Thomas Yeka Manase – Assessments

As A Man Thinketh
Assessment by Thomas Yeka Manase (Sudan)

1. What is the main idea that the author is trying to convey in the book?

The main idea that the author is trying to convey is the idea of adventuring and also the idea of discovering and also how to make an extra ordinary achievement for the benefit of the whole community. The author also quoted the very important aspect of how to be a successful person in life by treating all situations by flexibility or understanding of solving them. one thing that came to my mine is the relation of the whole history with the biblical history of Jonah which is mostly about disobedience as the nature of human being who disappoint God, because God has instructed Jonah to God to Nineveh to take a message of obedience, message of trustworthy and message of hope and so forth to people of Nineveh, but because of human nature and lack of self confident and self interest Jonah decided to take different direction which is he went to Tarshiah instead. Therefore on his way to Tarshiah God show Jonah how weak human being is, very big storm came to the boat and Jonah started realizing his mistake and he told the crew on the boat please throw into the sea meaning to die and big fish swallow him where he stayed for three days inside the fish until he confessed and the fish vomit him out and from there he followed the instruction of God. Jonah later puts into his mine that God is gracious and merciful, slow to anger and great kindness and you relent from the destructions.

2. What were the seven ideas which were personally most important to you and why? List these seven ideas followed by an explanation after each one as to why it was important to you use personal examples from your own life.

i. As a man thinketh in his heart so he is – this comes as the result where your are read within the community base on the way you behave which community concluded that this is what you think, because no one implement what he does not think about.

ii. Mans mind may be likened to a garden, which may be intelligently cultivated or allowed to run wild; but whether cultivated or neglected, it must, and will, bring forth – because the garden is where you can harvest your food and it is through your mind that you can make your life and others easy

iii. The body is the servant of the mind – without healthy body, the mind will not have good opportunity of coming out with good or talented thoughts. Healthy environment gives out healthy body which gives out healthy mind which gives out healthy thoughts and it will manifest success.

iv. Until thought is linked with purpose there is no intelligent accomplishment – this is in fact very important in life to always to ask you why I want and to come up with purpose which is on the ground. When men link his thoughts with purpose, it will give out remarkable and outstanding results which will be of great importance to all mankind.

v. All that man achieves and all that he fails to achieve is the direct result of his own thoughts – it is indeed the reality to certain extend that achievement does not come from nothing, it is directly how you think, plan and exert you’re in how to make it or put it to success. When he did not put his/her thoughts properly automatically it will resulted into failure which will reflects his thoughts and action. a strong man cannot help weaker unless that weaker is willing to be help, and even then the weak man must become strong of himself

vi. The dreamers are the saviours of the world – this is because in life, you will not do something without dreaming about it, first you will think about it and you have to start building it in order to come into reality through so many techniques or approaches. to dream of something is easy but how to put it into reality it need exerted effort and determination as such you can see in the world, the world is not balanced due to the fact that other parts of the world dreams and implement because they will exert much effort to convert it to reality to but others dreams and expecting others to put it to reality to them. Your vision in the promise of what you shall one day is, your ideal is the prophecy of what you shall at last unveil.

vii. Calm and peaceful – this is in the sense that human being should be quiet and vigilant in the sense that it will not fuel any problem which will create favourite environment which will engulf all inhabitants by the virtue of being human being. Calmness and peaceful environment will be a result of good thinking and harmonious binding. The strong, calm man is always loved and revered. he is like a shade-giving tree in a thirsty land, or a sheltering rock in a storm.

3. How will these ideas or lessons help you in a practical way, both in your daily personal life and in helping you to create a better world? If so, how?

These ideas or lessons helped me in several ways which it let me how to approach people at level of life. And also it makes me to revisit my life style and stories to which I was involved. It has make me to be a good listener to which an element of concentration in answering someone to certain degree of talking is the concern of the day and the foremost the self esteem and self control is neither of the great importance to the build up of the youth to be a cadre in the today and tomorrows future. In life as a whole, mission, vision and objectives are the fundamentals of the beginning of how to corp up with the day to day’s affairs in the world which has the involvement of the thinking capacity. Creation of the better world which human security is the business of the day. Therefore to make the world to that expectation, first there is need to plant the spirit of self reliance to the nationals at the world’s nation base on their way of orientation. People should have the habit of self respect and respect of others to reduce the rate of violence, imposition of ideologies through violent way must be stop, it has to be base on free will of people. Agricultural revolution should be the active and basic idea in the mine of all people. Birth control methods have to be preaching to people to accept it willingly without any imposition etc.

4. Quotes: Are there any statements which the author made that particularly got your attention? If so, please quote them and comment as to why they were important to you.

The quotes are:

v Law, not confusion is the dominating principle in the universe, justice not injustice is the soul and substance of life; and righteous, not corruption is the molding and moving force in the spiritual government of the world – it is the rule of law which engulf all the basic human rights.

v A man may be honest in certain directions, yet suffer privations, a man may be dishonest in the certain directions, yet acquire wealth, but the conclusion usually formed that one man fails because of his particular honesty, and that the other prosper because of his particular dishonesty – this is to the fact that human being is not complete is his life style.

v Man is always the master, even in his weaker and most abandoned state; but in his weakness and degradation. He is the foolish master who misgoverns his ‘household’ – man always dream that even if he is in desperate condition he is still the master.

v By the right choice and true applications, man ascends to the divine perfection; by the abuse and wrong application of thought, he descends below the level of the beast – when man ascend it is the results of his determination and his/her labour and honour.

5. Is there anything in the book that you do not understand or are there ideas which you disagree with and, if so, why?

I disagree with this quotes which state that, ‘A man is not rightly conditioned until he is a happy, healthy and prosperous being; and happiness, wealth and prosperity are the result of a harmonious adjustment of the inner with the outer of the man with his surrounding”. Yes I disagree with this in the sense that sometimes it will take you by surprise that you will find yourself in a happy life, you are prospering and having good wealth and health.

6. Did the book contain exercises for the reader to complete? If so, did you complete all of the exercises and did you find them helpful?

Yes the book contains a lot of exercise which is not a direct exercise but exercise that you need to understand certain statements which are of great value to the whole concept of the book. They are helpful in the sense that its increases the thinking capacity. The honest man reaps the good results of his honest thoughts and acts; he also brings upon himself the sufferings, which his vices produce

7. Was there anything you read in the book that you would like to comment on that was not covered in the previous questions? If so, please comment.

There is only one that I have discovered; it says ‘many men are the slaves because one is oppressor’. This situation happens when mostly people are in military.

Rating
A. How interesting was it to read? 10
B. How helpful were the contents? 10
C. How easy was it to understand? 5
D. Would you recommend it to others? 10
E. What is the overall rating you would give it? 10

 

 

Jonathan Livingston Seagull
Assessment by Thomas Yeka Manase (Sudan)

1. What is the main idea that the author is trying to convey in the book?

Jonathan Livingston seagull is trying to correlate the two stories of flying in the sea and the flying in the air which are so significance in the sense that there are two stories which need one understanding of a person who always like philosophical and theoretical understanding of understanding which interpreted the real life and theoretical life as concurrent activities which requires high level of thinking and life in making. It is important to discover the mistake as human being and it is also importance to put things you like as human being; as human being we would all know that decision making is most importance in the sense that when you decide, let your decision accumulate all understanding that builds up human beings at all circumstances which are the contributing factors of the world. For example Jonathan of the biblical time is trying to tell us that God is a dictator in his decision, when he said all human being must abide with whatever comes from him, since we are born of his image. Because at that time god told Jonathan (Jonah) to go to Nineveh to fulfil God mission, Jonah reputed by diverting to his own mission until God became angry with him and he was punished until he was swallowed and he happened to recognized his sins and he was spit out by the fish after three days of being under his mercy, where in the earth you are swallowed by any living things that are movable and you have survival there for three days and night and event in any living things stomach there are activities which are biologically related to each other. Also God is trying to show to us as human beings that we should respect his command and all of us are living his own mercy. Therefore his mission is a heavenly mission and nothing always interpreted.

2. What were the seven ideas which were personally most important to you and why? List these seven ideas followed by an explanation after each one as to why it was important to you use personal examples from your own life.

i Think positive expansion, not self – preservation.

This is important for you to eliminate procrastination in the starting your projects and enjoying them after you have embarked on them. What will I gain when I succeed in this? This is term as positive thinking. The opposite is; what will I loss if I do not succeed in this? This self preservative thinking. Self preservative thinking will always lead to focus on fear and pain resulting in generally being ineffective in living.

ii Focus on confidence, not mistakes.

This is the situation whenever you take a positive action; you have taken an act of confidence. Therefore there are people out there who would not dare attempt that act. But rather focusing on the mistakes or failure, it is healthy to always remind yourself that the mistake or failure was a result of the confident act and should not therefore be something to regret. Instead focus on praising yourself for acting confidently in the first place.

iii Think investment rather than sacrifice.

These situations happened at two circumstances when you said you are sacrificing means you are suffering for that cause. But when you investing it give the impression that the future benefits will be far greater than the value of the resources being put in now. And also by sacrificing it means something negatives.

iv Understanding that challenges are a reflection of corresponding opportunities.

Each opportunity you are going to have in life wills challenges related to it. In other words, any role that you will have in life will have its own challenges. challenges have something positive about them in that they are things that call you to take action to resolve them while problems or suffering are things that are perceived to be there to cause you trouble rather than to point you to solutions. Do not refer to your challenges as problems as this will lead to development of a negative altitude and dampening of morale.

v Self reliance.

You do not need to have everyone’s confirmation or approval for you to be happy with what you are doing. Rather all you need is use the widely accepted code of conduct (such as biblical principles) that guides you. Lack of self reliance is an unhealthy belief and it says something like this “I must have the approval of everyone I think is important before I can be happy about any given thing that I am”. Example of this is since fifteen years of age I was staying alone I decide things the way I look un to it, is very good. Up to now I am successful in life.

vi Freedom of choice.

Always in life you need to have a positive altitude about anything, you need to believe that you have freedom of choice about it. That is believe that you are in it by your own free will and you will let it go if you wanted it to go. This carries the same example of above idea.

vii Reconciling contradictory ideals.

This is the broader way and more flexible model for solving a particular problem by simply combining the contradictory ideas into a common model or approach. You can take all the causes as valid and show why they actually are not opposing points and hence end up with a broader model.

3. How will these ideas or lessons help you in a practical way, both in your daily personal life and in helping you to create a better world? If so, how?

Past life regression is the belief that we are eternal souls who are reincarnated each time our physical bodies die. As eternal beings, we carry forward our lessons learned, experiences, desires, and needs from one lifetime into the next. I have believed that I am rebirth; I choose the current ideas for living. By getting the answers to ‘What happened in my past life?’ I can understand why I am here today. What did I face in my past life’ will help to heal old wounds, lead to success in the present; guide me into making the right career choices, aid in forming relationships with friends and partners and will give me a deeper sense of self in all that you do. Look at all the patterns and images that emerge when recording dreams and meditating as this will open the door to previous past life memories that you may not have dealt with in forever. While you may consciously wish to retrieve knowledge about ‘Who was I during my past life’ there are those individuals with an irrational fear that a past might be filled with sins or evil deeds and have unconsciously buried the memories as a result. all this memories will help me creating peaceful and secure world.

4. Quotes: Are there any statements which the author made that particularly got your attention? If so, please quote them and comment as to why they were important to you.

The quotes are:

Poor Fletch. Don’t believe what your eyes are telling you. All they show is limitation. Look with your understanding, find out what you already know, and you’ll see the way to fly. This is very real because when you concentrate on your eyes you not see the future very clear instead you will keep backbiting those whom your eyes are seeing but when you look with your understanding simply your mind you will be able to progress. You will play a greater role in putting the world safer place for all.

The other quote is that the hardest thing in the world is to convince a bird that he is free and that he can probe it for himself if he just spends a little time practicing? Why should that be so hard? This one is very significance.

5. Is there anything in the book that you do not understand or are there ideas which you disagree with and, if so, why?

The quotation in the book which says “who is more responsible than a gull that finds and follows a meaning, a higher purpose for life? For a thousand years we have scrabbled after fish heads, but now we have a reason to live – to learn, discover, to be free! Give me one chance; let me show you what I have found. This statement is so complicate that I was unable to understand it. It sounds like self center rhetoric of self interest neither rhetoric of people’s center of people interest.

6. Did the book contain exercises for the reader to complete? If so, did you complete all of the exercises and did you find them helpful?

Yes the book contains a hell of exercise which needs someone to think properly to understand the philosophy of the phrases and the ideology behind doors. The idioms that are fixed here in the whole sentence were very important which need someone to think or crack his/her mind properly to understand the is stipulated.

7. Was there anything you read in the book that you would like to comment on that was not covered in the previous questions? If so, please comment.

There is nothing that can at the moment.

Rating
A. How interesting was it to read? 10
B. How helpful were the contents? 10
C. How easy was it to understand? 5
D. Would you recommend it to others? 10
E. What is the overall rating you would give it? 10