Some days ago, I noticed that there was a lot of commotion on the Twitterverse. Apparently, a Nigerian-American novelist, Tomi Adeyemi had accused the prolific, serial best-selling author, Nora Roberts, of plagiarizing the title of her debut novel. They had both written a novel that had the words “Blood and Bones” in the title.

The social media storm on Twitter obviously increased the number of people interested in Tomi and her book. For instance, I know who Nora Roberts is, but I had no idea of who Tomi Adeyemi was before the controversy. As Robert Greene’s wrote in his book, The 48 Laws of Power, “Everything is judged by its appearance; what is unseen counts for nothing. Never let yourself get lost in the crowd, then, or buried in oblivion. Stand out. Be conspicuous, at all cost. Make yourself a magnet of attention by appearing larger, more colorful, more mysterious than the bland and timid masses”

However, the more I looked, the less likely it seemed that Tomi Adeyemi was merely trying to garner cheap attention. As fans of the two authors went back and forth on Twitter, I could not help but take a closer look at the 25-year-old Tomi Adeleye and her book.

I was mindblown by what I saw.

On Amazon, Tomi’s book had over 1500 mostly positive reviews, while on Goodreads, it had well over 10,000 mostly positive reviews. That’s absurd when you consider the fact that not everyone that buys a book leaves a review. It’s simply impossible to have so many positive reviews if the book itself is crappy.

Also, months before the controversy, a reputable company had paid Tomi Adeyemi seven figures to publish her novel, while another reputable company acquired the movie rights for the same book, reportedly paying her another seven figures!

She had also appeared many highly viewed shows such as The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon, Good Morning America, BBC What’s New, ABC 7 Chicago, amongst many others.

The more I researched her story, the more I realized that Tomi Adeyemi is a superstar in her niche and her remarkable journey to superstardom can be attributed to a principle called the Matthew Principle. In this post, I would be shedding more light on the Matthew Principle, as well as how you can make it work for you, rather than against you.

Understanding the Matthew Principle

After telling the story of how the servant with the least talent lost his single talent to the servant with ten talents, Jesus made a remarkable statement that is both scary and profound in equal proportions.

Matthew 25:29 says,

“For unto every one that hath shall be given, and he shall have abundance: but from him that hath not shall be taken away even that which he hath.”

In other words, those who already have enough would be given even more, while those who do not have enough would end up losing the little that they have. This is the essence of the Matthew Principle!

Take a look at the way the world we live in works and you’d see the Matthew Principle all around you.

The richest 85 people in the world have as much money as the poorest three and a half billion people in the world! Yet even more and more money continues to pour into the coffers of these privileged few.

In the United States alone, nearly a million and a half books are sold. Only 500 of these books will sell more than a hundred thousand copies. Furthermore, a good number of these books are written by people who have other books under their belts.

Let’s take the Matthew Principle even further:

The well-to-do typically have preferential access to the best kinds of food. They live in the best kinds of houses located in the best parts of the city. They have more people at their beck and call, looking for ways to earn their favors. They are more likely to meet and network with other successful people who would increase their chances for more success. As a result, they are calm and are capable of delaying present gratification because they have a confident expectation of abundance in the future. The odds are in their favor, and it will continue to be in their favor until something really dramatic happens.

On the other hand, those with low statuses endure poor living conditions. They are often hungry, and in the few instances where they have access to food, the food is usually of poor quality. Due to the fact that they eat unhealthy foods, they are in dire physical and mental conditions which makes them liable to age quickly and die early. Even though they need as much help as they can get, they are not likely to meet successful people. In fact, they are more likely to meet and network with other people with similar experiences as them. As a result, they are impulsive and jump at any opportunity for pleasure without any consideration for how disgraceful, illegal, or sub-par it might be. Again, the odds are stacked against them, and it will continue to be against them unless something dramatic happens.

Apparently, over time, both success and failure compound upon themselves.

The more successful you are, the more likely you are going to embrace opportunities that would make you even more successful. Conversely too, the more unsuccessful you are, the more likely you are to find a way to jeopardize your chances for success.

Does this mean that the Matthew Principle has permanently condemned you to whatever rung in the social ladder that you find yourself? No, of course not. As it stands, from my research and observations, there are two ways you might be able to make the Matthew Principle work in your favor.

Reciprocal Determinism and the Matthew Principle

Some time ago, I was finding it incredibly difficult to make the time to go down to the gym and work out as frequently as I wanted to. So, I bought myself a treadmill, positioned it in my room in such a way that it was the first thing I saw when I woke up in the morning. As a result, it became much easier to simply get up from my bed, take a few steps to my treadmill and work out.

This is a classic case of reciprocal determinism where my immediate environment can influence my behavior, while I can also manipulate my immediate environment to help me change my behavior.

To take this concept closer to improving your life, the easiest way you can manipulate your immediate environment is by investing in more books. Someone once said that a mind that has been stretched can never return to its original dimensions. As exercise and food are to the physical body, so is continuous self-improvement to the mind. You need to broaden your outlook on life by exposing your mind to other perspectives other than yours. This is why it is expedient for you to invest in books. Read wide on a broad variety of topics. Read deep on the topics that intrigue you. Read biographies. Read classics. Read business books. Read. Read. Read.

With time, you would find yourself developing an ever-expanding knowledge base that would be crucial in helping you identify associations and patterns that are oblivious to the remaining 90% of the population that do not read. Eventually, the Matthew Principle starts working in your favor, and you will start seeing the effects of your compounding knowledge in the quality of your thoughts, choices, decisions, relationships, and life in general. Who knows, you might even be the catalyst for change in your immediate social networks and physical environment if you keep going along this path.

However, if you grab the bull by the horns, there’s a more powerful way to take advantage of the Matthew Principle.

Your Location, Your Allocation and the Matthew Principle

Going back to Tomi Adeyemi’s story, I discovered that there are times you need to do more than manipulate your immediate environment. Sometimes you need to physically change your environment by moving entirely different location.

And this is one thing that I noticed from Tomi Adeyemi’s story.

By making the decision to migrate from Nigeria to the US in the early 1990s, Tomi’s parents had dramatically improved the odds of Tomi becoming successful. In case you are unaware, the difference between living in a developed country and living in an underdeveloped country is like playing with two different slot machines. One of the slot machines is filled to the brim with $100 notes, while the other is filled with 25 cents. While it is possible to hit the jackpot and win all the coins in the 25 cents machine, the total winnings cannot be comparable to the winnings from a $100 machine. If you’re presented with the chance, it is a no-brainer to move from the 25 cents machine to the machine filled with $100 notes. And that’s exactly what happened with Tomi Adeyemi’s family.

Of course, the fact that Tomi Adeyemi was born in the United States does not mean that she just folded her arms and waited for the US system to bring all the good things to her. She had to develop herself and work hard. Eventually, the hard work paid off and she was admitted to Harvard University – one of the top five schools in the world. The last time I checked, the acceptance rate for Harvard was 6%. You can look at it this way: If 100 people applied for admission into Harvard, only 6 people would be accepted into the school! By implication, this means that only the best of the best can get into Harvard. So, when Tomi Adeyemi got into Harvard, her colleagues were the best students from high schools all over the US. In addition, because she was in Harvard, she got the best training from some of the best professors in the world. Imagine how Tomi Adeyemi’s physical and social environment influenced her thoughts and mentality for the 4 – 5 years she spent at Harvard. Imagine the opportunities she was exposed to, as well as the caliber of people she forged relationships with. It was only a matter of time before all the benefits of the Matthew Principle in her life led up to her writing a best-selling novel and getting a movie deal for the same book – all by the age of 25!

The truth is that your location will play a crucial role in determining your allocation from life. While you might not be able to migrate to a developed country like Tomi’s parents or get admitted into an Ivy League school like Tomi, you might be able to relocate to a bigger town or city. There are numerous benefits that living in a big city has over living in a smaller city. Seminars and other networking events are more likely to occur in a large city than in a remote village in the middle of nowhere. If you join the right groups and organizations, you are more likely to come in contact with life-changing information or industry secrets that would have never gotten to you if you embraced routine in your small town of 1000 people. Even if you are not able to change your physical environment, you can still change your social environment. In this day and age of social media, there are thousands and thousands of forums and groups on the internet that you can join to keep yourself in the loop where it counts.

Whichever method you decide to adopt, just ensure that you position yourself to get the best from the Matthew Principle.

Growing up, I remember my mom getting up very early to boil water for my younger brother and I to take our baths. At some point in high school, I stopped doing warm baths. Looking back, it was probably because I was lazy since I would have needed to get up earlier to boil the water myself.

For all my bravado regarding using cold water, it’s funny how I was never tempted to use it during the cold harmattan season. Motivating myself to take my bath…to use warm water was a big challenge back then. Numerous times, I considered just snuggling on my bed and not bathing altogether.

Okay. At times, maybe I actually didn’t bath.

So, you can imagine my surprise when, in my sophomore year, a colleague recommended taking cold showers to shake off the morning harmattan cold.

Boy, did it work!

Since then, (with a few exceptions, like the week when I moved into my new apartment and used scalding hot water to shower because I didn’t know better!), I have been taking my bath with cold water and it has been working wonders. In fact, I have been able to pick out a couple of lessons that I gleaned from my cold shower sessions.

Let’s dive in.

Cold Showers Cause Good Discomfort 

If you are serious about learning and growing to be a better person, you have to be willing to put yourself in uncomfortable situations. A lot of people hear this and the next thing they think about is quitting their jobs or taking one big risk!

It doesn’t work that way.

You have to get accustomed to accumulating smaller victories before going all out to catch the big fishes.

And do you know one way you can start doing that?

That’s right, by taking cold showers.

You see, by taking your bath with cold water, you are conditioning yourself to have patience and endurance. You are learning how to get out of your comfort zone, albeit in a small way.

Let me be clear here: Cold showers are not part of the formula needed to fulfill the purpose and destiny that God has assigned to you. Rather, you will need to stretch outside your comfort zone. And to do this effectively, you will need to patiently endure the discomfort that comes with stretching.

Taking cold showers in the morning is one of the best and safest ways you can be accustomed to the discomfort that accompanies stretching to new terrains.

What’s The Worst Thing That Can Happen When You take Cold Showers?

I can assure you that in a typical day, there’s nothing that would be worse than taking a cold shower every morning…especially when the weather is cold!

So, why would I recommend it?

Simple. Because it is the worst thing that would happen to you that day!

When you take a cold shower in the morning, your body doesn’t like it. In fact, every cell in your body would cringe in revolt like water on a hot pan of oil. In the first few seconds, your skin will be like that of gooseflesh with bumps covering every square inch. You would probably yell like a soprano singing off-key.

Your body cells do not like the feeling of a cold shower and at that moment you are bathing, your brain sets this experience as the baseline for the worst feeling you would ever experience that day. This is why if you are faced with a tough assignment on the day you take a cold shower, your brain would ask, ‘Is this as bad as taking a cold shower?’. Nine times out of ten, the answer will be ‘No!’ and you will be able to summon up the willpower and motivation needed to go far with the task at hand.

Cold Showers Can Rewire You For Crushing Limitations

Since I take cold showers, I brag about it a lot. I know it’s not a virtuous behavior, but which hunter kills an elephant and carries it home through the back door?

Anyways, when the topic comes up, a number of my acquaintances tell me that they CAN’T take cold showers. Not WON’T (i.e., not willing to) but CAN’T (not able to)! When I hear this, I start wondering: Do these people have a medical condition preventing them from touching cold water?

The excuse that is often given for not taking cold showers is the idea that they will make you fall ill. Actually, cold showers will make you less likely to fall ill. The only things that can make you fall ill are disease-causing organisms called pathogens. Cold showers reduce uric acid levels while boosting glutathione levels in your blood. The overall effect? Less stress and a general feeling of well-being.

Elementary science stuff.

Here’s the thing: When you take cold showers, you begin the process of conditioning yourself to have a limitation-challenging mindset. As I’ve said before, the body hates cold showers and if you try to rationalize with it, you will get myriads of reasons why you shouldn’t take cold showers. However, you need to realize that you are not under the control of your body. Rather, your body is under your control! You are its boss and you need to stand your ground and tell it what to do.

Developing this habit is crucial because once you are able to rise above the limitations that your own body is suggesting to you, every other kind of limitation is reduced to dust.

Cold Showers Can Aid Proper Breathing

Despite the fact that I am already a pro at cold showers, this is a part that I still struggle with a bit.

The truth is that a lot of us have forgotten how to breathe properly. Take a look at the way a baby breathes when it’s asleep. Notice how they breathe deeply and contentedly.

Sadly, as we grow older, we grow accustomed to taking short and shallow breaths.

When you take short and shallow breaths, your body starts anticipating stress and as a result, there is a spike in your cortisol levels. On the other hand, when you breathe like a baby, your body tells itself that everything will be alright and you are able to relax.

When I take cold showers, I normally gasp at the first impact of cold water on my skin. However, with each passing moment, I spend under the cold water, I am able to convert the gasping into deliberate deep breathing. As a result, when I am done showering I feel relaxed and cheerful.

The benefit of this? By practicing how to deep breathe during cold showers, you will be able to teach yourself to calm down deliberately, especially during stressful moments that you may encounter during the course of your day.

The year was 2014 and I was in Bayelsa State, Nigeria.

In my place of work at the time, I was part of about 20 people selected to undergo a training that would equip me with the skills needed to be part of a medical outreach team for 5 days. I was going to be paid for partaking in the training and also for being a part of the outreach.

Well, the script did not actually pan out that way.

First, due to a blackout in my neighborhood, I was unable to charge my phone. This meant that I was clueless about the venue of the training. Of course, this led to me missing the training – as well as the payment that came with it. And because I didn’t take part in the training, I was unqualified to be a part of the outreach.

Then, to add salt to the injury, the coordinator of the medical outreach was totally inflexible. His stone heart did everything in his power to ensure that I would not be a part of the outreach. Boy, did he succeed!

As I headed back home that day, with my arms drooping like the dried fronds of a palm tree, different thoughts raced through the contours in my brain:

What kind of head do I have?

Why was I the only one that didn’t get the venue for the training?

Why did my phone decide to die at such a crucial period?

Why do I always have ‘bad luck’?

It’s funny how the mind has the uncanny ability to turn the minutest of things into a hot-air ballon. My isolated incidence of ‘bad luck’, was already starting to be perceived as a reoccurring incidence by that soft, white lump of tissue between my ears. Little did I know that being rejected from that medical outreach team was probably the best thing that could happen to me at the time. Within the space of about 2 days, I got a part-time offer with a far better remuneration that lasted nearly two years.

And here’s the funniest thing: I would have missed this opportunity if I had been allowed to be a part of the medical outreach!

Do you think I still felt I had bad luck?

It’s funny how the narrative changes when the facts are changed!

There may be a couple of you thinking the whole world is set up to work against you. You might be asking yourself questions such as:

Why me?

Why always me?

Which kind of ‘bad luck’ do I have?

Well, I’ve got good news for you: You CAN create your own ‘luck’. In the next few paragraphs, I will be sharing FOUR ways you can do just that.

Acknowledging The Truth About You Can Help You Create Your Own Luck

I know I probably sound like a broken gramophone record now, but it bears repeating: You need to see yourself the way God sees you!

If you are totally blind to what you have within you, it will be impossible to walk in the fullness of your powers. This, in turn, will make you feel as though the odds are stacked against you, and ultimately, you’d lead a mediocre life. All you need for a successful life is not outside you. It’s within you. The sooner you recognize this, the faster you will create your own ‘luck’.

Let me share a little insight with you from Genesis 2:7,

“And the Lord God formed man of the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and man became a living soul.”

Some years ago, I did a study on the original Hebrew words that were used to express the phrase I boldened above. The original Hebrew word that is translated as “breathed” literally means “to inflate”. In other words, Jehovah God Himself inflated you like a balloon with His breath.

And it even gets better.

The term translated as “breath of life” literally means “raw, strong, and fresh Divine Inspiration”. By implication, this means that within you, you’ve got the raw, strong and fresh Divine Inspiration from God Himself. The only reason you’re a living soul is that God has put in you a part of the very Essence that makes Him God!

You are carrying God within you and you have no need to fear.

You are carrying God within you and you should be afraid of nothing.

You are carrying God within you and you are not permitted to be a victim of circumstance.

You are carrying God within you and you should be able to step into any situation and dictate how things should proceed.

The more conscious you are of the Truth about you, the more easily you should be able to write and create your own luck!

Doing What You Hate Can Help You Create Your Own Luck

In motivational circles, the talk eventually winds up to the point where the speaker challenges his captive audience to do what they love and follow their passions. While I am all for that, in my humble opinion, I believe the better advice would be to tell people to do what they hate!

I will explain.

A couple of weeks ago, I wrote the following statement on my Facebook wall:

“The quality of your life will to an extent be determined by the number of uncomfortable discussions you are willing to have”.

I wrote this because the most common things that people easily shy away from are uncomfortable conversations

Take a look at the parable of the Prodigal Son in Luke 15:11-32 and you’d find a person that was willing to have uncomfortable conversations.

The Prodigal Son was able to ask his father for the portion of his inheritance in the first place because of his attitude concerning uncomfortable conversations. (Disclaimer: Now, I’m not advocating for riotous living or rebellion against constituted authorities! Rather, I’m pointing you to the kind of attitude that the Prodigal Son had). It didn’t end there. After he had spent all his money and was already languishing in drought and poverty, he was again willing to have that uncomfortable discussion with his Father.

Contrast the Prodigal Son’s attitude with that of the Older Brother in verses 29 and 30.

“And he answering said to his father, Lo, these many years do I serve thee, neither transgressed I at any time thy commandment: and yet thou never gavest me a kid, that I might make merry with my friends: But as soon as this thy son was come, which hath devoured thy living with harlots, thou hast killed for him the fatted calf.”

Clearly, the Older Brother had a problem of entitlement. There was nothing stopping him from walking up to his Father and asking for a goat that he could cook and share with his friends. His Father said that much in verse 31. “And he said unto him, Son, thou art ever with me, and all that I have is thine.” In essence, all I have left had always been yours!

The Older Brother strikes me as someone who might have had these lines of thought concerning his younger brother:

Lucky bastard, he always gets what he wants! [When the Prodigal Son asked for his share of the inheritance]

Lucky bastard, Daddy has accepted him back again, after everything he has done! [When the Prodigal Son came back home]

Anytime you do what you hate, especially through the uncomfortable conversations you are willing to have, you increase options for yourself. And the more options you have, the more luck you create!

The guy who is overworked and underpaid may do two things. He may decide to have that uncomfortable conversation with his boss or potential employers, or he may stay put in the same place and hope –  like the Older Brother –  that his patience would pay off. If he does the first and his salary is reviewed or he’s employed elsewhere, the rave reviews will start flowing in about how lucky he is. And if he chooses to play safe and goes with the second option, he will continue to lament about the hard hands that life has dealt him.

The more uncomfortable conversations you have, the more options you have; the more options you have, the more luck you create!

The Law Of Large Numbers Can Enable You Create Your Own Luck

“For a just man falleth seven times, and riseth up again: but the wicked shall fall into mischief.” (Proverbs 24:16)

If you want to create your luck, you must be ready to fail numerous times.

The Bible says a just man will fall seven times and then he will rise up again. Numerous people are unwilling to fall once, let alone seven times. Yet, they want to have the results of the just man. It is impossible to have the same results if you disobey the principle behind the result!

Some months ago, I took a course in Statistics and one of the Laws that struck me right across the face was The Law Of Large Numbers.

In simple terms, the law states that the number of successes increases as the number of experiments increases.

Here’s an example that explains how it works:

Suppose you were told to flip a coin. For the purpose of this analogy, let’s assume that ‘Head’ means ‘Win’ and ‘Tail‘ means ‘Lose’.

To make it even more interesting, let’s assume that the first time you flipped the coin, you got ‘Tail’.

Does this mean you are a failure?

Does this mean you are unlucky?

You are probably going to feel apathetic because deep down within you, you know that every coin flip has two outcomes – ‘Head’ or ‘Tail’.

Let’s go a step further with this.

What if I told you that flipping ‘Head’ will fetch you one million…dollars?! And you have TEN chances to flip ‘Head’ in order to win the one million dollars.

Would you keep on flipping the coin? Or would you just toss the coin once, get ‘Tail’ and then blame yourself for having bad luck?

The truth is that the more you flip the coin, the better your chances of getting a ‘Head’!

We actually did the calculations in class and we found that if you flip a coin just once, you have a 50% chance of getting a ‘Head’; but if you flip the coin 10 times, the probability of getting a ‘Head’ increases to a whopping 99.4%!!!

Here’s the thing: Failing doesn’t mean that you are a failure or that you have bad luck. It only means you have figured out an aspect of your action plan that is not working.

Get back up on your feet, dust yourself and keep on flipping!

In Summary….

God did not create you to be a dud. He did not design you for bad luck. In fact, He has already given you ALL you need to pen down and create your own luck.

Today, start acknowledging the truth about what God has loaded you with.

Today, take a step of faith and endeavor to have that uncomfortable conversation that would make your palms all sweaty.

Today, keep on flipping the coin and let the law of Large Numbers work in your favor.

Today, quit watching porn and masturbating and watch your social interactions create your luck for you.

God bless you!