Tag Africa

WHAT IS YOUR OWN STORY ?

Brian Kagoro Leave a comment



FANTASY LIVES

No one can silence you from dreaming or sharing your dreams. You have a democratic right to fantasize about any aspect of life. In fact, many people live more out of their fantasies and memories than present day reality. If you’re so unfortunate to be their friend, sibling, workmate or neighbour, you will be drowned in make-believe lifestyles or stories.

Fantasizing helps some people to deal with reality or simply to dull pain, loss, fear, inadequacy and confusion. They make up love

Betrayal, success, greatness, friendship and happiness stories. These people can magnify or amplify a small thing, fleeting experiences, casual encounters with famous or rich people or events into Hollywood, Bollywood & Nollywood blockbuster combined in one with all the requisite stunts, sound effects, emotional expressions and backgrounds!

Sometimes people make up missing people in their lives i.e fathers, mothers, siblings, uncles, aunties, lovers etc) or create past realities that never ever happened e.g. trips, holidays, gifts, fights etc!

Others auto edit their past to remove poverty, dysfunction, abuse, rejection and even some unpalatable relatives and moments! Other people change their ethnic, racial and other such attribute.

Look your history is perfect in its imperfections. You don’t need a perfect past to be the perfect you. This stuff is real folks! People that fantasize a lot often become conmen, public figures, creatives or simply fantastic writers. A majority become avid politicians or activists for some cause! There is a very thin line between serial liars and serial fantasies!

Serial Fantasies are often a sign of delusions of grandeur, great creativity or a narcissistic disorder. Fantasy Manics are likely to be extremely sensitive, vindictive, needy, moody or downright abusive.

Let me sum it up for you :-

(a) They don’t really care about you, your thoughts, feels and personal vision. You have the same worth to them as a selfie , pendant, piece of jewellery, perfume or antic artifact! You are held very close because you fit the frame of their fantasies. You either have the right family background, educational qualifications, artistic talent, looks, social media profile or you pay them homage regularly. You are showered with attention and gifts in order to keep you enslaved, to enslave you or in order not to allow you to worship at any other altar.

(b) Fantasy Manics are the centre of their own universe and they worship themselves and expect everyone else to love, adore or worship them! Don’t you dare bow to their nonsensical delusions, because if you do, you will be manipulated from here to Gujarat, Timbuktu, Hawaii or Honolulu!

Call this abnormality out. Please don’t normalise the abnormal! Start with yourself though. Move yourself from information and image peddling to practical personal transformation and growth .

INFORMATION vs. PRACTICAL LIVED EXPERIENCE

Turn book, Internet and TV information into locally relevant and practically applied knowledge!

I have met plenty people that can eloquently describe how to make money, build wealth or even influence. They can talk about the law, politics, health , education, technology, spirituality, music, arts and culture, leadership, service, environmental consciousness, recycling, integrity, parenting, marriage and etcetera. After I have been impressed by the eloquent articulation, I have always asked how many times , in how many places and for how long have they have done what they have just talked about.

What have been the five major results for other people and for yourself? Where can I get evidence of this great set of achievements from at least five different people ? At that stage the eloquent often start describing sermons, meetings and workshops or just start to stammer!

Friends, it is possible to write books about leadership based on other people’s stories and experiences. You can talk about great miracles, blessings and wonders referencing other people’s experiences and achievements. You can take anecdotes about leadership, saving, investment from Rich Dad /Poor Dad , John C. Maxwell , Covey,etc cram and regurgitate them eloquently. BUT doing and saying are two different things and I dare say experiences. In other words , WHAT IS YOUR OWN STORY?

INSTANT SUCCESS

You can start something and be an overnight success. You can make a song and it becomes a global hit. You can start a movement and it captures public attention like a wild fire. You can say the right things and even become a struggle icon or poster child. You can make one investment decision and strike it rich. BUT instant success without a sustainability formula can destroy you more than repeated earlier failures.

NO ONE CAN TEACH YOU SUCCESS!

The greatest teachers on any subject are not the insanely eloquent, flashy or even celebrated. It’s men and women who have tasted failure several times and made costly mistakes that they have owned up to. No one can teach how to succeed really, BUT there are people out there that can teach you how to handle the very cold winter of failure, rejection, loss and eroded self-confidence.

So, I always ask great leaders two questions:
(a) Have you ever failed in life, if so, how, when & why ?


(b) What lessons did you learn from your failures and how did you rebound from it?

We celebrate a boxer for their triumph in a 15-round bout of boxing and forget how many months and hours of preparatory pain it takes. We celebrate a Sprinter that breaks a world record in under 10 seconds and totally forget that the few seconds victory took months to prepare for. In preparation, what you do everyday matters as much as what you eat, say and think. Feed yourself the right stuff, say and do stuff aligned to your dreams!

PLEASE ABEG, DO !

My friend, you most probably know too much about many very important things but you are either broke , broken or are about to break!

Do, don’t make up ideal pasts, create an ideal future. The things or people you didn’t have growing up created opportunities for imagining a future not based on past deficits but optimums.

-Don’t make up friends, lovers and great connections: deliberately build them. People don’t really care whether you’re great or not, but folks will respect your hustle, your talent, passion and authenticity!

-Fantasies can be turned into something awesome and rewarding if you invest time and skill. Stop describing the ideal , do it , try it and be vulnerable enough to accept that you may fail spectacularly! What is there to lose given your current true status? Not social media status – real state of your finances, relationships and self-confidence!

-If your level of knowledge and quality of life are miles apart, it doesn’t make any sense at all. Truth is, you don’t have bad luck at all. No one bewitched you! You are like someone that buys a fully-kitted gas heater or stove and freezes because of the cold or starves to death because they have the manuals but somehow are afraid to ignite the heater or stove. You have all the resources and even the need to turn your wonderful theories into practice. BUT you are not focused or disciplined enough to take the journey from FANTASIES to practical ACTION! You are not sure, you fear taking baby steps because you fear falling? Falling is part of learning to WALK by yourself. SO, please STOP this your THEORISING and DO! Fail whilst doing ! Who knows, you might just succeed!

DO NOT PROCRASTINATE, PAY UPFRONT

Brian Kagoro Leave a comment





Let me repeat what the late Pastor Zivanai D. Manyika (one of my great mentors & friend – ZD) taught me. I was a young lawyer with many accolades and more blind spots. I was very sure of many things and knew a lot less than I thought.

We have countries, communities, families, individuals, churches, mosques and NGOs that live way beyond their means. All of us owe emotional, nutritional, spiritual, cultural, professional, physical, intellectual, relational, familial and financial debts. Every dimension of life demands of us a price, certain risks and sacrifices. It demands that we give or give away somethings in order to receive other things or factors of greater value.

You see, many things that parents and mentors say to you only make sense much later in life. One thing I did though, was that I listened to all my mentors attentively. Each of them was like seasoning of a different type. Some were honey, others chilli 🌶 , others garlic or ginger. Mentors help to chisel characters.

ZD would hold his head in hands and say in a deeply reflective manner: “Baba, in Life, if there is any price, risk or sacrifice for anything – pay it upfront….. no matter how costly or painful it may seem. Delay or procrastination costs much more”. It only made partial sense then as ZD spoke. When I was on my own, a stream of contradictory thoughts would race through my head. Sometimes I would ask myself kuti ‘surely, if you cannot afford something that you want immediately, you simply buy it on hire purchase’.

Why choose the hard path when there are plenty easier options? I always thought. The country (Zimbabwe) was prosperous then and many young professionals lived LaVida on borrowed (hire purchases) clothes, cars, household furniture,etc. ZD insisted and I listened to his difficult, challenging & indigestible wisdom & instructions: Pay Upfront, Pay Now or Pay Soon!

As a result, I avoided unnecessary debt and when I look back, I also avoided unnecessary future pain, suffering & loss by paying for many things upfront ( be it career, studying, working hard, reading, friendships,etc). I still do!

Here are the reasons why:

1. Some of your present pain, your condition, your losses, your struggles etc is as a result of costs that you deferred payment or refused to pay when it would have been less painful to do so! It is about personal growth needs & imperatives that you tried to avoid, evade or ignore! Your pain is the outcome of both CHOICES that you made and those that you deferred or outsourced (to lovers, friends, parents, relatives, workmates or Comrades) .

2. Some of your stories of survival, your relationship Wahala/Nyayas/matata/shida (trouble) and the mess that you blame other people for are truly things you have repeatedly refused to risk, sacrifice or simply change. You want everyone, everything and even God to change to your own selfish, childish, delusional and unsustainable image of life. All legitimate victory comes after battle or competitition, preparation and some significant measure of pain, loss, discomfort, inconvenience. My brother, my sister, my friend, Comrade – pay the cost now! Risk and sacrifice now!

3. You substituted playing/fun for studying in high school or university and you think that you are cursed or have bad luck? No, you have a bad attitude, poor sense of priorities, are undisciplined, lazy or you just feel too sorry for yourself! You may even be delusional or simply carry a silly sense of entitlement! Lose it quickly, I mean -that toxic silliness!

4. THINK : about the seemingly menial job you were unwilling to do, the extra school work or degree you thought you could always do in the future, the business that you did not have the discipline and focus to sustainably build ; the course on language, coding or whatever that you despised or deferred? Ultimately, You will pay with the poor quality of life and diminishing opportunities.

Unfortunately, no amount of Prayer or lucky charms, no Blesser, Prophet, Marabou nor Sangoma can make you to totally avoid carrying your own cross.

Pay Now!

There are people who never had the opportunities for education, self-development, career advancement, and beneficial self-employment because they were too poor to afford these or were discriminated against by the system and so on and so forth – BUT You, your Case is different! You decided or failed to decide!

5. If you don’t read, learn and act now when you have the time, strength & opportunities – you will be forced by life to do so when neither time, strength nor opportunity are available. It is called sacrifice of Foolishness! Please Pay Now !

6. If you do not practice depriving yourself certain conveniences, comforts and privileges, you will unnecessarily suffer later on in life. It is as true for drink/food/diet choices and disease outcomes, as it is for hardwork and professional development. Practice pain and suffering (walk, run, jog, go to the gym, learn a new language, learn to drive, to fly, to swim, to sing, to play an instrument well, learn to cook, to code, to build, to make something with your hands, to write, to analyse….whatever). PayNow!

Avoid paying the prices of life with exorbitant interest rates in the future!

7. If you get away with lying about people, things and places and people believe your nonsensical lies (play-acting or pretense); change quickly when there is still time. There are places where your lying will not work for you, where playing naive or victim will have absolutely no currency at all. There are places and times where and when your lack of integrity and accountability will cost you everything! STOP talking BIG or pretending that you’re at levels that you are not at or that you are an expert on stuff that you know very little about . PUT substance to your posturing: study, read and enskill your passio!

8. If you’re the lazy type that gets siblings, parents, friends, workmates and strangers to do all the work – so that you can steal their work, efforts or credit: Change! Start working, thinking and doing. If all you have ever had to do until now was to turn on your charm volume & taps, there are places where charm and PR are not enough. Places where people want something meaningful and substantive beyond a feel good moment or a truckload of clichés and platitudes. There are places where your laziness or hollowness will take centre-stage and a big spotlight will be shone on it. No amount of English or French or good accent will suffice. These are places where your cleverness and smart posturing will make you look like the platinum standard of world foolishness!Please pay now!

9. Life is not waiting for you to grow up, to become more responsible, to mature beyond acquisition of things, positions and titles.

10. Peoples’ lives, time and everything else is moving on ! So, if you were the village( township or suburb) beauty or diva …move on !

11. If you were the high-school (or University) hero or genius, reference point of excellence and achievement, pathfinder, pacesetter, first this or that -move on ! If you were the most sought after, wanted, intelligent, handsome, powerful or sexy – Move on!

12. Grow up: set and achieve new milestones and everyday/year/decade successe, build new memories, create new value, push yourself to become the best version of your self as of today and not yesterday!

13. PIn Your Life: if there is any PRICE, COMMITMENT, SACRIFICE or RISK that requires doing or paying : PAY UPFRONT!
Deferred cost, living Life on hire purchase means that you will pay a lot more. Sometimes you may even have to pay such deferred costs with your Life, your health, your job and your relationships. Don’t be foolish – pay upfront for your needs, desires, ambition and vision.

ANOTHER AFRICA IS URGENTLY NEEDED & OVERDUE!

Brian Kagoro 2 Comments


The mission facing African youth is not one of participating or disrupting the Status Quo. No, it is one of conducting a modern ‘War-less’ and ‘Blood-less’ Revolution against the bloodsucking Elites ruining & running Africa!

A FLOOD OF CRISES BEYOND COVID-19

Beyond the scourge or scare of COVID-19, many African countries, communities, organizations, and families face innumerable crises, including the following:
– Crisis of families
-Crisis of leadership
-Crisis of citizenship
-Impasse of perception & crisis of vision
-Crisis of ethics and accountability
-Crisis of governance and politics
-Economic structural Crisis
-Ecological/Environmental Crisis

Some of the gravest manifestations of these crises are:
– Abuse of women, girls & children, and general sexual and gender-based violence. You should call this for what it really is, a Crisis of Masculinity and its toxicity. A man unable to discipline their bodies, fragile egos, unruly appetites, and the multipolarity of modern society

– Abuse of office, grand corruption, and impunity. Leaders that destroy society, institutions, constitutions, values, vision, economies, and social cohesion. We are a Leaderless society in ethical, service, and performance terms. We have millions dying because of casual sexual encounters and casual and temporary relationships with power merchants and masquerades during elections.

– Abuse of the vote and of voters by citizens that use petty short-term considerations to choose or recycle nonperforming, brutal, murderous, and thieving politicians only to spend 5 more years protesting against the predictable incompetence. In truth, we – for the most part – exchange long-term transformation and prosperity for a T-shirt, beer, or a few coins. Our transactional approach to elections can only produce wheeler-dealers and not transformative leaders

– If Vision is a redemptive and clear picture of what we need to become or can become, then we don’t have the shared transformative, let alone a redemptive one. It is one thing to make outlandish promises to voters and quite another to deliver on stuff that transforms society, nations, and continents. Negative framing of electoral messaging as ending this or that has no capacity to translate into the creation of such and such! Even more worrying is the fact that we expect to do the transformation in an ideological, ethical, values, human capacities, and skills vacuums. Please ask your leaders after they make fantastic electoral promises to show you their Team that will deliver on the promises?

– It is almost given that the number one job of most of our public servants and leaders in Africa is Corruption or grand theft. They will loot COVID-19 and any other disaster funds or money meant for infrastructure, social development, healthcare, and employment creation. For what? To buy cars, booze, impress lovers, and spend on self – That is splendid decadence and gross shallowness!

– Most of our political parties are not really organizations. They are hollow shells run like gangs or a game of Snakes and Ladders by casting dice 🎲. These have Constitutions and structures, but no meaningful skills. Check across the whole continent. How many political parties have research or policy departments? How many have leadership schools? How many have innovation or policy units? So, how do these hollow shells run competent governments? By charm or charisma of their leaders?

– Africa faces an economic structural crisis that manufactures poverty, inequality, and environmental degradation on an industrial scale. Soil fertility is being depleted, farmlands parcelled out to foreign investors like confetti at a wedding. There will be nothing left for future generations. Every natural resource is known is being exchanged for bribes or pittances without any meaningful job creation, industrialization, or thought for economic diversification. The incongruencies between our economic, social, and environmental policies should frighten you as must the short-termism. Our leaders are making long-term choices based on the duration of their term of office or the expected number of years before death

OPPORTUNITIES
Each of the crises I have described is also massive opportunities to shap, fight for, and create Another Africa, A different Africa! Another Africa is both Possible, desirable, and Imperative. You cannot create a New African reality using exhausted ideas of the future and Past. Nor is another Africa possible anchored on the current leadership, institutions, and policies. The Imperative of a New Africa calls for new names, new organizations, new approaches, new innovations, solid values, and bankable skills.

Africa’s great asset is its people, not the Big 5 or Mineral Resources. The fact that we allow the rest of the world to reduce our beauty and value to only naturally occurring phenomenon such as gold, platinum, tanzanite, oil, Game, Waterfalls, Mountains, Lakes and Oceans aptly demonstrates that we are unwitting participants in the reduction of African bodies and minds into uninteresting & unproductive forms. Some even joke that the African brain has great potential because it is yet to be fully used. This is crass self-hate or racism. Africa should be and has always been the Land of great inventions, ideas, and progress. To become this again we must not just pivot, we must transform or do a revolution!

FIX MEN IN ORDER TO FIX AFRICA!

Brian Kagoro Leave a comment

When we were growing up Sexual and gender-based violence was often inappropriately referred to as “domestic affairs” by police authorities. Our society sanitized domestic violence and sexual predatory conduct as “normal male conduct”. Until the Women’s Movement taught us that the personal is political and the private is public. This is an invaluable insight because our society often ‘privatizes’ abusive behavior that we ought to appreciate as both political and public.

Irresponsible and Unaccountable Masculinity

Each time a teacher or male relative or neighbor ‘raped’ an under-age girl, the rapist was treated like royalty and a quick marriage or payment of damages to the girl’s parents done. These pedophiles never stopped and no one ever held them to account. Their victims were ignored, silenced, or shamed by the community. This idea that the male species has unfettered immunity and impunity to behave badly at home and away explains the larger problem with impunity in our society.

Male children were raised and socialized into unlimited privilege and absolutely no responsibility and certainly no or limited accountability. What do you expect? These same children became husbands, fathers, chiefs, CEOs, managers, preachers, traditional healers, teachers, doctors, lawyers, councilors, MPs, and even Presidents. Their authority and status did not ever have to be linked to responsibility and/or accountability. Some continued their pedophilia, sexual predation, abuse, and unaccountable behavior. When reports are made to the police, they pay their way out of responsibility and accountability.

We – the men- wield authority, power, and privilege almost as an entitlement, an exclusive possession. We are not – for the most part- familiar with the idea of mutuality in leadership or the notion of co-leadership, let alone co-created solutions. This idea of exclusivity that is not reciprocal permeates every aspect of male life. We -the men- tell lies, are unfaithful, do not account for anyone, but we demand truth, faithfulness, accountability, and exclusivity from our female lovers and/or spouses. Of course, there are women who are unsurpassable at this cheating game (legends).

As men, we live and behave as though it is entirely up to us to choose whether or not to be responsible and accountable in the enjoyment of our multiple privileges and immeasurable private and public power. We can sire children, contribute nothing to their upbringing, and pitch up during a girl’s Lobola (bride price) ceremony to unashamedly play the father. It is one thing to be irresponsible and unaccountable, but quite another to be shameless. I am told that Tswana culture has a remedy for this stupid behavior.

Men can philanderers, abandon their spouses and children only to return terminally ill expecting to be nursed as of right. The Male status, socialisation, and bastardization of culture allow us as men to constantly reap where we never sowed and to sow where we never water or nurture. And society has an entire bank of excuses for our bad behavior! We never care to reflect on the harm and hurt we cause because responsibility is not our thing!

Fix men in order to fix AFRICA

Starting at the family level, we have established a system of assignment of privilege that is both corrupt and corrupting. If you want to fix Africa, end impunity, abuse, corruption, violence, and abuse ….. fix the Men & boys!

Don’t look beyond the home and family to understand our national and continental governance challenges. Fatherhood (or Manhood, Maleness, etc), power, and privilege without responsibility or accountability is the source of Africa’s problem. We can transform Africa based on minimal contribution for maximum returns, power without accountability, and responsibility. The African crises are male and we must fix Malevolent Masculinity. Start with responsibility and accountability!

STOP MAKING SILLY EXCUSES!

When you come to national or political leadership, how many times have you heard these moronic statements:


1. The President is surrounded by deadwood! Who fetched the deadwood and from where?


2. Politics is a dirty game, he is doing what it takes to survive


3. Power is like a tige, once you ride it never alight or else you become food


4. Let’s give him a chance, he needs time to clean up the old system that he was part of ? And how did he remain clean in a dirty system and even get promoted?


5. The leader is a good man, but his children and that wife of his ? Excuse me fruit does not fall too far away from the tree. Like children, like father.

We all must stop being silly and stop making excuses for ruling rascals! Any leader that chooses to surround himself with deadwood and corrupt sycophants is their high priest. He is the High Priest of Corruption and deadness of thought ! Remember that our choices are one of the best indicators of who we are and what we value most . There you have it ! If your leader is surrounded by hoodlums, thieves and thugs …that is who and what he is !

Love Complexities Explained – Part 1

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African

As you mature in life you learn certain important distinctions between friendship, love, abuse and manipulation. In other words, you will have experienced enough abuse and manipulation in the name of friendship and love to know the exact difference. Abusers and users never stop until you stop them or remove yourself completely from their reach. You might be the user or abuser, someone has to read you the riot act. Anyway, my greatest lessons concerning Friendship and Love are the following :

FRIENDSHIP


Friendship is rarely an instant thing. It is often developed over time through shared values, visions, experiences, struggles , pain or loss. Intensity of interaction is not synonymous with friendship. Some of your best friends are people you can go for sometime without talking to them and when you finally reconnect, it is like you were never a day apart .

In this life, you can interact with people, share several interests, even share information and perhaps intimacy. But this does not necessarily make them your friends. They mean well ,but to them you’re an object of curiosity- a fascination. You’re someone that they talk to, interact with, work or play with.

These people like – or enjoy- what you know , what you do , who you associate with or know or even hobbies that you have . When it comes to the crunch, these great people do not know you from a tin of peanut butter and you don’t know them either. If something tragic were to alter your fortunes drastically, these good people would tweet about it , post messages on Facebook, discuss on the Golf Course, in church or at the pub, You would simply be ‘that guy or girl’, just another statistic, a sorry soul they valued when you were as fortunate as themselves

They may feel pity, but not the type of compassion that would make them to go out of their way for you. Even when you go rogue, these great people will watch your madness flourish as long as it does not affect them adversely. They won’t sit you down, tell you off or be tough with you. They found you as a finished product and unless they wish to use you for some personal benefit , they will not attempt to help you grow or advance further in life. They don’t know you like that . In simple terms, these are not your friends, Acquaintances ? Maybe !

LOVE

We live in a world possessed by terminal levels of narcissism. Lovelessness and coldness permeates every aspect of our lives and sometimes it defines the new types of leaders, citizens, teachers, preachers, parents and children. Cruel and impish beings committed to wounding others at the slightest excuse. And folks that cannot distinguish the relationship they have with other humans from the one they have with an ATM , toilet seat , fridge, desk , sofa or road to work .

Our world is a crime scene of endless social, economic, political and sexual accidents as people desperately try to get their love-needs met through mutual consumption arrangements. Some folks should honestly write on their foreheads “searching for a usable person that I might also abuse emotionally, use physically , exploit financially and benefit from materially as we both pretend to share something of value”. Almost every aspect of life is characterised by lack of deep and meaningful relationships. Most of our relationships are splendidly casual or fantastically transactional. We may as well be each other’s emotional, monetary, spiritual and/or career ATM machines. This is as true for families as it is for work , business and broader social interactions. It is no less painful to be used by a sibling, relative, workmate than it is to be used by a lover, spouse or stranger . You still feel robbed, cheated, stupid or downright disrespected.

Our generation has the most lonely rich and poor, male and female, married and single, old and young people alike. Even Churches and mosques have become highly transactional and materialistic. Lonely social spaces where people do spooky spiritual stuff- I mean use each other in the name of God ! Within these churches and mosques – like with the Diet Industry- everyone is trying to find or is offering supplements and substitutes for authentic love and companionship. Tragically, a legitimate need cannot be satisfied through cheap alternatives

Love-hunger cannot be satisfied through or by pursuits in business, politics, sports, social media, churches,mosques etc. Social capital is no substitute for love and companionship. Each of us has the capacity to receive and to reciprocate love ,which is the core requirement for most longlasting relationships. But very few of us appreciate the mutuality of love ,accountability, respect and trust. We demand these and hardly ever reciprocate.

Somebody once said that in this life you will- no matter who you are – experience some abuse, hurt, neglect, fear, shame and rejection. There are no immunity passports for these unpleasant human experiences. Because we work and live with people, envy, jealousy, strife, rumours, murmurings, grumbling and reckless talk are as natural as the air we breathe. You cannot build a monument of bitterness around these unpleasant experiences.

Our world is driven by a cancerous ME-culture. It squanders everything on ME. Something is only useful or worthwhile if it constitutes a high value or high return investment to ME. All associations, alliances and partnerships are about ME. Books are written about how to put ME first. The dysfunction that arises out of the aggressive competition between two ME’s trying to do love is as hilarious as it is tragic.

Introspection into self

Brian Kagoro 1 Comment

Suffering and lack have never been the greatest threat to humans. The greatest threat to the human species in abundance. Human beings are dissolved into the things they create or own. Being fully human is – in a silly way – measured by reference to one’s material possessions. Even preachers propagate this heretic approach to life that measures humanity through things.

You can ask people that have big jobs, steady wealth or even just paupers with plenty of cash or dealers or occultists with every trinket that money can buy.

They will tell you that it is possible to have things and absolutely no peace of mind or emotional satisfaction. Some have to take sleeping tablets or alcohol in order to get a little sleep. You can have it all and yet poor health makes it all worthless . You can be the standard of affluence and social influence and yet fail to have a single functional relationship. So, you’re not what you own, even if it is a lot of stuff !

It really doesn’t matter what everyone else says about you. At the end of the day ,your self-worth is measured by the legacy you leave behind for your family, community, organisation or country.

Dr Martin Luther King Jnr , Kwame Nkurmah, Julius Nyerere and other human heroes did not leave us things. No ! They didn’t leave us billions of dollars either. They left us words, ideas, examples and inspiration! We still draw from their legacy bank for our daily struggles.

So, let me ask again, what will be your legacy ? How long will it last judging from the quality of your investments in people, processes and relationships? How authentic is your investment?

The beginning of any great journey asks that you prepare the following:
a. The driver
b. The Vehicle
c . The passengers
d. Check the route, figure out where stops are and where you can refuel
e. Check the weather

You check fitness of the driver,safety of the vehicle, fuel,oil, water, coolant, Automatic transmission fluid , tyre pressure, wheel balancing & alignment . You ensure that your tools and spare wheels are safe and sound on board the vehicle . As you drive you constantly are on the look out for traffic signs , other road users, animals and dangerous road conditions. If this is about your life journey, what might be the equivalent of the things that you need to check about yourself, your chosen vehicle, career, calling , hobby or vocation ?

As a start, please ask yourself the following nine( 9) questions and the answers will help you understand interesting things about who or what you are:-

  1. If you were a music genre , what would you be and why ? If you were a song , what kind of song would you be ? And why ?
  2. If you were a sport, which sport would you be ? And why ? How many people would play you ?
  3. If you were money, which currency would you be and why ? What denomination of that currency would you be and why ?
  4. If you were a film type ( e.g. drama, Sci-Fi, Comedy, Action etc) which type would you be and why ? How long would you be ?
  5. If you were a book, what type of book would you be ( e.g. Encyclopedia, dictionary, bible, fiction, poems , etc) and why?
  6. If you were a holiday destination, which would you be and why ?
  7. If you were a body of water (natural or man made) which would you be ? ( e.g. river, pool, lake, ocean, waterfall ,spring , fountain, stream, borehole,pond, etc)
  8. If you were a colour, which colour would you be and why ?
  9. If you were an animal (domestic or wild) what animal would you be and why ?

These questions tell you a lot about the following aspects of your life :

  • Your subconscious thoughts
  • Your vision, values and mission in life
  • Your fantasies, desires and sense of self-worth
  • Your fears and insecurities
  • Your value to others and how you value others
  • Your spiritual, social & sexual life
  • What you want other people to think about you

NB. Your desires and your fears are related to your experiences and your exposure. Your Faith, self-confidence and self-worth are linked to your sense of assuredness in backup, support or even security. The more secure you are, the more self-confidence and greater adventure seeking you tend to be. There are exceptions . Sometimes fear, desperation or the hunger to be someone, something or somewhere can create a social, emotional, intellectual or even spiritual adrenaline to achieve extraordinary things.

Of toxic humans & critical consciousness

Brian Kagoro Leave a comment

Friends, when a regime arrests and harasses high profile activists, opponents, and critics, be careful that these are not grand diversions and distractions from the core issues at hand, namely: endemic corruption, incompetence, and impoverishment.

It is a clever ploy to get everyone to focus less on the robbery transacted by elites and focus more on their collective and/or individual safety. This shift in focus gives looters relief and the space to ransack national coffers some more without anyone paying them attention or being a nuisance by asking inconvenient questions.

I have often been amazed by how we have – and continue to – reproduce the vices of our oppressors in our approach to leadership and also in how our imagination is tied to narrowly defined versions & visions of leadership.

This idea that conflates – or confuses – leadership with the ruling, domination, personalization, oppression of others, exclusion of those we disagree with, and hogging power. Leadership is seen only as a position and a possession ( a thing, Chinhu chedu, into yethu , etc). People kill – and go to the depths of occultism- in order to keep positions and this idea of leadership as a possession.

The process of leadership is – of necessity – characterized by mutuality; value-exchanges and co-creation between the led and the leadership. Leadership Traits and outcomes of leading – though important- don’t define leadership. The complex interactions between the bottom, top, and middle shapes, molds, directs, guides, restraints, and catalyzes the leadership dynamic or process.

That is why it is dangerous to have captive crowds that don’t reciprocate or contribute ideas beyond ululation and adulation. Crowd support can be intoxicating and blinding, especially in what it does not tell us about leadership as well as in what it hides. But you will always have such crowds if you don’t build critical consciousness in the society.

Critical consciousness is about the responsibility and accountability of everyone to shape the present, the future, and the society that we want. The multiplicity city of leadership allows a totally different approach to create unions on today’s and tomorrow’s challenges. The idea of One Leader who is the fountain of knowledge, wisdom & Innovation is a comical lie. A childish prank! One person cannot be the Mega Mall of everything Leadership. What is tragic though is the idea that the leader makes no mistake? How is this even possible to imagine let alone think about it?

We must viciously fight the personalization of stats States institutions. In politics, the rise of personality cults is -by nature -a very violent & exclusionary process. It is often dominated by thugs or political party Activists-Cum-Criminals.

Fi, st, you have a de-ideologization of politics. Second, ethical vacuums become entrenched Third, personalization becomes normalized. Then Villagization was followed by the family dynasty. This is why Julius Nyerere warned that African Nationalism- if it is not at the same time Pan-Africanist – is anachronistic. At such levels of political decomposition, appealing to ethical standards becomes futile because none exists. Referring to ideological consciousness is meaningless because no ideology guides greed & personalization

Well, there are merchants in every situation. These appeal to the naivete, insecurity, or narcissistic disorder of the Leader. If you’re the leader watch out for the signs of capture, manipulation, deception, and corruption.

These are:-
1. CAPTURE BY TITLES – You get these ever so helpful and generous subordinates who are always there when you need them ( Danger Skelem) . They insist on lavishing you with titles gifts, and obsessive attention. They begin insisting that everyone else should use these titles to refer to you Your real identity gets buried in fancy high-sounding titles. Please wake up ….You have less money than Jeff Bezos Bill Gates and Warren Buffet …Less fame than Barack Obama …Less infamy than Donald Trump …And you have dozens of Titles? For the Why My friend gets substance ….don’t make up for what you lack in substance through titles!

What these title-conferring tricksters don’t disclose is that they are using you as a stepping stone to their sinister agenda. They are forcing on you what they really want for themselves. If you don’t believe me, fire them or ignore them for 8 months and you will see how vicious they become towards you! They don’t love you, they are simply using you to gain authority over those you lead and credibility with your peers!

Before you know it, they will isolate and insulate you from everyone else except themselves. Then you will be fully captured! They will tell you who is loyal, who is trustworthy, who is for or against you. As sure as nightfall, they will soon use you to eliminate anybody and everybody in your team that they see as competition. This is a classic case of the Leader serving as errand boy or girl for power merchants or influence entrepreneurs

2. GIFTS and CELEBRATIONS: people must appreciate their leadership. But why is it necessary to flood Leadership with gifts that do not help broaden the leader’s impact and vision? Let me explain something to you. No matter how much you need personal things as a leader your best people are those who give to your business or mission & not just your needs. If your mission is technology, employment creation, Arts health, education, etc. Your greatest supporters are not the ones that build you a Blue Roof House…No It is those that donate to your Tech advancement, National Arts Fund, Education scholarships, Health Infrastructure development, etc. They are concerned about your legacy and not just your ego! So, this celebration of days and full adverts in newspapers and rituals of appreciation are more for the doer than the Leader. They are a means of capture!

3. ENEMIES, PLOTTERS & SCAREMONGERING:- There are people who plot and do harm. Don’t be naive always be alert to this reality But if you are surrounded by people who are more conscious of witches, wizards enemies & plotters than opportunities …..you’re finished!

In order to make a difference as a leader, you need to anticipate and prepare for opportunities. All opportunities require teams of motivated people. They require more accessible- not detached – leaders. Always get the pulse of your team directly, not through intermediaries. Some people work to manage your 24/7 and thus prevent you from knowing, feeling, experiencing, or seeing anything but what they want you to. These babysitters are dangerous. More so if as a leader you develop co-dependencies with them! Babysitters tend to be experts at cover and cover-up as well as scaremongering.

Scaremongering is the surest way to capture any leader. Devious characters work tirelessly to create or enlarge insecurities in the leadership that only they can eliminate. That way they become indispensable to the leader Be very careful that such characters! If you’re not alert and wise as a leader, they will make you eliminate your most dependable, loyal, and productive Team Members.

As a rule, I watch out for characters that are too heavily invested in organizational politics. They are usually the most unproductive in the organization. They are simply human destruction machines …TOXIC HUMANS!

Four Realities that have Liberated Me

Brian Kagoro 1 Comment

I long since reconciled with four realities and these have liberated me, my actions and thoughts:

1. STAGNATION & IMMOBILITY :

I realized that I am not a rock destined to be stuck in one place (physically, mentally, socially, economically) until some dynamite blows me away or some flood buries me. Motion/movement may not be progress, but stagnation is the surest way to die or rot (intellectually, socially, politically, economically, or spiritually).

Think about it, you were born into a loving family that nursed & nurtured you into independent adulthood, but you left them to establish your own home. The same way you didn’t stay in kindergarten, primary school, high school, college, or university, even though it was fun and you had great friends.

Each day, week, month, year, and decade is about creating new versions of yourself, new memories, new networks, new achievements, and ultimately a colorful and enjoyable journey

2. JOB PRISONER:

Work (a job) is not a monogamous marriage based on the vow, “Till Death Do Us Part”. It is not a war zone either where you go each day to engage in mortal or fatal combat. If you have a skill and you’re stuck in an emotionally exhausting job and you have become an expert at the bruising fights at work ….look in the mirror and repeat the following words after me ….”I am an imbecile and I suffer from inferiority complex and the fear to try something different, somewhere different on my own or with different partners, clients or customers”.

It is not loyalty or love keeping you in that abusing work environment each day fighting viciously. It is fear to move on orders to start your own thing. In simple term s, it is grand delusion and Foolishness. You are afraid of your own inadequacy and you’re afraid to fail on your own terms. You doubt your ability to stand professionally or economically without the crutches of an abusive job. So you embrace this abuse as your fate and are addicted to it Forgive me for being candid!

You don’t own the company, you have no shares in it, you feel unappreciated, used, abused, underpaid? You are getting health issues because of the job Look you’re not staying there for the bills or your children’s school fees or pension. You’re like that man Jesus Christ found at a pool and had been waiting for 38 years for healing. He had legitimate sounding excuses “when the water stirs, I have no one to lift and put me in there in order to get my breakthrough”. The answer to him was as simple as my advice to me and to you…Get Up take your mat, and Go!

3. TOXIC NICENESS:

I realized right from home (my extended family), church, work, school, sports, etc, are people that mistake ‘NICENESS’ for ‘GOODNESS’. This is going to sound very arrogant, but it is true…I didn’t come to earth to be NICE I am not chocolate or a pack of sweets. Neither are you!

Ever wondered why most medicines are not nice? Here is the answer, you risk perpetuating injustice, hypocrisy, oppression, mediocrity, and stupidity because you value NICENESS more than truth, frankness, and openness. So people never get to know who you really are, what you really think or feel beyond that nice smile, personality, and demeanor. Each fake smile is a nail in your coffin and all your relationships

Now, this does not mean that you should be mean or nasty. It simply means that you should stop deceiving yourself, your children, your spouse, friends, workmates, leaders, and neighbors. Let your YES be a true YES and your NO be a frank NO! Don’t be so nice that you can’t say NO!

Learn to tell people the TRUTH (or your version of it). It might hurt for a while but they will appreciate you for it. Don’t ever get promoted or favored for NICENESS, let it be for INTEGRITY, Candour, and Performance.

Toxic NICENESS is born out of a fear of rejection, lack of self-confidence, and the desire to be loved, adored, and appreciated. Some parents are so nice, they lead their children to ruin. Some bosses are so nice they destroy their entire organizations as badly as do very nasty bosses. Some friends are so nice they cheer you to hell and self-ruin. Your toxic NICENESS is responsible for a lot of future pain, destruction, and ruin. It spoils people around you; it cushions them from the consequences of their bad choices and the accountability they so badly need ….And it does not prepare anyone for the real world without you playing ANGEL. Stop it!

4. FEAR OF BEING FORGOTTEN or Fear of Missing Out (The young ones call it – FOMO)

I realized there is a reason why I am not AIR, I don’t have to be everywhere. I actually don’t have to be everything. Learn to Chill! You’re not GOD, you are neither Omnipotent, Omniscient nor Omnipresent. My friends and family will tell you this, I know how to enjoy my own company, agenda, training, projects, and books. I was liberated from the need to be always with the crew. I learned to balance Me-Time, family Time, group Time, and Chill time

I started off by making a lot of friends across class, religious, political, ethnic, national, racial, and professional groups. These became my everyday University. I call, text, or communicate with them regularly. I don’t feel the need to be dominant or present in any one dimension all the time. I have seasons of presence and focus. Friends, workmates & family often want you to be in one place all the time. You cannot, you shouldn’t and you must not! Your greatest value is a balance between absence and presence.

Each time I travel I always bring my family and friends gifts or souvenirs from the trips. But I return with new stories, memories, perspectives, experiences, and something of value. The most dangerous teachers (or preachers) are those that lack exposure from interaction with others outside their domain of influence. Lecturers that go on sabbatical rest and often return with new insights and even methods

Permanent presence as a leader often hides as much the incompetence and incapacities of your team as it does their creativity, innovativeness, and growth. You cannot be there barking instructions all the time One day you will be arrested, fall sick or die and they have to do stuff without you. Your children, spouse, friends, and comrades have veto make keep without you. Practice absence that permits growth and responsibility.

NB. I know that my talent is not equivalent to personal growth That you can be immensely talented and an intellectual or emotional toddler. I am certain that as you are reading this you are already putting several names to this in your head.
I realized early that my growth required the following :
A. Constant reading and mobility ( exposure)

B. Liberation from the myth of Job Security that degenerated into a lifetime Workplace imprisonment ( Golden Handcuffs)

C. That I stop trying to be nice in order to be liked, loved, and accepted. That I be authentic and real and if need be, be tough. Tough love isn’t nastiness, it is the refusal to comfort people engaged in Foolishness

D. That it was alright to be forgotten, to miss out on some things ( even important moments & things) and absence do not in and of itself kill the things that I care about …… the only desertion does That sometimes permanent presence is destructive and inhibits growth and maturity amongst those that you lead . Always delegate, but more importantly give people responsibility and trust them to make mistakes that they themselves correct!