more about Thomas Sankara.

In the fall of 1986, Captain Thomas Sankara made a one-week state visit to Moscow. It was his first visit to the Kremlin three years after he became president of Burkina Faso, formerly known as Upper Volta.

During that official visit, which started on October 6, Sankara and his delegation were invited by their host counterpart to visit a number of impressive historic sites—including museums, agricultural machinery factories, breeding farms, racetrack, racing jockeys, to name but a few.

Sankara met with activists of the Union of Soviet Societies for Friendship and Cultural Relations with Foreign Countries. Accompanied by twice Hero of the Soviet Union cosmonaut Georgy Timofeyevich Beregovoy, he visited the Russian Cosmonaut Training Center and congratulated everyone that was working there.

He planted a tree in the Alley of Friendship, visited the Office and Apartment of Lenin in the Kremlin, and laid wreaths at the Lenin Mausoleum and the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier. Needless to say, Sankara was very impressed by all he had been shown.

After he had bowed before the statue of Gagarine and signed the guestbook, the tour was now over and it was time to say goodbye—or rather that’s what the Soviet delegation thought. But like a stand-up comedian who has kept his audience long enough on the edge of their seats in anticipation of a good punchline, Thomas Sankara jolted the Soviet delegation with what could easily be considered as a crazy, overly ambitious statement:

“No, comrades! Wait a minute! It can’t be over just like that! I mean, Everything you’ve shown us is great! And we are really happy for you. We congratulate you on this scientific progress you’ve made. And I look forward to seeing all prowess being put at the service of the world. Yes! When all that scientific potential is put at the service of humanity, it will be really beneficial. But I have one request to make of you, comrades: two places! Yes, in your cosmonauts training program, you must include two places to train Burkinabè! We, too, want to go to the Moon!”

The audience exploded into a hysteria of laughter and thunderous applause. They were certainly amused, but not Sankara who insisted:

“We want to go to the Moon… Who knows! Maybe there are some interesting things there on the Moon, or else you wouldn’t have gone up there. We, too, want to go there and see for ourselves whatever is there. Our representatives will come back and tell us, ‘Here is what we can get on the Moon. It’s good, it’s cheaper, etc.’ We want to go to the Moon! So, let’s our cooperation in that area start right now. And we are serious about this. We mean business! We want to send Burkinabè people to the Moon. So, there will be the Americans up there, there will be the Soviets, a few other countries, but there will also be Burkina Faso.”

This anecdote confirms a well-known fact about Thomas Sankara: he was an iconic, likable leader with a sharp—and sometimes wicked—sense of humor who often made puns. But it contains an invaluable life and personal leadership lesson that is worth sharing with the world: The virtue of dreaming bold dreams, and the necessity of putting others first in our quest for success or greatness.

The size of your dream is directly proportional to the image you have of yourself

“We, too, want to go to the moon!” I’m sure when the Soviet delegation heard these words, they nearly passed out. They must have thought, “Are you off your rocker, Mr. President? Are you crazy? Have you forgotten who you are—the leader of a small and poor country?”

But when you really stop and think about it, you can easily understand why it was quite natural for Sankara to make such a “crazy” request of his Russian hosts. After all, it had always been Sankara’s dream to be a crazy person. Yes, he had always wanted to be one of those madmen who not only have the courage to embrace nonconformity as a lifestyle, but also see it their duty to invent the kind of future they desire for themselves:

“You cannot carry out fundamental change without a certain amount of madness. In this case, it comes from nonconformity, the courage to turn your back on the old formulas, the courage to invent the future. Besides, it took the madmen of yesterday for us to be able to act with extreme clarity today. I want to be one of those madmen.”

So there truly is nothing unusual or strange about Sankara’s statement. Why? Because you cannot purport to be a madman and still go on doing what “normal” people do. That’s right! You cannot invent the future unless you march to the beat of a different drummer. You cannot cannot accomplish anything significant if you continue to follow the beaten track.

In other words, you cannot change your life, let alone the world, if you continue to dream ordinary, puny dreams. You’ve got to dream big. Dreaming big dreams is the hallmark of those who understand their own value. And those who understand their own value (or self-worth) are those who not only believe that they deserve more in life but are also ready to settle for nothing less than what they believe they deserve in life.

It’s a bitter truth, but too many people walk through life convinced that they don’t deserve much. And you can tell by the kind of language they often use: “I can’t believe I made it to the final stage of this contest!” … “I can’t believe I got the first place award!” … “I can’t believe I got admission to this prestigious school!” … “I can’t believe I got hired by this famous company!” … “I can’t believe my company gave me a raise, a promotion!” And on and on.

Listen: If you happen to be using these expressions, I recommend that you delete them from your everyday vocabulary. Now and forever. Why? Because every time you utter such expressions, you are saying in fact that you do not deserve such favors.

The truth is, if other people deserve them, why not you? Is there anything wrong with you? Is there anything that makes you not qualified for a pay raise, a promotion, a first place award? I mean, quit belittling yourself! Stop pretending to be surprised by your self-worth. Wake up and shake off the idea that God has created you to occupy an inferior place in this world.

Remember where you came from: the Creator of the universe who made you in His own image and likeness. The moment you accept yourself as being made in the image and likeness of the Creator of the universe, that’s when you’ll realize that settling for less is choosing to be a disgrace not only for yourself, but also for your Creator.

Yes! The moment you accept the fact that you are in no way any more special or distinct from any other human being, then you will accept the equivalent fact that you have a right to the favors and blessings the King of the universe can bestow on any individual of the human race.

Once you understand that you are as valuable as anyone else, then you will accept the fact that you have a right to dream the biggest dream a human being can possibly dream. This is not synonymous with comparing yourself to others; rather, it is a refusal to settle for less when you know deep down that you deserve better.

As it is often said, life functions based on a simple principle: You don’t get what you desire. You only get what you think you deserve. And what you think you deserve is what you negotiate. And in case you didn’t know, life is all about negotiation. Yes! Whatever you’ve got so far and wherever you are right now is the result of a series of negotiations: your grades in school, your career, your social position, your marriage, your relationships, your successes, your failures… Everything!

We all have prayers we wish could be answered positively and immediately. We have goals, aspirations, and dreams we want to see accomplished as soon as possible. And all that’s good. But too often, instead of dreaming big, we do just the opposite. Instead of striving for excellence in all that we do, we are happy just doing the bare minimum.

I believe that God couldn’t have been clearer when He said: “Ask and it will be given to you; seek and you will find; knock and the door will be opened to you.” Yet, every time we ask God for something, we are afraid to ask big. As if asking big would inconvenience God. We ask for small favors and sometimes with no conviction that we’ll receive them. What we often forget is that we will never receive more than what we ask for. In other words, we will never get more than what we negotiate with the Universe. Jessie Belle Rittenhouse expressed that so well in her poem entitled “My Wage”:

I bargained with Life for a penny,

And Life would pay no more,

However I begged at evening

When I counted my scanty store;

For Life is a just employer,

He gives you what you ask,

But once you have set the wages,

Why, you must bear the task.

I worked for a menial’s hire,

Only to learn, dismayed,

That any wage I had asked of Life,

Life would have paid.

The message is very clear: Whatever you ask the Universe with conviction, you will receive it. As His children, God is actually waiting for us to ask Him whatever we please. He is in fact saying to us what He said to His anointed: “You’re my son, and today is your birthday. What do you want? Name it: Nations as a present? Continents as a prize? You can command them all to dance for you.”

I’ll never tire of saying this: You’re not an ordinary creature; you’re an extraordinary creature made in the image and likeness of God, the Almighty and Most Generous of all. You cannot have such a generous Father with infinite resources and still go around making insignificant requests of Him. I mean, when you ask the Universe for something, there is no such thing as humility.

Whoever you are, you are commanded to have God-sized dreams. Yes, you must dream big. You must dream big because it’s always better to have an impossible dream than no dream at all. You must dream big because the size of your dream is in direct proportion to the image you have of yourself. You must have dreams that are way bigger than yourself because our ancestors are right: “The tree that is not taller than you cannot shade you.”