REV. Sam Adeyemi said: ‘’You will only shine in the area of your gifting.’’ Everyone has been given an innate gift to do something unique that no one else can do; everyman is gifted for something. The core purpose of education should be to discover one’s gifts and talents as early as possible.

One of the most famous stories of the supremacy of gift is that of Adolf and Rudolf Dassler. The evolution of modern sportswear brands started with these two uniquely gifted German boys with no formal education, but with gifted hands.

Rudolf and Adolf Dassler started as cobblers (shoe makers), making sport wears from their mother’s kitchen after the devastating end of the World War I. They started out making bedroom slippers using scavenged materials, such as used tyres, old helmets and rucksacks.

Adolf, a sports fanatic, began transforming the slippers into lightweight gymnastic and soccer shoes with cleats. The brothers first sold a shoe made specifically for tennis players, and then began creating shoes for other sports. Their journey to international limelight and global recognition came during the 1936 summer Olympics in Berlin, and the Olympic Games gave them a platform to equip Jesse Owens of United States of America (U.S.A) with their wears.

Jesse Owens ended up winning four gold medals in the year he wore, Dassler’s magic shoes, which later became the brand called Adidas.
Adidas was incorporated in 1948 by Adolf Dassler following the split between him and his elder brother, Rudolf Dassler. Rudolf later established PUMA, which was registered in 1949. Adidas net worth was $18 billion as at January 2022, second only to Nike ($35 billion) while PUMA came fifth with a revenue of $5.1 billion. It is amazing how the story of Adidas and PUMA evolved from a woman’s kitchen with two young kids with nothing but gifted hands. The former brand slogan of Adidas symbolises the limitless possibilities in human gifts –‘’Impossible is Nothing.’’ Imagine what the world would have missed if the young kids never had the right environment to develop their gifts and talents!

As a parents, if you wish to give your child an unusual edge in life, you will have to create the right environment by sticking to the following:
• Give Them A Platform To Be Themselves: Parents should avoid the temptation of forcing their children to fit into their own design but rather provide them with a platform to stand out with their uniqueness. The greatest gift parents can ever give to their children is to provide them with a platform to be themselves. Parents are meant to nurture the uniqueness in their wards. Many parents already have a script that they want their wards to fit into for their own selfish interest. They obsessively try to control their children and dictate how they are supposed to live their lives. These parents want to live their lives through their children, neglecting the fact that those children have their own lives to live. As parents, we must prepare our children for their future instead of using them to correct our own past.

•Help Them Nurture Their Gifts And Talents: Every child is uniquely gifted. Our work as parents is to nurture the individuality and uniqueness in our wards and not to beat them into the shape or picture that we have in our minds. The world is in a dire need of kids that can solve problems with their gifts and talents. We have the responsibility as parents to nurture their uniqueness.

• Don’t Allow Their Schooling To Hinder Their Education: Most of the skills that will help a child survive in life are not found in the classroom! Albert Einstein once said, “Education is not the learning of facts, but the training of the mind to think.” Most schools don’t teach children to think or to be creative. Creativity and ‘thinking’ skills are only found in the way a child interacts with life’s challenges and disappointments. We must endeavor to give our children ample time to do other things that are not school’s homework and assignment. Their vacation periods must not be studded with academic activities alone. Let them travel, learn a new skill, go to orphanage homes, and do some volunteering activities.

• Find A Mentor That Can Help Them: Every child needs someone they can look up to. Children are in a dire need of models and mentors. Zig Ziglar once said: “A lot of people have gone further than they thought they could because someone else thought they could.” What a child will ultimately grow up to become is a deep reflection of the values passed down to him/her from the parents and mentors. Children don’t need critics; they need models and mentors.

• Give Them Exposure In Their Areas Of Abilities: The greatest form of disability is not knowing our abilities. We should discern our children’s areas of strength, their unique abilities, and help them build it. We should give them the exposure that is needed in those areas. When we discover a child’s ability early and help them build it, we give them a unique edge in life.

• Monitor, Don’t Manipulate Them: The greatest parental sin and abuse is to manipulate our children to live a life that is not theirs. As parents, we must prepare our children for their future instead of using them to correct our own past. Wanting our children to be who we should have been is a waste of who they are. Instead of manipulating your children, celebrate their giftedness and uniqueness; the easiest way to destroy their uniqueness is not to celebrate it.

• Don’t Skip Processes For Them: The process validates the products. Don’t help them skip difficult processes; it is actually part of what is meant to form them. You can’t help your child skip the basic process of life and expect them to live a fulfilling life. What many parents fail to realize is that the more we help our children avoid facing their own challenges, the more we make them unfit for the future. Hellen Keller said: “A happy life consists not in the absence, but in the mastery of hardships.” We need to have strong faith in the processes of ‘evolution’ of our children. As an entrepreneurship coach, I have discovered that when process is sabotaged, the product becomes inferior. In like manners as entrepreneurs, parents must value ‘processes’ in child’s development or else the result will be inferior adults.

Any education that does not teach us to discover, nurture and develop our gifting and uniqueness is a waste. We need to redesign our educational sector in such a way that it allows for the nurturing of individual gifts and talents. The best form of education is the one that helps you to discover, develop and deploy your gifts and talents to solve problems around you. Until you discover the gifts and talents within you, you will be unable to solve the problems around you. There is a special link between the problems that you have been called to solve and the discovery of your gifts, find it!

Our work as parents is to nurture the individuality and uniqueness in our wards and not to beat them into the shape or picture that we have in our minds. We are responsible as parents to help our children discover their gifts, use their unique abilities, unravel their hidden talents, and help them fire up their passion.