One of the major reasons why some people are practically stranded in life is their inability to plan beyond one day. They wake up in the morning, pray, take their bath, eat breakfast, and go to the usual place, and repeat the same routine tomorrow. That’s why millions of people are practically eating from hand to mouth across the world.

The future you don’t see, you can never seize. If you fail to set up a goal post, you will never score any goal. Your inability to plan beyond one day won’t stop the future from paying you a visit. But don’t forget that the future you failed to plan for will not be kind to you when it arrives.

Anyone who lives in a flood prone area can never say that he wasn’t aware that a day is coming when flood would pay him a calamitous visit. Yesterday’s disaster should teach you to plan for the future. But if you fail to learn from yesterday’s disaster, you must get ready for a bleak future. Your friend, relative or neighbor who died and left nothing for his family should teach you a serious lesson about planning.

The truth is that the future usually warns us about its arrival. Nobody can get to tomorrow and complain that he never knew that it would come. The sign has always been there, but many refuse to pay attention to it. If you want to have a future filled with success and abundance, you should have started planning for it many years back.

Talking about the black man, P. W. Botha, the former leader of South Africa said,

“It is our strong conviction, therefore, that the Black is the raw material for the White man. And here is a creature that lacks foresight. The average Black does not plan his life beyond a year.

By now every one of us has seen it practically that the Blacks cannot rule themselves. Give them guns and they will kill each other. They are good in nothing else but making noise, dancing, marrying many wives and indulging in sex. Let us all accept that the Black man is the symbol of poverty, mental inferiority, laziness and emotional incompetence. Isn’t it plausible, therefore that the White man is created to rule the Black man?”

We may not entirely agree with P. W. Botha, but some of the things he said are still true till today. Isn’t it obvious that we collect arms and ammunition from the white man to kill ourselves? Isn’t laziness and mental inferiority a way of life in our clime? By the way, how many of us plan our lives beyond one day, not to talk of one year?

Whenever I see an old man hawking things in Lagos traffic I usually ask myself series of questions. Does it mean this man was not aware that he would be old one day? What was this man doing in his 20s, 30s, and 40s? If he was sick it is understandable, but if the man was healthy all through his youthful years and failed to plan for retirement, he is not a wise man.

If you walk around the streets right now you will find out that an average African man does not care about the future. We live the same way year in year out. We don’t upgrade ourselves; we don’t have visions and goals. We just exist to meet our needs. Once we succeed in paying our house rents, children school fees and meet other needs, we don’t care what happens tomorrow! That’s not how to live.

You can accurately predict you future by simply analyzing how you live today. Your future successes are hidden in what you’re doing right now! I said in my book (Twelve Pillars of Financial Success) that if I follow you around daily for thirty days, I can accurately predict your future.

When I see how you manage your time, the kind of friends you have, the places you go to, how you manage your resources, the kind of discussions you engage in, and every other thing you do, I can accurately tell you how your future will look like. Your future successes or poverty are hidden in the things I just mentioned!

Dear friend, how old are you right now? Let me help you out. If you were born in 1967, it simply means you’re 50 years old. If you were born in 1957, you’re 60 years old. If you were born in 1977, you’re 40 years old. If you were born in 1987, you have just clocked 30 years. If on the other hand you were born in 1997, you are now 20 years old.

Kindly add 30 years to your present age. How old will you be in the next 30 years? If you’re presently 50 years old, in the next 30 years you will be 80 years old. If you’re presently 25 years old, if I add 30 years to your age, you will be 55 years old. I used 30 years because that is the right number of years to calculate the real value of things.

It is possible that when you read 30 years from now you said it’s still far, right? Well let me tell you that 30 years from now is around the corner. We used to see year 2000 as a very long time in the 80s and 90s, but we have passed year 2000 with 17 years! 30 years from now is just 2047 and it’s as close to us as 2027. If you don’t want to become a beggar by 2047, you must sit down right now and strategize on how to become financially free.

The first thing you must do if you truly want to live in abundance in the next 30 years is to change your daily routine. Take a sheet of paper and analyze your day. What is your 24 hours like? What activities have you repeated for the past 20 years? How profitable are those activities? If they are not profitable, you must sit down right now and rearrange them.

How many close friends do you have? What value are they adding to your life? Can the discussions and activities you engage in when you are together guarantee a prosperous future? How many hours do you sleep in a day? Do you think anyone who sleep that long can be financially free in 30 years from now?

In case you don’t know, if you sleep for 12 hours daily, half of your present age was buried on your bed! So if you’re 40 years old right now, it simply means that 20 years was deposited on your bed! What a ‘yeyecious’ life! You must rearrange your sleeping habit right now if you want you’re future to be better that your past.

How many hours do you bury on the television daily? Do you think that anyone who spends that number of hours watching television will retire in abundance in the next 30 years? Well, if your job is connected to watching the television all the time I have nothing against it, but if it’s just for entertainment, you need to sit down and work on yourself.

How do you spend your money? Will a man that make N150,000 monthly and spend N250,000 live in abundance in the next 30 years? What habits and lifestyles do you think are consuming your resources? Write everything down and begin to eliminate them so that they will not succeed in eliminating your enviable future!

I want you to spend the next three days to analyze every aspect if your life and begin to eliminate every negative habit or lifestyle that is hindering your progress in life. After that, begin to imbibe brand new habits and lifestyles.

Always remember that the future you refuse to plan for will not be kind to you when it arrives. If you refuse to kickstart the process that will guarantee a prosperous future today, that future will not be kind to you when you get to it. Sarah Blakely opined;“Having a mental snapshot of where you are, where you are going, and what you are moving toward is incredibly powerful.” John C. Maxwell said; “The most successful people in life are the ones who settle their critical issues early and manage them daily.” Wisdom is profitable to direct!

By Ifeanyi A.C Eze

Ifeanyi A. C. Eze is the C.E.O of Kings Uncommon Wisdom Limited. He is a trained business coach with many years of experience teaching leadership, finance and business.

Twitter @KingIfeanyiEze.

www.inspireafricaproject.com