I want to share another poem from my archive, written as a youth. It’s all about life, and I assure you, it’s not necessarily everybody’s truth. Remember that to each his or her own, as one man’s heaven is a next man’s hell.
Envy not a man’s success, because you never know the things he gave up or even sell. I have seen the wicked growing old and flourishing like a big green bay tree. While the righteous dying young and perishing and losing their liberty.
Is the world system all about money? Well, from the beginning of time, humans worked for sustenance. The wife stayed in the house and kept the home because it was dangerous outside. The man went out and brought back food for the household. With time, there was a need for transactions. A group of people seem to have an abundance of some goods and a complete lack of others. Both parties agreed on the value of goods being exchanged. This began the concept of the monetary system.
As civilizations began to take permanent shape and populations became denser, governing bodies created a legal tender to cater for commerce. I’m not here to tell you the history of money. Long story short, humans now work basically for survival. Both man and woman step out the door in search of monetary gain. Yet, families barely take three square meals daily. What has happened to society?
Mom and Dad wake up early in the morning for work and come back late at night. This doesn’t make sense. We work for the money we don’t have to gain a life we lose in the search for money. You will find kids who grow up with parents in the same house but they barely know each other on a personal level. The kid must learn hard to find a good job in future. Dad must work hard to get promoted and earn more. Some fathers measure their worth by their ability to cater for their family financially, yet they don’t have time to build a personal relationship with their children.
Kids are not allowed to chase their dreams and goals because apparently, that industry does not guarantee financial stability. We are even choosing courses for people based on income, wow. There are some who are simply religious because they don’t have enough. Once they have enough money to rely on, that’s their release clause from religion. People would rather marry a rich guy they don’t like than a poor guy they like as if we can determine who will still be rich in future. In some countries, old people can’t even afford to die, literally. Funeral bills are so high that they will crush the family expenses. Some pulled the plug for their mother and father to die because it was eating up all their financial gains.
We say rich people have rich weird diseases but that’s not really the case. When your family cannot afford the healthcare for your illness, it’s bye-bye for you. It’s the rich people who can continue living on medication. Go to hospitals and see desperate mothers negotiating with doctors who cannot possibly do anything about the situation. More people die due to lack of financial aid but no one takes note of such statistics. Imagine doctors and nurses who aren’t paid their worth. Now they look inhuman when they go on strike or refuse to cater for patients who can’t afford the bills.
As aforementioned, people on the brink of survival act instinctively. We are slowly losing our humanity because of monetary gain? Not necessarily. At the instinctive level, human behaviour and animal behaviour are very similar. When you reduce people to survival, they become instinctive. There won’t be enough room for compassion for others. Many are equally dying due to medical negligence because medical practitioners are not comfortable consistently looking with compassion at dying patients.
In urban design, we don’t mix the community of the rich with the poor. The poor will build more resentment toward the rich. As a result, rich neighbourhoods keep on looking “fly” while poor neighbourhoods look like slums. See, when you’re always broke there are very few things in life you care about. Sanitation is definitely not one of them. This explains why poor countries always look filthy and vice versa. With comfort comes the luxury of thinking. Imagine telling a man with a nagging wife and three kids in the university not to walk on the lawn. There are more important things in his life to worry about.
Whenever I walk through town, I see it on every face. It’s the face of survival. It’s not about chasing after money, but about surviving for the day. It makes almost everyone slightly irritated, a consistent complainer and a little insensitive to strangers. That tomato seller has two kids in Nursing Training School. Don’t let the iPhones of the kids fool you. You are annoyed because she is selling in the middle of the street? Don’t you think she knows that it’s dangerous? Don’t even talk about the beautification of the streets because she doesn’t care. All she cares about is making it through the day for another day.
When you’re poor, it is easy to blame the system on rich folks. Poor people believe so much in progressive tax. They don’t see why we should all be taxed the same. The richer you are, the more taxes you ought to pay. In reality, it is more difficult to stay rich than to stay poor. To stay poor, do nothing. To stay rich, you need to beat the system. The system is tougher on rich people than on poor folks. As such, rich people lose more of their humanity in trying to stay rich.
It will shock you to know what you will be willing to do to survive. It will shock you, even more, to know what you will be willing to do to become rich and stay rich. To me, this is one of the major reasons why this life is hard. Not just because it’s all about money. It’s because if you don’t run, the system will overtake you and you’ll become miserable. The monetary value of goods and services inflate and deflate but the standard of living is always increasing. It’s almost like the system is forcing everyone to chase after money. If you don’t run, you can’t even survive.
I throw the question to you? Why is the world system all about money? Is the world system all about money in the first place? Is it a good thing or a bad thing? Can something be done about it? Let me know your thoughts.
The pastor said we should pray to God to bless us financially. Mom said I should work hard in school so I can make a fortune for myself in future. The “financial” Motivational speaker I follow on IG is saying otherwise. Who’s right and what’s right? What Makes One Wealthy? God, Hard Work or Wisdom?
From observation, I know for sure it’s not speaking in tongues and attending prophetic conferences that make one rich. Most of the wealthiest people in the world are not even Christians in the first place. Most of the prayerful people I know too are not necessarily rich. In fact, they seem to struggle with their finances. Let’s face the facts. So God is out?
When it comes to hard work, I know for sure that’s what they always say. “How did you become wealthy, O wealthy one?”. I worked hard. It’s all about hard work. Cut the bullshit. You were born into wealth so let’s stop pretending. The richest people in the company do the least work. In fact, their wealth is based on how hard their employees work.
Hard work used to work once, I guess. In our world today, it’s about working smart. The first-generation wealthy guys are those who worked smartly on a very simple idea. So it’s wisdom, then? Because wisdom is just an ancient word for working smart.
So what makes one wealthy? Not God because pastors and Christians are poor? Not hard work because CEOs don’t stress but employees work their asses off? Is it wisdom? I don’t think so. There are foolish rich people, just as much as there are wise poor folks. Wealth is not necessarily a measure of how wise someone is.
So even though wisdom is better than strength, those who are wise will be despised if they are poor. What they say will not be appreciated for long.
Ecclesiastes 9:16 NLT
Those who think God maketh rich think it has nothing to do with hard work. Those who think it’s hard work think it has nothing to do with God or religion. Yes, some wealthy folks when asked will tell you it’s only God. The real assumption lies in the fact that we think since one has God, one has material wealth. This makes people sceptical.
If it’s only God, then why are so many Christians poor? Why are the so-called worldly people rich and wealthy? Then there are God folks who will make you feel like wealth doesn’t even matter. Dude, if you wanna be poor, be poor in peace. Stop spreading your poverty mindset.
So what makes one wealthy? In my opinion, it’s very bold of us also to assume that making wealth is about having one of the aforementioned ingredients. That’s my opinion. What do you think? Let’s hear you in the comments.
If there is one thing that is forever relevant in the world system, it is finances. Throughout human history, legal tender has changed. The complexity of the legal tender always reflected the monetary system put in place for financial transactions to be possible. However, the need and relevance has barely changed; only evolving with time.
Gone is the generation where the woman only stays home to take care of the house while the man goes out to work for sustenance. In our world today, for the family to fluorish financially both parents step out the door for work. This has brought about new challenges on coping with finances.
In this life, realize that sitting to think about a situation before venturing into it is the best way to tackle that situation. Thus, this write-up is really necessary for singles and young couples. Trust me, if you don’t plan beforehand what you’ll say when – for instance – you go for an interview, what you’ll do when you are broke etc, you can end up embarrassing yourself or making an avoidable wrong decision. Even thieves plan what they’ll do when they are about to get caught. You hope for the best, yes: but do plan for the worst.
Here are 3 outlined things I have come to understand about this issue;
1. Each one ought to have their own money
As a couple, the idea of doing everything together sounds romantic. Actually, it’s not always realistic. You are not two halves making a whole. You are individuals coming together as a couple. So you need to have a life of your own, complemented by the life you share with your partner. In simple English when it comes to finances, have your own money. Don’t put all your money together.
If you put your money together, if you’re broke you’re broke together. Yet, if you had your own money separate from the one you had together, one can be broke for a season and be supported by the other. In this way, you fulfill the reason for being a couple.
Two people are better off than one, for they can help each other succeed. If one person falls, the other can reach out and help. But someone who falls alone is in real trouble.
Complement each other. Divide major expenditure brackets among yourselves. As a man, I will take care of the car. As a woman, you take care of the rent. So once payday is due, everyone knows what they are taking care of. It could even be in percentages. As a man, I will take care of 40% of the school fees while the lady takes care of the 60%. There is no formula to this. It does not need to be rigid or fixed because circumstances change often. It really depends on the level of understanding between the two of you.
Compromise, don’t compete. Usually, men feel inferior when their partner makes more money than they do. It feels like the woman would get to make more vital decisions in the relationship because of how important finances are. That notwithstanding, your partner is your helper and not your competition. You are not trying to beat them. You both are coming together to face life. So you need everything you can get, including extra cash from a richer spouse.
3. Understand your financial personality
Depending on how we were brought up and the coping skills we picked along the way, we tackle finances differently. We can however group everyone under two main umbrellas. “Saving-oriented” and “Spending-oriented”. Proverbs 13:7 says “some who are poor pretend to be rich; others who are rich pretend to be poor.”
It’s human nature to “waste” resources once there’s that feeling that there’s more than enough resources available. This is because human wants are insatiable. Immediately you get enough money, you tend to feel more comfortable and begin to spend on your insatiable wants. That is natural.
Nonetheless, there are people who develop a saving-oriented attitude towards money. They are slow to spend, critical of the amount they have at the moment and barely buy out of impulse. The Spending-oriented easily releases money, doesn’t count until it’s almost finished and usually don’t know how their money run low so fast.
A couple who are both Spending-oriented is a disasterclass. They will end up spending three-month salary in advance. When both are saving-oriented, it’s bad in a different way. Ask them rich kids who look rich but aren’t allowed to spend rich. They are so rich yet live so poor. Proverbs 13:7 is so true.
Thus, identify your financial personality as a couple. Who likes spending? Who has cultivated a unique habit of saving? Who doesn’t count the cost until the money is finished? Who has so much money but still lives within their initial budget? Understanding who is what creates the balance both of you need. After all, coming together as a couple ought to strengthen your strengths and weaken your weaknesses. Where one falls short, the other is a suitable helper.
I hope you’ve learnt so much from this. Please leave a comment. I would like to hear from you. Speaking of finances, this website is monetized so please do well to like and share to any platform you know would help. I love you ❤
One anthem of the older generation is how the youth of today are morally bankrupt, how the world has changed for the worse and how life was better back in their days. It looks like, with each passing day, something new comes up to remind us of how worse everything is getting. Global warming, war threats, political unrests, heat waves, natural disasters, well-planned genocides, unforeseen suicides, widespread homicides, poor healthcare, corrupt governments, stagnant education systems, rampant kidnapping, “debatable” rape cases and yeah, your best friend’s bad breath.
Everything on the news is telling you how things are going sideways. Is it? Mean world syndrome is a cognitive bias that makes people perceive the world to be more dangerous than it is. Did you experience some sunshine? Took a deep breath? Smiled? The world is not dangerous after all, is it? Nonetheless, there are a lot of dangerous people in the world. The average person walks by a murderer 36 times during their lifetime. You didn’t even notice they were murderers, did you? Some even smiled at you. Thinking about it is even creepier. That’s what the news does all the time.
News is always about something bad, someone dead, someway somehow. Imagine the news only being about the good stuff? Won’t it be amazing? Actually not. It is not the fault of any news agency to feed us bad news all the time. It is because of how the brain works. Studies have shown that the mind is negatively biased and thus, people pay more attention to bad news than good news. Trust me, bad news accounts for about 80% of the reason why we think the world is getting worse.
This is actually not a surprise to anyone but, anything you hear happening today had already been happening. Wars? Pandemics? Rapes? Killings? Collapsing systems? It is not that they are rampant today. It is just that you have a higher chance of hearing about it today. In times past, messengers had to travel long distances to send any news to neighbouring cities. Today, Twitter alone can tell me how North Korea is flexing their muscles on the rest of the world.
Don’t long for “the good old days.” This is not wise.
Ecclesiastes 7:10
In other words, the world has pretty much been the same for a long time. There are just periodic abrupt changes for the good or bad, but things go back to the normal cycle of life; birthing, living, dying. Don’t get me wrong. I’m not pretending that the world is any better than it is supposed to be. What I’m saying is that there are no “good old days”. The world is getting better at a similar rate of it getting worse. The possibilities are high for both extremes. When the world improves – for example, the divorce rate drastically reduces – unless you are pretty much concerned about it, you are most likely not going to hear about it.
Let me give you vivid examples of how the world has gotten better;
Global life expectancy has more than doubled in the past century, rising to an all-time high of 72. Back in the 17th century, people lived to be about 35 years max. 25 years, in the 13th century. Today, we say life begins at 40. In 1800, nearly half of all children died before the age of five, but today that figure has fallen to less than 4%. Due to high advancements in medical research and technology, each individual has learnt to take good care of themselves and go for medical treatment when sick instead of leaving it to the “god of health”. Don’t let anyone lie to you that the older generation used to live long. That’s only true because the younger generations are still young. Young people die since the beginning of time. It didn’t start today.
More wealth has been created in the last four decades than in all of human history before then. Almost everyone was poor when Jesus walked the earth. It was only royals and officials who had all the wealth. Just 200 years ago, 8 in 10 people still lived in extreme poverty. Today it’s fewer than 1 in 10. Not just that. As the second of the UN’s 17 SDGs, the chance to completely wipe out extreme poverty increases with each day. From my phone, I can donate to the UN to help feed poor families in deprived countries.
Download ShareTheMeal app on your smartphone today
War, disease and natural disasters now claim fewer lives than at any point in human history. Two centuries ago, 88% of the world’s population was illiterate; now only 10% of the world is. I don’t even want to delve into technology and how it has changed the ballgame for generations to come. An average smartphone user now has more information at their disposal than the US president had 50 years ago. Until man went to the moon, we didn’t know we were destroying the ozone layer. No one cared about anything like that until the 1970s. Today, sustainability is the talk of many industries seeking to leave the world better than we found it.
How about the COVID pandemic? When the world had a pandemic in the 14th century, years went by without anyone identifying the cause of the disease. The Black Death wiped out cities. People were left dead on the streets for months. Many saw it as a curse from the gods. When COVID arose, in about 4 months the whole world shut down for the pandemic, knew its name, its causes and ways of spreading. Under normal circumstances, vaccines take 10 to 15 years to develop. In under one year, COVID vaccines were ready. The world has resumed and almost everyone is taken precautions.
People used to talk more about the end of the world and impending doom for so long for many centuries that people actually looked forward to the world getting worse. Today, people go about their daily lives, not being superstitious and idly waiting for the world to end, though they have it at the back of their minds that it can end soon. Remember, the world keeps getting better and worse at the same time. However, many don’t want to hear that it is better than it used to be.
All I am asking from you, O reader, is to leave a place better than you found it. Let the world be better because you are in it. Make someone’s life better. Make your environment better. It will make your life better.
Don’t worry. We will talk about it getting worse as well 🙃
The first time someone really close to me died was in 2005. I had lost my grandad. I wasn’t particularly sad. I was alarmed. “So I won’t see him physically again?, So that’s it? He’s gone? Is that all?”. 19th August, 2005. My grandad was gone. After the final funeral rites and all, life went on as if my grandpa never existed. All his stuff was quickly sent out the house. His favorite radio was no longer valuable to any of us. All the things he treasured meant little to us. Even his bed was taken away.
You see me now, but not for long. You will look for me, but I will be gone. Just as a cloud dissipates and vanishes, those who die will not come back. They are gone forever from their home— never to be seen again.ò
Job 7:8-10 NLT
The next set of questions came running through my mind. I did realize that my Dad, Mom, siblings and friends were not going to here forever. Everyone is the last person in their lifetime to die. Each death causes so much pain, so much disdain, so much havoc to so many families no matter how peaceful the death was. They rest in peace and leave the rest in pieces. Soon we too will be gone. Will our life be meaningful to those we leave behind?
What really is the essence of life? Have you ever asked yourself that? What is the essence of life? Is this all there is to life? The sad part about asking this question is that it only comes to mind when we are down, aggravated, tired, weary, dry, suffering, contemplating and reminiscing.
Life is simple yet very complicated. Life is short yet it lasts for eternity. Life is hard though we smile easily. Life is tough yet it is so tender. Life is dear and priceless yet it demands a lot of sacrifices. Life is unfair yet it serves karma on a hot plate. Life is unpredictable yet we catch glimpse of the future.
There is no life without death and there’s no death without a life. What makes me alive? Aside the heartbeat and breath, what makes our heart beat faster and takes our breath away? What do we give our life to? What kills us within? What do we do with our lives? What do we live for? What will we die for?
“Everything is meaningless,” says the Teacher, “completely meaningless.” Keep this in mind: The Teacher was considered wise, and he taught the people everything he knew. He listened carefully to many proverbs, studying and classifying them.
Ecclesiastes 12:8-9 NLT
Is living worth dying for? Is dying worth living for? How long till our bones are weak and our strength is gone? How long till I die at the hands of that unforeseen circumstance? How much time do I have left? How long till I’m long gone? How long is too long?
Life is but a breath. Life is breath. What gives me oxygen? What deoxygenates me? What drains me? What have I drained myself into? What have I given myself to? What am I doing? What am I? Am I my own life? Or I’m living my own life? Or my life is not my own?
If only you knew how glorious your future is, you wouldn’t be perturbed by the prevalent winds of the present. If only you knew how glorious your future is, the past would remain what it really is; the past.
One mistake we often do is pick our present static state and put it in a dynamic future context. Why wouldn’t we be so anxious?
Hard times make us appreciate the good times. Sad times gives us the experience of learning to do things at the right times. It’s not that we only tend to appreciate things when we lose it, but that we can only understand fully in retrospect.
That is why it is necessary to have a testimony. Testimonies are prophecies of possibilities. Have you been through a difficult time where you thought you had hit rock bottom but somehow you came through?
If only you knew how painful giving up is, you wouldn’t have made it an option. It’s better to do your best and fail than to have never tried. There are some things that a person must learn on his own. A person grows up when he is forced to overcome hardships. The best in us will never be revealed until we have come between a rock and a hard place.
Some things don’t change while others always do. Some things will change no matter what you do. Others will never change unless you do something. That is why you must never see “giving up” as an option when it gets so hard. Don’t allow your mind to tell your heart what to do. The mind gives up easily. The mind resorts to our instinctive most immature self when we are hard-pressed.
Let the convictions of your heart be the decisions of your mind. One reason people resist change is that they focus on what they have to give up, rather than what they have to gain. The minute you think you wanna give up, think of the reason why you held on so long.
At the end of the day, it’s not only going to get better; you’re going to get better. If only! If only you knew that one day you’re going to look back and be grateful that you didn’t give up, you’d work so hard to bring out the best in you.
Every relationship begins on a “honeymoon” phase. The feelings are so heightened and the love for each other is so heartfelt that we tend to overlook our partner’s flaws. Every shortcoming is taken lightly. Any misunderstanding that shoots up is swiftly swept under the carpet by reminding ourselves of how madly in love we are with each other. Yet as time goes by, friction starts to come into play. We all are never perfect so our flaws, mishaps and insecurities are soon exposed in our relationships. That’s because now there are two of us sharing our lives together. Surely that doesn’t justify why we should argue all the time. That should rather justify why we should deal with our personal problems together as a couple. So then, why are we still arguing?
We argue;
1. ’cause we wanna be right
It’s such a bad feeling to feel wrong. So whenever an issue comes up, we wanna justify our actions. We are so busy trying to make a point that we forget that our significant other is coming from a place of love. What makes the argument difficult the more is when we’re trying to convince ourselves that we indeed did the right thing. Because indeed we are not convincing our partner; we are trying to convince ourselves by justifying the right in our wrong. We don’t want to look like the one in the relationship always making the silly mistakes. This leads us to the second point which is closely tied;
2. ’cause we wanna prove that the other is wrong
If there’s something more difficult than trying to convince someone that we’re right, it’s trying to convince them that they’re wrong. In doing this, we are projecting something wrong on them. Since no one is perfect, we’re definitely going to find something to point out. If nothing really comes to mind at the time, we’d make something up. That’s why we as couples should never store any dislike for our partner in our minds. If there are any dislikes that we happen to come across, we should immediately point it out. Nothing hurts more than your lover pointing out all their dislikes about you that you initially didn’t know they disliked in one argument.
3. ’cause we feel attacked so we get defensive
All living things have adaptive features that protect them against harm in the environment. As humans that are evolving, we still have that defensive mechanism. Thus, we’d defend ourselves against what is trying to degrade our mental state of being in any way. The argument is a mental fight. Winning it boosts our ego. Losing it is mentally disturbing. What do we do when we realise we’re losing? We get defensive. We talk about how good and supportive we’ve been to our partner in the past. We remind them of our sacrifices. As a way of working on their soft spot, we try to convince them that we’re not that bad. Though it sounds like a good thing, it is actually unnecessary to do so when all the other partner needs is a sincere apology.
4. ’cause we attack as a means of being defensive
The best way to defend is to attack. When one is attacking, the other has to defend. Sometimes, that’s not really the case. We rather counter-attack. As our partner is listing our flaws and how we need to put our shit together, we decide not to go down so easily. We dirty ourselves in the mud. We also list all their flaws and shortcomings and exaggerate on how bad it is. Counter-attacking means my voice should be louder than yours. The emotional trauma alone of being shouted upon is disheartening. It never stops ringing in your ears. When the same point is repeated over and over, that adds insult to injury. This is because it really gets into our minds at the end of the day.
We should always remember that there’s a difference between having a misunderstanding and arguing. Misunderstandings will always arise because we are not all the same. We must make sure that we don’t argue when there’s a misunderstanding. Arguing is basically stress. No one should sincerely have the energy to argue all the time. After all, what do you want at the end of the day; to win the argument or to enjoy your relationship?
Put yourself in this scenario; Imagine you are in an emergency. Think of people you can call. Those are your real friends.
I used to think this way until I read the exact same idea on the internet. To me, it wasn’t a nice confirmation. It was rather a time of contemplation. There are those who will call me in such a scenario that I can’t call if I find myself in the same scenario. It doesn’t mean we are not friends. We are just not that type of friends. The “scenario” concept is just theoretical. In reality, it’s more complicated than that. It would be therefore detrimental for you to put those who would respond to your emergency in the special category and label all others as fake friends.
No matter how hard you try, whether you are the most approachable person in your workplace, the funniest guy in the world or the most famous entertainer, we all have a small circle. It’s not small just because there are more people outside it than there are in it. No! It’s small because no matter how hard you try to expand it, it will remain small. The more people you add to your small circle, the more likely some others in the small circle will leave. No one has a small circle of 50 people. The goal is to expand your acquaintance circle. That circle can take everyone in the whole world. Expanding the small circle has a great limitation; it can only hold about a dozen people at a time. This leads us to a major misconception that needs to be tackled;
MYTH: FAKE FRIENDS LEAVE, TRUE FRIENDS STAY
Perhaps we’ve all had a “friend” we really thought was our friend till a situation came up. After cutting off the person, we see quotes like these on the internet and we find it so relatable. First of all, no matter how many times the universe is involved, we ultimately choose our friends. We can become acquainted by accident sort of, but no one unintentionally becomes friends with someone by chance. If anything at all, you made an effort to intentionally communicate with the person, which is essential for the growth from just an acquaintance, to being a close friend.
When someone is in your close circle, there is that feeling of “best friends forever”, “you and I against the world”. Though seemingly unrealistic because we do not know the future, it’s necessary that that phase occurs and y’all live in the moment and enjoy every phase of it.
The truth is, some people are gonna leave your inner circle with time. Not anything so personal. It’s just that, life happens. Of course, not all your best friends are gonna be best friends with you forever. Y’all became friends at one phase in your life and may move on when another phase sets in. That’s just the way it is. The truth is, once you’ve been friends with someone through the thick and thin, it doesn’t matter if y’all don’t talk or see each other often; in your hearts, y’all are still friends. In fact, such a friend may even die but you can remember them in your heart for the rest of your life. Are they in your inner circle? No. But they used to be. Such people are in what I call the “good friends” zone.
Am I saying that there’s no such thing as a fake friend? No! All I’m saying is, friends come and go. Real friends. And that is absolutely okay. For some of us, life is gonna take us away from our families and they are gonna leave our inner circle. But they will forever hold a special place in our lives regardless. Truth is, you’re gonna meet your once best friend one day, exchange pleasantries, catch up on the good old times, share memories and then move on. Were they fake friends? No. Not in anyway. We just should’t expect someone to be there for us all the time. It’s beautiful that our journeys criss-cross and we meet people who forever make an impact on our lives, but always remember, we all are on our own individual journeys to our destination. One day, our paths may literally separate us. We should simply know that that path is gonna connect us to many other people who may choose to walk with us as well.
Life promises you so much beyond your imagination on the day of your arrival. Literally everyone has a clean sheet and a bright future. However, we stepped in blind from a dark womb. Our own cry puzzles us. Aren’t we supposed to be happy to be born? And this one that I’ve caused such extreme pain, why is she pretending to be happy? Will it cause similar pain to leave this realm?
It didn’t take me long to know that life is a driver, who has no idea where he’s taking me. Or perhaps, he makes me the driver, having no experience and bumping into situations and circumstances beyond my control well enough before figuring out there are no brakes. To add insult to injury, the steering wheel is as stiff as my thinking. Unable to see the road, my vision is shortsighted. Can’t see the bigger picture, ’cause there are so many details in the little I can see.
After being able to figure out how to drive after so many mistakes, pain and hurt, I realise I’m in the middle of one gigantic labyrinth with so many drivers as reckless and clueless as me. When you do not know where you’re going, any road will take you there. I try to find my path. Once in a while, I take a hit from other vehicles. Some leave a permanent scar on my skin. Some, just a bruise. All take so long to heal.
What we all have in common is brokenness. No matter how careful or reckless you are, it’s indubitably inevitable.
Many begin to follow my tracks. Little do they know that U have no idea where I’m headed. With time we each began to find our path. Some, much earlier; others, a little later. And oh, the joy of riding in my own lane, competing with no one as no one in their path competes with me. I ask you to take your time to look all around you. What life once promised comes to mind,
Find your path & know your place, the right people will eventually come along
Life is not meant to be figured out. Life is meant to be lived. In the end, it will all make sense. For the time being, life is not entitled to make sense to you. God has His own way of connecting dots that we thought weren’t part of the story. So live. Live to the fullest. Live life more abundantly. For when we have life, we can have everything else. But when we lose the Life, we lose everything.
Education has no end but school does. When school is done, that’s when reality hits. You begin to wonder why the reality of school has been made so different from the real world. That’s why we all question the relevance of what we are being taught and how it is going to help us in any way in future. Should we, though?
Information & Instruction
There are two things that makes school so great without we realizing; instruction and information. School builds a structure within us. Yes, there are a billion books you can read on the internet without attending school and a billion things we can get to know. However, in school you are tasked to finish 32425 assignments in very limited amount of time you wouldn’t have prescribed for yourself. Thus, school is building a structure within you. In architecture school, you could be given a thousand redoes on a task you don’t even want to do. What it builds within you is a resilience for life. It is on this structure that our formation for going about tasks is built.
Structure vs Creativity
Growing up, it is the ideas you are thought that shapes how you think. Our early school teachers either teach us what to think or how to think for ourselves. Yet, most school systems are stuck with teaching students what to think. School is just about learning only what the teacher taught, memorizing and vomiting it on the exam sheet to show how “smart” you are. Students have been trained to swallow the teacher’s vomit so much that students are stranded with lecturers who leave too much room for ingenuity. Even students of universities want to be spoon-fed, and that is a worry.
Exams is not Needful?
The best law student is not the best lawyer. This is enough reason to change how school assesses students. Is examination even necessary? To me, it isn’t. Examination favors the fool. You can simply be good at writing exams and passing tests without learning anything. This is why many creative students don’t really perform well in school. Students with the best results are mostly teacher’s pets, memorization experts and are pretty much concerned about marks. In the real world, you are not assessed based on marks. This can leave such teacher-pleasing people a little bit frustrated in real life. There is no grand final exam in the actual world. Once you are done with a load of work, another one is piled up on you. Life will always give you new problems as you solve the old ones. If there is any assessment at all, it should add to the existing body of knowledge rather than be a regurgitation of existing literature.
Too Much Theory
Leonardo Da Vinci once said, “He who loves practice without theory is like the sailor who boards ship without a rudder and compass and never knows where he may cast“. Theory is needful. Without theory, humans will just be like most animals; each coming in to life to discover things outside of their instinctive nature without prior knowledge of previous lives’ discoveries. Theory enables us to catch up with and come at par with all what previous generations have discovered since existence. Therefore, we don’t start afresh. Theories are developed based on one’s experiences. Once we learn all of such theories, we needn’t need to a thousand lives but simply build up on such theories within our own lifetime for the next generation. Isaac Newton once said, If I have seen further than others, it is by standing upon the shoulders of giants. Thus, it is not the abundance of theories in school that is the problem. It is the un-application of it. Once we cannot apply it in our own little way, and the basis for us learning is because “it will come in the exams”, we have failed as intellectuals. Are we in school to produce similar answers in exams or we are in school to make a difference in life?
Let’s not deceive ourselves that school is not needful. You can have all the information in the world available to you via the Internet but the question is, will you even make time for them outside of school? School has failed in
making such information relevant to our societal needs in various fields
making the information the basis (not the replacement) for our own creativity and ingenuity
Nonetheless, school provides us with education and we ought to be grateful for that. Or I’m just saying this so that this write-up ends on a good note? Trust me, if a lecturer tasked me to write this for marks, it would have been copy-and-paste and quillbot. Do you agree with me? Please leave a comment or two.
There is always new medical research that helps us live longer, a brand new technology that changes our lifestyle, and a new software app more interesting than our schooling system. Perhaps, it’s because the school system has barely changed. Let me not bore you with the details of the early formal schools but trust me, there is barely any drastic changes within those four walls of the classroom. The schooling system is slowly catching up with modern-day technology, let’s admit. However, the relevance of the things we are taught – and more importantly, not taught – is where the actual problem is. Oh, this is up for debate!
School is Not so Bad, Trust Me
Count all the friends you have. 80% of them, you met in school. Your acquaintances? Same percentage. School has always been the foundation for our lives. Being together with people in the same age group who are figuring out their lives like you are. Sounds interesting. Your values, perceptions, attitudes, lifestyle, interpersonal relations, opinions. These are things you pick up from school. Children go to school so early in their lives that whatever “foundation” that was laid at home can be made or unmade in school.
Forget about everything for a second. This system of school is responsible for 80% of your life; food habits, social skills, vocal expression, some of your greatest memories, even your most embarrassing moments. Enjoy your first 20+ years in school well. Don’t wait till you’re working a 9 to 5 routine to acknowledge how dynamic school was. Don’t say I didn’t warn you.
Life is Mathematics
One of the ways people bash school is weaning that they never used y=mx+c – or any other mathematical formula for that matter – in real life. Why is school teaching you calculus and not how to do your taxes? Well, first of all, who said we don’t use mathematical formulae in our everyday lives? Did you cross the road yesterday? Your mind subconsciously did all the necessary calculations. Have you climbed the stairs, kicked a ball into a net, dodged something thrown at you, guessed the time you would be able to reach your destination or put food in your mouth? See, all these were calculations your brains made. It just didn’t “show working”.
Isaac Newton said it better, “every problem – and for that matter, every solution – is mathematical in nature”. In other words, everything can be mathematically expressed. A formula can be derived for everything. Google it, there is a mathematical equation for gravity, motion, love, even music. You never knew you had a brain till you learnt about it in school. Mind you, you wouldn’t have ever known you had one because you can’t see your brain and be alive at the same time. What’s the point? School taught you what you knew without knowing you knew. Must have been interesting for your brain to understand what a brain is and what it does.
the Real Essence
Even though you’re not going to apply half of the things you learn directly in your life, trust me, you’ll apply them indirectly all the time. Especially the ones that stick with you. All knowledge – applicable or non-applicable – is important. School has expanded our brains in ways no other societal body could have. In school, we are exposed to more opportunities and aspects. Eventually, we discover what we really resonate with and understand the most. Though we may rather choose to go into a field that earns us more income instead of a field we love – another dilemma of life – it was a school that exposed us to them all.
So the question now is, why do we need to bash school? The theory is too much? The stress is overwhelming? It’s too much hard work, which is meant to be an archaic concept? Let’s talk more about this next weekend. Do you agree or not? Let’s hear what you think in the comments section.
