Let Me Tell You What Your Problem Is

First of all, this is to say thank you to all of my friends who have been checking up on me like plantain on the fire and dinor allow me to burn, y’all the real MVPs.

Also, a big thank you to everyone who has been checking on my blog to see if anything new came up, this is for you. I could not stand disappointing you any longer.

Ṣẹ wá rí those People at my working place tí wọ́n ti successfully managed to rid me of every semblance of a life, my God will judge you (its joke I’m joking o 🙆‍♀️ I am blessed to learn from all of you). But wait, have you read my last post? Click that link and read it 😌

Lately, I’ve been thinking so much about what to write and how to make your reading worthwhile. I’ve chosen and deleted topics once I saw I couldn’t really incorporate a sizeable amount of satire into it. But then the Holy Spirit whispered in my mind,

“What if they don’t need to laugh when they read this blog post? What if what they need to hear is the truth?”

At this point in the lives of some of us who are just getting out into the world and trying to find our place, it is hard to focus on the constant truth when it is so easy to succumb to the whirlpool of our ever-changing world.

How many of us have had phases to what we’d like to do to earn a living? Me I’ve wanted to be everything from a teacher to a detective. Blame Harlequin.

You see, my parents were catering moguls in their younger days. Our family had a big confectionery shop, so we always had those big Topper margarine buckets at home. These buckets made very attentive students whenever I taught them in class. The stubborn ones would carry themselves back inside.

But then I grew older and wanted to go into business, but of course one had to start small. So I collaborated with my Eniola (my niece who is more like my sister), we bought some Eve (if you don’t know this jedijedi drink, I don’t know what to say to you), orange and blackcurrant flavours to be precise, because you make more sales when you offer your consumers a variety of products and/or services (Even at 10, I knew this).

So we mixed this drink, yes. Packaged it in little nylon packs of N10 each, refrigerated them, and displayed them in a makeshift showglass – a transparent plastic bucket in front of our home.

To cut the long story short, God quickly showed me selling tasty time wasn’t my way. Or maybe I was the impatient one, we would never know now. Nobody came to ask what we were selling, and let me tell you, it hurt. And it had nothing to do with the fact that our house was in the middle of a bushy street nobody really navigated. But boy, was it sunny… So you understand why I and my niece had to drink them all. At intervals, of course.

Another phase came where I used to sell potato chips to my classmates in primary school (Adéshọlá, now you know why I like potato chips), I always sold out mehn. Sometimes I’d go with two packs and maybe just two pieces would remain. Until the proprietress banned me from selling my chips and took up the mantle the next week. SMH. Even from childhood, ọmọ ológo (child of glory) had been having enemies of progress.

Time to enrol in the university came and believe me or not, I had not a flipping idea what I wanted to spend the next four years of my life doing. My head was already filled with so many things people thought I could and should do because I happen to excel at anything I set my mind to (Even at 15, I knew this), that I didn’t know what I, thought I should do. I chose Sociology for the heck of it.

How I landed in the department of Linguistics, African and Asian Studies to study Linguistics Yoruba is still a blur. It didn’t fully dawn on me until I was in Baba Ajíkòbi’s (of blessed memory) class and he said what I think was, “Ẹ ma wò mí o, kẹ má kọ nǹkankan” (Y’all keep looking at me o, don’t take down notes).

Before you even say anything, the man was explaining some shit in Yorùbá language, how was I supposed to know I should be taking them down!? And not just me, I’m sure the entire class ’17 shared the same sentiment. And what the flipping hell was Linguistics? I didn’t even like diction in secondary school. How was I supposed to even SURVIVE here? Four years later and I was one of the best graduating students in the department.

You see, God has a way of orchestrating your life to an expected end, that leaves even you overwhelmed. What I did not know all those years, was that every day of my life has been one long expression of God’s promise towards me. Olúwaṣẹ̀rími lorúkọ mi.

How limitless is this God who weaves the lives of man so finely, simultaneously, that every day counts? Every person you meet counts? Every place you go counts? Every word you hear counts? Every book you read counts? Every thing you wear counts? Your friends count? Your location counts? Everything you eat counts??? How does He have that much time on His hands to sit down with me, as He does You, to plan my life daily, that the end result is a masterpiece?

I genuinely wonder how you can read this and think that you are ordinary. And I think that that is your problem. You try so much to give yoursef a name different from what God has called you, His own.

Stop trying so hard to be different, you are divine.

Stop trying to earn your salvation, you will never deserve it! It was a gift, humbly accept it.

I don’t know how else to make you see that everything you want is already yours. You have just to take it.

I never knew my bunkie’s squatter (whom I regrettably advised her to charge for the favour by the way), would eventually become my friend and introduce me to my first boss and mentor.

How could I have known that Olúwaṣeun who I met in a bus, would be the reason why I win a Yoruba translating competition that would enable me sponsor my Masters?

And who had any idea a fellow corper who I met in camp would be the reason I have the job I have today?

I tell you, pray as often as you can that God directs your steps. It is because my whole life is a testimony of God’s directional prowess. If I am here now, I cannot imagine where God will have me in the next five years.

Let’s just say that y’all are not ready.

Today, the Lord leads. The Lord directs. The Lord guides. Listen to the inner voice that tells you to only Trust and Obey. Listen. All you have to do is listen. It is not your job to worry about how tomorrow will be!

Sometimes I’m an impulsive spender. And sometimes I’m selfish to my own self. In between all these times, you’d hear me say,

“God will provide another one, why am I even disturbing myself?”

Or, “I don’t even want to know how God will do it, that one is none of my business. All I know is that God will come through for me.”

And He always, does.

Do that job nobody wants to do, there is a reason for it. Stay back and finish that work everybody left, there is a reason for it. Start on that business idea you have, there is a reason for it. Ha! Be nice to that Uber driver, he might be your breakthrough!

Everything about God is intentional. And the beautiful thing is, even your mistakes have been pre-ordained. Your life, is one big intentional plan of God. Wouldn’t you rather He lead you then?

Everything is better when you let God lead, because only then will even your failures count.

Ephesians 2:8-10 (KJV):
8 “For by grace are ye saved through faith; and that not of yourselves: it is the gift of God:
9 Not of works, lest any man should boast.
10 For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus unto good works, which God hath before ordained that we should walk in them.”