No Vex / Ma binu

"ma binu" used by the typical Yoruba person means "no vex" in pidgin. No vex is also typically used by the average Nigerian. These two words or their variations in other Nigerian languages employed when you offend somebody and want to appease them. A colleague recently used it on me and I was angry that she used it so I lambasted her... somewhat.


Ma binu is Yoruba for "do not be angry" or "don't get angry", I am pretty sure there is a variation for this phrase in every other Nigerian language.


What is my beef with this it is NOT an apology. I look at it as an arrogant phrase. If you offend somebody, your proper response should be: 1. I am sorry 2. Forgive me 3. It wont happen again.
Depending on the severity of the offence, all those three might not be necessary. No vex and Ma binu is not only inadequate, it is condescending.


In my opinion.

My advice/rant on the concept of "love" in romantic relationships.

I have a lot of stories about my love/romantic life. Sometimes I feel bad that I am still not "settled" or haven't been in an ideal relationship but overall I have more joy about being single than otherwise.
Through my journey I have learnt a lot of love and romantic relationships. Below are some of what I have learnt.


1. I do not believe in the concept of hope when it comes to relationships. For example if I like a girl and I ask her out and she somehow snubs me or tells me she "is not ready". I do not and will never bother to stay around "hoping" that she would "become ready". To me the concept of HOPE has no relation to Romanticism. I had a young lady once who liked me a lot of even though we were not dating and I did not ask her out, she kept treating me like I was her boyfriend. She later said that she was hoping that by treating me that way we would just become boyfriend and girlfriend without thinking much about it. I wanted to teach her something when she said that but I chose not to. What I wanted to teach her was that - anything relating to a romantic relationship that leads to marriage should never be done mistakenly. Marriage should be gone into like a business deal, a lot of negotiations should occur - it should be a very deliberate effort.


BALANCE: Before I make the decision of not continuing to pursue a lady, I assess her reasons for denying me. I am a very realistic person so if it is something like "she doesn't think I make enough money" or "she doesn't like my nose". I immediately move on without thinking twice. Now, if it were something like "she doesn't know enough about me" or "she is playing hard to get", sure I will still continue.


2. I try to tell people that you have to know how you define love. There are different kinds of love. You need to know how you define love and how the other person you like or want to be in a relationship with defines love. For a lot of people, love is a feeling - a positive feeling. For me though, love is A COMMITMENT THAT IS NOT BASED ON HOW WE FEEL BUT HOW WE ACT PUTTING OTHERS INTERESTS BEFORE OURS AND ULTIMATELY CHRIST'S INTERESTS FIRST. So if I meet a young lady and I teach her my own definition of love and she does not agree with it - forget it.I forget about the relationship immediately.  There is no moving forward. To me this is something very straightforward.


BALANCE: Even though the young lady might not agree at first, if she is open to the idea/definition and there is a possibility that she could accept it, then sure I would continue.


3. Balance is very important. I think one of the reasons I am still single is because I love my personal freedom too much. My last relationship was not good because she was an indoors person. She did not really enjoy going out. I am similar but sometimes I just like to hang out with my friends and CHILL. I realized that every time I hung out with my friends she got so jealous that she made me feel terrible for hanging out with my friends. That was definitely unhealthy. I do not ever see myself being in that position again. Like the point I referred to in number 1, a solution to this would have been for us to sit down like adults and discuss this conflict. I would have told her, "listen, I would love to hang out with my friends once or twice a week and hang out with you the other three or four or five days in the week. These are the specific days and times I will hang out with my friends. Do you agree with this?"
I believe couples should be able to freely talk like this about the things they have conflict about. The balance in the above situation is that normally I might hang out with my friends 4 times a week but I am sacrificing 2 extra days to suit my partner.


BALANCE: Already discussed.


4. We need to keep in mind that all human beings are selfish and that is one of the reasons why we should never try to change someone. We can try to influence people but we should never try to change anyone. I have lost several friendships because I have tried to change people. I realized that even though it is important to be a good influence and to motivate or push people to be better, we should not push too hard because their allegiance to themselves is ALWAYS going to be more than their allegiance to US. True change is hard, difficult, and most people want to take the path of least resistance. I have ended a lot of romantic relationships that I would have liked to continue because I realized that I would want to change the person too much. I took responsibility for that person. for that relationship and decided to end it in order to avoid future profound pain. I need someone that fits me without having to make major behavioral or character changes. Or the person should at least be on the right path while I help motivate them to get to "that place".


BALANCE: It is important that you are also showing that the person is influencing you and changing you too in positive ways. If you are so far advanced emotionally from someone, it creates a dynamic when you are the one always teaching the person. Learn a few things from the person too.


5. Most people take others for granted. I think this is one of my pet peeves in relationships. When you treat someone so nicely and then they take you granted. I have several stories about this. I have come to accept that it is human nature yet if there is something about me that I adore the most it is that I do not take the people in my life for granted. I do not know who taught me this or how it was taught but it is something I would love to instill in my children. In order to stop people from taking you from granted, you have to be more conscious of your behavior. What this means is that if you are a very nice person, you have to deliberately reduce your niceness/kindness so the person does not get used to it. Once you do this you can gradually increase the niceness or give random "bursts" of kindness. I believe that 80-90% of most people take things for granted. Therefore this approach can be used on most people. Now, if you manage to meet people in that 10-20% that do not take you for granted, then you can discard this approach and just be yourself. It is sad that you have to limit your niceness to people in order to ensure they do not take you for granted but this is what the world has turned into.


BALANCE: If you do not care if people take you for granted, discard this advice.


6. In a relationships, both people should be teachable. The point of a relationship is that both people must adapt to each other. It should not be just one way. I tell my mentees that any two people can be in a relationship as long as one of them is ready to sacrifice EVERYTHING.
Having good manners is enough to get you a good man or a good woman. Simple things like being clean, being courteous - if you can live with someone and they say you are a good/great roommate to have, that alone is good enough to get you a good person to marry.




For now, there goes my humble advice and rant on love. I could go in more detail but I think I have actually talked enough. Holler!

Everyone is selfish

Most people are selfish. As a matter of fact, everyone is selfish. Some people are more selfish than others and most time selfishness is not seen until an actual crisis or till a change in perspective but all human beings are selfish.


One of the most important things I have learned in the past few year is that PEOPLE ARE DIFFERENT. For example, while for a particular woman it would be selfish to NOT WANT to have children, for another woman it would be selfish to WANT to have children.
The reasons for this might be: for the first woman, the idea of her not being in control of her body, the idea of the body changing so much, the desire to be more in control of her body supersedes the desire to have children. For this reason, her selfishness prevails as she choses herself over anything else.
For the second woman, wanting to have children might fulfil her biological cravings. She would be able to superficially tell people she's a mother, and also the fact that she has a "mini-me" would probably make her ecstatic. This action is selfish when the woman is not capable of being a good mother. Unfortunately, not every woman is designed for parenthood and a lot of people do not have the capacity or will to become good parents, therefore when they chose or do have kids, they are being selfish by not considering whether they can actually be good parents or are interested in becoming good parents.


In essence, though human beings are selfish, we have to train ourselves to be more selfless. Holler 

Random Revitalization Post

It has been a while since I last posted on this blog. I realize that as you grow older you abandon some things that are important to you. This happened to me subconsciously... why? Because I got complacent and stopped following my daily practice. I am supposed to review my projects/goals/ plans on a regular basis. I have not done that regularly or consistently. I feel like I have lost dreams. Time has gone and the things I should have done I have not done enough of. Some of the things I've abandoned include: writing, yoga, reading, 10 ideas a day, journaling, etc...
I want to change. Maybe I was over-ambitious from the start...? Maybe I should cut my ambitions in half.


I want to change. I am changing but I need to ensure I am changing for the better.
Breathe in, breathe out, stretch, envision it, pursue it no matter how difficult or uncomfortable. Pursue. It.

My mother!

My mother is my hero.
Maybe. Or Sometimes.
I was recently unable to walk properly because something happened to my leg. I woke up that morning and the first thing I did was hop to my mother's room to see if she was there. Unfortunately for me she had gone to church. It was a Sunday and she had left earlier than she would normally leave.
I went back to my room and took my phone to call her. She picked up after two rings and I asked her: -  "Mommy, where are you?"
- "I am at church."
- "You left earlier than normal"
- "Yes, I have to do some teachings this morning... are you okay?"
- ".... I can't put any weight on my leg- I want to go to the hospital"
- "...... What happened"
*I went ahead to explain to her the pain from the day before and how it had unexpectedly gotten worse*,
She then said: "Don't worry, just rest and when I come back I will come and take care of you and take you to the hospital". It was sooo sweet.


I spent the next few hours lying on my bed, reading a little and sleeping while waiting for my precious mother to come back. She came back looked at me. Told me that she wont take me to the hospital and that she would pray for me that it is well. So she got hot water, took my towel and she massaged it. Then she prayed for it. Anointed it with oil and then left to make food and send food and fruits to me.


I do not know how to describe the emotions I had. I just felt like my mother does really own me. I felt like my mother would always be there and take care of me regardless of what happened to me.
Chai, my mother owns me. I am sooooooooooo grateful.

I am a lot of things?

When I first meet someone, I show them a lot of respect and defer a lot in order to get to know them and show them that they are of most importance.
After this stage, depending on how I perceive the person I either continue my original paradigm or I change my actions based on what I have perceived from the other person.
Sometimes this change brings out the rude me, the impatient me, the mean me.
I thought about it recently and realized that WOW, there are different MEs. And maybe that is what Christ has called us to recognize by saying death to SELF and told us to strive for the ME that is in accordance with His Person, Will, Heart.
The ME that acts the same regardless of how the other person behaves.
The ME that
The ME that always puts others interests before himself and ultimately Christ.

To argue or not to argue

That is the question.

Among the things I have to ask myself each morning one of them is the question: Do I choose to argue today or choose to NOT argue.

When I was much younger I used to argue a lot. I think I used to love arguing. Why? I have no idea, I think it was just fun to me, to see people on the edge and talking about things they were passionate about. I also think a big part of me arguing has been to try to teach others and show them I know more than they do..?

As I grew older I started getting tired of arguing especially after starting to believe that most people do not change their perspectives on issues they argue about. So I stopped arguing completely. Completely.

To argue or not to argue? It has been a while (maybe years) since I made profound discoveries about myself. I think I went through unconscious periods when I would go on an arguing binge and then a non arguing binge. Looking back I do remember these periods but at the moment they occurred I was oblivious to them. 

In trying to leave more consciously, when I wake up in the mornings one of the questions I ask myself is: Should I argue today or should I just NOT argue? I think it is also fundamental to whether I have HOPE that people will deviate and give themselves an opportunity to learn. LOL. 

Or maybe hope doesn't apply at all. Maybe I should just stop arguing completely and use my mental energy for more positive and quantifiable activities.

It is a new day. July 7th 2014. World Class Discipline resumes. 

CHyeah.

Les Americains

I am back again. It has been a while but I am back. I left World Class Discipline but I am back.
Chai. New Season.

Same Way, Every day
Never too high, Never too low
Getting Comfortable with the uncomfortable
Preparation and Execution
Consistently Consistent --->  More than Enough to Win

June 19 2014
Being still. Focusing on Christ. I'm praying that God will always rekindle my understanding and never let it die.
Sometimes the worst things that can happen to us happen slowly. --> Bad habits

We have to let the good things marinate into our lives. We can't force it. We have to let it slowly slowly enter our lives --> Good Habits, the 5 year rule.

I am learning more about myself. Learning that I don't need much in life. Learning about the things I am living for. I think once I have kids I would be living just to allow them have a great life. I want to give so much to my children. By the time they are 18 they will own all my property.
My style is that I wont let my kids be spoiled, I will train them to be humble, hardworking, tough kids who don't have a sense of entitlement and when they are grown and fully trained. I will spoil them.

Unlimited spoiling.

Slow Motion + Sense of Urgency

I thought about the contradiction. I was sitting in the car before driving off. I sat there for 2 minutes to let the car warm up but really to let spend some time in stillness before getting on the road.
It was a nice practice, for a lot of reasons.
I find myself rushing a lot nowadays. I should be at work by 8am every day but I find myself getting in late, 8:30am and a lot of times past 8:50am.
I think a lot of it falls on the fact that I do not sleep early enough. I would like to get to the place where I sleep by 10pm every night.

So what is the contradiction?
I believe we need a sense of urgency to achieve the things we need to achieve. I think we need to remind ourselves every AM and every PM what the most important things are to us.
I also think we need to enjoy the essence of life.

How do we live in slow motion but also w/ a sense of urgency.
I think by moving in slow motion we get to better feel and enjoy the essence of life. We have to balance enjoying that essence with actually achieving goals and living a life of excellence.

All my life I've been emphasizing the importance of balance. Never too high, never too low. Consistently consistent. I also try to emphasize the importance of building a healthy self-esteem. Having a perspective of no entitlement. Starting from zero and building yourself up in the right way. Letting go of insecurities, foolishness etc.

I know for some it is much harder than for others. But the fact is whatever hand you are dealt with in life is where development must start.

No retreat, no surrender.

In practicality, how do we do it?
Well, there is not enough time to do everything but there is enough time to do the most important things.
so the first step is to determine
1. What are the most important things to be -doing right now?
For me these are: - being more still, doing the right things, resetting, relooking at my past goals, dreams, being grateful
2. Eliminate the little things that take up your time:
From 5 minutes to 30 minutes, we spend our time on trivialities that take a toll on our time. and to be honest we are not just wasting 5 minutes or 30 minutes, we find out that we are wasting years. once accumulated.
For me these are things like: whatsapping, bbming, watching television, etc. there is so much! undersleeping, oversleeping,
3. Actually i'm not sure there is anything more profound to add. I think once we focus on eliminating the wrong activities and properly planning our lives, we would find out that there is more free time to be still, breathe and enjoy l'essence de la vie.

Bisous bisous

I am a women rights activist

I recently confirmed that I have a bias towards women.
I had just finished work and was on my home. I was getting to a roundabout when I saw two cars, at different sides of the roundabout, approaching each other. I could see clearly that one of the cars was been driven by a woman while the other was being driven by a man.
I immediately believed the man was in the wrong and proceeded to horning and trying to warn him about what was about to happen.
The two cars narrowly missed each other and I still kept horning at the man and pointing towards him in an attempt to let him know that what he did was wrong. Before realizing that I was going the same way he was going.
It was the woman who was in the wrong.
I was kinda in shock at myself as I got a revelation about myself.
I spent the next 5 minutes thinking about where this bias could come from. I narrowed it down to my childhood, to the relationship between my parents.
I think I am so biased against my father. Even when my mother is obviously in the wrong I probably still support her.
To be honest some of this has changed, sometimes when I see my parents relate I can tell my mom is obviously in the wrong and I see how she contributes to some of the dysfunction. Maybe its because of years of bitterness... or maybe....

I dunno.

You are blessed.


 

Why do I blog? / Responsible Love / True Love

Why do I blog?
Eventually I would like to write a book about my life. Even if nobody buys it I would love to be able to read and appreciate moments in my life that I would not normally think about.
Blogging is important. Sometimes when I read what I have written I cannot believe it is me that wrote it.
I need to invest more in my life. My habit of reading has regressed and I am disappointed about that.
I pledge to read for life. I pledge to life weights for life. I pledge to Jesus Christ for life.

Responsible Love
I had a discussion with a friend of mine about what true love is. He said you must love to the point where you can let someone go and still fully love them. He called it "responsible love", responsible because you know it won't work out but still 200% wish the person the best. I was so surprised it was a young man trying to teach me, his uncle, about love.

I had something else I wanted to blog about.... I can't remember now...

Maybe next time.

Badology

I have done some things in my life. I don't know whether to call them stupid or just plain random.
There was a time I used to sign all the dollar bills I got.
Why? I would also check dollar bills for my signature just to see if I received one that I had previously written on.

Sometimes I wonder what the point on life/success is if the majority of the people around you seem to be regressing.

Randomology

 

Driving and how it relates to MY life

I was thinking about this recently. I drive a lot in Abuja and I am so grateful to not have gotten into any type of accident since I started driving/living here.

I try to think a lot. I try to see possibilities and risks and try to mitigate against them. I have been in a car accident before. My brother was driving. Our windows were tinted and it was a little dark outside. We were at an intersection and had a stop sign in front of us. My brother had looked right but I guess the tinted windows didn't allow him to see well enough because a car was coming from the right side. Me, being on the right side and paying close attention to what was happening then proceeded to say  "Seun, a car is coming". The next thing that happened was typical of our relationship, me always warning him and him never listening. I  sat in the car, braced myself for impact, all in slow motion, while halfway shouting "Seun a car is coming"...

The two cars hit each other! BAM! And I just kept muttering, "a car is coming, Seun.... I told you a car was coming."

I was very pissed off that day. It was in the morning and my whole day was affected because of it. I was supposed to be on my way to class when it happened.

Anyways that day left me thinking, our lives would be better if we saw the accidents coming our way. Well maybe not. But I kinda believe that accidents - especially car accidents - we see about to happen



But anyways after the accident, my brother got out of the car to make sure the other guy was okay. It was an Hispanic man. I saw a part of my brother which I see often, the part that actually cares about people and I was impressed because even though he can act monstrous sometimes he was capable of being a gentle giant.

As always maybe I am just saying nonsense and just trying to write a blog post because I am supposed to do one every Monday.
But by writing this I got to rethink some of the demons that me and my family members need to deal with... which is listening to one another. Giving and Receiving advice is part of every relationship.

My family members need to learn that.

I. Need. To. Learn. That.
 

Egos cause wars

I have been thinking about this for sometime and it has come down to this.
I believe all wars have been caused by egos. I believe egos cause wars.
Nothing else.

Matter of fact I can boil it down to say Egoism is the source of all our problems.

Just random thoughts. Well, not really random but yeah.

I needed to write a blogpost this week. This is short but hopefully helpful.

2014 is your year

Your year of breakthrough
deliverance
healing
restoration
redemption
reward

The Lord will turn the failure of your life into success
the poverty of your life into blessing
Every sickness of your life into good health
mistakes into perfection
Frustration into fulfillment
pain into inspiration

I still can't believe 2013 is gone. Never coming back. This ish is real.

Your birthday and 1st of January of every year have something in common, they help us realize that we are on a journey and whether we move or not we are being moved.

I don't know if that last sentence made sense.

Anyways I am rethinking a lot of things. Sometimes I just want to chill and chill. All this work work work, is it necessary????

Anyways, looking ahead. in 2015 i'll be 27.. KAI!
2015 is my year. I feel it in the middle of my stomok (stomach), I must to marry in 2015 (by God's grace hahahahahah)

I must jiggy jiggy in 2015

2014 is also my year!!!!!

2014... WELCOME

I feel good about 2014. I am not sure why.. BUT I FEEL GOOD!
Lookin' forward to the new year. Looking forward to living a life of Excellence in Daily Living.
Looking forward to A LOT.


Welcome to 2014 HOMEYS!

Heaven uses technology (Mathematics)

Heaven uses technology (Mathematics).
On judgment day, when you are called to stand in front of your Creator or who ever will judge you, one of the criteria that you will judged upon will be presented on a powerpoint. Heaven show you a graph showing how you spent most of the |hours| of your life.

These are some calculations below:

There are:
24hours a day
x 7 = 168 hours per week
x 52 = 8736 hours a year

Assuming you live till you are 80 years old
8736 x 80 = 698880 hours

Assuming a grace of 20 - 25 years, for "discovering yourself"
- 262080 hours (calculated using 30 years)

That leaves 436800 hours

- Sleep @ 8 hours a night = 145600 hours
- Eating, Bathing, other miscellaneous @ 4 hours a day = 72800 hours
- Work @ 8 hours a day for 5 days a week = 104000 hours

= 114400 hours
114400 other hours that you can allocate to other things,

Some people will allocate a majority of these hours in to things like:
Watching television, spending time with friends, using social media, extra sleeping, and countless other ways people spend their time "unconsciously".

My point is that you will have to explain how the majority of your life was spent. And Heaven will present it in a clear and cogent manner (using technology of course Lol).

Maybe this is all BS.
Because at the end of the day you cannot calculate what will earn your salvation. We used to be able to until Jesus came and brought forth grace. The main point of this is to emphasize the importance of time management and seeing the big picture. Every day counts.

|Excellence in Daily Living|

I am not what you see

I started a job recently, and so I have been having numerous interactions with all kinds of people. As a philosopher (I used to call myself a philosophist until somebody corrected me and I dictionaried the word "philosophist" and realized that philosophist means "a pretender in Philosophy"... well I am not a pretender, at least I hope.. but anwyays back to the original post).
As a philosopher, I think a lot. There is always a deeper meaning to something. There is a reason for everything we do, even if we do not know the reason. From my recently interactions, I have come to re-realize that I get different treatments from different people and I realize that people adapt their behavior to me after a short time.

When people interact with you they do not interact with the true you but with their image of you. It is your responsiblity (to an extent) to provide a bridge to compensate for that gap. It is very easy to let people dictate to you who you  should be. For example, I find it tempting sometimes to become that image that people see. When people first meet me I have come to realize that they think of me as "arrogant", "stuck up", "privileged", superficial. They do not see me as I truly am: "too cool for school." :-)
It is easy to become that image because when people start out hostile or defensive towards you, you are tempted to put your guard up. To become that image.

Eventually people let their guards down when they realize that I am not that image that they have. I put a lot of effort actually into trying to get people to let their guard down. Well, I used to put a lot of effort into it and now it is just automatic.

Some of the things I do include:
I try to reach out, try to be the first person to say hello
Let them talk as much as they want and I listen. 100%
Not talking about myself. Deflecting questions and making it about them
If I talk about myself, I talk about my losses, almost never my victories.


Before I go on I must rethink about the original purpose of this post. The original purpose was to highlight that people interact with the images they have created in their minds and not with us. It is something I need to keep reminding myself because sometimes I get annoyed or discouraged by the way human beings, especially in this part of the world, interact with me. I either let go or attempt to let myself come out.


PS: I find it interesting that sometimes when I look at myself (before or after taking a shower), it is hard to reconcile that this is my body. In my mind I am this slim cool dude but on the outside I am this guy who looks like he spends so much time in the gym. When people think of someone who spends a lot of time gyming, they automatically conclude that this person must be superficial, among other things. Just a random thought!
 

Is Respect an Idol to you, Shola?

I value respect. Sometime ago some lady asked me why I behave the way I do. I wasn't sure what she was refering to. I guessed she was refering to how i show respect and my gestures. I thought about it and mentionned that I value respect so much and that is why I try to be respectful to people.

Upon further thought and after going through some experiences, I have come to realize that it is possible that I do value respect too much. Too much to the extent of making it an Idol. I place too much emphasis on gestures, respect. I have become too sensitive to them.

Maybe it's a good thing; maybe it's a bad thing. I'm not sure... but I need balance.

 

My Trip To Visit PARIS

So when I returned back to Paris to visit, I had been very excited that I was going back to a city that took my heart. 

A famous person once said that there is nothing better than living in Paris during your early twenty's.

Well I was very excited going back to visit and once I landed, I started blogging about it. I was kinda disappointed but.. here it goes... What I journaled while in Paris with the mindset of THINGS I MISS and THINGS I DO NOT MISS. 

--------------
Paris just arrived through Luftansa. I should try not to do a layover this long EVER AGAIN.
I arrived to Paris in a bad mood. So I started my trip somewhat negatively.

In the train now to Paris. I don't miss the Magreb French, loudness, behavior.

I don't miss the ugly and old cars and roads, especially in the suburbs.

I don't really miss the French facial expressions.

I don't miss seeing so many bummish black people

I don't miss the suburbs and the old houses. The graffiti everywhere

I don't miss the scarcity of housing.

I don't miss the dirt. Rushing. Rowdiness.

I don't miss the bread/baguette

I don't miss the small portions for food


Maybe tomorrow I'll wake up with a positive outlook of Paree

One thing I did notice was better systems: People are improving their methods, lives.. for example there was a busker who dropped info cards and then started playing. Usually it was not like this. It used to be one or the other. You either "begged" for money or entertained and asked people to give you money. This guy combined both

What I did/do miss was:
My friendship with Tobias. Tobias has become like a brother to me.
A daily life without drama from family members
Going out, salsa dancing, partaying!! with Tobias
Going out to eat in restaurants with pals
Wine
Cheese
ACP and its members
Seeing and appreciating all types and races of single ladeys.
Riding the velib around Paris

hmmmmm

Overall i think the essence of Paris is best felt with PEOPLE. People...