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Food for Living: Think Out of the Box
By Henry Ukazu
Dear destiny friends,
According to a ‘philosopher’, it is only a mad man who does the same thing over and over again and expects a different result. Imagine a student who failed an exam, what is rationally expected of him is to go back to the drawing board and fix whatever they did wrong. This is because you can’t be doing the same thing repeatedly and expect a different result.
The same principle is applicable for a businessman/woman who failed in business. Even in marriage, you cannot solve a problem with the same understanding you met it, neither can you solve a problem with the manner your friend or parents solved a problem. This is because a lot of transformation may have taken place. What works for them might not work for you. For instance, back in the days, a woman might be a housewife, but in our contemporary society, women are now feminist. Again, your friend’s wife or husband may have a different mindset, understanding and orientation. So, it is therefore imperative for you to think out of the box, and to know what works for you.
Thinking of the box is not for any specific person. A poor mind, rich mind, young or adult mind can think out of the box. To think out of the box, you must apply common sense. We are accustomed to hearing that common sense is not common, but in reality, common sense is available for all rational minds. You don’t need to have a degree or be an expert to have common sense. The inability to think out of the box makes you poor, and poor can be defined as passing over opportunities repeatedly.
Everyone wants to be successful in their marriage, business, academic, personal and professional life, but they fail to apply the logic and philosophy that works with it. For instance, some people who were successful because time and chance favoured them or either because they attended a networking event, or a friend recommended or referred them to a sponsor. So, if you can’t have access to the high and mighty, you can get them via your grades.
As newly married couples, we were told not to have third parties in our marriage if we want our marriage to work. In fact, we were told the only third party should be God. If I may ask, is God not a third party? Question: If a couples can’t handle a problem, what are they expected to do? Why do we have elders? Marriage therapist? Counselors? Etc. Do you know what if the couple mismanage the problem, it might lead to the end of the marriage? Moral: Think out of the box.
Time and chance are very critical to success in life. You can lose money and recover it, but when you lose time you can never recover it again. Just to let you know how powerful time is, I once read an interesting illustration that aptly highlights the value of time, and why it must be properly managed and maximized. Here it is: “Imagine there is a bank account which credits your account every morning with $86,400. It carries no balance from day to day. Every evening the bank deletes whatever part of the balance you failed to use during the day. What will you do? Draw about every cent of course. Each of us has such a bank account, and it is called time. Every morning it credits you with 86,400 seconds. Every night it writes off as lost whatever of this you failed to invest for a good purpose. It carries over no balance. It allows no overdraft. Each day, it opens a new account for you. Each night, it burns the remains of the day. If you fail to use the day’s deposit, the loss is yours. There’s no drawing against “tomorrow.” You must live in the present on today’s deposit. Invest in it to get from it the utmost in good health, happiness and success. The clock is running. Make the most of today.”
Your ability to judiciously use your time will show how productive you are. Most times, poor people think rich people are the cause of their problem, but they fail to understand there’s a secret to their success. If you are able to think out of the box by asking the right questions, offering yourself for volunteering service, going out of your way to support someone either a great man, the less privileged or even those who can’t help themselves like students, you are creating doors of opportunity.
It is important to mention that there are many opportunities for everyone; the world is in need of visionary leaders who can solve problems, add value and create jobs. But it’s quite unfortunate to note that lazy people with poor mindsets feel that the market is saturated. Let me tell you, the market is not saturated, all that is needed is for you to create a unique product. Your style might be how you communicate, engage or relate with people. Do you know that 73% of the human brain is filled with water and 71% of the earth is filled with water? That tells you that despite all the land we occupy on earth, we are yet to scratch the surface of the earth.
Do you know that there are so many problems around your environment, just come up with an improvised means of making life easy for everyone and trust me, you will get paid because many people are lazy in conducting research, so if you can help them solve that problem, you’ll get paid.
Furthermore, thinking out of the box will teach you how you can avoid burning bridges. You may disagree with someone, you may not get along with them, but then, don’t burn the bridge, instead, keep your distance because we live in a dynamic world, you never can tell where you’ll meet them or when you might need them. Moral: Maturity makes you understand that you can disagree to agree.
The same is applicable for relationship/marriages. The game (relationship/marriage) might still be the same, but the rules must have changed because we now live in a different world. For example, why we all believe in love, in recent times, we have come to understand that it takes more than love to keep a relationship, you need money, faithfulness, patience, character, understanding, compromise, technology and sex to spice up your marriage.
To think out of the box requires knowledge, information, and wisdom. What you know is the key to your transformation because you can’t give what you don’t have. Change is internal. You can’t change what is beyond you.
In conclusion, one of the greatest ways of succeeding in life is by thinking out of the box, because whatever you are looking for is on the other side of life. Therefore, I urge you today to think out of the day.
Henry Ukazu writes from New York. He’s a mindset coach and public speaker. He works with the New York City Department of Correction as the Legal Coordinator. He’s the author of the acclaimed book Design Your Destiny – Actualizing Your Birthright To Success and President of gloemi.com. He can be reached via info@gloemi.com
The Edo Governorship Election Petitions Tribunal sitting in Abuja, on Wednesday, affirmed Senator Monday Okpebholo as the governor.
A three-member panel headed by Justice Wilfred Kpochi, dismissed the petition filed by the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) and its candidate, Asue Ighodalo, against the outcome of the September 21, 2024, governorship election.
In its judgment, the panel ruled that the petitioners failed to call competent witnesses to prove the allegations of non-compliance with the Electoral Act.
In the lead judgment read by Justice Wilfred Kpochi, the Tribunal said non-compliance must be proven convincingly. It noted that the failure of the petitioners to call polling unit officers, presiding officers or even voters during the election proved fatal to their petition.
The Tribunal stated that most of the 19 witnesses called by the PDP merely gave hearsay evidence during the proceedings.
Justice Kpochi faulted what he termed as the PDP’s reliance on Section 137 of the Electoral Act to dump documents on the Tribunal. The Tribunal noted that it’s not for it to scrutinise documents tendered by the petitioners.
The Edo Tribunal further said the BVAS machines tendered by the petitioners remain dormant, as it’s not the duty of the Tribunal to access the data in the machines.
In the unanimous decision, the Tribunal thereby restated that to prove overvoting as alleged by Ighodalo and the PDP, there’s a need to tender the voters register, BVAS machines and polling unit results or Forms EC8A.
Following that, the Tribunal dismissed the petition of Asue Ighodalo, candidate of PDP for lacking merit.
INEC had declared that Okpebholo of the APC secured 291,667 votes to defeat Ighodalo who got 247,655 votes. PDP approached the Tribunal to challenge the results from 765 polling units of the 4,519 units in Edo State.
The PDP candidate faulted the outcome of the election on the grounds of non-compliance with the Electoral Act and the failure of Monday Okphebholo to secure a majority of the lawful votes cast. Putting that in context, the PDP governorship candidate alleged improper computation of votes by INEC, non-serialisation of electoral materials and over-voting.
The Edo State Governorship Election Petition Tribunal, sitting in Abuja, has
scheduled Wednesday, April 2, 2025, to deliver its judgment on the petition filed by Asue Ighodalo of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) challenging the victory of Governor Monday Okpebholo in the September 21, 2024, gubernatorial election.
A three-member panel, led by Justice Wilfred Kpochi, reserved judgment on March 3 after parties in the suit concluded their final arguments.
The Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) had on September 22 declared Okpebholo of the All Progressives Congress (APC) winner of the election with 291,667 votes, defeating Ighodalo, who polled 247,274 votes, and Labour Party’s Olumide Akpata, who garnered 22,763 votes.
Dissatisfied with the outcome, the PDP and its candidate approached the tribunal, alleging widespread irregularities, including
over-voting, ballot serialisation issues, errors in collation, and miscalculations in results.
In the suit marked EPT/ED/GOV/02/2024,
Ighodalo presented a senior technical officer from INEC’s ICT department as a witness, who tendered 154 BVAS machines as evidence to substantiate claims of
over-voting.
Adopting his final address, Ighodalo further alleged that results from 765 polling units were manipulated at the collation centers and that errors in computation affected the final outcome.
He urged the tribunal to nullify the Certificate of Return issued to Okpebholo and declare him the rightful winner of the election.
A Federal High Court in Port Harcourt has summoned President Bola Tinubu and Rivers State Administrator, Vice Admiral Ibok-Ete Ibas, over the emergency rule declaration in the oil-rich State.
The summons follows a lawsuit filed by the Incorporated Trustees of Peoples Life Improvement Foundation, alongside individuals Precious Elekima and Inanna Wright Harry, challenging the legality of the emergency rule imposed on the state.
Also listed as defendants in the suit are Senate President Godswill Akpabio, Speaker of the House of Representatives Tajudeen Abbas, the National Assembly, Attorney General of the Federation Lateef Fagbemi, the Revenue Mobilisation, Allocation and Fiscal Commission, and the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN).
President Tinubu, on March 18, 2025, declared a state of emergency in Rivers, suspending both the executive and legislative arms of government and appointing retired naval officer Vice Admiral Ibok-Ete Ibas as administrator.
In suit number FHC/PH/CS/45/2025, the plaintiffs are seeking judicial interpretation on whether the emergency declaration aligns with constitutional provisions, arguing that it is unconstitutional, null, and void.
They contend that it violates Article 13 of the African Charter on Human and Peoples’ Rights (Ratification and Enforcement Act) and Section 305(3)(b) of the Nigerian Constitution, which outlines the conditions under which a state of emergency can be declared.
The plaintiffs have urged the court to restrain the Rivers State Administrator from appointing caretaker committees for the 23 local government councils, forming a state executive council, or making financial transactions from the state treasury.
Additionally, they are seeking an order for the immediate reinstatement of the suspended executive and legislative arms of government in the state.
Meanwhile, the court has given the defendants 30 days to respond to the summons.
