FINDING MY PURPOSE

I recall how mad I was when at the age of ten my dad withdrew me from Primary Six to start Secondary School education. I was in line to being appointed as the head boy of my primary school and leaving such plum leadership position to gain a one-year advantage in attending secondary school made absolutely no sense to me at that age. Again I faced a similar quandary at the age of eighteen when I was offered admission to study at the University of Ibadan just at the same time as I was being considered for a position of a Cadet Inspector in the NSO. In those days the salary on offer as a Cadet Inspector in the NSO was far above what a University graduate earned. By providence, a friend of mine who was already a student at the same university explained to me the need to forgo the immediate benefits of a bumper pay for the future benefits of an early university education. These two moments probably altered the course of my life.

As an adolescent I had no idea of ‘purpose’. I was content with immediate benefits rather than long-term goals. As I grew older into my late teens I had cause to read my first set of motivational books starting from Norman Vincent Pearls’ The power of Positive Thinking, to other best sellers like Tony Robbins’ Awakening the Giant Within and my all time favorite, Tsun Tzu’s The Art of War.  My attention was first drawn to the issue of ‘Purpose’ upon reading Abraham Maslow’s ‘hierarchy of needs’ in the course of a Psychology class but I was too young to grasp its meaning. As a student at Manchester business school, I was greatly influenced by Phlip E. Baylis who taught Project management. Baylis made the idea of Purpose a central theme in his teachings. Through him I learnt that life itself is a project and that it was better managed with a Purpose in mind. Purpose is like a destination, how can one embark on a journey without knowing the destination. In the words of Gautama Buddha, ‘Your purpose in life is to find your purpose and give your whole heart and soul to it’.

As I live through middle age, the word Purpose keeps reverberating in my sub-conscious. Is it enough for me to be a success unto myself and my immediate family or community? Are there ways in which I can contribute to making my society a better place? For what purpose was I created by God? As I pondered over these questions, I realized that I might not be able to provide all the answers except by divine intervention.

But as I continue to search I found peace upon the realization that I need to  put my wealth of experiences at the disposal of other people so that together with like minded associates we can empower others towards finding their purpose and helping them to 'achieving the best possible outcome in their life's journey'.

This website is the beginning of a journey. My immediate goal is to start a discourse on leadership so that we can encourage educated and enlightened people to get involved in partisan politics and aspire for leadership. We hope to provide a platform for us to begin to question our leaders about their vision, leadership styles and direction of governance. We hope as well to empower our people to begin to call our political leaders to account for their stewardship rather than celebrating them for mediocrity. We will explore the values of entrepreneurship so that we can empower younger people to become wealth generators and bring prosperity to our people. It is our desire too to inspire the youths to think deeply so they can identify their life purposes early and encourage them to draw maps that would lead from the present to the destination.

To guide our discussion, we will introduce a new subject at the beginning of every month, and through a guest writer set a tone for discussion. All stakeholders are free to make input, but we will moderate against discussions that go outside our brief or the use of non neutral words. Our goals are very clear and we will not deviate from it.

I welcome you to adeadeogun.com and pray that you find the object of your mission as you explore our pages. I wish to encourage you with the words of Amit Ray ‘It does not matter how long you are spending on the earth, how much money you have gathered or how much attention you have received. It is the amount of positive vibration you have radiated in life that matters’.

May you find the right map to guide you through your Journey.