Why Mourinho Polarizes Opinion

From his teething coaching days in Benfica, Jose Mourinho already had the makings of pure box office. The notoriety became pronounced after he lifted the Champions League trophy with FC Porto, against all odds. His arrival in English football at the summer of 2004 fully entrenched him into footballing lexicon; and coaching narrative was going to be redefined forever.

Today, one can clearly say that Jose has come of age in coaching terms. He has been around for the better part of two decades, and irrespective of the disdain anyone holds for him, he is an undisputed serial winner. Since 2002, Mourinho has won eight league titles across Portugal, England, Italy and Spain. He has bagged the Champions League twice, won the Europa League twice and added thirteen other domestic cups along the way. Yet, each time Jose Mourinho’s name is in the narrative, there is still a contention, a polarization of opinion and a twinge of vitriolic spewing around in the verbiage. The kind that is not present when a certain Pep Guardiola or Sir Alex Ferguson are being discussed.

To my mind, there are two issues here. Jose Mourinho’s brand of football has always had pragmatism at the center. In his early days, this was perfectly acceptable as perhaps only Barcelona had the prerogative of being tagged ‘tiki-taka.’ But football has evolved since 2004, and sadly Jose has not done enough to evolve with it. From Manchester City to Liverpool, to Napoli to Bayer Munich, there is now more to winning than the score line. Most of the aforementioned clubs have showed that it is possible to win and win well. Jose’s plight has also been made complicated by the fact that he is not winning as much these days. A lot can be overlooked by a good run of results, but the diverse scrutiny is unleashed when this is not a given. But this is not all of Jose’s sins. He has also earned a reputation as the master of the dark acts in coaching. From storming off the pitch before full time, to poking the eyes of then Barcelona assistant manager, Tito Vilanova, he hasn’t covered himself in glory. Football is a game of passion and emotions, and it is acceptable in speaking terms that a manager or player will lose his head every now and then but there is something gross about Jose’s history in this regard. An evidence of that can be seen in his treatment by Chelsea fans at the last visit of Manchester United to the Bridge. There is a place for footballing rivalry but to be so grossly scorned by a set of fans you helped put their football club on the map probably says a lot about you as a person. One cannot purge the Chelsea fans of all blames though and it is perhaps true that Jose Mourinho will be truly revered when he eventually calls it quit on the touchline.

Jose Mourinho will remain a legend and his coaching exploits will forever be extant. But when he does a genuine inquest he will see that much of the inimical narrative that accompanies him, he brought upon himself. Fans like the rest of the world move on eventually but character, grace and reputation are hallmarks of a man that will always be remembered in the final analysis.

5 “Notes to Self” About the Precious Little Time You Have Left

1. Opportunity is only ever found in the present.
Some people wait all day for 5pm, all week for Friday, all year for the holidays, all their lives for happiness and peace. Don’t be one of them. Life is too short. Time is running out. Don’t wait until your life is almost over to realize how good it has been. The secret to happiness and peace is letting this moment be what it is, instead of what you think it should be, and then making the very best of it.

If you don’t allow yourself to move past what happened, what was said, what was felt, you will look at your present and future through that same dirty lens and nothing will be able to focus your foggy judgment. Realize this. What you do now matters more than what happened yesterday.

2. Your entire life can be customized from day to day.
There are hundreds of people in every town on Earth who live their entire lives on the default settings, never realizing they can customize everything. Don’t be one of them. Don’t settle for the default settings in life.

Find your loves, your talents, your passions, and embrace them. Don’t hide behind other people’s decisions. Don’t let others tell you what you want, or what you are capable of. Explore the unknown! Test the limits! Design YOUR journey every step of the way. The life you create from doing something that moves and excites you is far better than the life you get from sitting around wishing you were doing it.

3. The willingness to do hard things makes life worth living.
If you want a job, be ready to work. If you want a relationship, be ready to work. If you want a family, be ready to work. If you want happiness, be ready… To learn and earn and give and grow, NOT just want and have and take and show.

Truth be told, one of the most important abilities you can develop in life is the willingness to accept and grow through life’s challenges and discomforts. Because the best things are often hard to come by, at least initially. And if you shy away from hard work and discomfort, you’ll miss out on them entirely. Mastering a new skill is hard. Building a business is hard. Writing a book is hard. A marriage is hard. Friendship is hard. Parenting is hard. Staying healthy is hard. But all are amazing and worth every bit of effort you can muster.

4. Daily kindness is a beautiful legacy to leave behind.
Some people will be kind to you. Some won’t. Be kind anyway.

Through kindness you have the ability to make a profound difference in every life you touch, including your own. When you guide somebody who is lost and confused, when you hold somebody who is sad and grieving, when you hug somebody who has lost all their hope, you too will feel yourself healing and growing stronger.

So just keep reminding yourself that you will end up terribly disappointed if you expect people will always do for you as you do for them. Not everyone has the same heart, strength and inner resolve as you. No matter what has happened, or what happens today, let kindness be your superpower. Being extra kind to people is a peaceful way to live in each moment, and a beautiful legacy to leave behind in the long run.

5. Everything will change again, faster and sooner than expected.
Nothing lasts. Everything changes. Day to day is a winding journey.

As human beings we are constantly outgrowing what we once thought we couldn’t live without, and falling in love with what we didn’t even know we wanted. Life literally keeps leading us on journeys we would never go on if it were up to us. Don’t be afraid. Have faith. Find the lessons. Trust the journey.

You will gradually learn that nobody gets too far without losing somebody they love, something they need, or something they thought was meant to be. But it is these very losses that make us stronger and eventually move us toward future opportunities. Embrace these opportunities. Enter new relationships and new situations, knowing that you are venturing into unfamiliar territory. Be ready to learn, be ready for a challenge, and be ready to experience something or meet somebody that just might change your life forever.

(MARCANDANGEL).

In The Final Analysis, It Is One Life We Are All Given

Nia Vardalos once said ‘You only get one life so you might as well make it a happy one, and that's why I tend to just jump into things. I'm sort of a fearless idiot that way.’ It is a cliché which we have heard from time immemorial that life is short. But how many of us actually live our day to day lives like we’re really going to die one day? Aware that this thing called life is fleeting, and more importantly, a non-rehearsal.

Many of us live lives filled with tedium, responsibilities, and unpleasant chores. We spend so much of our mental energy just getting through each day that it’s easy to forget that our time on earth is finite, that each moment we fritter away is a moment we will never get back. This is a reality that though many are aware of, has not really sunk in.

Everything you desire in life has a price and you have to be willing to accept that price. If you desire to do great work, it will cost you. Likewise, security and comfort will cost you. If you want a luxury apartment with a wrap-around sectional couch in leather with stainless steel legs, it will cost you. In the same vein, there is a cost for not living your life to the fullest. Days will be drudging and hardly rewarding if you live this way. It is important that whatever career path you take in life, you don’t lose your spark and adventure.

There is an avalanche of literature that preaches on the need to be careful in life and lead a conservative life. The real question, however, is what is the price of throwing caution to the wind? Often time, it is not as huge as your mind or people will make you believe. However, to not do is to never know. It goes without saying that there is a plethora of people who had the Facebook ‘kind’ dream before Mark Zuckerberg, who conceived the blogging pattern before Linda Ikeji, and the list is endless. The difference is that Mark and Linda did something, understanding that it is much more rewarding to fail and try than to have done nothing, to have never ventured.

Taking a creative risk and stepping off the status quo treadmill requires bravery. It demands embracing risk, and fighting the good fight to face your fears of financial doom without bailing at the first sign of discomfort. The discomfort is just a test. In Bert’s Commencement Speech titled ‘Define Your Own Success and Go Against Life’s Comfort Zone’ he made a striking remark “First, “cool” is way overrated. Cool is a filter that allows inhibitions and prevents you from doing what you REALLY want to do because you feel you’ll be judged. I never got on a dance floor when I was younger for fear I’d be laughed at. I married a woman that loves to dance and I now wonder how many memories I’ve lost by not sharing a dance floor with the woman I love most. Every time you allow cool to win, you cheat yourself of living life to its fullest on your own terms. Which brings me to this. Live life to the fullest on your own terms. Pioneer your own way. Trail blaze your unique path. Others’ social rules can’t apply to you because none of us have the same DNA. Go against what’s popular. Be brave enough to be questioned because you went against life’s comfort zone.”

If you ask me, the best way to start living each day to the fullest, and the best way to live life to the fullest, it is to live your life from the end. To contemplate deeply on the truth of impermanence and to admit to yourself that “What is born will die, what has been gathered will be dispersed, what has been accumulated will be exhausted, what has been built up will collapse, and what has been high will be brought low.” ~ Sogyal Rinpoche. Because only when you understand that you have a limited time here on this Earth and only when you admit to yourself that you’re not going to live forever you will start to live each day to the fullest… loving and appreciating yourself, your life and the world around you and making the best of everything life has to offer you. We only get one life. Don’t spend it all at work. Forget working 24/7 and giving 200%. Be great at your job but try things that are outside of work too. An adventurous life is a life well spent, because 15 years from now when you look back over your life, you will regret more the things you didn’t do, than the things you did. The opportunities you allowed go by, the kind words you left unspoken, the places you didn’t visit, the hobby you didn’t pursue, the adventure you didn’t explore and the family time you didn’t spend are all the kind of regrets that can come with always playing it safe. It is true that we only have one life but if we live it to the utmost fullest, it should well be enough.

Randy Pausch, in his 2008 Carnegie Mellon Commencement Speech made a fitting admonition “We don’t beat the Grim Reaper by living longer, we beat the Reaper by living well and living fully, for the Reaper will come for all of us. The question is what do we do between the time we are born and the time he shows up.”

(Culled from my book ‘The Path Less Travelled’ https://www.amazon.com/Path-Less-Travelled-Reflections-Learning/dp/1540663507v ).

10 Hard Things to Remember When You Feel Like Giving Up

1. In the space between “I’ll try again” and “I give up” there’s a lifetime. It’s the difference between the path you walk and the one you leave behind; it’s the gap between who you are capable of being and who you have become; it’s the legroom for the fairy tales you’ll tell yourself in the future about what could have been.

2. There is no success without unrelenting love. Love is the foundation of human progress. Don’t give up on it. Instead, love what you do, until you can do what you love. Love where you are, until you can be where you love. Love the people you are with, until you can be with the people you love most.

3. Putting in extra love and effort—doing the hard things—is always worth it. Because those are the things that ultimately define you. Those are the things that make the difference between existing and living—between knowing the path and walking the path—between a life of mediocrity and a life filled with progress and fulfillment.

4. The most powerful weapon against immediate stress is our ability to choose one thought over another. Train your mind to see the silver linings. Positivity is a choice. The happiness and effectiveness of your life in the long run depends on the quality of your thoughts today.

5. Being positive doesn’t mean ignoring the negative; it means overcoming the negative. There’s a big difference between the two, and it all starts with your thinking.

6. Life will take things from you, and give things to you, gradually and continuously. It’s funny how we outgrow what we once thought we couldn’t live without, and then we fall in love with what we didn’t even know we wanted. Do your best to embrace life’s uncertainties as they arise. Some of the best chapters in your life won’t have a title you feel fully comfortable with until later. Don’t give up too soon.

7. The petty drama of an average day doesn’t need to get the best of you. Be selective in your battles. You can’t control how other people receive your energy. Anything you do or say gets filtered through the lens of whatever they are going through at the moment, which has nothing to do with you. Just keep doing your thing with as much love and integrity as possible.

8. When your marriage, parenting, faith, etc. gets tough, it’s not an immediate sign that you’re doing it wrong. These intimate, intricate aspects of life are toughest when you’re doing them right—when you’re dedicating time, having the tough conversations, and making daily sacrifices.

9. Hard situations build strong people. You may have seen better days, but you have also seen worse. You might not have all your wants, but you do have what you need right now. You woke up with a few aches and pains, but you woke up. Your life may not be perfect, but it is good. And more good things are coming down the road as long as you keep moving forward.

10. Inner strength, courage and love don’t always sing out loud. Sometimes these qualities are merely embodied by a deep breath and a soft whisper at the end of the day that says, “I’ll try my best again tomorrow.”

(MARCANDANGEL).

Nigeria on the Crucible

It was Theodore Roosevelt who once said that 'There comes a time in the life of a nation, as in the life of an individual, when it must face great responsibilities, whether it will or not. We have now reached that time.' The time Roosevelt refereed to is so apt that failure to act has the potency to plunge the next generation into despair.

It is cliche that there are so many issues bedeliving our nation today. It is also true that we are a people forged by perennial and untold hardship, that have made us resilent; too resilent in fact, that it has toiled with our collective senses.

Amidst the heightened political climate, the nation celebrates her 58 years of independence. With only two years to it becoming six decades of self rule, we find ourselves singing the same song, grappling with familiar spirits and contending with ominious signs. Beyond the political hysteria of the PDP potential presidential candidate, the chronicled travails of Ambode in Lagos politics, the intrigues of the just concluded Osun governorship election and the many political sub-plots across various states, this is the time to purge ourselves of sentiments, maintain a clear head and show an unadulterated conscience. It has been said and not without reason that politicians are at the bane of our national plight for many years. Nigerians must refuse to be blind acolytes to any political stalwart or flawed interest. We must speak up and act, away from the comfort of tweets and Facebook posts. There comes a time when what is needed is not just rhetoric, but boots on the ground. Everyone must take a position, realizing that the hottest places in hell are reserved for those who in a period of moral crisis maintain their neutrality. For there comes a time when silence becomes betrayal.

The elites of society must also snap out of their docility, for to think one is rich in the midst of squalor is delusional. The story of Nigeria's increasing poverty populace is one that should give the so called middle class and elites sleepless nights. In today's Nigeria, the inequality gulf is so sharp and wide. The very rich live side by side with the very poor. This is a time bomb. For one day when the poor has nothing to eat, he will eat the rich.

To end with the words of Martin Luther King Jnr, 'There comes a time when one must take the position that is neither safe nor politic nor popular, but he must do it because conscience tells him it is right.' In the final narrative, Nigeria does not need new heros. We have had and still have enough of them. What is required is for us to recover our collective senses, accept the home truth that we have been passive and ruled by petty interests for too long, and act to change the tide. The 2019 general elections provide us with an opportunity.