There was once young man whose dream was to fly an aircraft. Being unprivileged to secure enough funds to get through aviation school, he ended up cleaning aircrafts as a menial worker at the airport; the closest he could get to his dream.

One bright afternoon, he entered an airplane’s cockpit to clean. Laying right there on one of the pilot seats was a small handbook, with the most beautiful title the young man had ever seen inscribed in front ‘How to fly an airplane’. He hesitated for a moment, then picked up the book. He got even more excited after opening the first page and discovering how comprehensible the book was. He was going to fly!

He started to follow the instructions, and being quite a smart young man, he got the plane airborne in a little moment. Strapped to the pilot chair, he let out a lung deep shout of joy. A long-awaited dream comes true! After a while, he remembered that he was only a cleaner and not a pilot. The pumping adrenaline subsided, and he decided it was time to land. He flipped to the next page for instructions on how to land a plane, and right there on the page he found written, ‘For Instructions on how to land a plane, purchase volume 2 from any nearby bookstore’.


Knowing with precision the end of an endeavor before the beginning is in the domain of God. However, as humans, we can venture into the task of seeing the end of an endeavor before we begin and this is a critical part of accomplishment. Many people (myself inclusive) have abandoned books we started writing in very high spirits, given up on businesses we were so enthusiastic about starting, and forgotten about projects we would have sworn that we wouldn’t. What went wrong? Critical among other factors is that, we saw the beautiful beginning, at times, we even go ahead to fantasize and imagine a beautiful end. Then phew! Off we go without more, like the young cleaner in the story.


by Ayowole Olotupa-Adetona