LESSON NUMBER THREE: NET WORTH OR NETWORK?
Deep down in the minds of many people, is the desire to be successful and to them, that means to be very comfortable. A man’s net worth is the economic value of all he possesses excluding debts or liabilities. So to be successful (comfortable), they strive to increase their net worth – by reading to excel, taking trainings and generally getting higher paychecks – while avoiding careless expenditure.
Although that is good, there is something better, which would yield much more value – our network. Many popular sayings inspire people to work and walk with others if we want to go far in life. I would like to add that our sphere of influence is more valuable than our net worth, to a high degree.
In Engineering, Network refers to the interconnection of nodes and links via wired or wireless media, for the purpose of communication and resource sharing. Our network could mean the people or groups who are connected to us, who influence us and whom we influence directly and indirectly. When there is a break in the network, communication would not be successful.
Therefore, for our network to be reliable, network management must be ensured to avoid congestion, security breach, failure and other ills. We need to be deliberate about the associations we keep close for their influence would go a long way in determining our success in life. Their influence could hamper our growth in certain regards or shorten our learning curves when they provide valuable nuggets for our life’s journey. We must also keep in mind that “a chain is only as strong as its weakest link”.
LESSON NUMBER FOUR: REGENERATORS AND AMPLIFIERS
Regenerators are devices which help to reproduce signals at certain points in a network while Amplifiers increase the power of a signal to prevent attenuation (fading). As signals travel, they weaken (due to increasing resistance) and get distorted. Hence, regeneration and amplification are necessary if viable signals should be obtained at the receiving end.
While simple amplifiers only improve the power of the weak and distorted signal, regenerators have circuitry which is capable of correcting distorted signal such that it looks like the original signal repeated at another point of transmission. Both devices are germane in assisting the transmitted signal on its journey successfully.
Once again, I would do some parallelism. Let us say the amplifiers are our friends, loved ones and “hype” folks who support us with everything they have, so that we are at our optimum each time we leave them. They increase the power of our impact (signal) by making us, summarily, happy.
Then, the regenerators would be the faith groups and goodwill (professional and moral) societies. These organizations serve to inspire productivity, correct errors and refresh us for renewed and greater impact as we journey in life. Both amplifiers and regenerators are very important and we must not joke with them if we want to travel far and arrive successfully at our destinations.
To be continued…
What do you think?