The Rowing 20s - Daily Trust

Apparently, we are now in the 20s. The mid 20s. It is funny because when the “20s” are mentioned you conjure black and white pictures and crude life. My late grandmother was born in the 40s, the 1940s that is, so I believe my great-grandparents would be teenagers by the 20s at most. The 1920s effectively ignited the current blitz in technological development, and from the looks of it, the 2020s will shift the gears.

It is also the new year and I want to share what I want my resolutions to be. “To be”, because I am guilty of infidelity to such resolutions perhaps throughout my life. But who knows? There is a first time for everything.

The Roaring Twenties, sometimes stylised as Roaring ‘20s, refers to the 1920s decade in music and fashion, as it happened in what is now global pop culture. For a Nigerian, the 2020s could either be the roaring 20s or the rowing 20s.

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I want to make mine the rowing 20s. Literally. The West was already the capital of the world by the 1920s so all it had to do was to roar, but things are different for me. So I will row, instead of roar. Needless to say, rowing isn’t easy. It is difficult to even believe anything good can come out of anything we do. This is one of the biggest struggles. If you have ever struggled to be consistent with something you care about, the struggle I talk about will resonate with you too.

Make no mistake, it matters that we are in the rowing 20s while our president is the third most corrupt world leader. The donkey days are here to stay. Maybe that is all there will be—donkey days and hours and maybe years.

So here is what I will tell myself every step of the way: don’t worry too much if today you feel like giving up. I feel like giving up too. What matters is if what you do next, whether you lay down to die. But today? Well, today I am struggling. Today, I don’t feel like moving, or going anywhere. Today, I don’t feel like sticking to the routine. Today, I don’t feel like I have any great ideas and I don’t feel like I have enough time to make the good ideas great. Today, I feel like giving up.

“Despair,” Ngugi wa Thiong’o said, “is the one sin that cannot be forgiven”. And how does this make me feel?

Experience has shown that acquiescent grit is the characteristic linked most closely to success. I could use some of that grit today. Beyond the simplistic self-flagellation though, this is what I try to remind myself of when I feel like giving up.

That the mind is made up of suggestions. This makes you a suggestion engine yourself. If you consider every thought you have as a suggestion, not an order, you will have an easy ride going with it. Right now, my mind is suggesting that I am too tired, that it is hopeless. It is suggesting that I give up. It is suggesting that I take the easy way out. Maybe japa to Japan where leaders ritually disembowel themselves should they be as shamed as our own president. And because of that, it is the easy way out.

If I pause for a moment, however, I can discover new suggestions. My mind is also suggesting that I will feel very good about accomplishing the tasks before me once it’s all over. It is suggesting that I will respect the identity I am building when I stick to the schedule. It is suggesting that I have the ability to finish this one task, then the next, even when I don’t feel like.

I make it a point to make it a point that these suggestions are not orders. They are merely options. I have the power to choose which option I follow, without being condemned to perdition for all eternity.

That the discomfort is temporary. Relative to the time in your normal day or week, nearly any habit you perform is over quickly. The tedious weekly status update meeting holding every Wednesday will be finished in an hour or two. Even if you still don’t have your report and presentation slides ready by 4am on Wednesday morning, they will be completed before 10am, and the day will itself be over by 3pm. This article too, will be finished in just a moment.

Think about it – life is easier now than it has ever been. If you lived in Abuja just 100 years ago and didn’t kill (or grow) your own food and build your own house, you would die. Today, we whine about Glo & MTN flooding our smartphones with unsolicited, bitterly resented junk texts, while refusing to do anything about the absolutely terrible voice and especially data networks. Or is it the Tinubu NCC?

It is extremely easier said than done, but you must maintain perspective. Your life is good and your discomfort is temporary. Step into this moment of discomfort and let it strengthen you. Tinubu says this will only take a few years. But Buhari also said same. But – just do it!

That you will never regret hard work once it is done. By far, the best prize that life has to offer is the chance to work hard at something worth doing. That is where we are, folks. Left to us, we would rather work leisurely at things we must do. We want our output to be helpful and respected, but we do not want to have to struggle to get it all done. We do not want the dire punishment of having to drive to work from Life Camp every morning, or through CITEC at rush hour coming back home – but you have to do just that for your paycheck. We want the final result, but not the failed attempts that precede it. We want the gold, but not the grind.

That everyone wants to be a champion. Few people want to train like Mohammed Ali. And yet, despite our resistance to it, I reckon I have never found myself feeling worse after the hard work was done. There have been days when it was so hard to start, but it was always worth finishing. Sometimes, the simple act of showing up and having the grit to just do it, even in an average manner, is a victory worth celebrating.

So this is what rowing will be. It is difficult, thankless and it comes in black and white pictures. It will be a constant balance between giving into the ease of distraction or overcoming the pain of discipline. It is not an exaggeration to say that our lives and our identities are defined in this delicate balance. What is life, if not the sum of a hundred thousand daily battles and tiny decisions to either gut it out or give it up?

This moment when you don’t feel like doing what has to be done? This is not a moment to be thrown away. This is not a dress rehearsal. This moment is your life as much as any other moment. Spend it in a way that will make you proud after the rowing is done and life becomes wonderfully coloured.

Often, I will have to let nature decide too. And what will I do when I feel like giving up? I show up. Will I show up at my best? I doubt it. But my job isn’t to judge how good or how bad I will be.

My job is to do the work, row and let nature decide.

Allah ya bamu sa’a.