HOLDING ON He was sent from a presidency far beyond our world, on a mission far beyond our understanding to rescue us from a danger far beyond our sight. He could have given up at probation in the dessert when the enemy suggested bread at the peak of his hunger and fasting. When the enemy challenged his powers and gave him a chance to prove it by jumping down the temple. When the enemy promised him the entire world just if he would deny his mission. I’m amazed how he didn’t give up when despite his efforts, many of us refused to follow him in his vision, calling him an anarchist. When one of his most trusted friends, Sir. Iscariot the accountant sold him, a whole leader like him for just 30 pieces of silver. Worse still, his right hand man, Sir Peter refused ever knowing him - 3 good times. You and I would probably not stick with a crew like that, but he held on. What about the court cases. The police harassed him, the rulers lied about him, the courts condemned him, and even the very same people for whom he was spending his life insisted that he be killed for treason. They wouldn’t even let the police take him to the “electric chair’. The same people he had come to rescue beat him up with so much pleasure at his pain. Even as they mobbed him, he still had a chance to resign from the mission and avoid the pain, but he held on. He certainly never knew it was going to be so painful but even in the pain, he still asked his father to forgive the people he loved so much, who were killing him with so much hate. That is why he cried to his father “Eli Eli lama sabatani” -He almost gave up the mission but he didn’t. He held on. Just when he thought it will never be over, it occurred to him that he was through with the mission. He died with a sigh “IT IS FINISHED”. He said. 3 days after, it was all over the city, the nation and the entire world. CHRIST HAD RISEN FROM THE DEATH. HE HAD WON WHEN EVERYONE ELSE THOUGHT HE WAS A DEAD FAILURE. The same people who had nailed him put their hands in the air and confirmed with tears that he was lord and they were saved from their sins. Just what he came for. MISSION ACCOMPLISHED. The man with a mission had held on till the end. Today we celebrate EASTER.  What is your own mission on earth? HOLD ON TO IT. Honore Fo
	If love is: The tendency to think of and not just to be thought of The  heart to care and not just to be cared for The desire to kiss And not just to be kissed The strength to be faithful and not just be possessive The grace to forgive And not just to be forgiven The hands to give and not just to receive Then, I am ready to love, And not just to be loved. Author: FON HONORE
		WHO IS SANTA CLAUS??? When I was a kid there was one guy I really thought I loved more than my father. I had never met him. The only place that I ever saw him was in pictures or when I read about him in stories. I never ever talked to him, but I knew he was my friend. Why did we I like Santa Clause so much? Because he gave us gifts -even though we were not his children. Now, that is the most amusing part of the issue. I guess I would rather say, - Even though we thought we were not his children. Little did we know that Santa was our regular, sometimes stern father who loved us so much that he would wake up in the middle of the night to smuggle gifts he bought for us with his own money, just so that we would be so excited that Santa Claus cared. To Daddy, it was more fun, seeing the joy of Santa in our glistening eyes than the submissive words of thanks that we would pay him if we knew he was the giver. So who really is Santa? Santa is you on the 24th, when you shall remember the needy as you do your Christmas shopping. It is when you shall remember the poorest person in your neighbourhood as you send that electronic money order to your parents and siblings back home. Santa is you when you would be insisting on the phone that they make sure they give that portion of money to this poor neighbour in the most kind and discreet way. It is when you shall be telling your parents or siblings on the phone to pray with the family and if possible, invite them for dinner the next day. Santa is when you will buy a sweater for that poor-old-bony ��nob��in the neighbourhood and wait up till 12pm, just to sneak it in through his window with a kind message, saying, "From your neighbour, "Santa Claus" .. with love" Santa is you or me on the 25th of December when we shall sacrifice 3 hours of our day to visit the sick in the hospital, the dejected in prison, the old and forgotten on their smelly beds, the poor and ignored members of our churches in their ghettoes. That is Santa. But Santa should not disappear from your system on the 25th when you realise that the recipient did not even remember to thank you. Maybe he/she/they were too excited with the beauty of your gift and help to say thank you. Or well, maybe they are not yet sure that Santa exists, after all the ill treatment they have been getting from the world, or even from you. But is that really what matters? Did your Dad and Mum cease to become your "father Christmas" just because you did not like what "Santa" gave you for Christmas the previous year? What should please us most is not just the beauty in the grateful smiles on their faces, but the beautiful melody of love that plays in our heartbeats when we remember the most important people at Christmas - The needy. Money or material help is not all that they need from you. If they are lonely, they need you to stop by for a chat. If they are depressed, they need your smile. If they are old, they need you to do them a chore or two. If they have wronged you, they need your to forgive them with a warm Santa hug. The world believes in Santa Claus because they need Him. If you still believe in Santa or the need for one, then, this year, Santa will be YOU. Fon Honore
	OPTIMISM People in the world can be very well classified by the nature of their ambitions. We have the I am, the I wases, the Wannabes, the Gonnabes, the shouldabeens and the never-gonna- bes. Which of these are you? If you are an i am, you have managed to achieve some level of success in life but are so contented you cannot grow any further. If you are not an I AM, then, maybe you are an I was who has once been great and fallen due to some error or mishap. Because you have not yet recovered from your shocks, you prefer to dwell in your past glories instead of picking your pieces and making another try in life. Or are you a wannabe? You know precisely what you want in life. Unfortunately, you do very little towards becoming what you want to be. So you never get to be. You could be a gonnabe. Gonnabes know what they want to become and are moving towards it but they are not tactful in their approach. As such, you always make a mistake when you are about to make it because you never correct your mistakes. Worse still, you could be a shouldabeen. You have tried before and given up after failing once or twice. You lack the courage to move on. All you can boast of is one moment, one moment in your life when you almost made it. The most pathetic group you could belong to is the never-gonna- bes. Never gonna bes are never going to become anything. Not because they can’t but because they have told themselves that they are never-gonna- be what they dream of becoming. Are too scared of your dreams to do anything about it. Finally, we have the true self-leaders. True self-leaders are the guys who understand their past, know their present and are working hard and realistically towards the future. To them the future is not a moment when they stop moving ahead.  It is rather an infinite continuum of growth and achievement, which only evolves but never ends. They grow forever and even after their death, their achievements grow on. Are you a true self-leader? Simply stated, optimism is; believing in the value, the possibility and the reality of the better side of things. Optimism is not some blind kind of self-hypnosis that closes your eyes to the negative realities around you. No! Optimism is recognising your limitations and obstacles, not as limits but as the challenges we should overcome to achieve your desires. When God put you and i in the world, he put in us something that is bigger than the world, though smaller than our bodies. He gave you a spirit and that spirit is what makes your world in the world. What limits most of us is that we look around us too much instead of looking within us. As such, you fail to see the power in you that is waiting for us to manifest. Optimism goes with self-awareness, self-confidence, courage, determination and persistence. You need to know yourself well in order to know what goals you can best achieve, When you know your potential, you develop confidence, courage and determination, which gives you the strength to persist against all odds. You have so much to lose by being pessimistic. There is always an obvious reason why you can’t make it each time you put on our negative eyeglasses. As an optimists you should rather try, fail and face the disappointment with a lesson learnt than refuse to try and regret when others try and make it. Show me a man who recognises his errors on the last job and I will show you the man for the next job. True self-leaders are focused but not narrow-minded. They know first, how to lead themselves, then, how to lead others to a positive end. They are never embarrassed by failure. They are flexible but not capricious. Smart but not crooked. Fallible but not weak. Imperfect but not inconsistent. They fail but never give up till they succeed. Sometimes, optimism is born of adversity for it is often when the door is shot that we develop the skill to jump through the window. Racism made Martin Luther King a legend colonialism inspired Mahatma Ghandi and of course there would have been no Nelson Mandela if there weren’t apartheid. Is your own adversity turning you into a success story? Optimistic people are stubbornly sure of the possible. They are never broken by all the negative persuasion of defeated people. He who says he has come to the end of the road still has a bend to negotiate. Just keep believing, trying and persisting. You will fall, but your determination will lift you back to your feet and your self-confidence will help you persist till you reach the target. Do not forget to celebrate every step of your achievement. Success is a journey, not a destination! Underneath the reasons why we cannot make it lie our secrets to success. (Fon Honore).
	INTEGRITY Integrity is one of the scarcest assets to find among those who need it most. No doubt, the old saying goes “A gentleman is one whose faults have not yet been discovered.” The problem with Africa today is basically a leadership problem and the leadership problem is not that people do not want to lead or do not know how to lead. It is that most leaders do not want to encounter the inconveniences of doing the right things for the right results. A man or woman of integrity is one who knows what is right, believes in it and upholds the right thing in whatever circumstances. People with integrity are ready to sacrifice what they stand to gain from wrongdoing, just to uphold what is right and good for humanity. They hardly look for excuses to explain their errors. When they stumble they confess their sin, admit their human nature and regain their way in the same track of integrity. Petty corrupt people see people of integrity as obstacles or worse still, enemies but You know a mans’ level of integrity from the degree of temptation and opposition he can resist, just to uphold his values. Remember Nelson Mandela, Mahatma Ghandi and Martin Luther King. Integrity may robe us of our potentials to illicitly acquire wealth and pleasure, but it is the richest food for the soul. No wonder, men of integrity have been known to die with a smile on their faces. A smile that clearly shows who is the winner. Do you ever wonder why some rich people do tend to look onto their wealth with sad and haunted minds? Find out how it was acquired. You can never go right in life, doing the wrong things. There is no treasure as valuable to any group of people as a leader who has integrity and knows where he is taking his people to. It is more precious than all the money in our central banks. It is an assurance of peace, joy, harmony, progress and communal love, even in times of disaster. He is the kind of leader who with an empty stomach helps hungry people smile together in search of food instead of fighting and killing each other over excesses. Greed, selfishness and laziness are the main vices that make potential great men chose the way of corruption. Corruption has rendered our masses poor and poverty has made people mean and ready to be even more corrupt than corrupt leaders just in order to survive. We cannot count how many thieves, prostitutes and street children have joined the toll just because some corrupt soul up there stood in their way to success. Corruption eats not only into the present but also depletes our hope for a better tomorrow, even for our children. Young people suffer most, for It has robbed many of good opportunities to reap from our hard work and talent. Many of us are young, but our future seems, deep inside our minds. If you feel this way, then you are only helping the circumstances around you to defeat you. Then you have integrity without courage. Be strong. No matter how corrupt the society is, the hard workers eventually take the lead. When you are excellent in your domain, people do not look for you because they like you. They hunt for you because they need you. Because you are the best man for the job. Keep schooling, do not give up your job search, keep developing your skills despite your meagre salary. You may be giving up on life, just when luck is thinking about you. Above all, young people do not lose your integrity. Corruption is not the order of the day. Rather, it is the disorder of today and the nation is counting on you to keep your integrity today so that your integrity shall become the order of tomorrow when you become the leader of tomorrow.  You are on your way to becoming tomorrows leader. See you when you get there.    (by Fon Honore)