Ten Rules for Being Human

Traipsing through the jungle of information and junk we fondly call the internet brought me to these rules. Quite on point I must say. I thought I should share. If you are into motivational books and all, you can read more here.

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Ten Rules for Being Human by Cherie Carter-Scott

1. You will receive a body. You may like it or hate it, but it’s yours to keep for the entire period.
2.  You will learn lessons. You are enrolled in a full-time informal school called, “life.”
3. There are no mistakes, only lessons. Growth is a process of trial, error, and experimentation. The “failed” experiments are as much a part of the process as the experiments that ultimately “work.”
4. Lessons are repeated until they are learned. A lesson will be presented to you in various forms until you have learned it. When you have learned it, you can go on to the next lesson.
5. Learning lessons does not end. There’s no part of life that doesn't contain its lessons. If you’re alive, that means there are still lessons to be learned.
6. “There” is no better a place than “here.” When your “there” has become a “here”, you will simply obtain another “there” that will again look better than “here.”
7. Other people are merely mirrors of you. You cannot love or hate something about another person unless it reflects to you something you love or hate about yourself.
8. What you make of your life is up to you. You have all the tools and resources you need. What you do with them is up to you. The choice is yours.
9. Your answers lie within you. The answers to life’s questions lie within you. All you need to do is look, listen, and trust.
10. You will forget all this.

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Makes much sense, no?

The Inevitable

My parents live in a village; Miti-Kenda (Nine Trees), not far from Nairobi but still quite rural. Why, our local shopkeeper sells cooking fat at 5/- per tablespoon! My father ran over our neighbour’s chicken. He caused a such a fuss and erected a sky- high bump made of building stones and a thin layer of soil in protest! I’ve never really seen a road sign for “chicken crossing.” Anyway, it is a wonderful place. Once in every few weeks I go down there for a weekend and in the strong wind characteristic of the place, I am at peace. In the open and endless space, I take walks. I do some thinking. I make decisions. I let my emotions run loose. In the din of dogs barking, chicken squawking and cows lowing, I feel joy; joy that springs from the very pits of my soul and flows out in the form of a huge genuine smile. It always breaks my heart to leave but when I do, I feel re-energised and ready to face the bustle that is this Nairobi.

The space that the village provides

This time round, it was different. There was grief. My sixteen year old neighbour, Mary, committed suicide. She hung herself in her bedroom. She left a very brief note. “I am tired of life,” she had written. That was the second and successful attempt. She had tried to throw herself in front of a truck on the Eastern by-pass. She told her mother she had tried to kill herself but a voice called her name the two times she tried to catapult herself. Of course her mother did not believe her. For some reason, her death has hit me hard. I find myself thinking about her all the time. She was beautiful. That youthful beauty; glowing complexion, shining eyes, healthy cheeks, blossoming curves and long tresses. No, she was not denied permission to go out. I don’t believe she was a woman scorned either. She was not on drugs. Which begs the question, what would make one so young tired of life? Was she depressed? Was she being abused in school? She hated school by the way. Was she pregnant? She had survived two fatal bouts of illness in her childhood; did she survive so that she could later take her own life? I do not understand.

Her mother is still in denial, two weeks after the funeral. She is still in shock. How do I begin to comfort a woman I have never seen tremble for the ten years I have known her? Someone will tell me, “Be there for her.” Easier said than done. She asks me what she did wrong. She tells me she believes she has failed as a mother if she could not see her daughter’s sadness. Then she gets angry. She tells me children are the most ungrateful lot. Then she falls silent and her eyes glisten with tears which never fall beyond her eyelashes. Her lips tremble but she never lets go and breaks down. Tell me, how do I answer such questions? Please tell me, how such can be comforted.

I have always been a firm believer of learning from your experiences and those of your friends. This time round though, I haven’t learnt a thing. If I have, it is yet to become clear. Fact is God has a huge sense of humour. Morbid or funny, you choose. Not from Mary’s death, but over time I have learnt that no matter how painful a situation is, there is a bigger picture. While you fret and fuss over the finer details by asking Him rhetoric questions, He is painting the bigger picture which is always to your benefit. However, we never see it until it comes to pass.

Remember long ago when people used to queue at the hospital for injections? They would be boiled and the nurse would shout, “Next!” If one was scared, they would go to the back of the queue hoping to prolong time before the jab came. Death is pretty much the same. Just like in Final Destination 3, it has its design. It is an eventuality all of us must face. When it says “Next!” you haven’t the option of going to the back of the queue. It will find you. Even if it is suicide. Question is, are we ever ready? Does it ever find us at peace with the things that matter? With ourselves, our loved ones, our Maker? We should be prepared for it but we never are. Such is humanity.

How about those left behind? I like to think of grief and pain as a drum full of water. It is evaporated by heat, fetched cup by little cup, it leaks from the seams and finally it is empty. It is not as heavy as it was before. Only the drum is left and the memory that it was once filled with water. The pain fades with time and all that is left are memories.

I am angry at you Mary but you had your reasons. Death is an escape route very much like alcohol, but you never wake up. We will never see you again. Couldn’t you have at least thought of what your death will do to your mother? I guess you cannot answer these questions. I have the very hard job of forgiving you; it will take time as I try to understand why you did what you did. I hope that you find the peace and joy you were looking for wherever you are. Rest in peace young girl.

This Thing Called Forgiveness...

After a long break from church, I went for a service 'shingo-upande' because I had made a promise to my best friend that I would show up. Ah! The things we do for love! I was in for a pleasant surprise though, as the sermon was something I really needed to hear. It came at the right time and it inspired this post.

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forgive: / fəˈgɪv/, v. to pardon: to overlook: stop feeling angry or resentful towards (someone) for an offence, flaw, or mistake.

We are human. We have emotions and in our daily interactions we offend each other. We are never offended by inanimate objects, in fact I have never heard of anybody with a long standing feud against a tree, car, building etc. Anyway, these offences are pretty subjective and very much relative. What you may perceive to be offensive is what I will easily let slide or not find offensive at all. However there are those wrongs done to you that shake you to your very core. They cause hurt and anger/rage. They make you curse, lose appetite and suffer insomnia. In as much as people have different coping mechanisms, at the end of the day you have to choose whether to let go or dwell on whatever “crime” that was committed against you.

Forgiveness is one of the most painful emotional experiences a human being could ever go through. You oscillate between the relief and freedom that it brings you and the feeling that your offender will take you for a fool for choosing to accept their “crime” and overlooking it. You may feel that it is an indirect way of encouraging your offender to repeat his/her wrong because he/she believes you will forgive them after all.

It is more painful because you have to allow yourself to mourn. To relive what was done to you. To accept that what was done, was done and no matter what, cannot be undone. After this you have to let go; of the anger and to give room for an olive branch; if reconciliation is an option. All this is easier said than done...but it can be done. With time and with patience.

We always dwell on what is done to us by others. How about being on the receiving end of forgiveness? None of us is blameless; we also hurt others and ourselves too. That thing that you did that makes you feel stupid and disappointed in yourself. Those self-inflicted wounds. That thing you did that does not allow you to look at your friend in the eye. Your conscience will not let you sleep. Then you need to acknowledge that you did wrong and ask your aggrieved friend for forgiveness. If they do not give it quickly, give it time. If they do not give it, forgive yourself and move on. At least you tried.

Forgiving yourself is hard. You are left alone with your conscience to deal with in the dead of night. Those awkward moments when an unrelated statement is made and it resonates within you and you feel as if it is targeting you. A guilty conscience is a burden too heavy to bear. Don’t just chalk it up to simply being human though, even Enoch was but he was blameless. But humbly and with remorse, accept that you have tripped and that you have no choice but to stand, dust yourself off, regain balance and prove to yourself and your Maker that you are a better person.

My mum always tells me that happiness is a choice. I tend to think it is a function of the choices that we make. When you choose to forgive, you have not unnecessary baggage and thus a sunny disposition is something you cannot help.

Forgiveness is a work in progress. If you cannot run, walk, if you cannot walk, crawl. But keep moving...

Working with yourself

Have you ever thought of the things you want to change about yourself; physical appearance, financial wellbeing, character e.t.c.? Heavens know how many times I sit and day dream of the many things I want to change and the millions of wonderful things I believe could do for myself should these changes be effected. However, more often than not, these changes are fickle, selfish and very invalid. Do not get me wrong, it is healthy to dream (just don't stay in bed too long!) but some dreams we have are just plain and simple; not worth it.

Jane believes that if she loses weight, she will automatically be attractive to other men. She has a plan; to eat as little as possible (read starve herself), hit the gym every single day of the week and almost sell her soul to the devil to shed those extra pounds. She believes that being skinny will make men swoon and get into stampedes to be with her. Mary believes that if she hangs out with the president's daughter (who is so spoilt, that you can not stand) she will be accorded the respect that comes with knowing with the who's-who. Martin dances to the whims and dictates of his girlfriend because it makes him look sweet and loving yet he hates it!



When will we stop burdening ourselves with unnecessary obligations for appearance sake? Why are we so limited in our way of thinking that we do not pause to think that there is more to life than what we are narrow-mindedly focused on? When will we learn that we are created with a wholesome sense of self that is attractive to somebody somewhere? When will we stop working on ourselves? The answer is simple and not so simple; when we embrace and accept ourselves wholly and learn to work with the mix of strengths and weaknesses that we are given by our maker to the best advantage.

While personal growth and development is important for the human psych and relations, we need to understand that we are who are, wonderfully and fearfully made and that most of the things we try to change are inherent. Working with yourself allows and enables growth.. Working on yourself often-times leads to acquiring nasty traits as you try to be what you are not. Concentrate on your strengths, that way your weaknesses rarely, if not come to play, concentrate harder and your weaknesses will fade away. Give yourself realistic goals and ambitions, do not be hard too hard on yourself. Life is not a chemical experiment, there are no mistakes, just lessons learned. People, you can have it all; complete self acceptance and personal growth.

Go on, be the best you can be, work with yourself.

Goods Once Sold Are Not Returnable

I hate shopping, which is odd because I am a girl. I am supposed to have this insatiable urge to spend money on clothes, shoes, hair etc. depending on mood, occasion and simply and inarguably because-I-can. Either way, shopping is inevitable whether one is male or female because everything we need and/or want comes at a price. We have to hop from one shop to the next looking for best bargains on the product or service that we need. In some places you’ll find the case of the label being more important than the labelled, or you can find the best bargain in a place you least expect. You could also browse all the shops in town looking for that ever elusive item which is always out-of-stock and you have to be on constant look out for it. Such items we purchase irrespective of the state of our pockets. We’d rather be broke when we come across them

This got me thinking about life; the search for beautiful relationships and wonderful partners. This is one area of our lives in which shopping is a perfect analogy. In fact, when it comes to the search for the “One” we are all in a supermarket. Take a moment to think about a supermarket. It has floors and isles that are product specific; there is something for everyone. There is the ever smiling support staff who tell you where to find what and the marketing girls who are out to convince you why their products are the best for you (as if you don’t know why you use what you use). Finally there is the cashier whose job is to take your money and the packing guy who hands you your luggage, he even pushes it for you all the way to your car.

You all walk into the supermarket when you hit the ripe old age of sixteen when hormones are raging and you begin to have hazy ideas of what you want in life. You walk along the isles looking for the most exciting partner; you pick one or more depending on personal tastes, dash to the cashier pay for it (lunch and movie dates the folks never get to know about) then run home to savour the wonderful acquisition. Read clumsy sex in the most awkward of places. After a couple of days you get bored and go back to check if there is anything better. At this point it is all about validation from your peers, curiosity and like I mentioned earlier hormones. This trend doesn’t hold for long though; life happens, you grow up and you realize you cannot keep going back to shop. It is no longer exciting, it is exhausting and you simply do not have the time. This is especially so for women because we all feel that we have a shelf life. The urgency to settle and breed before you expire kicks in.

You now enter age where your friends are the support staff who tell you their idea of where to find men and women. Your mother friends become the sales girls who won’t stop feeding you praise about their sons and/or daughters. The potential partners jump off the shelves literally; they all want to be yours and the cashiers are almost making their way to the isle on which you are standing. It is completely up to you to keep a level head and focus to get the best amidst the entire hullabaloo. It is only then you realize you have a vast freedom of choice, and until you have paid and the packing guy had escorted you to your car, then you can take your sweet time in the supermarket. You even have the choice to return what you have to its shelf if you find the customer in front of you with a better brand than the one you picked.

Just like clothes shopping, impulse buying leads to items you may never wear and end up discarding at your cost; goods once sold are not returnable. If we make the wrong choice, it can be the source of all our woes in the foreseeable future. We should exercise control and patience, only then will we find those gems. If one supermarket doesn’t have what you are looking for, do not settle for less, go to another one. Remember though that there are always E&OE (errors and omissions expected). You will not find somebody perfect, but we can find excellent ones whose flaws complement our strengths. Therefore, keep an open mind and remember that you can also find gems in the least likely places. You will always find what you are looking for. All it takes is a little patience. For now though, there are so many items that make for brilliant window shopping, enjoy whilst you still can!

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I thank my friend Michael who is the original owner of this idea.