Are You Still Waiting For Tomorrow?

When we were old enough to know the difference between Adam and Eve, we also got to know that there are 3 Important terms in this world with respect to our existence on this Planet and the things we need to do to get life on living terms.

Those terms are: Today, Yesterday and Tomorrow

Of those 3, the one that is in the present and makes a whole lot of sense is TODAY.

All the achievements that men and women have made in this life were done on a day that was TODAY in the era they were made.

Today is real and available and anyone can start improving on themselves and live their reality.

Living in Today has many advantages.

When a today passes, it becomes a YESTERDAY

And though many people like to live in the past especially if their living conditions were better in the past than in the present; but those who really know themselves know that there is no greater opportunity presented by any of those terms I have used above than Today.

However, all of us have great expectations for TOMORROW

We grew up hearing that tomorrow would always be better than today

Most of us have lived that sentence almost all our lives

We have been in the wings and waiting for the magical wand that would change our lives conditions when tomorrow arrives

We have attended seminars and workshops that should actually improve our lives if implemented today but we wait for tomorrow when we would have been appropriately empowered

We listen to the Pastor's Preaching and we wait for Tomorrow when the Word shall be fulfilled in our lives even if we refuse to lift a finger to help ourselves

We hear Motivational Speakers tell us how we need to take our destinies into our own hands and turn around our fortunes, but tomorrow beckons and so we close our eyes and live in eldorado in our heads while waiting for tomorrow

We learn skills that we need to sharpen and earn from, but the ubiquitous tomorrow is waiting for us to wait on her and not act out what we have learnt

And finally when tomorrow arrives, we find out that it has just become another Today and that we ought to have done what we needed to do when we had to do it because tomorrow is like opportunity cost - it is very expensive.

Are you still waiting for tomorrow?

Take a small piece of advise from the man who saw Tomorrow, if you live out today in all its ramifications, tomorrow will meet you prepared to take it on.

Go on, LIVE OUT TODAY

And while you do that, I pray that the Good Lord would bless all your hustles

I am Dr. Jerry - the First Oguzie: JP

Your Friend

#DrJTF

Wake Up!!!!

Wake up everybody, it's a new day!!!!

I am quite ecstatic!!!

And you know the reason, don't you?

It's da weekend!! oh! oh! oh!!!!

Today, I am rooming in my bed a lil' longer than usual

And when am outta there, am going bowling!

You care to join me?

Then, let's meet at the Madison Alley

It's gonna be fun all the way

Ohhhhh!! How I love Saturday!!!

How about you?

Ciao!

#DrJTF

Shred The Hatred

Over the years, I have learnt to be on the brighter side of life and that is ALWAYS

It does not mean that I have never been hurt - far from it, I have been hurt so much even by those who ate from the same plate with me.

I have been blackmailed - those I brought into my own very house, under my own roof, have turned around to stab me at the back

I have been called names - even those that I went out of my way, bent over backwards to accommodate and please

I have been used and dumped - even by those I personally lifted out of the gutters

I have suffered indignities from the hands of those who should know my worth and promote me as such

Persons I have helped have turned around to take advantage of me

In all these and through them all, I have a choice

To choose to HATE with all the fibres of my heart or to choose to FORGIVE and forge ahead with all the fibres of my heart

And I chose to forgive and forge ahead

and you can't imagine how peaceful it is within me.

Hatred is a dangerous emotion especially when the object of hate is within visual reach.

Not only does hatred release the danger hormones in the body which cause havoc to the nervous system and thus lead persons down the path of stress, hypertension and heart disease but hatred also slowly eats the practitioner away.

So it is for my own good health that I choose to forgive and I tell you it has helped me over the years.

If you are harbouring hatred for anyone or any tribe or any behaviour or any character, it is your choice to #shredthehate today and set yourself free.

God bless you richly

#DrJTF

All In One Pictorial Posts

Thank You Father

God has been good to me, I really don't know what I would have done without Him being by my side.

Even though sometimes I walk the valley of the shadow of death but because He is nigh me, I shall not be moved nor would my toe hit on a stone

 

Abba Father

God Understands

He understands, there's no gain saying about that fact
Just trust in Him and believe

Pray Always

Mind These Unrealistic Expectations Or .....

8 Unrealistic Expectations That Will Ruin You

Your expectations, more than anything else in life, determine your reality. When it comes to achieving your goals, if you don’t believe you’ll succeed, you won’t.

Research from LSU shows that people who believe in themselves use more metacognitive functions than those who don’t. This means that they use more of their brains and have more brainpower to solve problems. Metacognition is especially important for achievement as it ensures that you approach problems from many different angles and adapt your approach as needed.

The tricky thing about your expectations is that they impact other people too. As far back as the 1960s, Harvard research demonstrated the power of our beliefs in swaying other people’s behavior. When teachers in the studies were told that certain (randomly selected) children were smart, those kids performed better, not only in the classroom, but also on standardized IQ tests.

Indeed, we get the most out of other people when we believe in them. Research shows that this happens because when we believe in someone,

• we treat them better than people we think will fail,

• we give them more opportunities to succeed than we give those we think will fail,

• we give them more accurate, helpful feedback than we give others, and

• we do more teaching because we believe it’s time well spent.

Letting your doubts cloud your belief in someone (or something) practically ensures their failure. Medical professionals call this the “nocebo” effect. Patients who have low expectations for medical procedures or treatments tend to have poorer results than those who expect success, even with regards to well-established treatments. If a doctor uses a treatment with a clinically verified high rate of success but presents it in a negative light, the probability of a negative outcome increases.

Your expectations shape your reality. They can change your life, emotionally and physically. You need to be extra careful about (and aware of) the expectations you harbor as the wrong ones make life unnecessarily difficult. Be especially wary of the expectations that follow—they give people all kinds of trouble.

1. Life should be fair. We’ve all been told a million times (and likely told other people) that life isn’t fair, but in spite of what we know about the intricacies of injustice, it’s a concept that doesn’t quite sink in in practice. A surprising number of us subconsciously expect life to be fair, and we believe that any unfairness that we experience will somehow be balanced out, even if we don’t do anything about it. If you’re stuck in that mindset, it’s time to get over it. When something “unfair” happens, don’t rely on outside forces to get you back on your feet. Sometimes there isn’t any consolation prize, and the sooner you stop expecting there to be, the sooner you can take actions that will actually make a difference.

2. Opportunities will fall into my lap. One of the most important things a person can do is stick his or her neck out and seek opportunity. Just because you deserve a raise, a promotion, or a company car, doesn’t mean it’s going to happen. You have to make it happen. You have to put in the hard work, then go and get what’s yours. If we limit ourselves to what’s given to us, we are at the mercy of other people. When you take action, think “what steps do I need to take?” “what obstacles are in my way and what do I need to do to remove them?” and “what mistakes am I making that take me away from my goals rather than toward them?”

3. Everyone should like me. People have hang ups, and that means all sorts of decent, kind, respectable people are not liked by (some) others, for no good reason at all. When you think that everyone should like you, you end up with hurt feelings when you shouldn’t. (You can’t win them all.) When you assume that people are going to like you, you take shortcuts; you start making requests and demands before you’ve laid the groundwork to really understand what the other person is thinking and feeling. Instead of expecting that people will like you, focus on earning their trust and respect.

4. People should agree with me. This one can be tough. Sure, you know what you’re talking about, and for that reason, people should take you seriously, but expecting people to agree with you out of courtesy or because your ideas are so incredibly sound is another story. Something that’s obvious to you might not be so to someone with different experiences and a different agenda, so stop being offended when people disagree with you, and stop assuming that there is only one right answer (yours). Instead, focus on how you can find solutions that give everyone what they need.

5. People know what I’m trying to say. People can’t read your mind, and what you’re trying to say is rarely what other people hear. You can’t expect people to understand you just because you’re talking—you have to be clear. Whether you’re asking someone to do something without providing the context or explaining a complex concept behind a big project, it’s easy to leave out relevant information because you don’t think it’s necessary. Communication isn’t anything if it isn’t clear, and your communication won’t be clear until you take the time to understand the other person’s perspective.

6. I’m going to fail. As I’ve touched upon already, if you expect to fail, you stand a higher chance of creating the very outcome you’re worried about. If you fail, accept that sometimes you’ll fail and sometimes you’ll succeed, but if you pursue an endeavor, believe with all your being that you’re going to succeed in that endeavor. Otherwise, you’ll limit the chances of that happening.

7. Things will make me happy. Sure, things can make life more fun and comfortable in the short run, but they can’t make you happy in the long run. Too many of us expect a future event (“I’ll be happy when I get that promotion”) to make us happy, instead of looking more deeply into the real causes of our unhappiness. If you don’t fix what’s going on inside, no external event or item is going to make you happy, no matter how much you want it to.

8. I can change him/her. There’s only one person in this world you can truly change—yourself—and even that takes a tremendous amount of effort. The only way that people change is through the desire and wherewithal to change themselves. Still, it’s tempting to try to change someone who doesn’t want to change, as if your sheer will and desire for them to improve will change them (as it has you). You might even actively choose people with problems, thinking that you can “fix” them. Let go of this faulty expectation. Build your life around genuine, positive people, and avoid problematic people that bring you down.

Bringing It All Together

Believing that you’ll succeed really does make it more likely that you will. It also means that you’ll need to let go of some erroneous expectations that will only get in your way.

Do you see people’s expectations helping them and holding them back? Please share your thoughts in the comments section below as I learn just as much from you as you do from me.

Source:     Forbes

 

 

The Needs Of Today's Teens

 

 

What Teens Need Most From Their Parents

As adolescents navigate the stormiest years in their development, they need coaching, support, good examples and most of all understanding.

 

The teenage years can be mystifying for parents. Sensible children turn scatter-brained or start having wild mood swings. Formerly level-headed adolescents ride in cars with dangerous drivers or take other foolish risks.

A flood of new research offers explanations for some of these mysteries. Brain imaging adds another kind of data that can help test hypotheses and corroborate teens’ own accounts of their behavior and emotions. Dozens of recent multiyear studies have traced adolescent development through time, rather than comparing sets of adolescents at a single point.

The new longitudinal research is changing scientists’ views on the role parents play in helping children navigate a volatile decade. Once seen as a time for parents to step back, adolescence is increasingly viewed as an opportunity to stay tuned in and emotionally connected. The research makes it possible to identify four important phases in the development of intellectual, social and emotional skills that most teens will experience at certain ages. Here is a guide to the latest findings:

Ages 11 to 12

As puberty takes center stage, tweens can actually slip backward in some basic skills. Spatial learning and certain kinds of reasoning may decline at this stage, studies show. Parts of the brain responsible for prospective memory, or remembering what you are supposed to do in the future, are still maturing. This may be why a teen may seem clueless if asked to give the teacher a note before school.

Coaching tweens in organizational skills can help. Parents can help build memory cues into daily routines, such as placing a gym bag by the front door, or helping set reminders on a cellphone. They can share helpful tools, such as task-manager apps.

Parents can help foster sound decision-making, thinking through pros and cons and considering other viewpoints. Children who know by age 10 or 11 how to make sound decisions tend to exhibit less anxiety and sadness, get in fewer fights and have fewer problems with friends at ages 12 and 13, according to a 2014 study of 76 participants published in the Journal of Behavioral Decision Making.

By remaining warm and supportive, parents may be able to influence the way their teen’s brain develops at this stage. A 2014 study of 188 children compared the effect of mothers ​who were warm, affectionate and approving during disagreements, versus mothers who became angry and argumentative. Teens at age 16, who had affectionate moms when they were 12, ​showed brain changes linked to lower rates of sadness and anxiety and greater self-control, according to the study led by researchers at the University of Melbourne in Australia.

Ages 13 to 14

Parents should brace themselves for what is often a wildly emotional passage. Young teens become sensitive to peers’ opinions and react strongly to them. Yet the social skills they need to figure out what their peers really think won’t be fully mature for years, making this a confusing and potentially miserable time.

At about this time, teens’ response to stress goes haywire, sparking more door-slamming and tears. The impact of social stress is peaking around this time: Of adults with mental disorders often triggered by stress, 50% received a diagnosis before age 15. Other researchshows teens from ages 11 to 15 become sad and anxious when subjected to social stresses such exclusion from social groups, while adults don’t show a similar effect.

Parts of the brain most vulnerable to stress are still maturing, so coping strategies teens use at this stage can become ingrained in the brain’s circuitry as lifelong patterns, according to a 2016 research review in Developmental Science Review. Psychologists advise teaching and modeling self-soothing skills, such as meditation, exercise or listening to music.

Coach teens on friendship skills, including how to read their peers’ expressions and body language. Encourage them to choose friends based on shared interests, not popularity, and to dump friends who are unkind. Teach them how to repair friendships after a fight by apologizing, making amends or compromising.

Family support is a stress buffer. Teens whose families provide companionship, problem-solving and emotional support are less likely to become depressed after exposure to severe stress, according to a 2016 study of 362 Israeli adolescents in the Journal of Family Psychology.

Ages 15 to 16

Teens’ appetite for risk-taking peaks at this age, according to a 2015 study of more than 200 participants ages 8 to 27 led by researchers at Leiden University in the Netherlands. The brain’s reward receptors are blossoming, amplifying adolescents’ response to dopamine, a neurotransmitter associated with feelings of pleasure and satisfaction. This makes thrill-seeking more desirable than it will ever be again.

Normal fears of danger are temporarily suppressed during adolescence, a shift scientists believe is rooted in an evolutionary need to leave home and explore new habitats. Studies have found adolescents fail to change their appraisal of risky situations even after being warned that the hazards are greater than they expect.

The ability to make and keep good friends is especially useful at this stage. Teens with friends they trust and count on for support are less likely to engage in risky behavior such as shoplifting, riding with a dangerous driver or having unprotected sex, according to a 2015 study of 46 teens led by Dr. Eva Telzer, an assistant professor of psychology at the University of Illinois in Champaign-Urbana. Teens who argue often with close friends are more likely to take such gambles.

It is not too late for warm, supportive parents to make a difference. In a laboratory risk-taking test, teens who grew closer to their parents starting at age 15 showed less activation of a brain region linked to risk-taking and took fewer chances 18 months later, according to a 2015 study of 23 adolescents published in Developmental Cognitive Neuroscience. The closeness to parents included having parents’ respect and help talking through problems, and an absence of arguing or yelling, according to the study, in which Dr. Telzer was a co-author.

Ages 17 to 18

Benefits of the teenage brain’s ability to change and develop are evident at this stage. Some teens show increases in IQ. Intellectually gifted teens are most likely to achieve gains in IQ scores, so teens who are already smart are likely to grow even smarter, according to a 2013 study of 11,000 pairs of twins led by researchers at Penn State University, in University Park, and the University of Colorado at Boulder.

In older teens, the parts of the prefrontal cortex responsible for judgment and decision-making typically are developed enough to serve as a brake on runaway emotions and risk-taking. Executive-function skills, such as solving problems and planning strategies, continue to develop at least through age 20, according to a 2015 study by researchers at Sheffield Hallam University, England.

Social skills and related brain regions are still maturing, according to researchers including Sarah-Jayne Blakemore, a professor of cognitive neuroscience at University College London. At this stage, teens are better at noticing how others feel and showing empathy. They still lack the ability to decipher people’s motives and attitudes in complex social situations, though, such as figuring out why a friend might suddenly change the subject during a conversation at a party.

Source:     The Wall Street Journal

 

Let The Sunshine In

Roses Are Red

Stop Wasting Your Time

Man Know Thyself

Dreams Do Come True

Drop That Baggage

It's the beginning of a new month and time to break with the past by dropping the baggage that is weighing you down

My friends,

Greetings of the new morning to you.

Every morning, I give thanks to the Almighty God Who makes it possible for me and members of my family to wake up filled with strength to persevere.

I also thank Him for you my friends that you and yours enjoyed this miracle of all times.

And so together we shall continue to hallow His Name for ever - Amen
 

It is the beginning of a new day, it is just not another day, but 

a NEW DAY because from eternity, there has been no day like the 1st of August 2016 and to eternity there would be none like it when it is gone.

What then shall we do with this day?
 

Carry over the old baggage that has kept us from moving forward? 

Continue with the resentments and hatred that have eaten us up and made us so jaundiced we have become a terror to ourselves?
Continue wallowing in self pity that steers us out of the path of successfully competing for the few resources of this world?
Continue turning around in endless circles that have brought no dividend?
Or doing the same thing over and over again and which has not taken us to our Eldorado?

While persistence pays out at the long run, but doing the same self thing over and over again and expecting another result is the definition the English man has given to “insanity”

Today, BREAK WITH THE PAST and look forward, the future is in front, it is not at the back and that is why God placed our eyes right in front of us. 

He is so omnipotent that he knew that the only way to make progress is to move forward and to move forward we have to “shine our eyes”

Make today your day of a NEW BEGINNING. I am already making it mine.

Leave all those baggage that weigh you down and have over the years made you run around in circles without producing any tangible results.

Today, resolve to be a NEW PERSON.

And while you make that resolution, I am here and waiting for you. Right here at the TOP.

My arms are already outstretched to give you a warm bear hug of welcome.

Join me soon

God loves you beyond all doubts and I also do

And hey,
It's Monday - the beginning of the working week

Go have fun

Have a very wonderful day

Dr. Jerry - the First Oguzie: JP

#DrJTF