Dec. 24, 2019

How to identify your gift

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In this short episode we talk about how to discover your greatest gift to yourself - your gift or what some call your talent. It’s remarkably easy and easy to do. Enjoy!

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Welcome to You Unleash Podcast with Femi Akiami, the podcast where we explore how to unleash your potential in the workplace, your hustle, and life in general with practical steps.

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Sometimes I'll use stories from my past.

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Trust me, I have got some stories, and sometimes I'll just share stuff I've learned, and other times we'll get people who know a lot more than I do that coming here and we'll just chop it all up.

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This is podcast five, so I'm really looking forward to it.

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Um I've become a firm believer that Don is better than perfect, so we just have to keep going.

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It's not perfect, it's not where I want to be, but it sure as hell isn't what it used to be.

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So let's get going.

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Now, one of the questions I get asked a lot by people like coach, people like mentor, and people I advise is how do I know what my gift is?

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Now it's a question almost every one of us struggles with, and in some cases, it takes a lifetime to figure it out if we ever do.

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And believe it or not, I was just like most people.

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But I've come to admit that it's one I struggled with for a long time.

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I didn't know where I was going.

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And if you're feeling like that, I'm hoping today I can change that for you in a big way.

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Now it was only very recently I started to find out the answer to this question, and in today's podcast, I would love to share with you how I got to my answer, how I figured it out, and I'm hoping it makes a big difference to you.

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Now you see, there's nothing more miserable than doing something you hate.

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And my passion is that you become your best and you and you become unleashed to become the best you can be.

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But there's nothing worse than going to work every day doing something you hate.

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I've been there, I was working for a boss I hated, and I don't think he liked me.

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And in the end, instead of quitting, which I guess wasn't an option financially, I got let go anyway.

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And that's one of the things I don't want for you.

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Now it's okay to have a job you don't like, but you have to have an outlet for your gift.

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Now, it might be that your outlet is fishing, your gift is fishing.

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You might not want to go be a fisherman, you might still want to be whatever your career is, which is fine, but at least you want to be able to follow your passion and fishing, fishing, right?

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It seems random, but what I'm trying to say is you should have your passion on the side as an outlet, at least, at the very least, to keep you going.

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So, I'll tell you how I got my gift, as I said I would.

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Now, a few years ago, it was my birthday, and the phone rings, and it's a friend I've not spoken to for a long time.

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And you know how it is when you get a phone call from someone you haven't spoken to for a long time, it's just wow, it's a blast from the past.

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It was an old school friend from when I was in secondary school or what some would call um high school, I guess.

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And he said, Oh, how are you doing?

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and he said the usual things, happy birthday, all nice stuff, and then it was around the time I'd started creating my um online nuggets, my videos, very short videos, one minute.

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And he said, Oh, I saw your video online, and um it was good.

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And you know what, Femi?

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I wasn't surprised when I saw it.

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I said, Well, what do you mean?

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He said, You've always been that guy in secondary school.

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You loved to debate, you loved to talk, and you were a member of the press club, you loved to write.

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As a matter of fact, you were the vice president or something of the um of the press society, so you loved writing.

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And this was at the time when I was figuring out, trying to figure out my way if what I was doing was what I wanted to do, and as soon as he said that, it was a word of confirmation, it was like bang that hammer moment when you go, Yes, this is it.

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I love doing this, and I have to admit, it brought a tear to my eye.

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Now, we like to think of the best gifts as gold watches or something fancy, but sometimes a gift like that, and I told him, I said, This is one of the most precious gifts anyone has ever given me because it awoken the gift within me, it empowered me, it encouraged me.

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And with that being said, these are three things I would love you to take away from that very short story.

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Number one, speak to those that know you best from when you were young.

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One of the best ways to figure out your gift is to reach into your past.

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Now, the thing about this is when we were kids, we just did what came to us naturally, we did whatever came to us out of passion, we just love doing it.

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So it was your gift pouring out.

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What happens is as we get older, society molds us, society shapes us, and we start to put all these barriers in place that don't allow our gift to flow out.

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So, one of the things I want you to do as a takeaway from this is speak to people who know you and ask them and say, What was I like as a kid?

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What did I love doing?

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What did that what made me happy?

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What were the things I'd be an idiot, I'd be playful, I'd just run out and do, and they'll tell you sometimes you might be playing football, which is sports, you were competitive, you loved reading, you loved spelling, um, you loved singing.

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They'll tell you something, and what you do is you take an inventory of everything people tell you, and then you go over it and you find out if it resonates with you.

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And trust me, what you then need to do is just try it, start practicing, trying out these, try out these things.

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Now, don't let the world tell you you have to have one thing you focus on.

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It's alright to take one thing, try it out.

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If you don't like it, you can it, you move on.

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You might have outgrown it.

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This is perfectly natural.

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But take all those ideas they give you, all those things you used to love to do as a kid, try it out, see how you get on.

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And if you love it and enjoy it, you might be onto something, and even in your secret time, start practicing having fun.

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And if it is, it'll rekindle that fire, it will light that fire, and you'll stop, you'll just find that you explode onto the next level, and then you'll see how it gets from there.

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It doesn't have to be something that brings financial reward, but it's certainly an outlet for you to channel your gift, and that would allow you to be happy because then, even if you have a job you don't enjoy, you have the outlet for your gift, and that brings balance to your life, which is the most important thing.

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The other thing I want you to do is do the same for other people.

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Just do the same.

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Think about your closest friends, offer them an encouraging word, people you've known since they were young, ring them up and say, Hey dude, or hey sister, you used to love to do this.

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What happened?

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You used to love singing, you used to love taking our money and counting, used to love doing business, used to like trading, buying things, and selling things, used to love leading in class, used to be the class captain all the time.

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How come you don't like leading people anymore?

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You used to love encouraging people, just ring people you know up.

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And if you know what, you know what?

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If you don't want to ring them up, just send them a text message, reach out to them on Facebook, just say something, and you don't know how that seed is gonna blossom into an acorn tree, and that's gonna give birth to more fruits.

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My point is, even if you don't can't think of anyone, do it for someone else, spread the word, pass it on.

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You see, the best gifts in life are free, and in this time of Christmas, maybe this is, and I'm making I've kind of made a segue here, but maybe in this Christmas time, this is the absolute best gift you can give to someone.

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The best gift is not a gift money can buy, it's not a gift you have to go into um a shop to think about.

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It's actually a gift of love, a gift of encouragement, a gift of uplifting someone, a gift of having true impact on someone's life.

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Listen, guys, that was it for me.

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It's a pretty short one, but I just it was it came to me, and I thought I have to share this with my people, I have to share this with my unleashed gang because we are on a journey to get unleashed, and next year I'm really looking forward to us doing great and massive things.

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And one of the ways to tap into doing great things is to know your gift, your gift, because when you do when you're you're in your when you're in flow, when you're in your gift, actually you're excellent because it comes to you easily.

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You will never be excellent doing something you don't like, you will never be excellent doing something you hate.

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Because even if you were, there's another level, and that's the level where people who love doing it excel and shine because it just comes easy, they're in flow.

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When you're in flow, you're awesome, and that's what I want.

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I don't want us to go through life with the handbrakes on.

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You need to go in life fifth gear, pedal to the metal, power through, and that's what we're going to do next day.

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It's about being on leased, and being on leased means flowing in your give your gift and operating at your best level.

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And one way we can do that is find out our gift.

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So reach out to those who know you, ask them to tell you what they like about what you used to do.

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That just gave brought joy to yourself and everyone else, and do the same for others.

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Okay, I'm gonna end that now, and um okay, this is it.

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So I really want you to have an amazing Christmas, and God knows most of us have ended it, have earned it.

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This is the season about enjoying yourself and family.

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For those who don't celebrate, it's the end of the year, anyway, and still a reason to celebrate.

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We made it to the end of the year, we're now just chilling out, plotting our next move and how we're gonna rock next year.

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But I what what I want you to do though is relax consciously, aware of how great a year it's been, because we're still here, you made it through.

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Whatever life threw at you, you made it through, and have clarity about what you're doing next year.

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I hope you enjoyed this episode of Unleashed, where we share ideas of how to rock it in the workplace and life.

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And don't forget to share and like our podcast, it's on Spotify, it's coming to Apple, um, Google, Stitcher, all the major platforms.

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Share with your friends, let them know what they think, and let them enjoy it because you want to be unleashed just as they want to be unleashed.

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And don't forget, guys, Don is better than perfect.

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Episode 5 is in the books.

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Get unleashed, stay unleashed.

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Have a great Christmas and a wonderful new year.

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We'll catch up in the new year, guys.