When I was in secondary school, Lagelu Grammar school Ibadan, one of those afternoons where we sat under the shade of tick trees to gist, fantasize and banter. We were in SS3, preparing for the WASSCE examination and one of my colleagues, Timilehin, treated us to his fantasy as we contemplated life after school and getting rich.
“I’m just imagining, that one day, as I'm strolling along the street, that a car would pull up by my side and the person behind the steering wheel would say, “How I love the way you are walking, take this cash”
Those were his exact words. Every other person shared theirs and we passed it around jokingly. I can't remember mine but I have always imagined that someone would pay me for having a beautiful handwriting. The year was 2005, and we didn't understand life that much. We were wet, not only behind our ears but in our pants!
Most people think like these innocent secondary school lads, like thieves and fraudsters who expect rewards and harvest from where we have not sown, from the ground we have not tilled, from the cloud they didn't store water in, from the relationship they left to be cold.
Recently I've been thinking about the subject of seedtime and harvest very deeply. Deep enough to share with you and it has put a stop to lots of agitation and worry in my mind. I am more relieved from hopeless expectation and fraudulent prayer points.
The harvest you are enjoying today is the seed you sowed yesterday. The job you have today is the application you made yesterday. The competence you have today is the skills you learned yesterday. The project you are undergoing today is the bid you made yesterday. The strength you have now came from the food you ate a few hours ago. The reputation you have today is the character you built yesterday. The result you have today is the performance put in yesterday. The money you have now came from the job you did earlier. The excellence of today came from the diligence of yesterday. Do not allow anyone to tell you otherwise if you don't want to become a heavy burden to yourself, your family and society in the future.
I treat each day as an opportunity to open the earth and pop in some seeds.
First let’s deal with this fact, If your store is empty today, you didn't plant enough yesterday. If there's nothing in your account, you probably didn't invest enough yesterday or you weren't frugal. If you don't have enough valuable relationships today, you were not intentional about building one yesterday.
We wish a lot, we wish too much. We fantasize like school children. Every seed is an investment and investments have different gestation periods. Some are short-term, others are medium-term and long term. The future we will arrive in will be determined by the investment we make today. Your retirement, health, relationship and benefits are premised on your investment today.
So when you procrastinate, lazy around, give excuses, allow yourself to be discouraged or bullied into not expressing your talent, building your business, understand the consequences. Every inaction is an attack on your future.
Why do we sow seeds? So we can have abundance in our barns and storehouses in the future. Seeds are not for the present, they are for the future. If you are planning to live long, marry, have children, be a big businessman, rise to the top of your career, be influential, you have to be super intentional about sowing seeds.
If you want to shape narratives and mold perception, be intentional about your content. If you want to be financially independent, be intentional about your investment. If you want to be influential, be intentional about how you treat everyone you meet. The harvest you want will determine the kind of seeds you will sow. This intentionality will help you to manage distraction and momentary discouragement or difficulties. It will help you to find new ways of putting your seeds in the soil.
One day we will check the color and brittleness of our hair, the texture of our skin, the rigidity of our waists and we will know that we have arrived in the future.
Have a great day and breakthrough from within.
©Abiola Iyiola, 2025
Thank you for your letters sir. I truly appreciate them and do not take them for granted.
Be intentional about the seeds you sow. Thank you coach for this.