time always gives us a chance to do the right thing. We cannot get back lost time, but for the fact that we are alive means we can always make amends and still be productive.

-There are many factors that distract us from doing what we know we need to do in a particular period of time and when we don’t do this, it makes us automatically view time as an enemy.

How to make time work for you.

1. The first key is to set goals for yourself.

- Without goals, one sees no need to carefully co-ordinate their life through making time work for them to help them achieve their goals. If you have no goals, you have no business even investing time in this message.

- Without goals, there is no sense of urgency concerning any activity in life.

- Decisions will then be made hap-harzardly without regard for the consequences.

- The most disciplined people in life are those who set goals for themselves.

2. Prioritize your activities.

- Not every activity is worth chasing after.

- The best way to decide on what to do with your time is to evaluate the value that those activities will add to your life.

3. Be Optimistic about your activities.

- You become what you think upon.

- Our actions are a product of our words and thoughts.

- This is why the bible says life and death is in the power of the tongue.

Joel Osteen said we are in part where we are today because of the words we have spoken about ourselves. Our words determine

2. Diligence makes one worthy of emulation.

- This is so because diligence creates formidability and such people are looked up to.

- Formidability is defined as the state of causing fear ,dread ,awe or admiration as a result of size ,strength or some other impressive

quality.

*1Corinthians11:1(KJV),

. Be ye followers of me, even as I also am of Christ..

*1Corinthians4:16 (KJV),

.Wherefore I beseech you, be ye followers of me..

*Hebrews12:13

*Hebrews12:1

-Diligence is the only way to gain prominence in your field.

-It takes grace to make the most of your time and let your works produce results.

*1Corinthians15:10

3. Diligence builds character and personality

-Character is defined as strength of mind ,resolution, independence, individuality and great moral strength.

-When you are diligent ,you have a strong resolve to achieve something thus this resolve will influence your actions ,attitudes, speech

and your individuality as a person.

-Character is judged in action and personality in standard of speech.

-It is easy to tell whether or not a person is diligent simply through their daily habits ,for actions speak louder than mere words.

*Isaiah50:7

*Luke7:35

*1Peter1:7

4. Diligence prepares you adequately for ministry

-The impact that a ministry makes is dependent upon the detail placed during the period of preparation.

-Every glorious ministry undergoes preparation.

-Preparation is a never ending process, even if you have been in ministry for twenty years.

-Without preparation, one can never ascend to the next level in ministry ,the level that is dependent upon the fulfilment of destiny.

-A lack of diligence in ministry will prevent divine help from reaching you ,because to move to a new level, there are specific people God

brings into your life who possess what you need to advance in ministry, this is true for every other area of life.

-When you are adequately prepared, you will be well equipped to overcome all the challenges ahead.

*1Timothy 4:7-8

*1Timothy 4:14-16

*2Timothy 2:15-16

*1Peter 3:15

*1Peter 4:7

-Every ministry that must work must be worked upon.

DILIGENCE

-Diligence by dictionary definition is defined as the combination of carefulness and long term effort.

-it is a term used to define the quality of a hard worker, including conscientiousness, determination and perseverance.

-diligence is not manifested in a single day or two but is cultivated over an extended period of time and is determined by our daily actions.

-Formidability does not happen overnight ,but it.s the simple acts that we are so faithful and committed to undertake each day that make us men

who become worthy to look up to and turn to.

-diligence should not just be in ministry but applies to every area of life.

-As long as you have a goal, diligence is the primary ingredient guaranteeing the fulfilment and manifestation of that dream.

*proverbs 22:29 (KJV) says,

. Seest thou a man diligent in his business ?he shall stand before kings ;he shall not stand before mean men..

-The word of God reveals to us that who we are and where we shall be tomorrow is dependent upon the actions we take today.

-where you are today is a result of your actions yesterday and where you will be tomorrow is determined by your actions today.

ADVANTAGES OF BEING DILIGENT

1. Diligence creates discipline in an individual.

-This is so because diligent people are very careful of how they use their time and prioritize their activities accordingly.

- A diligent person will never be found idling his or her time away engaging in meaningless activity such as gossip or unnecessary

involvement in other peoples affairs.

-relaxation and leisure activities are not bad ,but the time spent in engaging in such activities should be planned for and should not occur

haphazardly as this breeds laziness.

*1 Corinthians 6:12 (KJV);

. All things are lawful unto me,but all things are not expedient :all things are lawful for me,but I will not be brought under the power of

any..

* 1 Corinthians 9:27 (KJV),

. But I keep under my body ,and bring it into subjection :lest that by any means ,when I have preached to others ,I myself should be a

castaway..

*Galatians 6:4 (KJV),

. But let every man prove his own work, and then he shall have rejoicing in himself alone ,and not in another..

*Daniel 10:12

*Philippians 3:12-14

*2Timothy 4:2

*1Corinthians10:23