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AKPOVETA, Valentine ‘t
1
All rights reserved. Except as permitted by the author, no part of this work may be reproduced or stored in a database or an information retrieval system (other than for purposes of review) without the express permission of the publisher in writing. Copyright © 2012 Akpoveta Valentine ‘t For more information, please contact +(234)703 237 5200 akpovetavt@gmail.com val_akpoveta@yahoo.ca TERMS OF USE This is a copyrighted work and Connectus Consulting™ and its licensors reserve all rights in and to the work. Use of this work is subject to these terms. Except as permitted under the Copyright Act of 1976 and the right to store and retrieve one copy of the work, you may not decompile, disassemble, reverse engineer, reproduce, modify, create derivative works based upon, transmit, distribute, disseminate, sell, publish or sublicense the work or any part of it without Connectus Consulting™’s consent. You may use the work for your own noncommercial and personal use; any other use of the work is strictly prohibited. Your right to use the work may be terminated if you fail to comply with these terms.
AKPOVETA, Valentine ‘t
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Contents
Lesson # 1: Anointing and Poverty Are Not
Mutually Exclusive
Lesson # 2: What Do You Have?
Lesson # 3: Ask Your Neighbour
Lesson # 4: Shut the Door
Lesson # 5: Then the Oil Ceased
Lesson # 6: The Prophet Didn’t Do It
Lesson # 7: Pay Your Debts and Live On the Rest
AKPOVETA, Valentine ‘t
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7 LESSONS A PROPHET’S WIDOW TAUGHT ME
The wife of a man from the company of prophets cried out to
Elisha, “Your servant my husband is dead, and you know that
he revered the Lord. But now his creditor is coming to take my
two boys as slaves.” Elisha replied to her, “How can I help you?
Tell me, what do you have in your house?” “Your servant has
nothing there at all,” she said, “except a little oil.” Elisha said,
“Go around and ask all your neighbours for empty jars. Don’t
ask for just a few. Then go inside and shut the door behind you
and your sons. Pour oil into all the jars, and as each is filled,
put it to one side.” She left him and afterward shut the door
behind her and her sons. They brought the jars before her and
she kept pouring. When all the jars were full, she said to her
son, “Bring me another one.” But he replied, “There is not a jar
left.” Then the oil stopped flowing. She went and told the man
of God and he said, “Go and sell the oil and pay your debts. You
and your sons can live on what is left.”
2 Kings 4:1-7 (NIV)
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LESSON # 1: ANOINTING AND POVERTY ARE NOT
MUTUALLY EXCLUSIVE The wife of a man from the company of prophets cried out to
Elisha, “Your servant my husband is dead, and you know that
he revered the Lord. But now his creditor is coming to take my
two boys as slaves.”
It is very possible to be soaked in the anointing and still
enjoy the showers of poverty. Christianity is NOT a passport
out of indigence.
I want to state something quite controversial here before I go
on with the Lesson # 1. Some mischievous Christians with
less than honourable intentions seem to have gotten a notion
into their heads that God exists for their pleasure, and that
the relationship between God and man is conditional based
on man’s terms- enjoyment, pleasure, wealth, health,
hedonism. They have spread the gospel of “Poverty is a sin”.
Now, if lying is a sin, then a perpetual liar is a sinner. It then
follows that if poverty is a sin, then poor people are sinners.
By extension, James 2:5 will mean “Listen, my beloved
brothers, has not God chosen the SINNERS (poor) of this world
rich in faith and heirs of the kingdom which He has promised
to those who love Him?” I don’t care who said poverty is a sin.
It’s a lie. You can be Holy and Hungry.
Wealth obeys the certain PRINCIPLES. You may be
Tongue-Speaking, Demon-Binding, Spiral-Binding,
Mountain-Going, Valley-Confident, Prayer-Warrior and
[yet be] Poverty-Stricken. Not to worry. You will still
AKPOVETA, Valentine ‘t
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inherit the Kingdom of God. Wealth does not answer to
positive confession alone.
Now, let me give a final balanced view and move on to the
next lesson.
Though, being a Christian doesn’t automatically guarantee
you riches, being a Christian and practicing the principles
of wealth puts you at a distinct advantage. If you were
poor and someone has told you that giving your life to Christ
will give you an automatic jackpot or bonanza, you are in for
a rude shocker. And you will be poor. You will be very poor.
You will inherit the Kingdom of God. But you will be poor in
the kingdom of earth.
Pour all the fertilizer in the world on your farm then go home
and pray over your seeds lying safely and snugly on the
concrete floor of your bedroom. When the time of harvest
comes, your hunger will inform you of the gross folly of your
actions- or the lack of it.
I am a Christian. I practice the principles wealth. I don’t
intend to be wealthy because of the fact that I’m a Christian.
I intend to be wealthy in spite of the fact that I’m a Christian.
If I were an atheist, I would still practice the principles of
wealth.
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LESSON # 2: WHAT DO YOU HAVE? “Your servant has nothing there at all,” she said, “except a little
oil.”
Without fail, every single living man has something great in
them- even if they don’t know it or they see it as nothing. The
fact that some don’t have what they want in life is not that
they don’t have what it takes to get it but that they don’t
know what they have.
But there is a second stage- better, but sad all the same.
Some people have discovered what they carry but have no
idea what to do with it.
Ignorance is not always bliss. If someone tells you “What you
don’t know can’t kill you”, tell him his life is in grave danger.
And I mean that quite literally- GRAVE Danger.
I was about six months and careened of our high, front porch
while ‘driving’ recklessly my walker. I didn’t know about
gravity. I hadn’t heard the word before. It was strange to me.
Yet when I got to the edge, my walker refused to float in the
air because “what I don’t know can’t affect me.” One minute I
was in my walker laughing merrily, the next minute I was
under my walker bawling miserably. Gravity had done its
work.
What you don’t know can kill you. It can maim you and
render you useless. It can relegate you to a life of regrets,
bitterness and capsized walkers.
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The prophet’s wife said she had “nothing”. Then she added,
“But a jar of oil.” Most people stop at the “nothing”- “I have
nothing”. Sad. I don’t know what the prophet’s reply if she
had stopped at ‘I have nothing’. And if I were the prophet, I
would be tempted to reply her with, “And so you shall have
nothing!”
If you concentrate on all the ‘nothings’ you have in life and
ignore the ‘jar of oil’, it is highly unlikely you will ever get
what you seek.
You have some of the most essential things you’ll ever
require to succeed in life lying in you. Whether you know it
or not is another kettle of fish. Do you know what you carry?
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LESSON # 3: ASK YOUR NEIGHBOUR “Go around and ask all your neighbours for empty jars. Don’t
ask for just a few.”
In Lesson # 2 I said you have some of the most essential
things you’d ever require to succeed in life lying in you. If
someone tells you “You have all you’ll ever need in life in
you” please kindly throw that untruth out the window. If you
had everything you need to succeed in life in you, it is highly
improbable that you would either need or value
relationships. Our very own ecosystem teaches us that
INTERDEPENDENCE, not INDEPENDENCE, is the zenith in
relationships. You need people. There is nothing like a self-
made man. At the very least, he was made by the coming
together of his parents.
Now, let’s imagine that this widow was
1) a terrible vixen with a horrible temper who alienated her
neighbours because of her ugly attitude, or
2) she was proud or
3) she made it a point of duty to ‘borrow’ things and never
return or just spoilt whatever she took from her neighbours.
In the first case, no one would even give her a spoon, not to
talk of a vessel because no one likes her. In the second case,
shame would not allow her go and ask for help. (ehn, so it’s
now that you’re greeting me because you want my help? I
don’t have vessel). In the third case, though they might like
her, history has taught them that the woman is a black hole-
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if you never wanted to see your property again, just give it to
her. Always taking, never giving back. In any of the three
scenarios, she would have been seriously short-changed. She
didn’t have money to pay creditors; she would definitely
have had no money to buy vessels.
This widow did not know she would be needing their vessels
in future. Someone said, you judge the worth of a real man by
how he treats people who can do nothing for him. Let me put
it in a slightly better way. You judge the true worth of a real
man by how he treats people who it seems can do nothing
for him.
Another thing to learn is forming strong networks. No, not
forming friendships based on what YOU have to gain but on
what you all have to contribute. I don’t believe in “Associate
only with people better than you” (I’ve proven before that this
is a defective statement. A is better than B. B is better than C.
C wants the friendship of B, but B refuses- she is better than
C. B wants the friendship of A, but A refuses- he is better than
B. in the end, we have sad, dissatisfied people obeying the
Law of Frustration., looking for what was never lost and
what they’ll never find). This is not to say you form
friendships with every Adamu, Bayo and Chidi especially if
they’re horrible influences in your life. This is quite the
contrary. It is forming friendships based on Mutual
Contribution to both Individual and Collective
Destinations.
There are certain vital resources you need in life which you’ll
only find in other people. They don’t write it on their
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foreheads. And sometimes, they don’t even know it
themselves. You will perform far better, travel much further
and farther, and travel immensely faster in life if you value
your relationships.
Let me round up with one last example. It was originally
given by a friend, Oluwatimilehin Aiyekitan. What if, fifteen
years ago to the date I wrote this, you were just casual
friends with Goodluck Jonathan and it was revealed to you
exclusively that he was going to be President about thirteen
years later, how would you treat him?
I asked someone and his reply had me rolling in laughter. He
said, “I will call him several times a day. Even if he never
returns my calls. I will buy things for him- all sorts of things.
Then I will call him to remind him that I bought those things
for him. I would call him to ask if he has eaten, and call again
to ask if he has gone to the toilet. I will ask him if he likes
cassava bread and maybe yam flour bread. I will organize free
English Language lectures for the ‘umblerra’ Dame and her
‘fellow widows’.” (I thought it was quite funny and that he
really didn’t mean half of what he said. But you never know!
People can be quite funny and you never can tell what they
would do to secure their future!)
The truth is that you can not really tell the future of anyone
with accuracy regardless of present condition. People
change. Times change. Time changes. Situations change.
There are too many examples of failed prophecies this world
has to offer concerning people’s futures. Miss Phillips, You
Were Wrong is Peter J. Daniels, book and his reply to his
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former teacher, Miss Phillips. Miss Phillips had observed him
and his phenomenal rate at which he failed and had said he
would never amount to anything in life. He kept on failing in
school. Ultimately, he went on to even fail his former
teacher’s prophecy. He amounted to something. Something
very, very big globally- a wealthy business man, an
international award-winning public speaker and best-selling
author. His life brings inspiration to many on a daily basis.
His former teacher? I don’t know what became of her.
Frankly, I don’t even care.
Now, let me say something very important here. Some
people lose out on great friendships as a result of mistakes
and then go ahead to make foolish statements like “Afterall, I
didn’t know you before and I did not die. So if you leave, I will
not die.” While it may be true that they may not die, it is also
true that they might never find out what they have missed.
Sometimes, these friends might have been the missing key to
something important in their lives- but they never found out.
It’s like this, Mr. A has sent Mr. B packing from his life as a
result of an argument that could have been resolved if only
he killed his pride. Now, at the very moment he is watching a
great football match, there is an opportunity somewhere
waiting for the right person. Mr. B is to pick someone foe the
opportunity. He remembers Mr. A but pushes the thought
from his head and looks for someone else. Like I said, at that
moment, Mr. A is watching a football match and probably his
team is winning. He is busy rejoicing while a great
opportunity for him has been given to someone else. But he
never knew. And he’s happy. Rejoicing in his foolishness. And
AKPOVETA, Valentine ‘t
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then later on, he begins to wonder where all the
opportunities have gone to…
You don’t know for sure what everyone you meet in life has
to contribute. For that reason, you must treat everyone fair
and square.
AKPOVETA, Valentine ‘t
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LESSON # 4: SHUT THE DOOR “Then go inside and shut the door behind you and your sons.”
There are some very important decisions you will take in life.
These decisions could be the single most important choices
which would not only define but also redefine your whole
life and existence. I said something six years ago about these
kinds of decisions, “It’s not a general decision, it’s a General’s
decision.” The question of purpose and, at any rate, the most
critical answers you seek in life are usually not general
decisions or popular ones. Truth is, a wise man would take
advice from several trusted people and, almost always, the
replies are bound to be different (if every single person you
ask tells you the very same thing, please evaluate your
friends). A true leader weighs these differing options for
their merits. He knows that he’s going to live with the
consequences of his decisions. So he takes all the proffered
options, goes to a quiet place and shuts the door against all
distractions and noise.
However, leaders, and generally effective people do not
employ this method only during such critical life decisions.
They do it often. ‘Shutting the door’ is a synonym for ‘Focus’.
You have the power to choose what your focus will be. Focus
means essentially shutting out some things. In essence, it
also means giving up some things. You concentrate on one
thing and give up some others. The hunter who chases two
rabbits goes home with no rabbit. You’ve got to be able to
give up some things to be able to gain some better things.
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Give up what you have for what you want, what you possess
for what you value. Trading the actual for the potential.
There are too many ‘opportunities’ for distraction in the
present day world. They ultimately translate to
‘opportunities’ for destruction. Excess time spent with
friends just talking inanities, excess time spent in front of the
television or watching movies on our systems, excess time
spent reading what does not add any measurable or lasting
value to our lives, excess time spent sleeping or just killing
time (people who make it a habit to kill time are perfecting the
art of murdering their future), excess time spent on 2go,
excess time spent online, excess time spent ‘getting
prepared’ (does this surprise you? Many people say they are
‘getting prepared’ when they are actually delaying, afraid to
venture forth), consistently pursuing the wrong
‘opportunities’ because we can’t tell the difference… all these
are just distractions. We have got to focus our energies on
what gives the maximum returns on our time investments in
them. The sun rays, as powerful as they are, will not burn a
piece of paper from this distance from now till eternity. But
use a magnifying glass to focus the sun’s rays on that piece of
paper and in no time, it will be up in flames. Focus!
I suspect you want to be more effective in life. Learn to
occasionally shut the door. Focus.
AKPOVETA, Valentine ‘t
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LESSON # 5: THEN THE OIL CEASED But he replied, “There is not a jar left.” Then the oil stopped
flowing.
Every single vessel was filled to the brim. When every vessel
had been filled, afterwards, the oil stopped flowing. NOT
before. If it had continued pouring, it would only have
wasted. God detests waste. Nature abhors waste. I wrote a
piece about capacity once. Oftentimes, people make the
mistake of asking for more than they have the capacity to
hold. They would probably never get it. A teacup approaches
the ocean and asks that the ocean gives it what the tank has.
The teacup would not get more than a teacupful. It can fast
and pray. It will not get a tankful until it has a tank’s capacity.
Listen, the oil did not stop flowing because ‘a time to stop’
has come. No. It stopped flowing because the last jar had
been filled, because the woman had reached her capacity.
If she had just two jars, the oil would stop flowing
immediately after the second and last jar has been filled. If
she had ten thousand jars, the oil would keep flowing and
then stop immediately after the ten thousandth and last
vessel has been filled.
Let’s take this a step further. If after the oil stopped flowing,
she rushed out to get two million vessels, came back, and
attempted to continue pouring, only one of the new vessels
would be filled- with the contents of the pouring jar. That
would be it.
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You see, when some people are experiencing draught or
cessation, it could be for any number of reasons, one of
which could be they have reached full capacity. Full Stop.
You have no right to receive what you have not built the
capacity to handle.
There are those who specialize in getting jars after the oil has
ceased. They wait. And wait. And wait some more. And then
they conclude that that perhaps their time has not come
and that God’s time is the best, when actually, their time
has come and gone. There is a cessation because full
capacity has been reached. No matter how long the wait is,
no oil would flow.
Thankfully, however, opportunity comes more than once.
The best time to get prepared is NOT before the oil
CEASES. The best is before the oil STARTS flowing- and
definitely not after the oil ceases.
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LESSON # 6: THE PROPHET DIDN’T DO IT The prophet gave the woman direction on what to do. It
doesn’t always happen like that and, sincerely, I don’t know
why it happened like that. I only know that this time, the
prophet didn’t do it for her. That is instructive. Sometimes,
you need help by way of direct intervention of someone who
has gone ahead. At other times, the best help they can give
you is showing you what to do.
It’s much like the difference between giving a person fish and
teaching them how to fish.
If there’s someone who you always run to every single time
you run into a fix, and the person always, without fail, helps
you out- maybe bails you out financially everytime, prays
and fasts on your behalf, carries you under their arm and
takes you everywhere, thinks on your behalf, makes
decisions for you or anything of the sort- what they are doing
in earnest is harming you. In the short term, it might look
like they are helping you. In the long term, however, they are
actually harming you. How? Simple, really. You are being
formed, slowly but surely, into a perpetual dependent, little
better than invalids. They are unwittingly forging you into a
state of existence of learned helplessness. What happens
when they are gone? You look for someone else to leech unto
and become a parasite or you are decreased to a helpless,
directionless mess. Believe me when I say they are NOT
helping you because they won’t be here forever.
Value the people in your life who show you what needs to be
done and ‘helps’ you only so far. Value the critics who point
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out your faults but don’t do anything to help. Value the
‘enemies’ who consistently seek your weakness. From them
you can learn an enormous lot. In their unkind words, you
might just find kind truths subtly hidden. Value people who
unfailingly stretch you, stretch your thinking ability, and give
you tasks that seem greater than your power, value
circumstances that test your capacity greatly, value
adversity. From them you can find hidden strengths you
never knew existed and which you’d never have discovered
any other way.
AKPOVETA, Valentine ‘t
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LESSON # 7: PAY YOUR DEBT AND LIVE ON THE
REST “Go and sell the oil and pay your debts. You and your sons can
live on what is left.”
This last lesson is an important principle in Money
Management and Wealth Creation.
I’m going to address this from the perspective that everyone
of us owes debts. I will, in little detail, explain this concept
here.
We all owe debts to whoever has to offer what we need. Let
me make this clearer to understand. No one eats money in
the paper form- at least not anyone I know or anyone in full
control of their senses. So, when we earn money, it isn’t an
end to itself. It is a means to acquiring some other things.
You must eat. If you’re not a subsistence farmer, then you
owe a part of your income to farmers, food vendors and
people in the chain of production of the food you consume.
You will give them that part in exchange for food.
You must wear clothes. If you’re not a textile manufacturer,
don’t live in a nudist camp or favour a dress made of a
patchwork of leaves and raw animal skins, a part of your
income must be paid to those who produce the clothes you
wear.
You need shelter. If you don’t particularly favour living under
bridges or laying your head anywhere darkness meets you,
AKPOVETA, Valentine ‘t
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then a part of your income must go to owners and/or
managers of whatever patch of real estate on which you live.
Now, you pretty much understand what I mean when I say
we all owe debts.
Now, I classify the debts we owe under two broad
categories- Essential Debts and Elective Debts.
Basically, every product or service we purchase fall into
either of these categories. Some people, however, get the
whole concept of what is essential and what is elective, they
mix up and confuse both categories. The result is, almost
always, predictable. They run into a financial quagmire. But
I’m already delving too deep. Let me address just one
category. Essential Debts.
At the very peak of our Essential Debts is the Debt we owe to
our Future. That is the debt we must always pay FIRST. It’s
called saving and investing. In George Clason’s The Richest
Man In Babylon, Arkad (who is the richest man in Babylon)
explains something very profound- A PART OF ALL I EARN IS
MINE TO KEEP.
KEEP means I’m not paying that part to anyone but ME. I
hope you understand this sufficiently.
The injunction was to first pay all the debts and then live on
the rest. For some, it’s quite the opposite. They live on the
best part of their income and then think about paying their
essential debts.
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If you consistently live above your income, you’re living on
the best. If you regularly go binge-shopping or suffer from
impulse-purchase (always buying what you never budgeted
for), you’re living on the best. If you’re in the habit of buying
what you don’t need, with money you don’t have, to impress
people who don’t really care, you’re living on the best. If you
earn an income and have never thought to possess assets
that can be profitably liquidated on short notice and that
consistently appreciates in fiscal value, you’re living on the
best.
Even someone like Donald Trump, who, in my opinion,
spends shockingly and lavishly doesn’t live on his best. He is
one of the most aggressive real estate dealers in the United
States. If he spends that lavishly, it’s because he can both
afford and sustain it.
Look at the two diagrams below.
AKPOVETA, Valentine ‘t
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This is a very simplified diagram of the Income Reservoir.
We might have noticed that the Financial Equilibrium
Position (FEP) is always beneath the tap.
Figure A is typical of the perpetually poor. The tap of their
outgoings is usually at the very bottom of their Income
Reservoir. They never have any reserve and their FEP is
never either high or substantial. These are the people who
live on their best. To add to that, in a more detailed diagram,
we would see that any tap located beneath a mark called the
Financial Safe Point is bound to ride lower and lower. The
end result is that their FEP converges at Rock Bottom. This
type of income is not exclusive to Low Income Earners. High
Income Earners with unsound financial knowledge also
suffer this too.
Figure B is typical of the wealthy. The tap of their outgoings
is located above the Safe Point, at the top of their Income
Reservoir. From this simplified diagram, we see that only the
excess above the FEP ever goes out. In the more detailed
diagram, we would notice that the tank has another tap (not
shown here). That tap is exclusive to investments and that
tap is always beneath the Safe Point for the wealthy. That tap
always feeds back into their Income Reservoir. The end
result is their FEP rises higher and higher.
Now, I will quickly define both terms Spending and
Investing. They both implicitly mean exchanging something
owned or presently possessed for something desired.
AKPOVETA, Valentine ‘t
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Whereas, in the case of SPENDING, the primary focus is for
present, momentary benefit, in the case of INVESTING, the
primary focus is on future gain and residual benefit.
Poor people who make a habit of living on their best are in
the habit of spending the better part of their income and
resources.
Wealthy people who make it a habit to live on the rest are
dedicated to investing the better part of their income and
resources.
On which side of the divide are you? On which side of the
split would you rather be?
Pay your debt and live on the rest.
AKPOVETA, Valentine ‘t
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RUN THROUGH Let us do a run-through of everything we have learnt here.
Get a piece of paper and honestly answer the questions
below. If there are any answers you would love to share with
me, please do not hesitate to mail them to me. In addition, if
any questions arise, I’d be happy to hear and help solve
them.
1. Without looking back at the pages of this e-book, list
the 7 lessons you have learnt from the story of the
prophet’s widow?
2. How does Lesson 1 change your approach to
Christianity? How does it affect your understanding of
the rules of wealth?
3. Can you answer the question of Lesson 2 confidently?
List your answers. How can they bring you Financial
Value?
4. Write the things you would have to consciously
change in your life as it concerns your relationships
as a result of Lesson 3.
5. Can you enumerate ways in which you have not been
observing Lesson 4? Explain how you plan to change
that.
6. Can you remember any incident in your life that
Lesson 5 reminds you of? Things that you lost
because you hadn’t built the ability to manage them?
how can you change that in your life?
7. What does Lesson 6 teach you on finding true
strengths and placing a value on tough times?
AKPOVETA, Valentine ‘t
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8. Has Lesson 7 taught you anything new? What are
they? Explain explicitly how you wish to apply the
lessons learnt here in your life.
Has this e-book helped you in anyway? Are there ways you
would wish an improvement? I value your feedback in order to
serve you better.
+(237)703 237 5200
akpovetavt@gmail.com
val_akpoveta@yahoo.ca
AKPOVETA, Valentine ‘t
26
AKPOVETA, Valentine ‘t is an Author, Effectiveness Coach, Public
Speaker and Infopreneur. He is President of the green project and
CED, Connectus Consulting. Touted as one of Africa’s foremost
Revolutionary Thinkers, and with several years of service in
Leadership Capacities in a number of organizations, he is a regular
contributor to numerous Web and Print Media. His pastimes
include Critical Thinking, Reading, Group Discussions and Writing.
You may connect with him on facebook
www.facebook.com/ofVALOUR, follow him on twitter
@akpovetavt and visit his blog
www.touchedbyapen.wordpress.com.
To book him for Speaking or Training engagements,
Place a call, +(234)703 237 5200
Or mail,
akpovetavt@gmail.com
val_akpoveta@yahoo.ca
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