A friend of mine once told me that he wanted to invest in one single thing that would be the rallying point for all other things that bring out the beauty in my life but he warned me not to be too excited because the monetary value will not buy me a pair of jeans even in the open market. It was close to my birthday. He said to me, now that your birthday is approaching, as you plan for the big feast for friends and well wishers from far and near, every other person can gift you every other thing valuable to you but I will be the only one to provide all the salt to be used to prepare the food to be served at your birthday feast because that is what I can afford.

Many times we draw a long list of what to do but forget what not to do to create enough room for what to do. It’s like buying new clothes to change your wardrobe without letting go of the old stock. It’s like putting old and new wine in the same bottle. You won’t get the optimum taste. If truly you are growing, some things that used to matter to you will stop bothering you. If everything that mattered to you years ago still matter to you today, please check. You may just be adding years to your life but not life to your years. Both are important.

It’s 2022. Goal setting should not necessarily follow a pattern but it is common to set goals at the dawn of a new calendar year. Sometimes the goals are clear, at other times they could be blurry. Even if everything appears blurry, you still have to set goals for your journey not to be aimless. I hope to find a company in you as we journey through 2022. You have to be sure of what you want, else you will be swimming with the tides and this could be dangerous. The ideas that form in your mind may not make sense at first but ideas are not fully formed until you get started. When your goals become clearer and you begin to make sense of it, that is a good time to ringfence your goals from undue influence. Keep it locked.

By this time next week, the year will not only be spent but it will be done and dusted. So much to cheer but not without stories that touch the heart. If yours is full of wins, raise an altar of thanksgiving in praise of Yahweh. If you had some losses, it’s still yes and yes in songs of praises to the host of heaven. If it’s a mixed bag, don’t forget to praise and praise because it is one sure way to victory. Allow me to say that 2021 will roll by but not without its lessons if only you care to listen. Head or tail, life is full of lessons for those who are full of ears with their heart in company. Some learn from wins but others learn from losses. More often than not, I’ve learnt to be awake even when I’m sleeping. Not that I hate sleep but because sometimes you listen best when the noise is deafening.

Some feelings are indescribable, the feeling that comes with Yuletide is one of them. Some moments have unique identifiers, Christmas season stands tall among the rest. Now that Christmas is coming, the feeling I have is holiday-like. What is a holiday? Robert Orben described it as having nothing to do and all day to do it. Christmas is here, the feeling is infectious. I just want to wish you a Merry Christmas. Everything about Christmas is special. The atmosphere is different. Whether in Africa or Asia, Europe or America, from the Middle East to the Far East, no one denies the coming of Christmas.

There is a very thin line between self appreciation and self adulation. Sitting in between the two is pride. Appreciation and adulation both start with letter A, one is positive but the other has negative meaning. The tricky part is that only you can save yourself from self adulation. Beware of pride. I gave a tip of an experience I had during my university days in a short message recently. There is a lot more to learn from the full story. I am glad I had that experience early in life. It taught me the danger in ego boosting. I remember that the second semester was about to be concluded with the final exams in progress. We were in the bus commuting from the campus to town. Everything was going on well until a final year student, who was standing, jokingly requested for the seat of another student who looked too quiet to have been a returning student.

There is a bully in all of us. It takes a great deal of discipline, good nature and godliness to minimise bullying tendencies particularly when we are in position of power, be it social, political or economic. The heart-rending news of the passage of Sylvester, a boarder in a secondary school in Lagos, whose promising life was aborted in the most unfortunate manner, should serve as a wake up call to all of us not to ignore bullying, even when in disguise. I imagine the pains that Sylvester’s family is nursing at this difficult time. My heartfelt condolences to the bereaved family. The truth that is coming to the fore is that many parents contribute to the bullying of their wards when they fail to listen to them even when they have things to say. In a bid to meet the dictates of the society, many times we undermine the unique nature of our children and force a new nature on them. We ride roughshod on their personality until they tune off and stop talking to us or anyone.

What can the righteous do if the foundations are destroyed? Truth is shrinking in Nigeria. Lie and more lies are becoming entrenched at the roots of the foundation of my beloved country. I worry. Shouldn’t I? I worry not even only at the institutionalisation of lies at the top echelon of leadership. We blame our woes on leadership and institutionalised corruption but if the immediate and far future is the hope we nurse, I worry that this upcoming generation is becoming a lying generation. In less than 48 hours, I had three different experiences that got me thinking how fast truth is becoming unfashionable amongst these young adults. Lying is becoming a way of life and I fear that honesty is struggling to find space.

Live life from the positive side. Truly, there are times when smiling does not truly reflect your mood but the person that will be purpose fulfilling cannot define life from the blurry lens and still expect to see clearly. For every one reason to be moody, there are two reasons to be grateful. It will appear as if we are wired to think that what characterises life itself are the activities we form around it. The urge to succeed leaves us acquiring that we, sometimes, forget to give more so we can acquire more. Sometimes when I think about life and how stories change in a flash, I wish we can all be in hurry to touch all the lives we could touch no matter how unplanned. For the knowledge and material acquisitions, humanity should benefit from your acquisition for it to make meaning.

Each day presents me vista of opportunities for new discoveries and adventures. As nature adds years to my life and as I consciously add life to my years, I discovered a fact about life. The freest human beings are those who do things their way. I found out that the life of an imitator is a very stressful life. Those who do things their way are quick to borrow from the knowledge of others but they are not stereotyped. They don’t pretend to know everything but they don’t allow themselves to be caged to a thought process. They fear less about what tomorrow will bring because they are not restricted to a one size fits all approach to any problem.