A choice called poverty 1

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Case number one. Sometime in March 2022, the Nigerian cyberspace was agog with the story of two young men known as Happy Boys. Two of them were working as security guards in a fast-food restaurant. However, they had a leisurely approach to their work and were fond of dancing at the entrance of the establishment while opening doors for customers. Internet bloggers took videos of them and made them trend. Embarrassed by this development, the management of the restaurant promptly sacked them, an action that attracted outrage from some Nigerians who believed that they should not have been sacked for bringing fun to their job. Consequently, many people reached out to them to give them material support and encouragement. A renowned pastor offered to sponsor them to study in Cyprus, all expenses paid. One year after getting to Cyprus, the boys had not sat for the qualifying examinations they needed to pass before their proper absorption into the school system. They were simply collecting money from the pastor for their upkeep and did nothing to enhance their own lives. After a while, the funds from the pastor were not coming as expected. The boys began to place a demand on the cleric even when he explained to them the challenges he was having with the continued funding of their lazy lifestyle. Pronto, they made a video, revealing all their chats with the pastor and denigrating him. This riled the pastor to no end, and he also took to cyberspace to curse them for their ingratitude.

Case number two. In May 2022, Deborah Samuel, a female student of the Shehu Shagari College of Education in Sokoto State, Nigeria, was brutally lynched by her Muslim colleagues on the allegation of having blasphemed against the Prophet Muhammed. It was a story that sent shockwaves and provoked national outrage. Consequent upon threats to their lives, Deborah’s parents withdrew her siblings from school. The same pastor that came to the aid of the Happy Boys promptly reached out to Deborah’s family, paid for their relocation from Sokoto to Port Harcourt, gave them a three-bedroom bungalow accommodation, paid one year’s rent for a shop for Deborah’s mum to continue with her petty trade and offered to sponsor the education of her siblings. He did not stop there. He secured employment for Deborah’s father and in addition, bought him a Toyota Corolla saloon car for Uber business on the side. Fast forward one year later. Deborah’s father is complaining that he has no money to renew the expired rent, and according to him, the car that was bought for him has been giving him problems! The last time I checked, Toyota Corolla is one of the cheapest cars to maintain in Nigeria’s harsh driving conditions!

Case three. I spotted the gentleman in a meeting of ministers of the gospel where I spoke. He looked gaunt and flushed. I knew there was a health challenge. I asked him to see me after the meeting for discussions. It turned out that he was diabetic and hypertensive. Not only that, but he also had a hernia around a very sensitive area of his body and needed immediate surgery. I asked him about his medical history and the efforts he had made to get the surgery done. One of the conditions given by the hospital was that his sugar level had to come down before surgery could be done. I immediately instructed our Resident Pastor to arrange for the regular supply of his blood pressure and diabetes medication until we could get the logistics right for surgery. After we got quotations from a Consultant Surgeon who knew his medical history, I went ahead to speak with a protégé, a Regional Manager of a bank, and a Purpose Account was opened for the cause. My protégé even went ahead to buy him a glucose monitoring device for him to constantly check his sugar levels. I made a public appeal to friends, and we were able to raise funds for the procedure even before it was done.

Thank God, I requested that even though the account was opened in his name, the alerts would come to me for accountability, and he would not have the authority to withdraw from it as the hospital would be paid directly from the funds. However, when he was to submit his photo and signature at the bank, he cunningly changed the alert number to his. As soon as he noticed that the money was over N100,000, he started making demands for withdrawal using all kinds of excuses ranging from wanting to use alternative medicine to hunger! I promptly requested that his number be removed from the alert. He was so truculent about having access to what he called “his money” and told everyone who cared to listen that I was depriving him of access to money that people contributed for his health and upkeep! It was so bad that the bank Manager politely withdrew his involvement in the matter and delegated the responsibility to one of his subordinates. It was one of the toughest and most traumatic periods of my history of helping others. This man epitomised the perfect mindset for poverty and its appurtenances. At a point, I was no longer willing to pick his calls because every conversation led to a new problem. And it was always around needless demands, with the claim that after all, the money was contributed for him! We eventually succeeded in getting the surgery done and settled all the hospital bills. I thereafter handed over the control of the account to him with a surplus of almost N200,000 which he depleted in no time.

If you ask anyone if they want to be poor, it doesn’t take a soothsayer to know that everyone would respond in the negative. Everyone on earth desires economic power. What differs from person to person is the degree of appetite for financial success. Poverty is a symptom of an underlying dysfunction around thoughts, attitudes, choices, habits, and decisions. Poverty or wealth is only a mirror of these factors that shape our lives. The way we think shapes our outcomes. Give a man with a poverty mindset all the money in the world, it is only a matter of time before he reduces the money to the level of his poor mind. If you doubt it, statistics have shown that over 95 percent of people who win millions of dollars in lotteries are flat broke less than three years afterwards!

Conversely, give minimal resources to a man with an abundance mindset and he will grow it to the level of his mind. Resources don’t produce or grow wealth. Resourcefulness does. Charity or benevolence may help to get your foot in the door, but skillfulness and resourcefulness are the key things that will keep the door from shutting against you! Depending on charity from others without bringing any industry to the table can never make any man financially successful.

My focus over the next few weeks will be on the mindset that produces financial success and the mindset that drives poverty. It will bless you.

Remember, the sky is not your limit, God is!

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