Beneath The Smile

Dear lovely people,

Just one month into their marriage, Parkson felt on top of the world and he told himself he deserved it after all the meticulous work he had done from the moment he decided to get married to the time they left the banquet hall at the end of their wedding ceremony. He spent a greater part of his time admiring his wife as she went about her domestic chores. All was moving according to plan and he told himself he had found the perfect wife of his dreams. She knew just what to do when, where and how to do it.

The story was not the same by their first anniversary in marriage, everything suddenly changed for the worse. Parkson could not place a finger on what actually went wrong. They suddenly became too quarrelsome, their home was no longer the sweet home with all the fragrance anybody would desire, the smiles where gone. There came moments when Parkson did not feel like returning home after work and so the questions kept coming: what suddenly went wrong? What could have happened after all the planning put in to ensure they had a wonderful marriage?

Parkson’s experience underlines a major truth in life. No matter how well you plan, no matter how much you think you master your surroundings, problems will arise, some unforeseens will crop up whether you like it or not. The first thing you have to understand is that it’s not about what happens, it’s about how you handle what happens that makes the difference.

Many are those who tell the world how positive they are when things are moving right and when things swing to the down side, they can stand it, they become negative and some even give up on their beautiful dreams.

One major step to handling whatever happens the right way is to be crystal clear about what the problem is. Before trying to argue with someone and come to a solution for whatever the problem is that the two of you are having for example, make sure you understand what's really bothering them first. Sometimes people seem mad about one thing but really they're mad about something else. If you want to really fix the problem, it's a good idea to make sure you're working on the right problem first.

Let’s consider Parkson’s case, the wife might have told him she’s mad at him because he accepted a new job in a none-accompanied country instead of a local job within country. Of course, he will still be coming home on leave and grow their marriage without serious problems: what she's really worried about is that all that time off on his own might lead him to meet someone new and that could entail unpleasant outcomes for their marriage.

Debra’s Patchiness

Dearly lovely people,

While Debra walked down the aisle besides Jude that afternoon, her eyes where focused on the elegant Wilfred standing at the doorway a short distance from them. At the end of the wedding, Debra went missing for over two hours, equivalent to the time she secretly spent with Wilfred at his place before returning home to Jude. This is how it all started and lasted through the following year. Debra was swinging between Jude – her lawfully wedded husband and Wilfred – the boyfriend she loved to bits.

Debra was convinced the only thing that linked her to Jude was their marriage obligations and his money. Her heart and soul was reserved for Wilfred, the man her spirits could not depart from even for a second. Even when in romance with Jude, all she could think of and see in her mind’s eye was Wilfred. This dangerous kept on and on until that fateful day when all broke loose with the outcome that Debra ended up neither with Jude nor Wilfred. Her love life in one instance, was shattered to shreds….

It’s not much different from those who have consciously made a decision to improve upon their lives and so, they get married to the quest for success yet are in a passion-loaded love affair with the very things that gruesomely prevent them from attaining their goals in life. You find people who spend a greater part of their time at parties, nightclubs, underperforming at work and are not abreast with happenings in the corporate world; such are those who get crippled by lethargy, acrimony, mediocrity and lack of vision yet, they want and even hope to become CEOs at the prestigious companies in town.

I have met some of such people who painfully imagine that just for the simple fact that they conceived beautiful goals, all will move to their favor just like that. They even deceive themselves by praying for some miracle backed by nothing. They are those who are quick to complain that God does not answer prayers forgetting completely that what you get out of life is equivalent to the positive energy you put into your struggles.

If life was that easy, I will have a billion dollar account today just for the mere fact that I have beautiful dreams. Trust me, you either dare a lot to get a lot or you die trying to get a lot.

Trotting to Success

Dear lovely people,

As I set out on this journey to success, I remind myself of how much I have been dreaming about my destination, sometimes, it sounded so real, so achievable and so easy I forgot to remember the thorny roads, the seemingly bottomless gullies and the rough pavements I have to pass through.

Then I heard the voice telling me to be ready, to be prepared and to brave it. To brave it because it certainly will not be as easy as I dreamed about. The thorny roads will get thornier, the bottomless gullies will be more frightening and the rough pavements would get rougher but for sure the destination will become brighter for those who brave it to the end.

It got to a point I told myself enough might just be enough because no matter how hard I tried to brave it, my destination seemed to be further and further away from me and a lot of what I thought I had a grip on where slipping through my fingers.

Then the light shown on me at some point and I could read the words of Ezekiel 36:26 (NIV) “I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit in you; I will remove from you your heart of stone and give you a heart of flesh.”

Thence, it downed on me that the issues where more about the stereotypical conditioning of my mind than the physical world challenges I was convinced were the interference between me and my cherished destination…and so, off I trotted even harder heading for my destination.