By Akpeli Othuke Andrew
In everything you do, choose greatness and run away from mediocrity. Learn to soar with the eagles, don’t walk with the pigeons. When Alexander of Macedon was seven, his father, General Philip of Macedon, took him to the oracle at Delphi, to prophesy on his future, as was the custom then. Having peered into
Alexander’s future, the Oracle gave Alexander two choices: A long uneventful life or a short life full of glory.
Alexander chose a short life full of glory. In effect, Alexander chose greatness. Today, Alexander the Great remains one of the very few people in the human history to have the title “Great” appended to his name
Victor Frankl in his ground-breaking work, Man’s Search for Meaning, documented that between stimulus and response there is a tiny SPACE! That is the FREEDOM TO CHOOSE! Unlike birds in the air, the fish in the water, and the animals in the field, MAN IS THE ARCHITECT OF HIS DESTINY!
So stand up today and choose how you want your life to go. Nothing great is ever achieve standing still, so choose between greatness and mediocrity, choose between greatness and vanity, and between greatness and the enemy called average.
When we become great, our family will become great, when our families becomes great, our neighbourhood will become great, our local government will become great, our state will become great and our country will become great.
Aristotle taught us that the root of education, and therefore progress are bitter but the fruits thereof are sweet. Aristotle also reasoned that the leader also ought to stimulate people to virtue and urge them forward by the notion of the noble. A great leader ought to be a servant, a shepherd.
An old Indian proverb says, when you were born, you cried and the world rejoiced. Live your life in such a manner that when you die, the world cries and you rejoice.
While painting the Sistine Chapel in his late seventies and going blind as the paint was dripping into his eyes, family and friends alike urged Michelangelo to leave out the hidden corners, for as they said, no one would see them. Michelangelo retorted ‘God will see’.
So from today onwards, let us choose greatness in what ever we found our hand doing.
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