Tuesday, 21 February 2017

Distraction: Article by Chidinma Ahika


There are thousands of students I shy away from. So many of them need to rekindle from the light that emits from my candour. Yet I toss every approach to neglect; all because I want to stay focused. It's been three sessions now; this universe that is flowered by collage of students starve from my touch as I need to bag that degree. It sounds egocentric right? Just as much as I thought!

Was it not some months after my admission I made a blueprint where I exalted academics above extracurricular activities---not its death? I thought some way I would manage the latter but not trample on it. Today, the system I live in has subtly made the social inherent proclivities of me, like in all other human personalities, inconsequential. To make a First class I must or should sacrifice 'all'.

What are these other 'all' my soul has become a murderer to? They are my talents and natural dispositions. As far as I'm concerned the cramming talent; the ability to predict exam questions or prepare theoretical theses (to be dumped at the closest bin by the lecturer) are iota of the greater circle.
You may not understand if you are out there. And if you are in here you still don't understand then maybe it's because, sorry to say, you have been indoctrinated in full eclipse. I once was, I still partially am, and I pray someday I would be free.

'Suffer now and enjoy later' this is the scam we bought for an exchange of our potentials manifestation. What can be so abominable, injurious, and cataclysmic than the abortion of dreams, ideas that would change the world, and natural sociological tendencies? We forget that if at all we should suffer now, it should not be at the destruction of ourselves; yes, our gifts are what make the core of us.
Four years in subconscious delay or decay of our contributions and manifestation to the world is a dangerous thing to do to oneself and community.

'The end would justify the means' was the ideology I once used to embrace myself. What if this means actualises this intended end and then decimates the entrance of another more glorified beginning? What if this means becomes the monster towards other alluvial pastures? The end alone should not justify the means. Instead the means should justify and account for itself.

I love to write; Okiez likes to sing; Efe is a dance lord; Isaac can talk for Africa! And what do we do with these God given gifts? I bet you would guess right. We shove them off and call them distractions and flow with the trend. We try not to bother about developing them or question how our conscience will qualify positively for the test of abortionists; for the foetus in us are decaying by the struggle for academics, for great grades. The foetus that would affect Nigeria; that would help lives we have been taught to name bastards in the guise of distractions. Yet those out there wonder why we turn out to be mechanics after graduation.

When scrupulously assessed, we are refined to function in a school and not adjust to life according to our psychomotor domain and entirety of our prowess in whole. The mind is the system's emphasis which is an error to be corrected.

My prayer is that those who rush to come in here should over dose themselves with that which is vaccinated against this indoctrination, and thus react appropriately. A balance is what true education is all about not full time academics. These distractions are part of the instruments needed for change. I pray we all come to accept these necessary distractions one day!


© Chidinma Ahika
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