Can we do it alone?

Introduction

Hello there and welcome to my 4th blog post. If you’ve made it here I’m hoping you’ve been able to read my previous posts. If you haven’t, you can do so by clicking here. I promise, they are well worth the read.

Without further ado, would you help? This title is both a personal interest and probably an interest to many others. In this blog post we will be exploring a question; ‘can we do it alone?’

We will be going through

1. My personal experience
2. Does the Bible say anything about collaboration?
3. Things which contribute to lack of collaboration 
4. Tips on how to begin collaborating

My experience

In my 5 years of running Atusaye Boutique on and off, something important stood out to me. No one was willing to assist, even though payment was included. When I had an open conversation with one of the people I had been pursuing to work with concerning the lack of assistance; they mentioned that many people in the sewing industry were afraid to help because they thought that they were going to make other people lots of money while they felt under appreciated.

I continued to struggle finding someone to assist with sewing and eventually realised that I could start applying what I learnt in sewing school myself, which meant that I was now working alone and had lots of work pilling up on a daily; even though I understood that delegation and team work was important and enabled me to concentrate on other duties which included finances, sourcing material, brand strategy, content planning and more; I found myself working alone.

This caused me a lot of tension and frustration because in reality, I couldn’t run everything myself; which massively contributed to the on and off operation of Atusaye Boutique.

Does the Bible say anything about collaboration?

We are one body with many parts is a summary of how the Bible explains collaboration; all working together with one end goal. Simply put in Biblical words, 1 Corinthians 12:25-26 in the MSG translation reads that “The way God designed our bodies is a model for understanding our lives together as a church, every part dependent on every other part, the parts we mention and the parts we don’t, the parts we see and the parts we don’t. If one part hurts, every other part is involved in the hurt, and in the healing. If one part flourishes, every other part enters into the exuberance.”

What 1 Corinthians 12:12-27 means to me

With this interpretation, we will be looking at how as individuals represented in the form of different body parts is reflected in 1 Corinthians 12:12-27 in the NLT translation and what the excerpt makes us aware of:

1. Many people can make up one whole 
2. We are all created by One God 
3. Thinking we are insignificant does not make us not belong
4. It’s against norms to be alone
5. There should be no feeling of self importance/pride
6. Feeling insignificant doesn’t annul or make your role less important
7. People who are deemed less than are indispensable 
8. Extra honour and care are given to people who have less honour
9. Honourable people don’t need special treatment

In other words we are all equally important and as per Kingdom Principles people who need special treatment are the one’s who have less honourable positions/roles in society. How God wants His people to live is the opposite of what the norms are in the world.

When pondering upon the written word of God, I couldn’t help but notice and really relate to 1 Corinthians 12:25-26 (NLT), “This makes for harmony among the members, so that all the members care for each other. If one part suffers, all the parts suffer with it, and if one part is honoured, all the parts are glad.”

Of course things are sometimes better said than done, I for one relate to that. I had lived my life in solitude for a very long time. When I was transitioning from being a lone wolf to a team player, there were things I noticed contributed to resisting collaboration. I will be listing some below. You are welcome to add more points in the comment section below.

Things which may contribute to lack of collaboration

Most of us go through many bad experiences which end up preventing us from growing or working with others. I have only mentioned a few things which may contribute to our lack of collaboration and I am sure that there’s more to mention and explore, however, for this weeks post we will be touching on fear and trauma.

1. Fear

• Fearing that other people will get there before you do
• Fearing that your ideas will be stolen
• Fearing to be taken advantage of

2. Trauma

• This point may be summed up by unexpected or expected life events which may induce the inability to trust people due to past experiences like betrayal, hurt or pain

Tips on how to begin collaborating

What I have learnt and adopted to understand is that all things happen in God’s timing and His way. The person whom I should be working on is me, aligning my will with His will, receiving His unending Grace and live under His peace. This allows me to pray about things before attempting to achieve them, it allows me to work and improve my skill set bearing in mind that we are not born to be or survive alone; we are all many parts which form One Body; Jesus Christ.

How to begin collaborating

1. God first

• He is our firm foundation
• Trust His timing
• Allow Him to become the potter and work on you

2. Heal

• Forgive yourself 
• Forgive others
• Seek therapy or help regarding trauma, pain or hurt from professionals like Psychologists or Councillors 

3. Read the Word

• The most available voice of God is His written Word, reading it helps us know and eventually be able to identify His voice
• God’s will for our lives is written all through out scripture  

4. Pray

• Give people a chance, before shutting someone out because of fear or caution, pray about it and ask God to lead you
• Dedicate time to pray about your life
• Praying and asking God to help you with identifying a pattern in you which allows toxic people in your life helps

5. Try again

• Begin to trust, even at a slow pace
• Understanding the we all might have been hurt at some point in our lives gives us the insight we need to work hand in hand with empathy

Conclusion

Most of us want to grow, we have dreams and goals we want to achieve, however, no matter the company or entrepreneur, we can never do it alone, one person can’t be buying the groceries, cooking the food, serving the food, cleaning up, reconcile the books and design the leaflets. At some point, we need assistance, we need to be able to delegate or we will burn out, or fail at what could have been successful.

A building can never be built by one, but by many, this is a principle that can lead to growth and achieving your goals.

To be able to begin to collaborate, we need to learn why we hesitate doing so, whether it be hurt or pain. Upon realising the resistance, we are able to begin healing and apply tips which help us to move forward and start building together.

Do you still think you can do it alone?