Men In Relationships---Tips for Women

It is often said, “If you don’t know the use of something, then abuse is inevitable.” Many people may easily dismiss these words as common cliché, but their weight becomes clear when you observe the misunderstandings between men and women.

Both men and women find it hard to fathom the purpose of the other, and as a result, abuse of one partner becomes an ugly reality in many relationships.

Firstly, let us look at how men relate to women. If I were to ask a group of men this question, “Do you know the purpose of a men in relationships?” many of them would probably say yes, but the truth is, many men go into relationships with the attitude that says, lets just do it and see what happens.

And it is this negative attitude that sets men up for dismal failure in the relationship component called SHARING (ability to freely communicate every aspect of your life with someone else).

Secondly, men tend to interpret communication of their weaknesses as vulnerability not as a mandatory element of a relationship. And this is because, to a large extent, our cultural background instilled the principle that real men do not cry. Therefore, we learn at an early age to bottle our emotions. Eventually, it becomes hard for anyone to change our mindset when we finally get into relationships. Perhaps we can recite an old idiom, “You can’t teach an old dog new tricks.”

As a man, I can really relate to the taboos that men face. I recently got myself into a big financial crisis (don’t we all!) and I could not devise means to get myself out. And for weeks, my fiancee would ask, “What is wrong?” but, “I am fine,” was all she was getting. I thought I had proper reasons for not telling her. She would think I am weak, irresponsible and not in control.

Does that sound familiar? If you are a real man, you have probably found yourself in that situation.

After weeks of constant nagging, I finally decided to tell her the real problem. And guess what? She helped me find ways to get out of my mess without even one word of judgment. And out of this experience I learned two profound lessons about the dynamics of a relationship,

1. Women love men who are real- not those who don’t want to expose their vulnerabilities to the expense of their reality. And,

2. Hardships make relationships grow stronger.

And eventually, I was able to identify three important reasons why men act the way they do in their relationships with women.

#1. Lack of knowledge

Women possess great inherent resources of support, encouragement and comfort which lay dormant and gather dust if not used. Many men do not know that women are specialists in the emotion department while we are specialists in the logic department. Make use of the resources you have at your disposal, share.

#2. Our Design

It is in our nature as men to internalize our emotions. But we need to learn how to share our emotions with the women in our lives. Let’s face it, if we are going to spend the rest of our lives with them, why don’t we make them our best friends?

Women are vocal by nature. But for man, sharing is a skill you need to practice daily if you wanted to have a great relationship. As Bishop T.D Jakes often puts it, “Being a man does not make you emotionless.”

#3. Denial of REALITY

Every man experiences their fair share of mountains once in a while. Relationships should be headed by men, but if a man is obsessed with being in control, they tend to think that receiving from women is a weakness. Let us get real men—real men know when to admit when they are overwhelmed.

It is fine to be overwhelmed by life’s realities. It does not make you any less of a man to be in need. Real men are seen in challenges. As Dr. C. Motebang would put it,” Crisis does not build character, it reveals it.” When you begin to share everything you are going through with your woman, you relationship will become real and that will take your relationship to the next level.

Finally, my advice to women is, next time you make a subconscious judgement that men are weird, please consider the above reasons as your starting point and then deal with your men in great humility and understanding.

And men, GET REAL!

THAPELO JONAS [Your Very Own...Life Coach]

© Copyright 2008. All rights reserved

Persistance Ultimately Gets His Way

“It’s not all closed doors that are locked...some are closed on the account of weather."

Thapelo Jonas

Everyone has knocked at least on one door in their lifetime. Be it in applying for a job, acquiring that important capital for your business start-up or even applying for that university scholarship.

The reality of life is, we are all compelled to knock at certain doors in life for us to get ahead.

But guess what? Many of us are crippled by fear when we have to knock at some of these important doors.

The big question is why?

It is a song you will hear in many people’s lips, “there are no jobs; I have been trying to apply for years now…” And this anthem, in my two cents opinion, is not 100 percent accurate.

This is because the advent of the Internet has exposed people to online job applications, people can sit behind their chairs and send their curriculum vitae by means of an email and eventually conclude(by themselves) five days later that, the position was taken.

And yes, technology has afforded us convenience and speed, but it should not be a replacement for action-oriented approach our fore-fathers had. We should adopt that attitude that says “If they don’t reply to my application, I will physically go and knock on that door.”

There is an employer looking for someone with your talents, skills, personality, values and abilities but they are not always going to realize it by the four-page document dropping in their inbox.

Action is what separates extraordinary people from ordinary ones. But taking steps is not always an easy thing for some of us…how can you knock and get the answers you want?

# 1. Develop your speaking and writing skills

When you are applying for a position or trying to get capital for your business, you need to realize that you are selling a product called YOU. And how successful that product sells, depends on the power of persuasion that you have. Practice how you will use words when asked to describe why the potential employer should hire you.

Create a sales copy for a product YOU.

# 2. Brand yourself

You probably heard this before, “you don’t get a second chance to make first impressions”. Many people ignore the importance of image. Everyone you meet has perceptions about you; you cannot afford to let people brand you. Dress for success, look the part and before long you will be the part.

# 3. Develop positive self-talk

Your words have creating ability. You eventually become the product of your words, therefore if you continuously tell yourself, “I am the best, I will make it and I am destined for greatness….” You will eventually become.

And lastly, even if its only because they are annoyed by the knock, someone will always open the door for you.

Thapelo Jonas [Your Very Own...Life Coach]

© Copyright 2008. All rights reserved

The sky is not Your Limit, You Are

"When an egg breaks by a power from outside, a life ends. When an egg breaks by a power from within, a life begins"
Unknown

Thomas Carlyle once said “The block of granite which is an obstacle in the pathway of the weak, becomes a stepping stone in the pathway of the strong”. I never understood the power of this simple cliché until I thought really deep about something.

Geography has taught us that Mount Kilimanjaro is one of the tallest mountains in the world, but think about it for a second. If you were on a plane right on top of Mount Kilimanjaro, would you give the same rendition?

The answer is no. This is because, from a plane's view, Mount Kilimanjaro is as small as a marble. Now, how tall or how small Mount Kilimanjaro is will be determined solely by the POSITION IT IS VIEWED FROM.

The difference between somebody who wrote geography and a person who sees Kilimanjaro from a plane view, is the position they view it from.

You might be asking yourself, Thapelo Jonas, what are you getting at? Well let me break it down for you. Life has a tendency of throwing lemons our way, sometimes we find ourselves in the valleys of disaster. We get to be faced with gigantic goliaths of life who surfaces in the form of poverty, unemployment, low self esteem and shattered backgrounds.

But the reality is….Life happens, you might have been born in poor background and life has dictated to you that you can never amount to anything, you will never rise above your situation maybe its time you change your view.

Dr. Maswanganyi once said “there is nothing wrong in been born in a poor family but there is something wrong when you die in one. You have a choice of looking at yourself from the top view and declare that you are born for great exploits, thereby planting seeds of greatness in your tomorrow.

What does looking at your problems from a plane view mean?... If you are one of the thousands who is asking that question, don’t worry you are at the right place.

I believe in God therefore I can attest to what the bible says when it declares that as a man thinketh in his heart, so he is. Think about this, can you build a house without a plan…?

 In other words if you don’t have a blue print of where you are going then you can’t get there. Have you ever taken time to think about what it means when it says God created us in his image? You are created by an imaginative God who cannot create unless he has an image/blueprint or material to create from.

You need to think big if you want to be big. An interesting phenomenon of life is that images we have about the kind of future we want, always transcends into physical realities if we don’t let go of them in our minds.

Remember to dream big no matter where you are, that blue print you have in your mind must be there and if you don’t have it…destiny cannot create because it has no material to use.

Where you are today does not determine where you can go, and if you can dream it then you can do it.

Thapelo Jonas [Your Very Own...Life Coach]

© Copyright 2008. All rights reserved

Which Leadership Style Do You Use?

"If you do not know the use of something…abuse is inevitable." Myles Munroe

I have been studying the book of Esther recently, and the word caught my attention on the piece of text that blew my mind completely.

The Lord showed me the contrast between two leadership styles, Haman Leadership style and Esther's Leadership style, and how they both handled power and authority that came with it.

In Esther 3 verse 8 – 11, we hear of a very cruel man called Haman and how he went to King Ahasuerus and lied about the Jews with the intention to completely wipe them out of the kingdom.

The bible records, the king believed his story and gave Haman the ring from his hand and said, “The silver is given to thee, the people also, to do with them as it seemeth good to thee. “ NKJ

In today’s terms, we can say, The King gave Haman, the signed cheque book to do as he will. He was given the position of power, the authority to exercise as he deemed fit.

I wonder….what amount would you and I write on that cheque book if the king who owned everything gave us his cheque book and said I could do anything with it?

Authority can be defined as, the legal right to exercise power. But when the king gave Haman this legal right to exercise power, he abused it. He compelled everyone to reverence him, even though his vision, mission statement and leadership did not cause people to willingly follow him.

He even went as far as plotting to kill Mordecai when he refused to reverence him.

But contrary to Haman’s business acumen, the bible also tells us about Esther, what a woman? Esther 5 verse 3 declares, “Then said the king unto her, what wilt thou, Queen Esther? And what is thy request? It shall be even given thee to the half of the kingdom.” NKJ

What answer would you have given the King? I hear somebody saying, I would have asked for half the kingdom. But Esther’s motives were not selfish; she did not have any personal agenda to push at The King’s expense.

She invited The King and Haman to dinner because she wanted to convey her people’s dissatisfaction, ill treatment to the king, talk about a woman who has her people’s interests at heart.

Both Haman and Esther were in positions of power; The King gave them authority to exercise respectively. But because Haman did not know the use of his position, he abused it, he lead militantly not strategically.

He forced his followers to respect him not earned it by his deeds. He used his position of power to push his personal agenda. What kind of a leader are you?

But Esther on the other hand, had her people’s interest come before hers. She used the King’s favor for her people’s benefit not hers. She became selfless in an attempt to save her tribe. What kind of a leader are you?

Are you the Haman kind of leader…or the Esther kind of leader?

Thapelo Jonas [Your Very Own...Life Coach]

© Copyright 2008. All rights reserved

There is no future without the past

" Your dream is not big enough if it doesn't scare you."
Matthias Schmelz

 

As a motivational speaker, I often get approached by many people from the different spheres of life. It amazes me every time to see how easy people can take other people’s forms, and pursue to be other people.

Many young people often become ashamed to tell their friends, collegues about their background.

The big question is why?

We have absolutely no control about our place of birth, the parents we have and the kind of environment we grow up in. It has always puzzled me, how easy it is to blame either one or all of these elements when we meet with difficulty in life.

All of us, at one point or another, we have blamed our parents, where we grew up and everything else about our background.

Many people in our society are in denial of all these elements (where they grew up, their parents etc) about their past. As a result, our society today is full of people I call clones-- people in pursuit of being other people.

And once you pursue to be someone else, the maintenance becomes too high because you don’t possess resources to fulfill that person’s purpose. It goes without saying that, the end is disastrous, disappointment and dissatisfaction for the clone—the person pursuing to be someone else.

We need to learn to be satisfied with who we are. I have said this before, God gave you those two people you call parents for a reason. He knew that they possessed the right genetic make-up to make you the person He wanted you to be.

You might have grown in up in the most poorest of environments, but maybe that environment had the right type of lessons, mistakes and the right education to develop the character you will need to fulfill your destiny.

Thapelo Jonas [Your Very Own...Life Coach]

© copyright 2008. All rights reserved

How to turn your lemons into lemonade

You are the magnet that attracts your goals and success
“Wendy Nthantha”

I often hear people complain about life. Some of the comments that reside on people’s lips these days are, “Life is unfair”, it’s always life this and life that. It is an obvious truth that, life will throw dirt us, for most us that is, but the reality of it all is, in life you call the shots.

Many young people will start blaming their background, the parents they have and the size of their family’s bank account. Dr. Elijah Maswanganyi once said “There is nothing wrong in been born in a poor family but there is something wrong when you die in one”. Your parents end could be your beginning and not your end.

The question that you should be asking yourself constantly is, how can I turn my lemons into lemonade?

#1. STOP PLAYING THE BLAME GAME
The energy we put in blaming our background, parents, what could have been and should have been, tends to destruct our vision and to waste time we could be spending into strategies to employ in order to accelerate our growth and achievement of success.

#2. THINK BIG
If you don’t have a picture of a preferred future about your life, it’s impossible to work against the unknown. You must learn to dream big, think of the impossible even when you small in your own eyes. There is no big building that is erected without thorough and precise plan. What do you want out of life?

#3. MAINTAIN POSITIVE CONFESSION—ALWAYS
What you constantly say about yourself is what you eventually become. Instead of, waking up in the morning and dreading what the day holds for you—make it a habit of confessing greatness, “I am the best, I am an achiever, I wont end where my parents ended, I am a history maker”. Just remember, what gets talked about eventually gets done.

#4. ASSOCIATE WITH RIGHT PEOPLE
You probably heard it before, show me your friends and I will show you where you going. It is a simple cliché, but people we hang around with shape our thoughts, our confessions and who we eventually become. Don’t let anybody be your friend if they are not going or have not been where you going.

#5. COUNT THE COST AND TAKE STEPS
You now know what you want out of life, what will it take to reach it? How long will it take? What should I start doing today to make sure I reach my pinnacle? These are questions you need to ask yourself, and finally take small steps in the direction of your dream. Of course, patience, discipline and faith will be required along the way.


Thapelo Jonas [Motivational Speaker, author and Marketing Consultant]© Copyright 2008. All rights reserved

You failed….so what?

“Money never forgets where it has been”
Grace M

A very good friend of mine recently uttered these words to me, and it totally blew my mind. Because I wasn’t expecting it, the truth behind it got me after an hour. I started to think about those people who once tasted the joy of success and wealth, only to meet with the bitterness of poverty, bankruptcy and catastrophe soon after that.

Our God is a strategic and a brilliant designer, your destiny was beautifully crafted by an awesome designer. Our end was finished before we began...God knew our everyday before you were even formed in your mother’s womb. It is an absolute phenomenon how He created the universe— every situation we go through, no matter how painful, carries in it the valuable lesson to develop our character. Each and every one of us was created for a purpose established in heaven.

Failure has a funny way of discouraging us; it has got a way of making us feel incompetent, useless and with no means to amount to anything. The truth my friend is, you are God’s solution to the world, its not about how many times you failed but its about how long you stayed down. Failure is a friend you will meet on your way to success, and he is evidence that you are on the right path.

I got a revelation a while back, God said to me “It takes money to build wealth but it takes ME time to build a man”. The painful situations of life plays a pivotal role in shaping our character, life’s experiences are ideal to ensure that our talents and gifts never take us where our character wont keep us. We need character if we are to sustain the financial power that God is shifting on your side today.

You might have fallen dismally; life has thrown lemons your way. You didn’t expect the fall to be so painful but let me tell you my friend, life happened and you failed- but what have you learned?—let go and let God. Let him take you through every step without skipping any step, with time you will develop the character that will keep you when money begins to call you daddy/mommy.


Thapelo Jonas [Motivational Speaker, author and Marketing Consultant]
© Copyright 2008. All rights reserved

You are born to be exceptional in something…..

“The purpose of life is a life of purpose”
Robert Byrne

Our society today is surrounded by people who don’t know why they exist. Unfortunately, many people have not caught up with the fact that, living life without a purpose is like winking to girl at night. The fundamental principle that I want to demonstrate, is that each and every one of us is born for something; we have the potential to be exceptional in something.

If my Samsung mobile phone gives me a problem, I cannot take it to Nokia for them to fix it- reason being, the original purpose of every product lies with its manufacturer…wow, I know that is deep. The business that knows Samsung best is Samsung not Nokia. Let me submit to you guys that, your life’s purpose lies with God, the creator of humanity.

An intimate relationship with God will enable God to reveal to you His divine purpose for your birth- in heaven, no birth is authorized unless purpose is established—there must be a situation on earth that requires somebody with unique inherent characteristics to remedy the situation. You might not know it, but YOU are God’s solution to the world. You are born to be exceptional in something.

Everyone has at least one thing, which you are exceptional at. Let me ask you this question, if money was not an object and time was of no essence, what is the one thing you would be doing with your life? For me is speaking, I was born an eloquent speaker, if you want to destroy me in anyway—don’t let me speak because if I speak, I can get myself out of every mess….what is yours?

Our natural talents can help us a great deal in discovering our purpose—because God has endowed in us every little thing we will need to excel in our destiny. Some of us are born with exceptional singing talents, some of us are born actors, some brilliant in knowing what people need and how to meet that need, It means you are entrepreneurial my friend. Some of us possess exceptional listening skills, we enjoy that…

Our society is messed today because people are not in their positions, they have chosen wrong careers. You might not know it, but everything that is in you—is for someone else…if you are where YOU WANT to be, you have robbed somebody of their deliverance in life and you will not get maximum satisfaction until you are in your rightful place.

If you are asking yourself why you are not flourishing in your career, first look in your God given talents and gifts and ask yourself if you are totally tapping into your potential. My friend, you are born to be exceptional in something—find it and enjoy life. Remember, the original purpose of every product can be found with its manufacturer.

Thapelo Jonas [Motivational Speaker, author and Marketing Consultant]
© copyright 2008. All rights reserved

Think Big…Despite your small background

“Where you are does not determine where you can go”
Palesa Kortman

It’s often said, there is no future without the past. Unfortunately, this short-sighted statement tends to halt so many people from achieving real success in life. As a result, many people let their destiny be determined by where they come from. The truth is, you are only as successful as you think…

I recently heard a story of two salesmen, who were sent to an island where its inhabitants never wore shoes (the fact of which were never aware prior to their departure).Upon their arrival, they realized that nobody wore shoes in that island. The 1st salesman immediately sent a telegram back home: “Send me a plane ticket NOBODY WEARS SHOES HERE”, the 2nd salesman also sent a telegram home: “Send more orders EVERYBODY NEEDS SHOES HERE!”

The moral of the story…your perceived obstacle, poor background, dead-end or stronghold can in actual fact be a stepping stone to greater things. If you view your background as an obstacle, it sure is an obstacle. Thomas Carlyle once said “The block of granite which is an obstacle in the pathway of the weak, becomes a stepping stone in the pathway of the strong “PERSPECTIVE- how you view your life is important.

In my primary education, teachers taught us that Mount Kilimanjaro is one of the tallest mountains in the world. But, if you are in a plane on top of Mount Kilimanjaro, you would see it as small as a marble. The difference between the former and the latter is, the former was written from a sitting position and therefore it looked taller but the latter is rendered from the top and therefore once again we realize—the problem is not your poor background, it can not hold you down. It’s not as important how big or bad your situation is as how you choose to view your bad situation.


No matter what your dream is—you always wanted to start your own business, you always dreamt of becoming a doctor or you have always fantasized about flying that aircraft. Your background might be screaming that you don’t qualify… the people you grew up with might be saying you don’t have enough IQ to start that business. But, life is what you make my friend, you call the shots. If you can think big….despite your small background but above all take small necessary steps towards your dream, you will succeed.


Thapelo Jonas [Motivational Speaker, author and Marketing Consultant]
© copyright 2008. All rights reserved