by
ESV. Patrick Ogungbola
MD/ CEO, BLUEHEDGE REALTORS
We welcome you to the blissful month of November 2016. Over time, I have learnt that the most important things in life are the intangibles: Love, Peace, Joy, Sound health, and also, the gift of life; money cannot buy these. We thank God for all these and many more. You are once again most welcome to the eleventh month of the year.
We want to sincerely appreciate our clients, friends and well-wishers who take their time to read our monthly articles, and for your good comments and encouragement. We must let you know that these are what motivates us to keep doing and improving on what we know how to do best.
The year 2016 has been very interesting to say the least. The form of greetings we hear these days is “Happy Recession!!!” and we’re quick to respond “What is happy about the recession?”
One of the things I learnt about life is called “WYSIWYG”, that is, ‘What You See is What You Get’. The word ‘Recession’ by its very meaning is not a pleasant situation, and if one is not cautious, we may tend to justify our failure, underachievement, and lack of money to the situation in Nigeria.
Wise people in every generation always use the current situations (good or bad) to their maximum advantage. These sets of people don’t complain (because complaints never solved a problem), but they sit down to analyse the situation, and see how they can benefit maximally from it. These people understand the times and seasons, and they know what to do at each of these periods. They do not wait for things to get better before taking action, but they study the situation and consciously adapt themselves to it. In other words, they ‘change’ in the true meaning of the word.
One of the problems we are facing today is that people do not understand the true meaning of change. As a matter of fact, they resist change, and cling to the status quo. The Yorubas in the Western part of Nigeria have a proverb that says, ‘Let’s continue to do things the way they’ve always been done, so that things will always be the same way’. Whereas, Albert Einstein defined ‘Insanity as doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results’.
Agreed, the process of change is difficult and tedious, especially for people who had been fed and spoilt with well-circulated corruption money. It has gotten so bad that even the judiciary who should be the last resort for justice and equity have been found wanting, as cases are delayed forever, and most often, the merit of court judgement goes to the highest bidder. There is even what is called ‘perpetual injunction’ which makes some political ‘cabals’ never to be investigated and tried by any authority.
Change requires that we don’t continue in this way. We need to take the hardship being experienced now as a sacrifice for a better tomorrow. This is not the right time to do things the usual way.
Since the inception of the current recession, almost everyone in Nigeria (learned and unlearned) have turned to economic analyst; they all seem to proffer ways Nigeria can get out of recession. We do not claim to know the right and sure way out (we leave this to the government’s economic team), but for individuals like you and I, our concern is to develop a sort of immunity against the effects of recession, or better still take good advantage of the recession.
In every dark cloud, there’ll always be a silver lining. To this end, here are 10 benefits of the current recession:
1. It causes you to be more creative and innovative. We tend to be more creative and innovative in periods of crisis and discomfort.
2. It forces you to make the tough decisions that will ultimately improve your life. Tough times never last, but tough people do.
3. It thins out the competition. Since things have changed from the status quo, old competition will no longer be a threat.
4. It makes you realize you can’t take anything for granted. The period calls for greater sense of responsibility and accountability.
5. It reminds you that real wealth isn’t about the stuff you own. The need to value and appreciate the intangible things of life.
6. It fosters out-of-the-box thinking. Developing the ability and capability to do what seems impossible (Possibility mentality).
7. It creates the opportunity to experiment. With this, there’s a higher chance of success, as he who is down fears no fall.
8. It brings you back to the basics. The opportunity to retrace your step back to how it all started, and begin again more powerfully.
9. It accelerates change. The only constant thing in life is change, hence, the opportunity to embrace it.
10. It causes you to be less wasteful. There will be high sense of prudence and frugality.
While you may not be able to control what happens with the economy, you can surely control what happens to you.
As usual, we want to remind you that we care so much about you, and that when it comes to your real estate investment, we are always here to give you the very best service you can never get elsewhere. That is our promise, and will always be.
We wish you the very best in the month of November.
Thank you.
