The kid in You

Have you ever noticed how little children fight for some level of independence from their parents even if it's just to play ? Have you observed how they run around and often glance around in search of their parents while they play? Have you seen their reaction when they fall and are about to cry? They still look around for their parents. They actually expect their parents to be watching and ready to offer some help or consolation, or sometimes with fear for the spanking to come.
This actually reminds you of you, right? Not when you were a child but right now, as an adult. You have won the battle of independence from your parents and you are enjoying your life. And for those whose parents are still alive and in good terms with them, they would tell you that they talk to their parents once in a while. Of course they won't always run to mama or papa when the chips are down, they have grown to the point where they deal with whatever comes their way. That is adulthood right? But you would agree that from time to time, you find yourself longing for the responsibility to be taken from.you, or for the approval they gave you that showed and reassured you that you were on the right path.
You still long for that parent figure from time to time, sometimes from people who are not your parents or in any way or right, positioned to be your care giver or guardian.
That's just the kid in you, the kid in us. And no matter how old we are, how strong we think we are, at some point you will have that longing, the difference is, will you act on it?

RICH KID POOR KID

This is not like the rich dad poor dad episode, this is the reality of some lives around you, all over the world. This is the evidence of polarity and discrimination that can never be erased or destroyed, at least not in our life time. Not because we (this generation and many generations before ours) have not tried, but simply because it is what it is. This is life.

RICH KID:

Goes to the best schools available from infancy, intelligence is not in question, he excels, some say because of the enabling environment he finds himself in, others, because he is naturally gifted and still others because his parents have paid the price and bought excellence for him. He graduates at a very young age because his schools do not go on strike and comes back to the country to integrate and know his roots and his people. He is extravagantly rewarded on his return, with a certificate in hand, the minimum requirement for any graduate, but he has more. Even when he was “abroad” he won several local and international scholarships, many would say he didn’t deserve it or more importantly, he didn’t need it. He got it nonetheless. His return is coloured with fun-fare and a contract of employment in one of the top companies in the industry of his interest. The top of his worries is the traffic and the harshness of the Nigerian sun on his very delicate skin.

POOR KID:

Attends a public school until the level of corruption in it pushes his parents to withdraw him from the public school to a very expensive private school in the country. After a few years he drops out because his parents can no longer afford the fees. He manages to seat for entrance examinations to the unity schools with affordable fees although it is very far-away from home. He survives the harshness of the local boarding school system and is successful in all his certificate exams. His return home is greeted with a list of expectations as his parents have both retired from the country’s civil service and are expecting their pension and gratuity (if it ever comes). He scores high in the matriculation exam, but he knows no one in the university admin office to push his admission through even after he scored way above the schools cut off mark. He finally gets the admission albeit after 3 attempts to study the course of his dreams. His stay in school is frustrated by lack of infrastructure, strikes and lecturers trying to sell hand-outs to pass their course. He survives this and graduates. The expectations are even higher from home but he knows now that he has to get, not just any job but a good job to take of his ageing and ailing parents and to elevate his status. Maybe he would break in to the elite group and buy a house on the island or ikoyi. The top of his worries? How long will he have to continue like this?

It is not a level playing ground. Never was and never will. Strength, however is required to break in to the upper echelons of the society and more strength to remain there. 

START STOPPING: the oxymoron of the season.

As opposed to “stop starting” which is for quitters or those in the process of evaluation or re-evaluation, start stopping would be seen to be a more positive venture into the gradual cessation of a habit or vice. 
Vices, we all have one or more. The reason for having a vice could differ with individuals but at some point, one may choose to stop or desist from a particular vice, either temporarily or on a more permanent base when the senses are functioning to their full capacity. I encountered a young man recently who claimed to have all the major vices of an ordinary man, drugs, alcohol cigarettes, women (sex) and the life of the party even when he could not afford it. He asked me to choose a vice for him, one which he would not give up because as he said “every man needs a vice”. He asked for my opinion and I gave it to him and then I asked myself, “What vices do I have?”, and more importantly, “what vices should I give up?”. Many people around the world during this season of lent will seek a vice to do without and many people (cynics and critics) would argue the essence of dropping the said vices and habits during lent only to relapse and go back to them after Easter. Why give up alcohol or smoking, sex or any other bad habit for 40 plus days only to be seen repeating them sometime after Easter? Some would dare to question, “who are you deceiving?”. Well, the answers would vary as to why you or anyone else should stop a habit for a period of 40 plus days especially during lent as the church would encourage her members to do and these answers would suit people differently but one essence of the period of lent is simply to start stopping these vices, dropping them one by one and gradually till the addiction and allure of such vices no longer ensnare the perpetrators.
Sometimes, starting is the hardest aspect and the vices seem bigger than they actually are because we are so used to living with them that we can’t imagine living without them. The trick is, as we all are in the period of dropping vices, together we start stopping and get strength, not only from within but from seeing others in the same struggle with vices and giving as good as they got to stop.
It will be gradual and painful but let the season be one where we start stopping our vices and long after the period of lent keep on stopping whatever vices till we have overcome them or it as the case may be.