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As a kid I thought turning 50 was old and I have not really given much thought to what life would be like post 50, which brings me to my current reality.

So I’m 50 now, yes 50. I don’t feel 50, so call me 50 years young.

My wife asked: “Can this birthday celebration be different, can you celebrate with joy?” I have not really celebrated birthdays with parties, except for a couple in my teens, which my parents initiated. For me a birthday had been a milestone moment of what goals I have missed the last year or a moment of reflection on some poor decisions. Especially the big birthdays, where you reflect on the last decade, not a milestone, but more of a crushing millstone moment. Maybe I’ve set too many goals or the goals were unrealistic, but how would you ever achieve something significant if you don’t have anything to aim at? We also make decisions with the information at hand at the time, with hindsight always trumping the “now”, on the not-so-good decision outcomes. 

I understood what my wife was saying, or rather what she did not say and I nodded in agreement that this one will be different. So what will be different now? My 50th celebration will not focus on “what” I missed but “who” I will miss. It will celebrate not just my journey of life, but our journey as a family and won’t be just a moment of reflection, but a joy filled celebration that will create a memory… a moment that will also look to the future, to ponder on what is possible. This birthday, although a milestone moment, will be different, it will be a joyous memory stone moment! 

If you are blessed with an 11th hour on the last day of your journey of life, I bet your parting wish will be to see those nearest and dearest to you one more time, with the only difference that you’d not really be in the place where you could interact as in the days gone by. You’ll share some memories, may laugh, may cry. That moment will forever be a memory moment… the last one, it’s goodbye. So why wait?

My birthday wish for what others call a milestone birthday, filled with fancy dinners, parties and presents, is simply a memory stone moment. “What gift would you like?” my family ask. “Your presence only, thanks”, my heartfelt reply. 

I’ve booked my whole family into a fancy hotel over the weekend so we can share meals together and simply enjoy each other’s company, while we are all in good health and in good spirits. Creating a memory stone on this 50th milestone birthday!

A milestone birthday is not just reflecting on what we have achieved, but rather who we are becoming. Not the age, but of age. Refined, yet still curious and hope filled that our best is yet to come, regardless our milestone number. A milestone birthday is our day, we need to own it and make it something memorable. No better way to make it memorable than to use the occasion to bless others. 

Was this celebration all joy? A few things worked out differently than expected, but joy also showed up in abundance through unexpected moments, like the “Live Life with Joy” themed cake my wife arranged and through the thoughtful gifts and cards I received from my family. Our disposition towards life should be to live life with joy, even in moments of its absence.

My Dad lived his whole life in pursuit of giving away what he had and I belief that is why God blessed him with many years, through many tears and trenches, that most would not survive, yet he thrived and his life stories are an incredible testimony and inspiration to all who hear it. My parents wanted to buy me something really nice for my birthday, but my only wish was for them to celebrate this memory stone birthday with me. What a blessing it is as a parent to celebrate your child’s 50^th!! I pray I will be blessed to experience that as well. I did get a beautiful watch from my parents, which for me resemble being blessed with having more “time” with them, which I treasure greatly.

True joy is not found in what you get from this life, but what you can give through your life. What might be deemed a little in your hand, could be life changing in someone else’s.

Who can you help today to live life with joy? What have you experienced that can be an encouragement to someone else? How can you turn your next milestone moment into a memory stone one? 

So stop beating yourself up about what you have not achieved in the past, how things you planned turned out or what you have or should have had by now. Think about how today can be different, think about how today can be memory stone. Your life matters, what you do with your life matters. 

Grab your pen, write your story as a memory stone and share the revelation that continues to flow from it. Your birthday should be a memorable moment, to be thankful for the gift of life you have received and a reminder to make it count. Bless others, be generous and give what you can. Change someone else’s world. Do it today, do it now and live life with joy.

It’s 6 am, on the dot, as you pull the front door shut behind you and pause for a moment. The crisp fresh air made you pause and reminded you to take a light jacket along for your daily exercise walk. The sun has been sleeping in later and later and the temperature has been dropping steadily. It’s never just one thing, but a combination of little things, building up until a tipping point is reached and you find yourself at the start of a new season.

You’ve been sensing the change, but have not prepared for it and now your morning routine is disrupted by finding “that jacket” from last winter.

A change of season in life can represent a promotion at work, a career pivot, job loss, health challenge, empty nesting, new baby, etc. and can be for the better or worse… for a season. Either way, on reflection we recognized the signs, yet did not prepare for it, until the tipping point day arrived.

The goal to transitioning well to a change of season is to prepare for it early, the very reason why summer and winter are bookended by spring and autumn. Recognize what things from an outgoing season needs to be kept and what needs to be discarded, cleaned up, organized or given away. In my street just about every tree drops its leaves as it transitions to winter season, only to flourish again in spring. Likewise, there are things we need to release from one season in order to embrace that of the next.

The key is not to wait until the last minute and to schedule in certain life review moments.

What skill sets do you need to add? It can take time, especially if it’s reskilling to a new career area. Not something you want to do during a time when you may, for some reason, find yourself without an income and with the pressure that comes from that. Added to this, is reviewing your resume, networking platform and professional reference groups. 

From a crises perspective, a review of your paperwork from time to time is important, so you can clearly think through things on blue sky days, that’s almost impossible to do when they are not. You are also able to seek good advice and consider it over time, not to make rushed and costly decisions. Some boxes to tick, are insurance, pension fund, investments, savings, debt, your will, letters to guardians of your dependents, list of all passwords, especially social media accounts and email accounts. 

In a nut shell, what do you know that those you may leave behind and who depends on you, do not? 

How ready are you to move if the opportunity presents itself? The real estate market could swing upwards and the upkeep of your property will have a direct impact on the return you could achieve if the conditions to sell are optimum. Keeping things neat, uncluttered and well maintained at home will save you from a lot of avoidable stress when opportunity knocks on your door. It may actually become the reason why your door is the one selected. 

Time to take stock. Reflect on the areas that needs attention and make a list. It can be a bit overwhelming when you realise the scale of the project, which is exactly the object of the exercise. Next choose a period of time over which you will be attending to your list. What’s on your list?

I’m currently on day 12 of 40 days and have been working on bits of the list every day. In my case, it included some fitness goals, books I’ve been wanting to read, short courses for new skills, organizing, discarding  and reviewing lots of paperwork, including insurances, goals and the next year’s budget. With winter season drawing to a close, today was also the first day that felt like spring and a change of season plain. 

On the other side of preparation for a change of season is the new you. Once your list review is complete, divide the 40 day workload over the next 12 months and schedule in the regular review points, so you live ready as your default.

I have received a few things over my life that fell in that category. A very rare Montblanc pen from my Dad, 18 years ago, that’s locked away in a safe. I’ve written with it only a few times, as I’m concerned that I may drop it and damage it. Should I want to write with it today, I may need to replace the original refill, as it’s been years since I’ve used it. The reality is someone may inherit this pen and lose it or sell it to spend the money on something else within six months. 

Likewise, the very first gift my eldest son gave me, paid for from his first job, has been kept untouched, because it is so special to me. I realize now that the set of L’Occitane En Provence fragranced soaps and creams, may have an expiry date and although they may last as a wonderful gesture and live on in a beautiful gift box in my cupboard untouched forever, I have not received the benefit from it that the giver intended to bestow on me, who actually wanted to bless me with the benefits that the gift releases.

Maybe that’s why receiving ice cream as a gift is one of my favourite things, because there is no saving it!

As a parent, I’m watching my kids grow up and each finding their own lane to run in. They each have been given unique gifts from God, ranging from sports, music to math, and others. By gift I mean a natural ability to do something, which goes to another level if any additional effort or training is applied, and the right lifestyle added, to extract the gift’s optimum benefit.

Life presents choices to us daily that either moves us closer or further away from the goodness of what God gave us. Sometimes all that’s needed is to recognise a natural gift, to strengthen it and having the courage to step into it, unlocking the fullness of its benefits.

What gift have you received that is special and personal to you that you are not using or enjoying the benefits from, that the giver intended you to have as an expression of their love or friendship towards you? Our response to something given to us in love should not be, to store it, or to not to use it, for the value it’s to release, might be forever lost. 

It’s your first day back from a short staycation. The “break from routine” you desperately needed, but you can’t get yourself out of bed. Exhausted by the very thought that hitting the cancel button on your phone’s ringing alarm, was like pressing the old routine “play” button.

But it’s not the alarm that woke you.  You were already awake, like every other morning, even during your few days way. Something has to change, but what?

To “rest” is simply not possible. Even if you have nothing “urgent” to do, you feel like you should be doing something. After all, there is so much to do, with ever increasing items on the to do list. 

Does any of the following sound familiar? You have grown more anxious about the future in recent years. You are exhausted before the day is out and your doctor is saying you should watch your stress levels. Dealing with weird skins conditions? You are procrastinating on certain things that are important but not urgent. Your social language is lacking passion for something in the present, with your default topic going to something in the past. Looking through your bank statement, you have increased the amounts spent on impulsive buys. Worst of all your faith is impacted, where you have stopped believing for a certain outcome. These are just some of the signs that you may lack margin in your life.

Margin is having the space to respond to what matter most to you in order to fulfil your life’s purpose.  You may thrive on helping other people, but if you don’t intentionally create margin within your day to do so, being consumed by other things, whilst recognising a need that you want to respond to, will drain you. The same goes for generosity, where unless you structure margin within your budget from which you can be generous, your finances will simply find its way to other impulsive buys, leaving you with feelings of regret.

Margin is therefore not just time or the space on the side of the page. Margin can be applied to our faith, the lack thereof presenting as anxiety, fear and doubt. Margin in our health is intentionally creating space in our day for following a healthy diet and exercise, the fruit of which will be a healthier body and reduced stress.

What areas of your life can you add margin to? How is your career going? Have you intentionally created margin for continuous professional development and for networking?  

Start by recognising the areas that require margin and intentionally add white space to your diary for relationships, study and exercise or maybe your budget, so you can afford to be generous.  The “rest” will follow.

Everyone can experience a Gap year, at any age and a lot of people might have experienced a gap in their momentum this year.

What’s a Gap Year? A Gap Year is a period of time (usually a year, but could be shorter) taken either before or after university education, to expand one’s horizons, typically by extensive travel and cross-cultural experiences. Put simply a Gap Year is a pause between two seasons.

Although a Gap Year is usually referenced in the context of University studies, I believe the concept applies throughout our lives and could happen at any age. The critical distinction is this: For the year (or period of time) to be a Gap Year, it must fall between “what I just finished/was doing” and “then after I’ll be doing…”. The Gap Year is intrinsically linked to vision. Unless I know what I’ll be doing “after” the Gap Year, it’s not really a Gap Year, is it?

Let’s talk vision for a moment. Vision is a picture of your life purpose fulfilled, future self, expressed in a number of goals, over a period of time. What I would like you to focus on is that vision is a picture of your “goals” clarified.

I maintain a few lists of goals that I reflect on regularly and update once a year, on my birthday. It starts with a Life Time list of goals, which reflect my “life purpose fulfilled”. The next list is my 10-year list, then a 7-year list, then a 4-year list and lastly my “this year list”. The rationale behind this system is to come up firstly with the Life Time list of goals and to then move some to the 10-year list. From the 10-year list, moving some to the next list and so on, until you have the “this year list” of goals.

You can set up your own breakdown of the lists and have one for each year if you like. Really depends on your own circumstances and age. When I was younger, I had a 5-year gap between lists, but also because I was still working out what my Life Time list would look like. Bottom line is your bookends are a “Life Time list” and a “this year list”. I’m still adding goals to my Life Time list.

So how does this relate to a Gap year? Currently the world is navigating through a medical pandemic that has led to loss of life, halted global travel, closed businesses and forced those businesses which didn’t close down to completely rethink how they operate. The interesting thing is that this pandemic hit at the start of 2020, the beginning of a new decade. Ironically this was set to be the year of vision, 20-20 vision (medical term) and then the pandemic hit, wiping whatever plans the world had.

How did this pandemic impact you? Did you have plans to expand your business, to travel overseas or studying in another country? Did you have to self-isolate, working from home or lost a job? All of a sudden what seemed secure was now shaken. New decade resolutions on pause or cancelled and we find that 2020 unexpectedly became a Gap year.  The irony extended to the cancelation of global travel, which is normally the hallmark of a Gap year.

When we are faced with the unexpected, that put an enduring pause on our plans, we need to decide which side of our Gap year we will focus on. We could go through it like taking a ride on a passenger train, adopting its momentum and simply accepting that our goals are on pause, day dreaming of what it will be like when things returns to normal. Or we could visualize ourselves standing on the other side of our Gap year and consider how we could “progress all Goals” (paG) during our Gap year.  The “paG” acronym is “Gap” spelled in reverse if you didn’t notice.

So how do we progress all our goals? During this pandemic I started my next postgraduate course, renovated a home, sold another home, expanded my investment portfolio, taught my teenage son how to invest in shares, to name a few. I bought a book I wanted to read (the buying part is the progress, reading it is the next step). Sure my travel goals are on pause, but that doesn’t mean I can’t research the intended trips (progress). What goals are on your next year list or even 1 to 5-year list that you could progress? You may not be able to complete the goal, but what measurable step can you take today towards progressing it?

It all starts with vision and articulating your goals across different time milestones.  Fixing our gaze on the future, let us to see past the present pause and helping us to identify the goals we can progress. The pause could actually provide us with the margin to progress goals that might have otherwise lived on a list until years into the future. Sharing our vision and demonstrating how we progress our goals to our loved ones and friends might just inspire them to do the same.  Embrace the Gap to Progress All Goals.

What’s your definition of success? Is it vision fulfilled or being in a specific place or position? What if you get there and you are not happy, with no new vision set beyond that point? Maybe you’re a young person with a dream of what success should be, but it seems unattainable so you talk yourself into something else, something easier, something more safe to achieve or maintain.

Stay with me (as a not overly sporty person) as I show you what I’ve learned from observing my sons play their favourite sport of soccer (or otherwise known as football).

Both love scoring goals and despise conceding same. This naturally places them in an attacking (forward) position, but due to their height, speed and big kick, their coaches invariably choose to assign defender (back) positions to them. 

This season was no different. The coach asked my eldest, when he met him the first time, what his preferred position was. “Up front, right wing, left wing or striker” was his response. First game and the coach had him on centre back! Whilst watching his game my dad gave me a call and was the first soundboard of my disappointment. He responded that he was glad to hear we had a good coach that could recognise that my son could play in the centre of the field and kick equally good with his left and right foot, but more importantly he would know exactly what to expect when the striker of the opposing team tried to break through their defence, so he could turn an attack into an opportunity for a counter attack. Being a defender is a very strategic position, that apart from the obvious, creates new opportunities to attack by how the ball is played forward. Wow, talk about a change of perspective! 

With grandpa’s encouragement in hand we looked forward to the next game. This time round my son was on the bench! Later in the game he got subbed on in the mid field. I knew it was not his favourite position, but from my perspective he was moving up the field. They didn’t win that day and the coach was not shy in relaying his disappointment, yet encouraged them to learn from it and prepare for the next game. This did not dampen my son’s passion. “Best game I’ve had in a while he said.” He continued to say that they knew it was going to be tough and be a very physical game, so the coach decided to put my son on the bench so that he could go on “when” we had an injury. His abilities made him a highly versatile player who could play anywhere on the pitch. The first player to go down with injury was the captain. Whilst the team was playing safe and trying not to give away further goals, my son kept his legs warm on the sidelines, ready to run on to any position assigned to him. He was not limiting himself to playing a specific position, but rather readying himself to play any position. 

My youngest son’s team had an uphill battle most of the season. Likewise, he was put on as a defender, but starting every game with a “come on [his name], you’ve got this”, regardless of the position he was assigned. He was not interested in playing safe, he played to win, despite the growing list of losses they suffered. Now they are winning games.  

When we play safe, our perspective becomes tainted by what we stand to lose (this includes our position) and fear may enter our life. We become focussed on holding on to the land we have already conquered and we stand to lose our vision for greater success or even worst, our vision becomes envisaged losses. 

When we do what we can, playing any position required and driven by faith for success, we confirm our vision, which propels us forward towards achieving it. We do this by being ready for opportunity, looking past the conditions we find ourselves in, not settling our identity in a particular position, opening our hearts to encouragement and closing our ears to opinions. 

Most importantly, draw strength from every personal victory and don’t let anything rob your vision. Staying focused on where you are going is way more important than lingering in contentment in the how far you’ve come.  

When life happens and things get tough do you respond by thinking that nothing you can do can make a difference and move to preserve the little that you have? Instead be the difference and drive forward with faith for new opportunities of success. Maybe you could even be the coach or grandpa for someone else to encourage them to see new opportunity.

We are all unique, with no two people exactly alike. Even identical twins are unique, with unique life experiences contributing to the uniqueness of each person.

Imagine for a moment that you, as a person, is presented by a single colour hue, like a blue or green and your life an extension of this single colour into a palette of colours, representing the good (lighter) and the not so good (darker) times of life.

A monochromatic colour is exactly that, a single colour from a base hue, that has been extended through tinting and shades into a colour scheme from the one single colour.

Non colours, white and black, are used the create lighter and darker colours, with black added to a colour for shades and white added for tinting.

Would your life reflect lighter tints or darker shades?

As an artist I always look at the way an object reflects light, which assist me to draw or paint the object. Even the darkest object will reflect light, which defines its shape, texture and size. Have a look right now at a dark object near you. Do you see the light reflecting off it? It’s there, even the darkest part will reflect a shimmer of light.

Likewise, in life, when fear-filled trials come and situations can seem hopeless, we could seek out the light within, that define the darkness, to put boundaries to its reach. When we see light, we speak life, and the darkness becomes lighter, as we tint it in the peace that hope brings.

What shades can you tint today to bring lighter colours to the colour palette reflecting your life? Drive out fear, anxiety and darkness today by seeing the light within every situation, adding white by speaking life.

Thinking back to childhood days, a picture of the sun was usually illustrated with a radiant friendly smiling face, invoking feelings of joy.

Somewhere right now the sun is rising and somewhere it’s setting, or is it? We all know that it’s actually the earth that’s turning, moving into or out of, the sun’s light. Then there is a solar eclipse, which the earth has no control over, that can also momentarily block the sun’s light.

In the same way we can actually turn either towards or away from something like joy, thinking it’s joy that moves into or out of our lives. We can also allow events that’s completely out of our control to rob us of our joy.

So most of the time we actually determine if joy is present or absent in our lives and if someone or something tries to rob us or our joy, it’s our response thereto that determines the duration of joy’s absence.

I use a very easy system to make sure I live life with joy. Every morning I focus on starting my day joy-filled. Life usually happens soon after, whether it’s a phone call, cancelled appointment, traffic accident, etc. Every incident trying to rob me of my joy, like bumping against a glass filled with water, the water representing my level of joy.

Needless to say sometimes there are spills, that can’t be avoided, and here is the secret to living a joy-filled life:

Before I enter my home at night, I think through every incident that day, that may have robbed me of some joy and I make sure I fill my glass again before I enter my home, so that its full for tomorrow. It’s that simple.

Most importantly those that matter most to me, receive me full of joy. I have to admit there are some days when I sit in the garage for a while to fill the glass again, but the glass always gets filled.

Living life with joy is a choice. How about you, do you live life with joy? Don’t let the sun set on your joy.

So I wanted to do something big, something significant to bring encouragement to thousands of people.

Here’s the catch, I didn’t want them to know it was from me, as I’m just the conduit to help unlock vision, joy, hope, love and peace. I was trying to find one thing, one message, I could bottle so to speak and launch into the big blue sea, hoping it would reach the masses, without it just ending up on a pollution statistic somewhere.

Breakthrough came…  I shared my heart with a Pastor friend of mine about the burning desire to do something significant to which he responded that we only need to encourage two people that each in turn encourages two other people and so on and so on… “Soon it will be something big, something that is significant.”

One year ago on this day I launched this blog with a single post and without any promotion or telling anyone about it. No different than putting a single message in a bottle and launching it into the sea, not knowing who, when or if anyone out there will find it, read it and be encouraged by it. The goal however was simple, just two people needed to read it and be encouraged by it and significance will follow…

I would like to thank the two people that wrote to me to thank me for sharing that single blog post and for setting in motion something significant.

All the significance of what a tree represent is contained in the smallness of that one single seed that believes there is more.

What can you do right now to encourage just two people that can each encourage two people in turn, and so on…? Choose to live life for significance.

I’m determined to launch this blog today. Why, because I set a deadline for this day, which happens to be a significant day on a personal level for me as well.

But it almost didn’t happen today, because life is full, schedules are filled with meetings, there are more issues than solutions and you would expect to see at least a few posts on a blog when it’s launched… right?

So how did I get there in the end, you ask? I saw a post from Michael Hyatt, earlier today on Instagram that quite clearly and simply stated: Stop Waiting. Start Creating.

Start Creating… just start. Find some margin, some white space, somewhere and start.

My posts on this blog will build around specific themes, that at first glance may appear to be random, but they are all in fact interlinked, which I believe will bring revelation and purpose to your life, as living these stories brought to mine.

So who am I? A person that was given a literal dead-line and lived. A person that used to live to be successful and now lives for significance.

In time you’ll know. I have a specific goal to help bring change to others lives through sharing my life journey, which I have found have helped many people find vision, joy, hope, love and peace.

I believe that adwht.com will help you to add some whitespace to your life.

What is your dream and what single step can you take today towards it?