A chance to wipe away past mistakes

WHY does the dawn of a new year feel like a new chance?

Like all the past year’s mistakes are forgiven and there is a chance to start all over again?

Like a new beginning?

Well, because it is.

From 1 January, a new era known as 2024 commenced in your life.

It gives you a chance to change for the better, to evolve into efficiency, to be different.

If you were in Form 3 last year and performed dismally because you were always on your phone and couldn’t manage time for serious engagements, 2024 gives you an opportunity to be better.

It gives you a chance to be serious with school or whatever you need to focus on.

You know where you have to change to be a better person this year.

You know what you have to do to improve from your 2023 version.

If you do make these adjustments, it won’t matter what mistakes you made last year or since you were born.

You will be glad you learned from those mistakes and became better from 2024.

This will become the year you discovered your greatness.

That is what a new year can do. New Year’s Day usually sends people into a reflective state over what the past year offered but more importantly, it makes one hope for better.

It doesn’t matter what one achieved in the prior year, they still hope for more.

That is called ambition and it motivates every one of us to look to the future with great expectations.

I respect the ambition you have and how it makes you yearn to achieve more in 2024.

But guess what — it doesn’t come while you’re seated there.

You have to put some effort for you to achieve what you aim for.

If you look back over the years, every New Years Day you had new dreams but rarely do you achieve them come December 31.

It’s always regrets and then renewed hope that it will happen the next year.

But if you are the same person you have been over the past years, you will not achieve something new.

So here is a reminder to dream, plan, work and achieve your 2024 desires.

I know they are possible because you have already accomplished them in your mind. What the mind creates, the body can accomplish.

So put your energy to use and see 2024 manifest into the productive year you dream of today.

Many know they have to work harder to achieve their dreams but very few do enough to make their dreams reality.

That is why only a few people are successful and the rest just allow themselves to be led by the few who decided — on a day like today — to work towards their goals.

When they achieved them, they set new ones and worked towards them and again and again until they became untouchable.

It was just one day at a time, one dream at a time for them.

Now look where they are.

So do the same!

Start this year.

Start today!

At least at the end of 2024, do not blame whatever regrets you have on lack of effort.

It’s obviously simple things that you have to do — simple to you that is — but the world will admire your work and reward you in ways that you cannot even begin to imagine.

Simple to you means you are doing something that you have loved and dreamed about.

People see it as special but to you it’s as natural as breathing.

If you love cooking for example, this could be a year to find out how far cooking can take you. What does it take to be a chef ? What have the greatest chefs achieved?

How did they become so great at it? Answers to these questions about cooking — or any other profession are available on the internet or from people that are within your grasp of you really want it.

You can find out as well what the greatest chefs were doing to nurture their craft when they were your age and practice the same.

That could set the tone for a successful career and business that can change your life.

And you will say it all started at the beginning of 2024 when you decided to be serious with your life.

Use your natural gifts and inspiration this year — like Alick Macheso uses his guitar — and the world will appreciate.

You do that every day this year, even for a little time, and you will be thanking God for a great 2024 in the next 52 weeks.

Happiness is created by decisions people make when they are young and so is poverty.

While someone is planning to work hard and lay the foundation for their future this year, another person is planning to destroy their life.

When 2024 dawned they started making silly resolutions like, this is the year I will start smoking or drinking or engaging in premarital sexual activity.

That is how failure is born. ◆