Loving myself: I am Unique

When did you last look at yourself in the mirror? Was it this morning or just a short while ago in the bathroom? Next time you do remember that the person staring back at you is UNIQUE. Of the 7 billion people in the world, I am one of a kind. There is no one else with my set of fingerprints or my DNA.

I was born in a situation, place and circumstances that could not exactly be duplicated at that precise time anywhere else. On the day and time that I was born, the world was made that much richer by my grand entrance. My family, community and the world at large were all receiving a special package and blessing that they had never had before.

Being the last born, I am in many ways different from each of my six brothers and two sisters. I brought my own unique gifts into the family. I was a special gift to my parents and to each of my brothers and sisters. Each one of them was a special unique gift to me. As I look back now I am fascinated by the rainbow beauty of the blend of our unique individual differences and the richness that this brought into the family.

 I totally believe that on the day that I was born God was in the process of introducing into this world a very special person that he had never produced before and was not going to produce again. I acknowledge and embrace the unique inherent value that my God gave me.   I am absolutely convinced that I have a magnificence and beauty that no one else in the world has.

Your unique magnificence and beauty are only meaningful when you embrace and articulate them yourself. They can never mean anything to anyone else before they have meaning to you and are expressed by you. They cannot move anyone else before they move your own heart and you stand in awe and gratitude of the magnificent and beautiful you.     

I feel challenged to use my magnificence and beauty to make a positive difference in the lives around me.  And as I live out my purpose, I feel driven to inspire other people to look at themselves in the same way.

I have a mission in this world that is unique to me.  If I do not respond to the call of this mission it does not get done. This awareness has challenged me to seriously search for and find my purpose in this life.  

My number one purpose is to be a teacher of love and wisdom and to passionately inspire myself and others to be the best that we can be. And I have chosen to do this through writing, speaking and coaching. Visit www.silsystems.com.au

I have also dedicated my life to making a positive difference in the lives of as many AIDS orphans in Zimbabwe as I can reach out to. In this regard I have played a central role in the establishment of a charity organisation Zimbabwe Orphans Looking Ahead (ZIMOLA) - originally called the Education Fund For AIDS Orphans in Zimbabwe (EFFAOZ). Visit www.zimola.org   

I am fully aware that I can only fulfil my purpose as David Pasipanodya and no one else.

You also have a purpose only unique to you. Your dreams, vision and mission in this life have a power and meaning that only your unique mind can most meaningfully conceive, understand, visualize and translate into reality.

You are the only authentic author of the book that is your life. It is your unique input into the time you spend here that determines the quality of the life you live. Ultimately only you can most accurately tell from your unique experiences whether or not your life has been of value and fulfilling. Other people can make an attempt but they will be talking about a life that they never lived. And so their assessment can never be as meaningful as yours.    

Stop focusing too much on seeking approval and appreciation from others. Your first duty is to appreciate and give value to this unique identity that is you. When you seriously and sincerely do so consistently, you will create an atmosphere and spirit of love around you. Then other people will become attracted to you.

One of the greatest causes of failure in our lives is the fear that comes from comparing ourselves with others and feeling inadequate and less significant. We either forget or ignore how unique we are and we blindly model our lives on other people. We put these people on a pedestal and look up to them as the giants of the game of life.

For many years I tried to be like someone I admired who seemed to have everything that I wanted in life but couldn’t have – wealth, a good car, a big house, a great job. I was setting goals and doing things just to catch up with him.

At one point I took up studies to do a course that he had done so that I could acquire his qualification and live his lifestyle. At the time I was the Headmaster of a boarding high school of over 800 students. I failed to appreciate the gift of leadership and inspiration that was so clearly evident in my life. I was too busy trying to be someone else.

By all means admire what other people have done and respect them for what they have accomplished. Learn from them and see how their experiences can nourish your own unique purpose and mission in life. Feel free to even use some of their ideas. But don’t try to be like them because you can never be.

Your best comparison is with yourself. Whatever task or passion you pursue, make every effort to perform better today than you did yesterday.  Measure yourself against your own standards. Be the person you always want to surpass. That is excellence!  Og Mandino –Author and speaker expressed it so well when he said, “To surpass the deeds of others is unimportant; to surpass my own deeds is all.”

You are a one life time gift to the world and you pass through this planet only once. Make it a unique, fulfilling and successful experience. The impression and imprint that you stamp on this world and in other people’s lives are uniquely yours.

Let your unique gifts, talents and abilities make an impact that is greater than your lifespan. Leave a legacy, a memory imprint that is uniquely you and that will always be remembered as uniquely yours and that will continue to enrich the lives of the many generations that will walk this earth after you.As John Mason so powerfully put it, “You were born an original, don’t die a copy.”

 

The Most Amazing Relationship

Something is awfully wrong here. What on earth are we doing? We are giving away our birth right. We are surrendering responsibility in the most meaningful and important area of our precious lives – the area of Relationships.

 At the centre of every meaningful relationship is LOVE. We all value ourselves and want to be loved.  But most of the time we are depending on other people to love us. We are depending on other people to give and show us LOVE. We are giving them the first responsibility for loving us. We only feel loved because other people have decided to love us. This also means that if we don’t feel loved, we blame other people for not loving us.

We are depending on other people to give us value, to tell us that we are special, valuable and lovable. This means that we are building our sense of self-worth, our sense of value, meaning and well-being on the whims, moods, feelings and judgments of other people.

When we do this I strongly believe that we are setting ourselves up for a lot of disappointment, anger and frustration. Would you agree with me that people usually don’t do what we want or expect them to do for us most of the time?

 Would you also agree with me that people tend to do or say things that serve their own interests first before they think of serving other people’s needs, desires and interests?

And so what happens? These people that we depend on so much, fall short of our expectations and do not give us the love we want in the way that we want it.

The reason they behave in that way is not necessarily that they are bad people. They are just different from us and see things differently. They are not necessarily thinking of the same thing we are thinking at the same time that we are thinking about it. At the time that you expect them to be expressing and showing love to you, they will most likely be pre-occupied with their own issues and challenges. They are only human. So why stake your own happiness and fulfilment on them?

What I have come to realise is that when it comes to our strong desire to experience meaningful love, other people are unreliable.

Without encouraging vanity, self-centredness, selfishness and empty pride, I would like to suggest that after God, the first human being you can trust more than anyone else to give you meaningful and fulfilling love is YOU.

My own number one mission and purpose in life is to motivate and inspire myself and others to be the best that we can be. Please note that I have to motivate and inspire myself first. I strongly believe that I cannot give others what I don’t have myself. I have to walk my talk. Everything that I am sharing in this article and that I am going to be sharing on this blog, I live.  Meaningful life and leadership is all about working on yourself first before you can start demanding from other people and expecting them to do things for you.

Within my number one mission my first objective is to build an amazing relationship with myself –David Pasipanodya, my God, my wife, my five children and my two grandchildren. And once again I have to begin with myself. I cannot build meaningful relationships with my wife, children and grandchildren if I am all messed up. I cannot build fruitful work, business and other social relationships if I have not put my own act together.   

I am asking you to truly and unselfishly love yourself first before you can expect someone else to love you. I am asking you to build an amazing relationship with yourself first before you can expect to have an amazing relationship with someone else. I am also suggesting that it is when you give yourself genuine love, value, respect and appreciation that you will be able to attract genuine love, value, respect and appreciation from other people. It is the law of attraction.  What you create within you, you attract from other people.

Become aware of how valuable, important and special you are. Become aware of the fact that you spend 24 hours with yourself, a lot more time than even the closet person ever spends with you.

Also become aware of the fact that unless you appreciate who you are and give yourself the value that you deserve, no one else will. Focus on and become aware of your strengths more than anyone else ever will.

You are capable of and responsible for transforming your life more than anyone else can ever be. Nurture and nourish yourself in every way possible. You deserve it.  So why don’t you take 100% responsibility for the quality of your own life. After all relating with yourself is the only relationship where you have full control with no other human being involved.

Loving and building an amazing relationship with your self is not the same as feeding on your ego, vain pride and selfishness. It is not thinking that you are better than someone else. As a unique person you cannot be more important or less important than anyone else. All I am suggesting is that you embrace who you are and give yourself the value that you deserve  

Building an amazing relationship with your self means cheering yourself on even when everyone else has gone quiet. It means acknowledging, accepting and appreciating yourself unconditionally.  It is when you do all that needs to be done to encourage, motivate and inspire yourself that you show true love for the special person that you are.

This is building an amazing relationship with the one and only you. This is treating yourself as you truly deserve to be treated. This is focusing your thinking, your attitude and behaviour on the person who matters most in your life.

Do all these things and you will create an atmosphere of love, value and positivity around you. You will attract loving and amazing relationships around you. And that is where God lives. You will have empowered yourself to love unconditionally those people who matter in your life.

You will have followed one of Jesus’ most powerful instructions “Love your neighbour as yourself.”

So next time you are standing in front of the mirror, tell that person staring back at you, “Hey I really appreciate you. You are truly awesome, magnificent and special and I would love to build an amazing relationship with you!”