“No man is an island…” Have you ever wondered what this adage means? Have you ever given yourself time to meditate and understand what it truly mean? What is your conclusion on this? Houses are built to provide shelter. To protect the owners from the scorching sun and rain. Protect occupants from animals that could hurt people at night and they diligently do that. Vehicles are designed to ease transportation. Clothes are designed to beautify the body, adorn and protect the skin. Shoes are designed to protect the feet. Everyone is designed to accomplish something. No one is born to be useless. There is a purpose behind creation. It is important for one to understand and know the purpose behind his creation in order to function effectively in this universe. Until the question of “what am I designed to accomplish?” is properly answered, one will live without focus and direction. While others are meant to maintain a certain structure and improve them, others are meant to create and invent. Find where you belong and stick to the cause. When you identify your path, stick to cause regardless the little beginning. Everyone wants to be top on the social strata but many ignore the days of little beginning. It takes time to build an empire. It takes patience to build a castle. It takes years build a city out of nothing. Do not ignore the place of men. While others seek to break you, others help you up the ladder. Nations of the world also depend on each other to be sufficient. This is the secret behind imports and exports and foreign policies. Are you starting to see why no man is an island? We earlier explained the purposes behind houses, vehicles, clothes and so on. Not a single material is used to build a house. There’s a need for sand, cement, rods and others. For vehicles, different kinds of metals and fuel for effective motion. For clothes, Cotton, colours, threads etc. That is also applicable to humanity. Interdependence for growth. You cannot do it on your own. Be careful who you ignore. Be careful who you send out of your life. People hold keys to the next level of your life, it takes wisdom and discernment to know and identity such people. They may not look it from the first instance, only time and circumstances activates their roles in your life for a greater purpose, that is, your destination.

In my previous post of this series, I talked about the need for predecessors to carry their successors along in their practices/life. So that successors can learn what they should. That’s how they can learn by watching. Now on to this episode… Not everyone of us have fathers (as guys) or mothers (as ladies) who we admire and deeply aspire to become like. I know you are more matured now, and understand some of what your predecessors did or went through. You respect them a lot and wish you could do more to appreciate them. But when you think of becoming like this person, what happens in your mind? Let me try to describe: immediately you try thinking of becoming like your dad or mum, there’s this dread and all your inner strength goes into fighting a twinge of the idea… you don’t even think. Everything within just wants that idea dead immediately. “Crucify it!” your whole being cries, “we don’t even want to hear it at all!” Yeah. And that’s why you would rather seek counsel from an outsider. Your predecessors are so flawed, you don’t trust them anymore to give you guide as you drive through the very path they drove some time ago. Now, I’m not saying we must all get counsel from our predecessors. I mean, we know that some of these people are not even aware they made mistakes, and they will want to have you make same thinking it’s nothing. What I’m saying is this; First, we are so scared of becoming what our parents are that we never asked counsel of them. We fought them off But we need to accept who they are, don’t we? Because our predecessors’ lives should give us some heads-up concerning our natural tendencies. Then we will be more equipped to fight the generational battles. Yes! Even if our predecessor failed. When I saw that ad, I saw a young man who wants to first be like his father. The second thing is, we must understand generational living and transitions. I mustn’t start all over in my time, I can continue the good work my father started. But how can I do this if I have not recognised something good in my father? When I saw that ad, I saw a young man who sees good in his father, wants to be like his father and then do greater than his father by carrying on with the good work. if we don’t do these things, we will realise some day that we need to ask them some questions but they’re no more… we will find ourselves exactly like or even worse than they were. We must accept them and accept our destiny. Admit that you came through them. So you can be sincere with yourself concerning specific weaknesses and be educated. Once you got these two, you are, by far, equipped to do better (that is, carry further not better in comparison) than your predecessors.

Remember the narrative of how I saw an advert by Pete and Yul Edochie In the last post? I pointed out how every great person has or had some shoulders they rested on as pillars. I also added that those who will be great need those shoulders. Did you grow around an elder who had an habit? (That is drinking, smoking, fornicating, lying…) They practice it as if they were held bound by it but they warned you saying, “the day you try this thing that I’m doing, I will just kill you.” This is common in Africa. They had a lifestyle they were ashamed of. They did not know how to lead the younger ones to be better than them, so they threatened the young. On the other hand, I recently heard a group of people discussing how a particular man takes his whole family to an alcohol spot to drink. He did it with so much pride. Unashamedly!  This is not so common in Africa. Now here is my point… When I looked at that advert (for an alcohol brand), I saw a man who knows his lifestyle; is sincere about his habits; has forgiven himself for being human; has used a habit that could be a disadvantage to benefit (get cash from the advert for) himself and his son. Now bear with me I am not saying parents should pass down bad habits to their children but how about the good practices they did not pass down because they were ashamed? I was praying loud in the room the other day when my brother came in with my baby niece; dropped her and left the room. I wanted to reduce the intensity of my voice as it burned in my heart so that she would not be terrified. However, within my heart, I said “no! I will continue what I’m doing and will even behave in a way that shows her that I’m aware she’s in here with me, and in a way that makes it look to her that what I’m doing is a norm in life.” Guess what? She was almost mimicking me (a baby not up to a year old). And I did not try to make her stop. I did not want her to ever think that what she’s doing (praying) is something to be ashamed of. Every hero we see today had those pillars behind them; who cheered them early enough to keep certain practices and how to keep those practices well. Every hero of tomorrow, need such pillars too. May we find them always in our lives, and may we not despise the ones God has given us. There is yet one more about this series… it will come later. Anticipate!

We drove along an express road today, and there were banners of an advert. It was Pete and Yul Edochie. Some were both of them and some was only Yul. In both, I could almost see only Yul, and they looked gloriously dressed in the igbo chieftain attire.  Now please, keep this in your mind because I will keep referring to it, as so many things have come to my mind as lessons.  First: have you ever seen Yul in movies? The boldness, audacity, courage. You might just think that the man has become a star, a lion, a champion all by himself. You might even think that he has become all he is without depending on anyone because of his audacity. But even in the banner, Pete stood behind Yul. Right behind him with a strong face just as Yul had. Tadaa… the man, Yul, suddenly doesn’t seem that independently heroic to me again. He has risen in the shoulders of his father. Pete has modelled a life for Yul. Yul finds that path of life Pete has modelled as worth following, and boom!! he stands to succeed Pete in the role (that’s movie character) that Pete most fits and even more roles.  This made my heart bleed, you know. How many of us have such mighty shoulders to stand on as we strive to become who we perceive God wants us to be? What most of us have is what we appreciate but still what drags us from aiming as high as the call.  Every champion needed, at some point of (if not all through) their journey those shoulders and mouth and support of every kind, to let them know they have not failed, to encourage them, to paint the physical pictures of what they see within them, to give them the needed validation, to  even bestow on them some sense of rights and independence or freedom to be who they want, etc.  May we find those shoulders soon before the time for fulfillment of those things would pass.