WHY IT IS IMPORTANT TO GIVE

“We make a living by what we get. We make a life by what we give.” Winston S Churchill

Giving to those in need benefits yourself as much or more than it benefits those to whom you give.Whether it is to beggars, that widow with 4 children in your church, to orphanages or to small non-profit organizations, giving is an integral part of living.

There are millions of people in the world who are worse of than we are. Many of these people have problems that are not their fault or that are beyond their ability to prevent or change. Humans are a social animal and the best way for us to advance is by helping those who are unable to help themselves.We have a responsibility to care for other people, to help those less fortunate than ourselves.When we have some spare cash, time, clothing materials, foods and other items, it is an opportunity to help out.

Here are 5 good reasons why we should give:

It Promotes Personal Satisfaction:

Giving to other people makes you feel good. The feeling of satisfaction you get when you help someone else is hard to replicate with any other type of activity or endeavor. People who give feel happier, are less anxious and suffer less depression than those who don’t. Giving can provide a healthy boost to your self-confidence, self-esteem, and life satisfaction. You are doing good for others and the community, which provides a natural sense of accomplishment. Your role as a giver can also give you a sense of pride and identity. And the better you feel about yourself, the more likely you are to have a positive view of your life and future goals.

It Promotes Good Health:  

Better health is enjoyed by those who donate their time, expertise or money to others who are in need. Giving has also been shown to lessen symptoms of chronic pain or heart disease. It is good for your health at any age, but it’s especially beneficial in older adults. Studies have found that those who give, especially those who volunteer have a lower mortality rate than those who do not

It Increases Prosperity:

There is this popular saying “The more you give, the more you receive”. Well, that is very true. A lot of people have testified that what they give out is often returned to them threefold, seven-fold, or even tenfold. This is backed by the words of God “There is one who scatters, and yet increases all the more, and there is one who withholds what is justly due, and yet it results only in want. The generous man will be prosperous, and he who waters will himself be watered”- Proverbs 11-24:25. “Give, and it will be given to you. They will pour into your lap a good measure, pressed down, shaken together, and running over. For by your standard of measure it will be measured to you in return”- Luke 6:38. When you give to others, your generosity is likely to be rewarded by others down the line—sometimes by the person you gave to, sometimes by someone else and ultimately, by God.

Giving is Contagious: 

I recall a time when I was chosen for a random giveaway online. I had arranged to meet with the giver after we had communicated anonymously online. When I saw this young lady, I was utterly shocked. I half expected a fully grown woman with a big car and a driver probably, but she alighted from a public bus and made her way towards me. The situation was very awkward for me because she was way younger than I was and was a student. Well, I was ashamed of myself for participating in the giveaway game as I really should have been a giver rather than a receiver. I was older than the young lady, I had a job and a car. What made the situation even worse was the fact that she took the pain to meet me at a convenient location I chose because I couldn't go too far from my office. Well, that experience changed something in me immediately. I resolved to be a giver rather than a receiver. If a girl who had so little could give, why couldn't I? When we give, we don’t only help the immediate recipient of our gift. We also spur a ripple effect of generosity through our community. Those of us who have spouses that have problems with buying gifts for their partners can attest to the fact that they eventually changed and began to reciprocate after we constantly bought gifts for them. Giving has such effects. It may help you build stronger social connections and even jump-start a cascade of generosity through your community.

It Promotes Social Connection: 

When we give to others, we don’t only make them feel closer to us; we also feel closer to them. Lyubomirsky wrote in her book The How of Happiness “Being kind and generous leads you to perceive others more positively and more charitably,” and this “fosters a heightened sense of interdependence and cooperation in your social community.” Those who witness our giving are reminded that we are all interdependent on one another for our care and well-being. That reminder can have a viral effect and motivate countless others to follow your example and this makes our community a better place to live.

LOW SELF ESTEEM- A SUCCESS KILLER

Being self confident is a struggle for most people. If you don’t believe in whom you are or in what you want, do you really believe in anything? Likewise, if you don’t believe you have the capacity to succeed, you surely would fail. 

For the sake of this article, Self esteem and Self confidence are quite interchangeable. In a simple sense, it is knowing your essence and self worth. It is knowing what you are good at, the value you add and acting in ways that portrays that. Self-esteem is the self-perceptions that people hold about their capabilities. If you have low self-esteem it means that you have negative ideas about your worth and value as a person. The difference between someone with a healthy or good self-esteem and someone who doesn't is simply acknowledgement of your strengths and weaknesses, and moving through the world safe in that knowledge. 

HOW TO IDENTIFY A PERSON WITH LOW-SELF ESTEEM 

Sometimes it can be hard to identify the causes of low self esteem, but the traits are often the same. Some of the traits include:

• ·         Being really critical of yourself
• ·         Focusing on your failures and ignoring your accomplishments
• ·         Comparing yourself to others·                     
• ·         Being scared to express yourself publicly 
• ·         Scared of failure
• ·         Not accepting compliments
• ·         Engaging in negative self-talk 
• ·         Being scared of failure

HOW DOES LOW-SELF ESTEEM AFFECT SUCCESS?

The big question, "How does self esteem affect success? Typically, the level of your self esteem helps foster the outcome you expect from decisions, events and activities around you. Confident individuals or people with high self esteem often anticipate successful outcomes while people with low-self esteem envisage failure. People who are confident in their social skills anticipate successful social encounters. Student confident in their academic skills expect goods scores on exams and expect the quality of their work to reap academic benefits. The opposite is true of those who lack confidence. People who doubt their social skills often envision rejection or ridicule even before they establish social contact. Students who lack confidence in their academic skills envision a low grade even before they begin an exam or enrol in a course. People that are less confident not only are more hesitant to tout their abilities and skills, but also may be less willing to contribute in a team environment at their various places of work, school and other social gathering.

Ultimately, your self esteem determines your attitude towards a particular cause. Students may well realise that strong academic skills are essential for obtaining a good academic score, and this, in turn, will prompt them to work harder. But if students lack confidence in their academic capabilities, they may well shy away from challenging courses, and may develop a lazy attitude towards their academics. They will most likely approach examinations with apprehension and self-doubt. In social interaction, people may realise that pleasing manners and physical attractiveness are essential for attracting the attention of others, which is the first step toward building long-lasting relationships. If, however, they have low confidence in their social skills and doubt their physical attractiveness, they may hesitate to make contact and hence miss potentially promising opportunities. 

WHY SHOULD I BOOST MY SELF ESTEEM?

One thing that prevented me from accomplishing my goals for a very long time was "fear". I was scared that I would fail and would be mocked. This prevented me from putting my best efforts into any thing I did as I constantly felt it would ultimately crash and I would be ridiculed. I would often hide in the background while others voiced their opinions. I would rather not take risks as I saw myself losing if I tried. I would even go out of my way to please people even if my needs suffered as I feared rejection. But I have come to learn that there is really no success without failure. In-fact, successful people fail more often than failures fail because failures don't take risks. I still have those fears, undoubtedly. But now I know that I can beat them, that I can break through that wall of fear and come out on the other side. I’ve done it many times over, and that success continues to fuel further success.

It’s something we all face, to some degree, I think. The question is "why should we overcome fear and build self esteem"? There are so many reasons why we should boost our self esteem and self confidence among which are: 

It helps us accept who we really are: Having low self esteem leads you to say or do what others might expect of you. As a result you put their needs before yours. You also put yourself in a low position just to have a confirmation from others. When you develop a healthy self esteem, you get to like yourself more, and your opinion of yourself goes up then you’ll stop trying so eagerly to get validation and attention from other people. And so you become less needy and your inner life becomes much less of an emotional turmoil based on what people may think or say about you. 

It helps to curb negative thoughts: When we think negatively about ourselves, we often project that feeling on to others in the form of insults and gossip. A healthy self esteem helps us feel positive about ourselves and about people around us. By looking for the best in us, you indirectly bring out the best in others. 

It helps us express our opinions better: It’s a general observation that many people are afraid to speak or ask questions in a group discussion or a public gathering. They are afraid that they might be judged for saying something stupid. A healthy self esteem helps us express ourselves without the fear of being rebuked. You'll become a better public speaker, more confident in your own thoughts, and respected by your peers. 

It fights the feelings of inferiority and insecurity: Sometimes, we experience various degrees of insecurities in life. It can be anything from weight gain, to friends at school, to your Boss at work. People and situations can make you feel inferior only if you let them. A healthy self esteem helps you manage your insecurities properly so they do not affect your perception of yourself. if you continue to loathe and belittle yourself, others are going to do and believe likewise. 

It helps us recognise and appreciate our Successes: Low self esteem makes us blind to the talents we have as well as to our achievements. God has blessed each one of us with some talent. The key to discovering yours is feeling good about yourself, only then can we focus on improving them. A healthy self esteem helps us to take pride in our talents and give ourselves credit for our successes.

WHAT CAN BE DONE ABOUT LOW-SELF ESTEEM? 

You may wonder if it is quite possible to change especially if you've been low in self-confidence from childhood. The good news is that you can gain back your self esteem. You can do this by taking control of your life, and taking control of your thoughts. By taking concrete actions that improve your competence, your self-image, you can increase that self-confidence, without the help of anyone else. Here are some tips to help you re-gain your self esteem:

Reflect on the trigger: If you are going to improve your self-esteem, it may also help to understand where exactly the feeling came from as well as the situations that trigger it. It could be work, school, friends, an abusive relationship/marriage, a sad childhood experience, excessive weight gain, physical deformity, a sexual assault or rape experience. Whatever it is, reflect on it, forgive yourself and the people involved, then let go. If you find it difficult to let go, you should seek help. It is always good to talk to a therapist at times like this. Until you confront your shadows, you just may never be able to hold your head up high.

Set realistic expectations for yourself: This will ultimately help you to stop the cycle of negative thinking about yourself that reinforce negative self-esteem. When we set realistic expectations in our life, we can stop berating ourselves for not meeting some idealistic goal. You should recognise that things don't always go the way we plan, but sometimes our plans are unrealistic. If you set realistic goals for yourself and work towards achieving them, you will feel satisfied and proud of yourself when you achieve your goal, and feel more positive about yourself as a result. For example, if you are struggling with being overweight, rather than decide not to eat completely, knowing so well that you love foods so much,  you can start by cutting the quantity you consume per serving then stuffing your refrigerator with healthy snacks like bananas to munch on whenever you feel hungry. Set a goal you know you can achieve, and then achieve it. You’ll feel good about that. Now set another small goal and achieve that. The more you achieve small goals, the better you’ll be at it, and the better you’ll feel. Soon you’ll be setting bigger (but still achievable) goals and achieving those too. 

Accept the fact that no one is perfect-including you: It’s really great if you want to do things well, but keep in mind that perfection isn't possible. Every human being on earth makes mistakes – it’s in our basic human nature. Why should you be any different? When you stuff up, don’t stress, just learn from it and move on. There’s no point wasting all your energy thinking about things that you can’t change. Why don’t you rather think about some of the things that are in your power to control and see what you can do about those? 

Identify your God-given talent and Shine: Sometimes when we’re down on ourselves and our self-esteem has taken a big hit, we feel like we have nothing to offer the world or others. It may be that we simply haven’t found everything that we do have to offer. Every one of us have something we are good at. This thing comes naturally to us. It could be singing, writing, public speaking, cooking and lots more. Whatever your talent is, you should focus on it, groom it and shine with it. Rather than envy that friend of yours that seems to be liked by everyone because she is cheerful, you can develop your cooking skills and be liked by all who eat your meal. 

Take good care of yourself: My favourite slogan is "looking good is good business". Appearance is key in human interaction. When you look good, you feel good and people would interact with you better. There are a lot of simple habits you can imbibe to look good. Looking after your physical health can help you feel happier and healthier, and improve your self-image. This involves, exercise, relaxation, eating right and getting enough sleep. Also, dressing nicely, adopting suitable sitting, standing and walking postures as well as caring for your skin, hair and nails help you look great. 

Surround yourself with positive people: Avoid people who bring you down or constantly hurt your feelings. Find a group of people who make you feel good about yourself and avoid those who tend to trigger your negative thinking. Avoid people who make you present a 'fake' version of yourself in order to get their assertion. Such people only make you to put yourself in a low position and put their needs before yours. This is toxic to your self esteem.

THE SECRET BEHIND FAILED MARRIAGES IN NIGERIA

                                                 
Marriage is an institution ordained by God. It is a sacrificial commitment between both parties involved, in which both leave their former lives and come together to become one in a new life. It is very saddening to note that the very people smiling and overexcited about their marriage some years ago, can not now stand the very presence of each other.

In Nigeria, the rate is on the increase, but because of our culture where we strongly do not believe in divorce to a large extent, and how patient our women/men can be towards their marriage, our divorce rates are low compared to the other countries in the world, but this tends to be on an alarming increase as the years roll by.

Now let us examine the Causes of Marriage/Relationship Failures in Nigeria.

LACK OF TRUST

Trust is essential in a marriage or romantic relationship.

It is impossible to have a close, intimate relationship when people do not trust their partners. Trust involves knowing that a partner has your best interest at heart. It is hard to feel safe and secure when you are involved with someone who would betray your trust
This is the number one reason why marriages fail. What causes lack of trust is the inability of couples to be HOT. Not that kind of hotness o. lol... Honest, Open and Truthful (HOT). The foundation of a successful marriage is trust. Broken trust in marriages lead to depression, anxiety and insecurity. The marriage can suffer from a lack of intimacy. A lack of trust in a relationship opens the door to a host of other problems which, if left unresolved, may destroy whatever is left. As soon as trust is broken, the marriage is doomed.
That moment when a couple exchange their wedding vows on the altar, they actually trade their exclusivity to one another, they both give up their freedom, time, love etc. to their spouse. But it is saddening that a lot of young couples take their vows without really understanding the implications. Lack of trust always destroy marriages, and gives room for resentment, anger, jealousy etc. because the very foundation of marriage depends on it.


LACK OF COMMUNICATION

Communication is the glue that holds marriages together.
Effective communication promotes a sense of trust at its core. Conveying words, facial expressions and hand gestures ineffectively can destroy relationships. Leaving out details in your communication, forgetting to communicate important information and not listening actively prevents you from being able to properly communicate in a way that is essential for sustaining a relationship.
Regardless of what causes communication breakdowns in a marriage, they can cause rifts between partners that are hard to fix. Poor communication can create a sense of dissatisfaction, confusion, restlessness and fear between partners. It can also lead both partners to wonder if the other person is being faithful or whether he might have found someone else. Failing to communicate on a regular basis at the very least can cause people in a committed relationship to feel less connected to one another. It is not as important for married people to always agree with one another as it is for each partner to express himself clearly and try his best to listen deeply to, and understand, the other person.
Remember the song, 'you say it best when you say nothing at all'? Well, it does not work all the time. Communication in relationships is important if you want your loved ones to be with you all your life, and for this to happen it is important to express your feelings to them and let them know exactly how you feel.
A marriage with a lack of communication can be a source of great unhappiness. Without communication, it’s almost impossible for two people to maintain a loving relationship through all the years of marriage.


BAGGAGE FROM THE PAST

People often make the mistake of bringing in excess baggage from their past relationships into their marriage. They may have previously been hurt by a bad relationship and tend to allow it to affect their marriages, by judging their spouses based on past experiences.
Sometimes spouses are still hooked to their past relationships, they find themselves comparing their past relationships to their marriages and setting expectations, which puts their marriage under pressure and risk of failure, because the marriage is probably not meeting up to the set standard.
There are scenarios whereby a young married man may have had a previous girlfriend who was great in bed, but decided against getting married to her because of her manners, tribe or other factors. He finally marries a humble, gentle and '

good' woman who meets the description of a wife material in his opinion, only to realize that she is not good in bed compared to the ex girlfriend. Subsequently, such a man would take out his frustration from the bad sex on the poor woman and would compare her to his ex and wish she was as good.
What we need to understand understand is that people are different in many ways, what your spouse has, your former girlfriend may not have 10% of it, but just because she is lacking in one aspect your former girlfriend seems to be a professional is no justification to compare both persons, we ought to avoid unhealthy comparisons in our marriages and learn to appreciate our spouse as it diminishes their self esteem and eventually wrecks the marriage.

PRIDE AND EGO

All of us have an ego. And we choose to accept criticism when our egos feel small. On the other hand, we retaliate even if we’re wrong when our egos grow bigger than our head.
A good marriage involves two people who drop all their egos for each other. People who have difficulty genuinely accepting a mistake or asking for forgiveness usually make bad partners. Not because they’re perfectionists, but because they don’t like accepting defeat or compromising for anyone else.

To be able to truly love yourself and to truly be able to love someone else, you must drop the ego. This is absolutely essential to finding an amazing relationship, but it’s equally critical to maintaining and continually improving a relationship or a marriage once you’re already in it.
Nothing will kill a relationship (even the best of relationships) more quickly than ego.
Let’s say your significant other is frustrated with you in one way or another and really needs to express something about that to you. How do you respond? If you let your ego get involved and you defend yourself, it means that you’re not listening to them.
Now, I know that in a perfect world, we would never be ego-driven. This is not a perfect world of course, so let’s get real. We are all ego-driven to some extent or another, so let’s acknowledge it and embrace that we need to separate the ego to cultivate and maintain a truly amazing relationship with someone.

LACK OF INTIMACY

God designed marriage to be the most intimate of all human relationships.
For a marriage to work, a certain level of bonding between the spouses is necessary. A couple needs time to communicate, to spend some quality time together and to have time to keep up to date on each other’s lives and accomplishments. Keeping in touch with each other helps to strengthen the bond between them and keep their marriage going. Couples who start to focus more on their own lives and start leaving their spouse in the dark often leads to a breakdown of the bond between the couple. This is where one or both of the spouses can feel neglected and ignored by the other, which in many cases has led to extramarital affairs and/or the breakdown of the marriage.

But that is not all. A good marriage is best friends with passion. Without the passion, you just have a friendship. For some, being companions is sufficient. But for most, it is not. Most marriages will slowly wither and die without physical and emotional intimacy.
You cannot create a physical intimacy without the emotional intimacy, nor can you have complete emotional intimacy without the physical aspect as well. This is where many couples find their marriages in trouble.
One of the major casualties of the harried pace of modern marriage is the loss of sexual intimacy. It is too steep a price to pay.
Human beings require intimacy. This is why simple physical affections- such as hand-holding, cuddling, hugs and kisses are important to your marriage. These simple actions let you and your partner know that you're there for one another, that you matter to the other.

If you know you can give your partner a "look" from across the room, and that he or she will return that special wink or smile, then you've developed an intimacy in your marriage.

Your marriage cannot survive without intimacy, because intimacy is the foundation of any relationship. Perhaps that's not quite accurate, intimacy is what helps love to survive through the toughest of times, and makes us continue to want to love and be loved by our partners.




THIRD PARTY INTERFERENCE

Marriage is a union between a man and his wife and not a man, his wife and the entire extended family or friends. Of course these people are necessary in ones life but they should have their limits when it comes to family matter in other for peace to reign.
Let us face it, if a country has more than one president in a country, the country will not move forward because each one of them will have different opinions about how the country should be run. In the same way if you allow third parties to interfere in your marriage, it will never be successful because people will always have different opinions on how your marriage should be.

In this part of the world, we run to our pastors, or in laws or bosses, or just any person to settle the dispute in our marriages at the slightest provocation. It isn't entirely a bad idea to seek counsel from elders or therapists when needed but this practice should be reduced to the barest minimum and never be encouraged.