The Power Of Growth
“I must create a system, or be enslaved by another man’s” – William Blake
As human beings, there is a one constant in our lives. We grow. Every day of our lives we are evolving physically, mentally and spiritually because of the power of growth working inside us. It is such a phenomenal power that from the time we are in our mother’s womb, to the time we are buried in our graves, we have this drive to grow.
As we get older, our growth needs begin to differ and become quite complex. They are no longer just based on the process of human nature, some want to grow muscle, whilst others want to lose it, others want to grow financially, spiritually, academically and relationally. What I have come to realise is in all its forms growth has a pattern that we need to follow.
In the book World War You – How To Overcome Yourself, I wrote about the 3 things you will need in order to grow successfully in any sphere of the word.
The first truth is you will sacrifice for your growth, it will be painful, your body, mind and soul will be pushed to their limits because they are about to be transformed and made ready for a new dimension of purpose.
If your friends do not understand this level of hunger you are going to need to change friends because you cannot afford to be held down in the name of fellowship. If your business associates cannot understand your desire to get to the next level, you are going to have to leave them behind because there is no amount of money or business associations that can quench the fire of growth.
Here are the 3 things that you will need to understand and embrace:
i) Desire ii) Sacrifice iii) Action.
Without embracing those elements your growth will take a while because you refuse to migrate to a higher level of operation and thinking.
Desire
The dictionary defines desire as a strong feeling of wanting to have something or wishing for something to happen. It has synonyms such as craving, yearning, covet or aspire, all that have a deep connection to one’s emotions and intellectual drive. Aristotle wrote in “De Anima” that the soul is seen to be involved in motion because animals desire things and in their desire, they acquire locomotion. The moment you set your eyes on an area of growth, it begins to change you from within, it begins to transform you from the inside out. You must want to grow so bad that you begin to prepare for it even before you see it. Before it is tangible, you begin to move things around and putting them in place so that when it happens the environment is ready.
You do not get a drivers licence when you have bought your first car, yes I know someone reading this has done that but that is not how it goes. You desire to get a car and you begin to save up for it, you get a licence so that you know how to drive it then you begin to shop around for the car that you want.
Sacrifice
The dictionary defines this as giving up something of value for the sake of other considerations, it has synonyms such as forgo, relinquish and cede. The first thing to understand here is that growth requires everyone to sacrifice something because it involves parting of one’s own self-liberties. The second thing to understand is that in all forms of sacrifice a lower dimension of yourself is surrendered for the higher dimension of yourself.
Once your desire is greater than yourself or your environment, the process of sacrifice begins because your thinking is no longer governed by your own mind or your circumstances.
At this level, you begin to forgo certain luxuries or necessities because they would have become a lower principle in your quest for a higher one.
Your growth is not about you being better than your friends or your environment, it is about being a better version of you and because of that a lot of relationships are tested and boundaries are broken.
Action
An action is defined as the fact or process of doing something typically to achieve an aim or a goal. It is associated with other words such as measure, movement and work. The book of James says in chapter 2:17-18 “Even so faith, if it has no works, is dead, being alone. Yes, a man may say, Thou hast faith, and I have works: show me your faith without works, and I will show you my faith by my works”.
You need to prove that you can back the desire that you are showing around by putting words into action. I used to be at that place where I would have amazing ideas but they would all die as mental constructs they would never see the light. This was particularly frustrating because more times than not, I would then kick myself when I saw the same idea executed because I would then say that could have been me. So this final dimension is important to your growth because it seals everything for you, it demonstrates your capabilities in an undeniable manner.
The moment you prove that you are ready to move forward, the environment aligns itself with your actions, people begin to take you seriously they begin to listen to what you have to say and offer because you would have presented a full dimension.
Though this is an exciting way to harness growth, it is also one of the most gruelling because you are venturing into unknown or unfamiliar territories. I have seen and heard of many people giving up because they just do not know what to expert and some can not deal with sacrificing their comfort zones for zones that are not familiar.
The only way to make it out successful here is to remember that the vision or desire is greater than yourself and that the new you that will emerge on the other side is way better than the current you.
Join us below and share with us your growth hacks in the comments section.
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