Por Que?

'There is no such thing as chance; and what seems to us the merest accident springs from the deepest source of destiny."
- Johann Christoph Friedrich von Schiller (1759-1805)



I finally got to watch "The Curious Life of Benjamin Button" after learning that the sciatica nerve in my left leg has more power than the IRS to elicit total obedience and compliance. In the semi-delirious state brought about by a potent cocktail of cyclobenzaprine, hydrocodone, acetaminophen, and naproxen, I was laid up in pin-drop silence as the story of Benjamin Button - who "ages backwards" - was revealed...


...as I thought about this post, I was brought back to Benjamin's recital of the events that took place prior to, his love, Daisy's career-ending demise. "If only"...a pair of words that may have likely changed the story; down to the milisecond, every occurrence before that fateful event seemed to be intricately orchestrated.


"By whom?" you ask. Well, it depends on your belief system. Whomever or whatever you believe to be behind it all, the common denominator is me, you...the individual. I don't believe that we are powerless to destiny, but rather that we are co-authors of our destiny. While life may come at us with winds filled with hurricane fury, whether or not we become victims is a choice that we make.


Sadly, we spend too much time trying to understand why what has happened to us happened; that is, instead of focusing on the lessons to be learned from the experience. We are all defined by particular and peculiar situations; they come at us without fear or favor...respecting none of us. Yet, no matter how it all looks to be by chance, there is often something at work that is larger than we are...

That said, I urge you to take inventory of your life.
Inventory.
Taking stock.
Have you learned from the occurrences of the past month?
Or, better yet, what have you learned from the past month?

(c) 2009, Dr. Kozhi Sidney Makai. No part of this blog post may be reproduced or stored in a retrieval system without the written consent of the copyright holder.

Who's Driving?

...it's not easy when the road is your driver
- Celine Dion, "When I Need You" (1997)

Have you ever felt that way? Like you had no control of anything?
No matter what you did, nothing seemed to go your way? If you have not, I applaud you; you are among a very small minority. For many of us, the road tends to be the driver with such frequency, we budget for it each quarter!

Being in the business of dealing with human behavior and development, it's amazing how it still surprises me how shocked many of us are when we go through seasons with no maps, no instructions...no direction. Celine Dion, the best-selling female artist of all time, could not have put it more succinctly, nor could she have been more correct, when she prefaced the season with "it's not easy..."

As with all posts on this blog, I'd like to shed some light on the role we individually play in the midst of seasons of darkness. I cannot speak for everyone, but I can certainly speak for myself when I say that sometimes we need to pull over. Yes, the road may wish to be the driver every now and then; however, we have to choose whether we remain clueless passengers or we grab life by the horns and determine the speed we travel, the vehicle in which we travel, and the baggage we carry. We have to choose whether we trade our victim mentality for a determined and destined one. We choose...

Of all the marvelous gifts God gave me, I am most thankful for free will - the ability to make choices and decisions. This happens to be the least used gift we possess; especially when set against the backdrop of a more litigious society and one that has become less about personal "responsibility" and more about "rights." Before you write the ACLU about this, let me say that I strongly believe in having my rights - to bear arms, to a fair trial, etc - but not at the expense of shunning responsibility.

When a drunk driver is given probation for being quite past the legal alcohol limit and hits a couple on a motorcycle head on (nearly killing one and maiming both) and then hits the vehicle behind them, one has to wonder where "responsibility" comes in. Four lives...changed in less than 60 seconds. Yet, the person responsible never gets to answer for it. I'll let you be the judge...

While I deeply sympathize with anyone going through a time of the road being the driver, I have to say that you do have a choice. If you cannot stop immediately, eventually there will be a gas/bathroom stop. Use it to make your escape and determine your path. Refuse to be the victim or a clueless passenger. It's your only life to live. Live completely!

(c) 2009, Dr. Kozhi Sidney Makai. No part of this blog post may be reproduced or stored in a retrieval system without the written consent of the copyright holder.

It's not...over!

"Here is the test to find whether your mission on Earth is finished:
If you're alive, it isn't."
- Richard Bach

Feelings of despair often wrap themselves around us like a warm blanket in the winter. At that point, every decision and motive is filtered through these feelings. We wonder about our worth, our abilities, or if what we have to offer...the world even desires. Self-doubt becomes our constant companion while we, like Columbus, try to find our way in the vastness of - not the ocean as Columbus - a sea of faces strewn over the earth. And when we make port, thinking we have hit our India, we base our judgments on false information and assumptions that only perpetuate mythical realities...
We've all been there; have we not? Nothing seems to go right. The kids fall ill, one by one; a key account cancels the order that was to make the year for you - and simultaneously significantly alter your net worth; "all of a sudden," you and your significant other take "Men are from Mars, and Women are from Venus" literally and begin speaking in different tongues - one speaking squirrel, the other speaking whale; every light is red [especially when you're late]; the State Trooper misses the bright red corvette that was driving at 90 mph, but tags you, in your gray Ford Taurus driving at 75 mph in a 70 mph zone. The list goes on...
...isn't it tempting to throw our hands in the air? To wish the end would come? It's adding insult to injury when the storm comes through and blows the house down, but leaves the west wall - only to have a small gust snap a pine that crashes the last remnants of what used to be your home...isn't it? "C'est vrai! La vie es tres dificile!" my late high school French teacher taught us. Life can be difficult. It's not, as Celia Cruz sings: "La vida es un carnaval." It's not often a joy and a party. Yet, in all honesty, it is you and I that decide whether or not we find joy in it. It all comes down to a choice.
The tide turns when we realize that, had our mission and role been accomplished on Earth, we'd be elsewhere. So long as we have zoe, the breath of life, in us, there's yet more for us to do. It may be to hug our children more, serve the community more, develop technologies that will shape future generations, or improve the human condition through our service as teachers, nurses, or...speakers?
Whatever our role is, then, it is not complete. Each of us 6.5 billions souls on Earth have a role to play. Do you know your role?

(c) 2009, Dr. Kozhi Sidney Makai. No part of this blog post may be reproduced or stored in a retrieval system without the written consent of the copyright holder.

"Mailo"

"Mailo" - Yesterday...or Tommorow

Nyanja, like many of the other 60 plus languages of Zambia, is an interesting language. For most who speak only one language, the intricacies of meaning can be lost because they have only one referent. For those of us who are bi or multi lingual, language is something to behold. As I thought about what to write this week, I was brought back to our propensity for living in the past...
I know...we've talked about this before, but after working with someone this week who is fiercely fighting a daunting and haunting past, I thought it prudent to address it again. In Nyanja, the same word is used to refer to yesterday and tomorrow. In order for one to know which it refers to, one would need to pay particular attention to the discussion. I find that this attentiveness is the same we need for us to overcome daunting and haunting pasts...
If you're like many of us, the economy has affected you in some small or significant way. If you're like most of us, you've become proficient at kicking yourself for the decisions you made or the actions you took. Regardless of the economy's effect on you, you have to be careful how you use "mailo" - are you going to focus on "mailo yesterday" or "mailo tomorrow"? The choice you make will determine whether you become better...or bitter. What say you?

(c) 2009, Dr. Kozhi Sidney Makai. No part of this blog post may be reproduced or stored in a retrieval system without the written consent of the copyright holder.

Bitter Waters

...if you take anger into a second day, anger changes: it morphs into bitterness
- Kerry & Chris Shook in "One Month to Live"

I just returned from one of my two monthly blood donations. The team at The Woodlands Neighborhood Donor Center and I have become quite close; constantly teasing and filling the suite with laughter. I have the unique opportunity, twice a month, to give both platelets and plasma; essentials for trauma victims as well as cancer patients (since donating my hair is out of the question). I have been donating blood for some time now, yet I am still intrigued by the process of the machine taking my blood and breaking it down into the needed platelets and plasma. While not a true morphing, there is a wonderful transformation of my whole blood into constituent parts...
Anger is quite similar to blood, when you pass it through the "Time and Meditation Machine" - it becomes something else. Sadly, none of its constituents are useful for the giver or the recipients. Whether you are facing the harsh aftermath of the recent turn of economic events or you're dealing with a personal dilemma of catastrophic proportions, there's a possibility that you can, could, or have become bitter.
We have a tendency to want to explain things. And, in the right setting, this can be a wonderful trait. Without it, polio would not have been eradicated nor would many of the technological advancements that have changed our health and way of life been possible . Yet, this incessant need to explain things can also lead us to become bitter. According to The New Ecyclopedic Dictionary of the English Language, the word "bitter" comes from the AngloSaxon word "bitan" - to bite. The problem with biting down without any other thought is that we cannot be nourished - essential, we do not grow.
Imagine being at your favorite steakhouse and ordering their best cut; cooked to your specifications, you cut a piece and do nothing but bite into it. No chewing, no swallowing; nothing. Would you gain anything?
See? That's what happens when we become bitter. We bite down and never enjoy the flavor of life. We do not gain the nutrients from the environment that we need to grow or improve ours and the human condition. There are going to be many ups and downs; and being angry is fine - after all, it is a human emotion. However, we need to be careful not allow our anger (righteous or not) to become something that is of no use to us or others.

What are you doing with your anger?

(c) 2009, Dr. Kozhi Sidney Makai. No part of this blog post may be reproduced or stored in a retrieval system without the written consent of the copyright holder.

"Handle with Care"

"How we handle our tough times stays with us for a long time..."
- Max Lucado in "Facing Your Giants"

I have often wondered what makes an individual great. If you're like me, visions flash before you of individuals you have come to deeply honor and respect. There is an "epitomic" view we each have of what a great individual looks like. We each have what is called an Implicit Personality Theory (IPT) about people; that is, our own sets of hypotheses about what people are like. Armed with our IPTs, we envision what these Champions of Life look like and set our lives against that mold and standard.

The common thread, for the Champions of my world, is tied very closely to how they each handle(d) tough times. That is, what they did when:

• They stumbled...over and over again
• They lost things and people important to them
• They encouraged themselves when discouraged by failure
• They were disappointed and betrayed by others
• The machinery of life simply would not cooperate in their favor

How these individuals handled these and other situations ranks high in my IPT of great individuals. See, I believe that to traverse the world leaping from one mountaintop to another builds less backbone than having to ascend and descend multiple mountains while spending large amounts of time in the valley. To me, the Champions of Life are those individuals who have learned how to handle tough times with clarity and sensitivity to the effects that the decision(s) at hand have for the future...

Our IPT builds on previous and current experience; equally, our ability to handle tough times improves with each tough time. If we can handle tough times with maturity (please note that I did not say we will handle them without fading, failing or falling), we set ourselves up for even better performance the next time another tough time comes. So, today I have two questions for you:

What's your IPT about Champions of Life?
How are you handling tough times?

(c) 2009, Dr. Kozhi Sidney Makai. No part of this blog post may be reproduced or stored in a retrieval system without the written consent of the copyright holder.

I want...OUT!

...the only way out, is through!!


I woke up this morning thinking about the challenges I have faced in the last ten years. As I prepared my decaf Chai Tea, I considered my response to every storm that has come in the last 120 months: death, loss, pain, betrayal, financial tornadoes...
I decided to take inventory because I was concerned about my progress; I wondered if I had grown at all. I wondered whether I was responding to every storm in the same way. I asked myself if I was avoiding the storms again...
Unlike the physical storms that Mother Nature orchestrates, the "storms of growth" cannot be avoided. For those who feel they have successfully avoided them, they become repetitive patterns in their lives until the lessons are learned...
The "storms of growth," I have found, must not only be faced head on, they must be traversed through. Last year, the Gulf Coast experienced Hurricane Ike and the constant word by our local metereologists was to "hunker down" once the storm hit. Again, being a storm whose maestro was Mother Nature, this makes perfect sense.
However, for "storms of growth," the only way out of them is through. I was speechless as I thought about how the only way I would grow ("survive") after the storm was to go through it - not try to drive around it, fly over it, or burrow underneath it...
Did this comfort me? Not really. I just realized that I cannot avoid the highway leading to my growth and improvement. As one friend said, "the highway to heaven is in the desert." I don't know what your "heaven" is, but I can assure you, my friend, that the only way for you to get there is through - not under, through, or over...
What storm(s) are you avoiding?

(c) 2009, Dr. Kozhi Sidney Makai. No part of this blog post may be reproduced or stored in a retrieval system without the written consent of the copyright holder.