A SOLO DAY.

A solo day did I witness 
The thunders of disagreements 
Thunders of quarrels 
But in their solo ebb of quagmire 
Did they remember the 
Exhilarations... 
The excitement it brought. 
When skirt was lifted up 
When trouser was brought down 
The burden they shared 
The puzzle it brought 
Mankind is very limited 
Certainly they maybe sole in a moment 
Who are they? 
Study your queries 
For their might be a lesson to learn 
Make mends if need be 
Harm not yourself with pride and be just 
For even the tongue and 
The teeth quarrel, but still 
Make mends if need be. 

_ HENRY CHIKE OKONKWO.
(This poem was firstly written by Henry Chike Okonkwo in 2004).

Dealing with the challenges of life - Part 2

I feel as a sense of duty to continue this weekend's write-up from whence we last bid goodbye. If you have been following all along, you will allude to the fact that we had earlier addressed some life's social challenges. You should recall that we categorized the term life into seven different parts and today, we shall be looking at the educational aspect of life; what it entails, the threats associated with it and some solutions proferred towards overcoming threatening situations..

The oxford dictionaires defines education to be ''The process of receiving or giving systematic instruction, especially at a school or university: a course of education''. In another vein, it defines education as the ''information about or training in a particular subject''. Need I inform or remind us that education is divided into two catgeorizes, namely; formal and informal education? While formal education takes place in the classrooms, informal education usually take place outside of classrooms such as libraries, after-school programs, museums, at home, and so on.

The challenges that betides one educationally are either external or internally induced. Some external factors as you may be aware includes: lack of sponsorship or inadequate financing, inadequate/ lack of access to educational facilities, lack of supply of basic educational ammenties/ equippments, untrained/ unqualified teachers/ personnels, lack/ inadequate enabling laws, neglegncy/ failure/ inadequacies of the regulation authorities, unstable homes, ineffective parenting, exposure to so many distractions such the internet, television, games, telephone and technologies of other kinds etc.

From my personal experience, I have come to identify some internal induced challenges to the acquiring of the needed education as follows; lack of exposure to the needful information, lack of self awareness of ones ability and capcity, inability to create a quality study time schedule, or lack of adherences to it. Another factor is, lack of the desired motivation to study, bad companionships, truancy issues, no educational role model (where necessary), no set goals, no dreams, no visons, no aspirations and so on.

Haven said that, we need to be careful as to whats we grasps also, since as too much of everything is not good . Some persons know too much of what isn't needed and which of course cannot be helpful to them. The other side of the coin is that no education gained is a waste,  In any case, the role of education whether formal or information is vital and cannot by any chance be underemphaized, It is said that when you give a child a fish, it can come begging for more. But when you teach the same child how to fish, you have given him a skill for life. A good education is better than money, because education can teach one how to make money. Hence,''the only person who is educated is the one who has learned how to learn and change ''says Carl Rogers a renowned humanistic psychologists. I have always said that 'life is a school, we keep learning till we die'.

Hence, I feel very particular about internal induced deficiencies towards the acquiring basic education and as having to excell in it as there is no height that one cannot attain, only if he belief that he can make it (edcuationally). I do not believe that anybody can be responsible for your failures but you, because in the first place, you allowed them to take possession of your life. Nothing is responsible for your failures either, where if you gave it a chance to take possession of you.

Be that as it may, take charge. It is possible, We all may have different Intelligent Quotients (IQ), yet it is not everybody that make use of what gift or talent that has been given him. The entire human race is awaiting our manifestations, innovations, inventions and solutions, something that comes as a result of knowing what other never knew, and decided to act upon it where they failed. and such opportunity can real good be facilitated by a quality education.

As I come to a close. I shall leave you with a rhethorical question which is; educationally speaking, HOW FAR BEHIND ARE YOU?

  From: HENRY CHIKE OKONKWO.

Dealing with the challenges of life - Part 1

Dear readers,

I do not find you out of mind, even though I could be described as gone out of sight. Of course, its been a year since I last wrote on this forum. Given that my original intention was to maintain a periodic release of some nuggets. Hence, my french leave is indicative of some imperfection we share as human beings.

Predisposed to the hustle and  bustle of life, in all, I wanna trust that life has been kind to yall (Not too worry, as I shall not be too much into the Americas).Well, I find it chief that we consider giving the above named topic worthy of discuss since we as humans are bound to be faced with some challenges in life. Hence, the need to profer some solutions. In any area and in every area of the human life, namely; family, educational, finance, spiritual, physical, social and materially challeneges are bound to occour, but the good thing is that they can be overcomed. Now, the aformentioned areas of life could all be standing apart and are yet interwoven.

In this piece, we shall dwell on the social aspect, afterwhich we shall graudually progress into chewing over the rest areas in subsequent write-ups. It is natural that every human wants to be loved and to feel loved. Every human should want be appreciated, respected and cherished. Nobody wants to be treated as a daft or some ridicule even if they facilitated any of such case unpremeditatedly.

Now, to any general rule, there is an exception as we shall not overlook that some persons might actually prefer to be disrespected, unloved, and uncherished. It might not be far from the fact that they fall within some social anormally known as saddism. In any case, some perosns are unwanted, some persons do feel unwanted, some persons are unloved or do feel unloved, some persons are ridiculed, jeered at, disgraced or might feel, or have once felt it.

Such treatments could be categorized as coming from ones colleagues in the office, at school, at church or some other social unit within the community. But if we shall look at it from the out of court. If you were not up to something, nobody might want to jeer at you, or talk you off course. Many at atimes, the people who criticise you or make you feel unwanted are actually afraid that you could succeed and become ahead of them. Could you have ever noticed that the same persons who caused you pains, still come around in somewhat way even outrightly to check after you?

On the other hand, where ones social needs are not met, it behoves too, that the person who is not receiving isn't doing a giving, even if the person gives, it isn't giving enough. I believe that love is reciprocal, and that respect is even. But that is not to say that we trade love, care and respect. It just happens that what we sow in others comes back to us and not necessarily from the exact persons we had sowed into. Someone once said, that if you do all the giving that you could to your kids, your wife, and to as many persons as you could and still expect the same persons to return the same favour to you, you had automatically enslaved yourself to the timing of their response of the same gesture. And so, the freer you give, the freer you receive.

Sometimes, we show some persons love and they don't return it back to us, sometimes we show some persons care but they don't return it back to us. Not too worry folk, there is nothing that you own that wasn't given to you in the first place and so there is no end to doing good, ONLY REFUSE TO BE TAKEN ADVANTAGE OF, BECAUSE SOME PERSONS ARE WIRED TO RECEIVE AND GIVE BACK NOTHING. If you don't tell them, show them. Giving don't neccessarily have to be money, or material, you can give your time. Nobody has the right to humilate you either no matter his/her status, rank, color, position, possessions, or creed etc,

Lastly,you couldn't need a friend and not show yourself friendly? You couldn't be rightly criticized and you never fail to improve?
Till I come your way next time, I remain yours truly,
HENRY CHIKE OKONKWO.
Do have a lovely week ahead.

THE SEED OF DISCOURAGEMENT.

The week had been rather long and thorough for me and of course, I bet you have some story to share. "huh! Me?" You might say. Yeah!!! Yes, you! Of course, you do have a story to share and I can count that, it is only dead people that don't have stories to share. Hahahaha. I'm laughing out loud and I know I got you. Well, that's by the way. Actually, I have thought of keeping to promise by coming up with another article (and that is if you had follow the previous one). I am not yet resolute as to how often my publications shall come.

However, as you could see from the above, our topic for today is title 'the seed of discouragement' and I shall try as much as possible to be tact. Well, I am yet to come across anybody in life who wants to become or remain a nobody. Even at age 60 some people are still kicking; at least I know one part of the world where many bred politicians in their 60s and 70s are still scrambling for power with every audacity.

Now, the focus is not on some politicians, but to every Tom, Dick and Harry. We should understand that some people are not nice with words at all and I am not saying that you should become spoiled by receiving too many kind attention, because life is not fair; else first class graduates should be the most placed persons on planet earth.

I understand that words are powerful to influence, that is why someone who has got a good job and an easy going life will quit work, not because of anything else but because somebody said something. Words are powerful, that is why somebody who has got an amiable marriage will want to pack up, because somebody said something. Hmm. Separation should wait for a minute. I want to stress on the case of divorce. Though I am yet to walk down the aisle with my heartthrob. I am personally against a case of divorce order than on the ground of infidelity. More so, some people quit their plans and the execution of their plans or their ambitions, just because somebody said something. And that could pass to be a seed of discouragement.

Many at times, decisions are reached in the heat of tension without making necessary checks and due consolations, before joining into conclusions. It might interest you to know, that sometimes the people who you listen to are not even happy that you are happy. Some of them feel threatened by the height to which you have attained already, some of them even want what you got! They want your husband, they want your wife. They covet your position. They want your job; that is why they talk you to want to resign. Some even want you to keep depending on them. Hmm, well I may not have exhausted the list, but the point remains.

Hence, I have got good news for you: 

1.CHOOSE WHAT YOU HEAR!!!!!!!:  You may not be able to choose what gets at you, but you can choose what you hear. Like seriously, remember that some people feign statement likes "I did not hear you". Now, I don't mean that you should lie as that could be highly unethical. All I am saying is that you can control what gets into you.   

2. KEEP TO YOUR PLAN: I am not a fan of people who don't plan, but sheepishly allow people's plans to be imposed on them . And that is why we must plan for our everything. That is why when somebody says something to upset you, quickly take a look at you plan so that you don't crash.

Till I come your way next week,  I remain yours sincerely,

HENRY CHIKE OKONKWO (Dip. in Law, B.Sc, MBA).

VALUE AND THE CHANGE OF RHYTHM