SON OF MY FATHER By Tosin Olukuade

This book was given to me as a gift by the author - Tosin Olukuade. I was so elated when he told me he was going to post a copy of his book to me. I looked forward to reading it as soon as it was delivered, but work schedule and preparation for school resumption got in the way.

Having gotten those out of the way, I decided to read this book and it was a humbling experience flipping through each page and filled with awe at how blessed the author is to have a father as his. I think I sensed the burden Tosin must have felt trying his best to fit his dad's larger than life description into a 83 page book. After reading it, I make bold to say his Dad is living a life worthy of emulation.

It was his dad's dream to one day write a book about himself and he shared this with his son Tosin who took it upon himself to fulfil his father's desire. Amazing and noble are words that comes to mind in trying to describe how incredible it is for a son to do his best to see that his dad's dream comes to reality.
Over this past weekend, I watched some interviews Micheal Jackson granted during his lifetime and a common occurrence in all of these interviews were details of how he was physically and emotionally abused by his dad. He recanted these details with pain in his heart. That realisation that a famous man like him had a traumatic childhood was saddening. So it was refreshing and heart warming that in this era of dead beat dads, someone can write a whole book about the awesomeness of his dad.


This book comprises of ten chapters, eight of which were dedicated to attributes associated with the author's Dad, one chapter dedicated to his mum and one for the author - where he described the influence his dad had on him and their unique Father and son relationship.

In the first chapter titled His Fatherhood, Tosin starts this book by giving a few definitions of a Father and these ones stood out for me

One who performs the office of a parent by maintenance, affectionate care, counsel or protection

A father goes beyond giving birth to a child only.

Fatherhood, a state of being a father is a lifelong responsibility

These definitions ought to be written in bold letters and handed to men all over the world. I have come across a lot of dead beat dad who should just be called sperm donors and the sad reality is that they demand the type of respect accorded to men like Tosin's dad when they clearly do not deserve it.
The author's dad is a man of the robe and at no point did he forsake his immediate family because of his role in the church and I think that is how it should be - family first.

Tosin gave in clear details an incident that happened when he was young. He was involved in an accident, his dad was in a middle of a meeting while it happened and as soon as his dad heard, he asked to be excused and rushed to be by his Son's side. If I had read that part before the advent of social media, I would have said - kini big deal? Is that not how a father should behave? Social media has however, revealed a lot to us about some men's perceptions about their roles as a father and to most dads, it is a big deal.

The author also wrote about his dad's faith and I must say I found that chapter very touching. He spoke about his mum's battle with asthma, vivid details about himself and his siblings battle with ailments and how his dad was able to cope with all of them through prayers and faith. His siblings and himself are all well and doing great.
The author described his dad as an hospitable and loving man who opened his home to all and sundry in a loving manner. The author attributed that to his dad's deep understanding and knowledge of the Bible.
I have heard elders talk about good names and I must say the chapter titled the good name in this book was enlightening.
A good name is better than expensive perfume and the day you die is better than the day you're born.
The statement above lends credence to the fact that we all as humans should live a fulfilled and purposeful life so that our deaths can be celebrated.
In this chapter, Tosin wrote about branding in relation to a good name while connecting these two with a verse in the bible. That was insightful. He also wrote about a heart warming experience he had with an old student of his dad.

The author also wrote about his dad's love, humanity, Bishoprick, the awesome relationship between his dad and mum, Himself and his dad. The last chapter were beautiful tributes from people across the world to his dad. One word that was repeated across all the tributes was the fatherly love he showed to all these people who were not even his biological children and that is awesome.

The second to the last chapter titled His Word, His Son. I sensed the pride the author must have felt as he penned down words of gratitude and prayers to the man he proudly calls father. He also wrote about the impact his father's life has had on him and his siblings over the years.

He ends the chapter with this proud statement - My name is OLUWATOSIN OLUBAYODE OLUKUADE and I am the son of my father.

I recommend this book to everyone and most especially to men who desire to have a positive impact and influence on their children. This book will inspire you to live a life worthy of emulation.

Hearty Cheers to Tosin's Dad and other awesome Dads around the world. You all are doing great and doing your part towards making this world a better place!!!

The Breakthrough Experience Book Review By Dr John F Demartini

This book, to a large extent is bound to blow your mind, dissect life mysteries into small parts and break it down for easy understanding. It is that good. It is a book and workbook that has the tendency to put things into perspective and make one to be of service to the universe.

It aims to teach you how to make your dreams come true, how to love and be grateful for every thing life throws your way, reawaken the true genius in you and helps to transcend fears and illusions concerning death.

If I have to summarise what I learnt from this book in very few words, it will be to LOVE, get WISDOM and be filled with GRATITUDE.

Dr Demartini started off this book by writing about his childhood, His first grade teacher told his parents that he had learning disability - left hand dyslexic and he will never be able to read, write or communicate normally, she advised that his parents enrolled him into sports because she wouldn't expect him to do much in life. First of all, I was shocked by what this teacher said and I think it came from my perspective of being a mum. Why use such words to describe a child because he is different from the other children? I mean she was not even an expert on learning disabilities but chose to predict his future in such clear negative terms!!!

Anyway, Dr Demartini went into sports as advised and when he was 14years old he travelled away from home. In the course of his journey, he met a man who he describes as his first mentor, he told him "Never judge a book by it's cover" and "You learn to read boy. You learn how to read cause there's only two things that the world can't take away from you: your love and wisdom. They can take away your loved ones, money and just about everything, but they can't take away your love and wisdom"
I hope this resonates with someone, It is important to read, to be knowledgeable, Ignorance in 2016 isn't bliss at all. Love is the greatest gift of all. When you love, you get to be kind, tolerant and emphatic. Imagine how this world will be if everyone loved one another.

It's amazing how that encounter changed his life, today he is an author of several life changing books and a Speaker. It is not surprising that love and wisdom is the core of this book and he describes "Love and wisdom as the essence of life"

The author describes gratitude as this simple principle, yet it has the power to change your life. Gratitude is key to growth and fulfilment.
He went on to give an analogy - If you were to give someone a gift and they just looked at it and tossed it away without giving thanks, would we be inclined to give them another? My answer to this was NO!!
Well according to Demartini, the universe behaves like us on a grander scale. The universe will not give you more gifts if you are not grateful for what you have being given.

He also wrote about divine order. Everything that happens is a vital part of the divine order even the most terrible events are part of a divine order and they contain hidden blessings. He went on to say the masters know this and are unperturbed  by events while those with lesser wisdom swing from elation to depression as they move through positive and negative experiences on their way to understanding

Well I guess I belong to the class of those with lesser wisdom as I tend to swing through all sort of emotion depending on what I am going through and I sometimes doubt that everything that happens especially the bad things was part of a divine order, I am unable to wrap my head around it. Spiritual and religious leaders have often lend credence to that school of thought and on some level, it is most likely true. He added that It takes a well centred person to see the good in every bad occurrence and the bad in the good ones. He made an interesting analogy about balance in the universe. If something bad happens somewhere, something good is happening somewhere else to enable balance in the universe. When I read that part, I was like can bad things please stop happening? Evil occurence gets scarier by the day.

Greater wisdom recognizes that blessings can also trigger a crisis. When we truly understand that, we are less likely to be upset about difficulties or elated about opportunities; we remain centred no matter what.
Now being balanced or centred according to Dr Demartini does not mean being optimistic or  pessimistic, he had a word for it, it is being - gratefulism - and that is both wisdom and true power.
The moment when we realise that we have everything we need to be fulfilled in life and we are truly grateful, we have awoken to the true power of gratefulism

This book is not one to read in a hurry and I am sure I will read it again. There were times when I had to ponder about powerful statements from this book for quite a while. One of them was
Have you ever read or listened to something and gotten tears in your eyes and feel inspired? Those tears are an infallible clue that something meaningful and important for you is being revealed

I pondered on this for a while and tried to think back to moments like that in my life and I found one distinct moment. I honestly can't remember the full story but with the little I remember, I hope you get to understand my point. In summary, I watched a video on Facebook in 2015, a lady talked about the power of prayer and she gave a testimony of how prayer turned a situation around for her, the details are a bit hazy, I am sorry. This video was so powerful and inspirational. It made me cry, I got down on my knees and  prayed. My prayer lasted for say 20 minutes and I felt a burden lifted off me. I knew something good was about to happen, but could not pinpoint what exactly. This was what happened to me.
Few weeks before I watched that video, I attended an interview for a job I really wanted in a big organisation. I was called the next day to say I didn't get the job. I was heart broken and somehow depressed. Exactly two weeks after I watched the video, I got a call from that same woman who interviewed me to say they have a similar job opening in another department and it's mine if I was still interested. I cannot put into words my feeling after that phone call, it seemed like a dream, but it was not, it was REAL. It did happen.
After reading that statement, I decided to start recording moments like Dr Demartini described in writing. I need to pay attention more.

The author also wrote about secrets of an inspired life and I must say, I can relate to the first secret
Living an inspired life requires mastering some skills, one of which is the ability to ask yourself inspirational, meaningful questions. To me, this simply means the act of self reflection in a positive way that is bound to make you feel inspired not make you second guess yourself. He gave an example, if you say to yourself  I'd like to do that, but how can I when I don't have money?
This question, according to Dr Demartini creates a mind set that you can't without even trying. He however added that, that same question should be asked in a more positive way that gives power to your word -like this  How can I do what I love and be magnificently paid for it?

Human beings live a life of duality. There are two sides to everyone - good and bad side and we cannot live our lives without experiencing the good and bad of life's experiences. This I agree to a large extent and Dr Demartini claims that the Quantum collapse process which he describes as a systematic series of predetermined questions and actions which brings presences and certainty to your mind and gratitude and love to your heart " helps people to appreciate both sides of their lives. Now the example he gave made me ponder for a while.

He gave an example of a lady in the Canadian Justice Department who disagreed with the notion that all human beings have good and bad sides. she gave an example of a very evil man in the prison and she can't think of any good side the man has. The Quantum collapse process made her see that she is as evil as the man as someone has once committed suicide because of words she said to this person.
Now I had to think about this for a while, too many bad things are happening around us, terrorism, kidnapping and all other evil things. To think that a person who goes into a crowd with an intent to bomb that place and kill people also has a good side, is something I was unable to wrap my head around, hard as I tried.

This paragraph below was a food for thought for me
Everybody has two sides. if you're honest, you'll see that you are both a saint and a sinner, virtuous and vicious. So when someone accuses you of something, don't waste your time defending yourself. Instead admit that you are in fact possessor of whatever it is they're attacking you for. Not only are you possessor, but they are too, and they're judging themselves; that's why they are accusing you. If it hurts to hear it, that means you haven't seen how that quality serves you or others and you're judging yourself. Their gift to you is to wake you up to another part of yourself that you haven't yet loved.

In explaining about human duality, he added that We have a part that lifts us up and another that puts us down.

He concluded that "We're not here to judge another person; we're here to love." - I whole heartedly agree with that.

As it is with humans, Love is also made up of two sides; support and challenge. Another definition of love by Dr Demartini that puts the above statement into perspective is Love is a perfectly equilibrated, divinely ordained state of consciousness that's available to you 24 hours a day if you just balance your mind and don't let it go off all emotional illusions.

He went on to explain that supporting someone can make them dependent and challenging them can make them strong and independent, so I believe to function well in the universe we need a bit of both as Nature won't allow anything but equilibrium.

Looking for elusive, one sided events in a two-sided universe is the root of people's so called suffering. This was an Aha moment for me as it resonated with me.
He is not by any means insinuating that we should do away with negative events and embrace positive events, he is just saying we need to appreciate both events and know that they are necessary. He added that all phenomena are universally full quantum and it is impossible for there to be such thing as happiness without sadness or vice versa

This paragraph about love blew my mind.
Love is a full quantum state. Physicists know that a full quantum state is massless, charge less, space less and timeless, which by definition is spiritual and unconditional. Consciousness is light and it comes in full quantum state. God is full quantum light.

This simply means to me that God is love.

He also wrote about relationship. The purpose of relationship isn't happiness, it is a combination of happiness and sadness which makes up fulfilment. He added that It takes one to attain a certain level of wisdom to understand the above statement. This to me means that any relationship that does not give anyone fulfilment should either be looked into with the intent improvement or do away with.

Dream is in the detail, now I love this part. Demartini asked questions concerning our dreams, and dreams here does not mean what we see while sleeping. It refers to our goals and desires. Are you clear about what you love? Do you see it in so much detail that when you close your eyes, you can't see your life in any other way than that?
If you are able to see your goals manifest, if you are able to have the conviction in your mind that what you think about always is your desire, you begin to exhibit the power to make your dreams come true. This reminded me an episode of The Oprah Winfrey Show I watched, where Jim Carey (Actor) was a guest. He spoke about the power of visualisation, he was able to visualise the first cheque he received before he got the Job. Jim Carey added a statement after talking about the power of visualisation, that was funny but true. 'You don't just visualise and go have a sandwich, you get to work'.

Visualisation and dreaming in detail to me is the same principle. There is power in our thoughts.

I love this quote by The Upanishads
you are what your deep driving desire is
as your desire is, so is your will.
as your will is, so is your deed.
as your deed is, so is your destiny

At the end of this chapter, there was an exercise, one of them is to meditate on your dream for few minutes a day. I started doing that, he also advised that you write down your dream, and everyday take at least one action step towards achieving your goal - this means don't just write your goals down and go eat a sandwich.

He also wrote about life after death, he claims that after we die we take another form and although this is in contrary to my belief as a Christian, I gave it a good thought. I am yet to arrive at a conclusion.

This book also consist of affirmations, exercises and a quantum collapse work book designed to make the reader get more clarity about his or her life.
This book gave me clarity to a large extent especially on embracing everything that comes my way and not see it as an attack but an opportunity to refine and expand myself as opposed to feeling depressed and being in a self pity state.

It also consist of miracles Demartini performed.

I learnt this as well, We are over 7 billion people in this world and we were created for a unique purpose, this book will bring out the genius in you, open your eyes towards the fact that everything you need to live a fulfilled life is available for you to use.

What I know for sure now is that practicing  Love, wisdom, and gratitude are important towards self and spiritual awakening.

This Book is for you, if you are interested in self awareness, spiritual awakening, finding your purpose on earth and actualising them. It is intriguing, insightful and inspirational.