Everything seemed static early in life.
The seasons would come and go, and the chores remained the same. The food was always the same, depending on the change in the weather. Pastures for grazing were plenty in wet seasons. When dry, we would trek barefooted for hours to graze. All along singing, shouting, and whistling in the scorching sun. One hand holding a huge stick and the other, swinging some cold lunch in a recycled metallic tin.
All this changed in one unforgettable season.
It was in 1984, when the rains missed for two straight seasons. All the food in our raised, dark granary got depleted. My parents, unlike before, had to start buying from the market. There was no fodder or pasture for our cows, and they started dying, one by one. Uninspected meat became the staple. In a village where everyone erstwhile ate boiled dry maize and beans for every meal. There was so much beef such that even the stray village dogs started declining to eat it. For the first and the only time in my life, vultures descended upon our village.
We lost all our animals. Our wild fruits disappeared. The river went dry, and we had difficulty getting water to drink. There were no chores to carry out, and we played and enjoyed the moments. I experienced a holiday during this period. A type of introduction to the blissful life that I imagined town kids lived. Waking up and not having to toil for basic needs was such an excitement. We, for once felt like rich kids in our times.
The government had to intervene to save lives.
Relief food came in trucks. On designated days, villagers would queue for long hours awaiting their arrival. Yellow maize was introduced, a half-rotten foodstuff that tasted horrible. I have no doubt today that this was the taste of aflatoxin. They also brought something called soybeans. A strange earthy tasting legume, to replace our yummy beans.
Then there was a new oil. Not the cooking fat that my mother scooped sparingly to prepare our meals. It was an attractive golden liquid in metal tins that transformed the taste of our food. The villagers called it “maguta ma carari.” Translating to, “salary oil” in my mother tongue. After leaving the village, I came to learn that it was meant to be “salad oil”.
The church also stepped in.
Those days, unlike today, the church used to give and not rob the needy. Our white Italian Catholic priests brought many gifts that kept our lives going. There were free medical camps for all and home visits to the elderly. But the most remarkable stuff they introduced was second-hand clothes. They brought them in neat bales to our church for distribution. Luckily enough, I was an active altar boy entrenched in the system, and the proud son of a church elder. I upgraded my polyester wardrobe with some beautiful cotton costumes.
This opportunistic advantage led me to become the most dapper child in the village. To proof this, I was the first kid in my village to wear a zipped college jacket and a pair of jeans. White rivetted jeans for that matter. In an instant, I became an attraction in school and church. Girls started to tease me and extend invitations to visit their homesteads. One of them, a truly gorgeous girl, declared that I was her boyfriend. And that is how I got my first girlfriend without even trying. Thanks to mitumba!
I became very enviable. Boys were always jealous of my acquired taste and the attention I got from schoolgirls. They started a rumour accusing my father of selecting the best clothes for his children. And giving the rejects to their parents. This was a silly lie, and never deterred me from enjoying my new village fashionista status.
The elders were not left behind, either.
One day, I experienced our traditional Kikuyu rituals first-hand. On that random afternoon, the aged men gathered around the river under a Mukuyu (African fig) tree. These were not mere male villagers. They were athuri of a specific age group with powers to conduct rainmaking ceremonies. They had a very different look and demeanour from today’s pot-bellied money-seekers. Who are popular for masquerading as traditionalists. The ones who place monkey skins on the shoulders of evil politicians as a way of “anointing” them. Only after receiving corrupted handouts.
The ones commercially recruiting all and sundry to become “elders” after receiving two goats and cans of traditional brew. Convenors of every weekend parties for young men to eat charred meat and drink alcohol till dawn. While disparaging women in the name of perpetuating Kikuyu tradition. All well-intended. But obliviously incubating a severe health and familial implosion crisis within our society.
Ranting aside, we all went down to witness this unique and uplifting ceremony. The elders slaughtered a fat, black lamb. Then splashed its blood, and started grilling it while chanting some words facing Mt. Kenya. The shrine of our God. They were pleading to Ngai to end the suffering of the people by sending some rain to restore the earth. It was very solemn, a sight to behold. That very afternoon, some showers came. Within a few days, the heavens opened with loud thunderstorms, and heavy rains poured.
The drought ended, but our lives were never the same again.
The suffering and hunger came to an end, and the sluggish village came back to its vibrant life. But many things began to change owing to ideas introduced to us during the famine. Our way of eating transformed. We started including vegetables like spinach and kale in our meals.
Second-hand clothes became the norm. Patched clothing, barebacks and exposed buttocks started to disappear. Tailors with their sewing machines began to vanish from the shop verandas. So did their displayed fabrics and measuring tapes dangling from their necks. Our busy local cotton ginnery shut down, and we stopped growing the crop as a result. Our local economy started to collapse.
My father joined other progressive people to introduce irrigation along the riverbank. We stopped relying on rains for food and economic production. New crops like green beans, tomatoes, bottle gourd and okra entered our farms and joined our menus. In other words, the economy and lifestyle of my village started to transform for the better. Our adversity converted to our fuel for change and growth.
The universe imposes change on us.
Our village experience is no different from this Covid-19 epidemic, which is a universally imposed change in the world order. No one ever imagined that a bat in a Chinese market could bring the entire world to a complete lockdown. It was unthinkable that the wealthiest nations in the world would become helpless in a flash. Their sophisticated healthcare systems and levels of preparedness in vain. Their advances in medical science and technology notwithstanding. It was unimaginable that a sizeable global population would get decimated by a flu.
Only some visionary men saw it coming. The likes of Bill Gates, Shi Zhengli, Anthony Fehr and Peter Daszak. For decades, the world conducted business as usual, and life seemed to move on a straight line. We thought we were thriving and progressing in many aspects of human development. But this has been a delusion. A severe wave of global change in our thinking and practice has begun.
This disruption is for all.
Coronavirus is unlikely to kill most of us. But like it or not, it is going to impose a change in our lives in a way that we never expected. The pandemic will not bring life lessons that have never been unknown to us. It will only remind us of the things that we have always known but ignored.
Massive disruption is taking place in every sphere of humanity. Economies will get depressed, and businesses will crumble. Some rich will end up miserable. Marriages will strengthen or break. While some careers will end, others will emerge. Some well-fed families will starve, and unlikely people will die. Some sane ones will sink into depression, but none of us will escape unscathed. This is a call for all of us to change some things in our lives. But what we are seeing is resistance to this disruption.
The generational lies of this world are refusing to die.
Drunkards are forcing their way into closed bars during the day, retreating to their homes before night curfew. Pastors are crying out loud for churches to reopen. They want us to continue believing that the world cannot exist without people attending churches. Capitalistic opportunists want the dead buried by large, feasting crowds. Wholly ignorant of the imminent public health risks.
School owners are forcing governments to allow for their reopening. Intentional profiteering has made us believe that our children cannot learn without classrooms. Governments are threatening their citizens with punishment for defying lockdowns while taking no action. Yet we have always trusted in their power to put all people in jail at the same time.
No matter how the truth tries coming out, much effort is being made to cover it up. Churches, mosques, and temples are not a necessity for connecting to God. Sweaty preachers shouting themselves hoarse on television and in open grounds cannot heal themselves, let alone anyone. Our children can acquire education without attending school. Governments are not powerful enough to control entire populations. And neither do we need most of our excessive social feasts and gatherings to be human. The truth has been laid bare for those who can think and see.
The ego will, indeed suffer during this period.
Resistance to life rides on the power of the ego, the false voice in our heads. One of my favourite teachers on this subject is Eckhart Tolle. He describes the ego as any image you have of yourself that gives you a sense of identity. Derived from the things you tell yourself. And the things other people have been saying about you that you’ve decided to accept as truth. It is your heavy protective shell. Akin to animals like beetles, crabs or tortoises. That act like an armour to cut you off from other people and the outside world. In other words, your ego separates you from the reality.
The truth is, illusionary human beliefs and societal systems are now openly exposed. Their relevance in governing the planet is under total scrutiny. People and institutions that will continue to resist the universal transformation will suffer. And in the end die, leaving the adaptive ones to thrive. And this transition must not happen in our lifetime, but the wave of change has begun. This world will never be the same again.
In the end, our society is going to change for the better.
The forest epitomises the plenty and fullness of life to all humans and many other organisms. It is the habitat that we historically lived in. Its beauty and serenity experiences violent fires, harsh weather, invasive plants and destructive insects. But it never ceases to exist when this happens. Instead, it rejuvenates and becomes anew.
In the same way, this pandemic is good for humanity. There will be less busy social places and more cohesive families. New babies will come, love will blossom, and children will start to know their parents. Some sinful people will seek salvation. Alcoholics will enjoy healthy teas, and some struggling and new businesses will boom. A lot of us will become more energetic, wealthier, and more happy and loving.
Whatever we are forced to adapt to is never unknown to us.
There is always a lingering sign or a voice to change beforehand. That usually goes unnoticed or deemed unimportant. Then we must wait for suffering to make the necessary forced improvements in our lives. From a tender age, we all know the need to save some parts of our regular personal or business income. To keep it away for emergencies but not bothered.
We have all along been aware of the value of spending time alone to recover mentally, and at home with our loved ones strengthening relationships. Instead, we perfected the art of spending our time in loud social places. Ridiculing those who stay indoors reading, knitting, and cooking. We have frowned at those who spend lots of time with their spouses and children when they choose not to attend unending social events.
We know the importance of walking. And there has always been a place to take a stroll around the hood. The oven, ingredients, eaters and time for baking and cooking have always been with us. The books, eyes, knowledge, power of learning, time and reading space have always been there.
So, what has shifted now? Only one thing. What goes on in our heads.
The patterns of the universe epitomise change.
Seasons are forever changing. Wet and dry. Cold and heat. Green and brown. The temperature of the sun in a day keeps fluctuating. The tides in the ocean alternate. If you look with keenness, the dominant colours of the flowers blooming change with time. We were born young and healthy but will soon become old and frail before we die.
All the transitions in nature occur beautifully. And without resistance, unlike in human life. We do need to realise that irrespective of whatever our minds deceive us, we are part and parcel of nature. And change must be integral to our existence. The more we accept the time and seasons for change, the less brutal is the pain of the changing force.
Learn how to change, or life will forever give you a kick in the backside.
For us to grow and progress, change is inevitable. Changing is a critical ingredient to thriving. Like author Gail Sheehy says, “If we do not change, we don’t grow. If we do not grow, we aren’t living.” It is crucial to learn that change for our growth can be self-initiated and ingrained. And the less likely we will wait for misfortunes like this pandemic to coerce our transition. The more flexible we get as we grow older, the higher the chances that life will end well, with more happiness and less physical pain.
Those who listened to ever-prevailing cues have found this occurrence easier to navigate. They did not wait for extreme distress to shift and adapt to new circumstances. The rigid ones await fire force.
Not everyone will change.
Change is uncomfortable. Human beings, like all other organisms in the universe, exist for three things. Enjoying pleasure, conserving energy, and avoiding pain. If something is fun and less strenuous, it is what we choose.
Transformation elicits a strong emotion of internal discomfort, resistance, and avoidance. Desire to remain comfortable is far more forceful than redefining one’s self-concept. The multi-dimensional mental construct of who we are. The older we are, the more difficult it is to reinvent ourselves.
We all undergo situations that demand change. Yet our reaction is to overcome adversity, and then spring back to business as usual. A strong sense of ignorant denial and inability to cope prevails. The lessons from discomfort disappear, and we revert to our old ways of life. We squander the opportunity for improvement and lasting transformation. After all, adversity is always temporary. But repetitive.
But change is coming.
In the words of Rumi, “The pains you feel are messengers. Listen to them.”
You may still not feel the need to change during moments of compulsion. In that case, know that the message has not arrived. You have not suffered enough.
And always bear in mind that what you resist, will persist.
The opportunity to suffer even more is definitely on your way.
