COGITATION: A MIXED FORTUNE

I have always wanted to be part of the prolific auburn horizon that is not only a scenery but also an epitome of beauty for photographers and nature lovers like yours truly. For those used to it, it’s like the oxygen we take for granted each and every day. However, for peeps like me, it heralds what I usually miss in the city. For a fact, this was in the rurals, a breathtaking visage that kissed the hills and the now hyacinth littered lake that is my hometown. I love the rocky terrain that is my countryside, the rugged landscape that my cousins said I should not leave but ponder on sometime giving a facelift to a picturesque aesthetic panorama when I come of age (greenbacks wise).

My rural area where my old man has erected a structure is full of stones underneath and in the event you strike a hoe in it, you can easily land a boulder in patches that have not been reclaimed. When my old man built the structure, he thought it would be a temporary dwelling where he would stay for a while before constructing something graceful a top the tiny hill with a wonderful view of the massive lake. Now it has become his permanent residence. As a civil servant, he thought he would one day upgrade it to match the status of his stature in the hope of solidifying his lead. Even in retirement, he still thinks of constructing a modern structure that will be the embodiment of his once reputable stance. Not that his reverence has withered, but his position was questioned by one of my grandads owing to the fact that other people have gone two strides while he has remained with the good old conventional tenets instead of copying the avant-garde that once came to solicit for direction from him.

While there is erratic power from the inconsistent lines that serves our area in terms of electricity, forcing them to acquire over-priced solar panels that you have to feed daily by paying some cash in order to continue lighting up the house. Still, there is no proper supply of water in our area. The drought that had forays with fitful rain in the just ended season contributed in the area that is found near the equator to dry up and the worst part is that women and those people who fetch water have to walk far distances to find the commodity now likened to gold. Crops have failed and the corn fields where casual labourers wielded in the hope of reaping are now used to feed cattle. The peasant farmers are despondent.

Reminds me of a time when a certain shampoo-like liquid was used to hoodwink people that it would solve the perennial food-shortage in our rural only for crops to fail resulting in a dearth. That season, the supplier of the inept fertilizer smiled all the way to the bank as hapless farmers were left to shoulder the loses of having taken in advice that was catastrophic in terms of contributing towards good yield. Realistically, this should be a hardship area. Yet policies passed by lawmakers have rendered it a place that is self-sustaining, which is awesome as it adds to stature but fallacious in terms of the wellbeing of people who reside in this area.

Since it is almost approaching the electioneering season, one chap suggested that an aspirant who was keen on reaping from the area can either dig a borehole, or bring a water bowser to wow the ladies for at least a month and his or her name will be a song in the area resident’s mouths. Am not a not a political strategist and even though I know how politics shapes the economy of the country, there is little or no desire in my intuition to immerse myself in the murky waters that can be dogmatic and sycophantic.

In retrospect, I can say this was a mixed year full of ups and downs. At the beginning, I was all lamenting about the lack of jobs since I was in some kind of frictional unemployment. Yet when I got somewhere in an MNC which I sometimes run into gen about that which am studying, I am feeling like am again in a structural kind of unemployment. Indeed, I feel there is a mismatch of what I am wired to do and what I am doing. But given the fact that I am at the lowest cadre of employees, my plea for change has been unforthcoming. Yet my dashboard is red. A sign that I just have to plead hard or because I cannot perform, I exit before the axe finds me.

This is my confession. Obviously, I have been like a toy being swung around by those who have authority over my stay in the bank. Already, I have got a transfer letter and I am jittery now that there is too much pressure on three forces that sometimes make me feel like I need to take a break from one and focus on that which is material and not back-pedaling. First, I have this lady who I think I have been playing cat and mouse games with for long I feel like she should just find a beau who will make her feel like a lady and take her to where she wants to be- married. Though, I like and love her, when things are not moving, you have to let go. It’s sad but, given the turmoil that I am currently in, I will only be a baggage as opposed to a solution to her new-found overtures that have been promising. Still, I want her to get someone else to compare me with. Like I have been this good guy she toys with then when she feels like exiting, she does and returns thinking I am a stone that is devoid of feelings, hell no, am human.

Well, I don’t feel like writing is bothersome. It goes and comes back gratuitously. So it does not fall into a category that gives me internal pressure. Lastly, there is pressure from CFA Institute. This one though, I love because I enjoy reading knotty stuff in as much as it enlightens on so many fronts. The pressure is internal. I have written about it and am not going to engage so much in it again.

The year in wait comes with so much to ex ante (in investment lingo it means expect). I am expecting to get a new job and to embark on the final level of my studies. It really feels good to pass exams. Though the feeling is transient, there is normally that joy that you have done your part and it’s now up to nature to reward you. If it does not, you have a life to live. Given that there are people who see you as their role model, you have to sometimes pretend even when it’s tough. Hope, the Oldest Man up high hears my prayer and grants me something relieving in due course.

Sometimes, I usually feel like I have let down those who surround me. Even though I am not accountable, I still feel that pressure that even after studying laboriously, I still am not able to match even those who dropped out and are independent and taking life by the collar. They make me feel challenged. It is as if am not doing things right.

What’s next? It’s high time this bugger moved away from contentment towards a challenge that will harness my potential. That should be soon because serenity and laxity may make me forget that there is more than just writing a blog, maintaining it even though it is kind of dormant, working to be seen you are in a job while in reality there is no prospect of breaking even and the list is endless.

Hasta La Vista baby.

[Picture Source: Waiting]

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ADDICTION

I have been battling some queer addictions which I have always wanted to do away with in order to move on to the next stage of the after effects. And there is nothing as tempting as trying to do that which you have always wanted to eschew completely and ensure that it goes to the dogs without ever coming back again. There is an extra precipitous pull that wants you to engage in the urge because of cues that work towards strengthening it. Just visualizing can “light up” a wont and it’s worse when you have to do it in isolation.

It has been a cool four years trying to ensure I go for three weeks without swinging back to my addiction. Some nerd called it 21 days of breaking a habit. While it may be easy starting off the process of breaking an addiction, the consistency bit is what is usually very hard to execute and stick to the guns. There is this notion of “I have got to have this thing; this is what I need right now” that spirals intermittently while also having this thought distortions, “Remember where you got your fix last time. Go there to get it.”

If my memory serves me right, it all started a while back when I was lolling in the digs where I had access to free internet and nothing other than writing to do and the trappings of power that comes with being a lone ranger. Then this blog was conceptualized because I had always wanted an avenue to express myself to the world about that which surrounds me.

Orange network it was, and with my small 3” Samsung phone which I wrote about here, I got hooked up. I remember subscribing to some unlimited bundles where I could download all the stuff that I could put my mind in. And the truth is that an idle mind is the devils workshop. Truth be told, I started exploring into the wild. It’s worse when you think no one is watching, because you go to such depths that are quite unfathomable. Given the reverence chaps bestow on yours truly and that they think I am straight and upright but deep down into stuff that you would be shaking your head if you think about the person addicted to such stuff.

True, it can be quite tasking to avoid something at the start. After you start the process, having discovered it out of the woods, you want to perfect it so that it carries on immaculately. Afterwards, is the discovery of the fact that you are apprehended to an addiction, when you have been hooked up to the habit already. Given that you are hooked, you hide to engage in it. Say you are a novice smoker, you start by hiding then when it gets to a certain stage, you become an amateur and before you know it, you are a professional who is so hooked to that point where you can even do it without a tad bit of worrying.

So, recently when I completed my three weeks’ dose, I had to big up myself for coming of age with a regimen that I can be able to stick to even though there are times when it was so tempting I felt like resorting back to the indecorous behaviour. Looking back, I have come a long way in breaking bad. Breaking bad? Yes, this wont was like a dictator in my life. With availability of free internet, I only had no other option other that thinking of it every free time I had to loll.

I bet the internal pressure to break this habit contributed immensely towards finding a way or engaging in horrible activity to act as a caveat. There were times I would give myself a penalty while trying to circumvent this billowing trend to be devoid of what I can term as mental sickness, but, guess what, the trend became cyclic. I would withstand the addiction for two weeks then resort back on the first day of the start of the third week or even before. Having forgotten that I had even sentenced myself much to the chagrin of angels of light but to the conceit of a gremlin that wanted to thrive over the angels of light. When you experience surge after surge of dopamine in the brain, there is an unprecedented condensation of dopamine in the brain, the end result is that it becomes intensive and you want more than you had experienced before. There is some kind of shame knowing that you are addicted to that which society has placed a red flag on.

Breaking from overstimulation like I intimated was quite a thing. You feel like a marathoner who has just won a medal for the first time after years and days of trial without victory. Those are the moments you feel like GIFing yourself one of those GIFs where someone is shouting her voice hoarse due to some soothing swoon having seen her team win victoriously. The challenge now lies in creating good to replace the bad old obsession. I guess I have to be humble in my next strategy of going to the next level. I really need to plan for the worst-case scenario now, because due to the heat of the moment, temptation can be pervasive and I may find myself throwing out all the plans I had in the twinkle of an eye.

Critically this habit was draining because of the fact that it interfered with my working and short-term memory, problem-solving ability, common sense, long-term memory, attention, decision making, ability to suppress urges, concentration, focus, and general intelligence. I can personally attest to my lack in motivation, interest, and noticeable declines in my overall intelligence as a result. Which is evident in my work results where I am at the periphery given that there is a gauge on one’s performance. It upsets that it has come this far.

When I am finally able to break free (say like going back to be a tot which never happens), experience clarity, think clearly, and have permanent, colossal boots in memory, intelligence and intellectual aptitude, motivation, decision making and being a free being, I will tell it once again. That I got hooked, struggled with the problem and finally ceased the indulgence. As at now, I am only through with the trial phase of debarring by trying to acclimatize even though the oner will still remain a challenge.

One thing I have come to realize is that there is some kind of beauty and natural satisfaction in having a burning passion for liberty from the corruption of the mind and spirit. I guess the feeling of addiction contributed immensely to the detrimental effect of feeling inadequate and that meant there are times I did reach a dead end and holding it unto myself, I could not move on. This partly contributed to my romantic empathy. Ideally, I had thought of myself as a real romantic. The kind that most women would die to have or fight for. Yet this has been the opposite. I looked at the mirror and realized am aging and wrinkled with cracked lips full of chielitis. However, there is this girl who has never got out of my mind. I have even thought that she dumped me, though she has not. Yet she knows that I belong to her. Aint that not so sweet that a lady thinks of you so much yet the bachelor in you is struggling with financial turmoil and petty phobia.

In spite of all that, she is like an addiction. I sometimes miss her so much that I feel like I don’t want her anymore. In the end the bitter becomes sweet. Like it’s now sometime ever since we last talked. I have been lying to myself that I will one day leave her for good but that has become so hard a challenge to achieve. I no longer even know those ballads that I can tell her to listen to because she wows me more than I know. I also became sloppy and indifferent to her. But her voice is serenading and pacifying. The kind of lady who I will one day probably handcuff with those small 24k magic inshallah.

Back to basics, when I said NO to the urge after the struggle I really felt good. I did not feel disappointed like I have before. Nor did I feel ashamed, or had feelings of self-hatred or filth. Reminds me that I should at least try to write that girl a romantic message, just to enliven our sensational camaraderie.

As the struggle continues, there is hope at the end of the tunnel, to be free from bondage, enjoy the intimacy of normalcy, regain confidence and be proud that I am that person who has gone through nature’s turbulence as a result of my own making and come out a victor though that journey has just started. My only prayer now is that the Almighty won’t let me go down the abyss that I have come from. The answer to this petition has just to be a stunning YES. His passion endures forever.

Hasta La Vista, Baby.

[Picture Source: Google Images]

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