You know, I cannot deny the fact that for the past few months, one has been struggling a lot. Mentally that is. The cause and why is something that I will explain in another post. This post attempts to answer a question I asked myself earlier this morning:
How does the ocean quench its thirst?
I am sure many philosophers have asked this question. But, I am not going to be philosophical about it. The question stemmed whilst I was thinking about a young man who looked up to me. You see, God has given me the talent to attract young individuals who find wisdom in my mind.
Trust me, it is something that I do not hold as a badge of honour. It is something that makes me uneasy, to be honest. It is something I am yet to be comfortable with. Even though, as far back as I can trace, there has always been someone I am mentoring or someone who desires to be mentored by me. Again, this is a realisation I am yet to accept if I’m honest.
Because why me? I am not the smartest man in the room. I am not the wealthiest man in the room. I am not the most attractive, well-dressed or most handsome. In fact, I am the most awkward one in the room. Yet, someone who will look at me and say, “Thando, please guide me.”
And so, feeling it’s my God-given duty to do so, I will answer the call. Herein comes this young man I am talking about.
The dude is intelligent. Extremely intelligent for his age. He is well dressed and well-mannered. He is a young man who success is looking for him. And for some reason, this young man looked at me and asked that I mentor him.
Naturally, I said yes. It is what happened earlier this year that bothers me. Obviously, I can’t delve into everything to respect his privacy. But, he was going through some challenges himself. And in those moments, he reached out hoping I’ll help him.
I was going through my own challenges as well. I tried to help but it was clear I couldn’t. He had come to sharpen his mind on a dry whetstone.
I failed him.
It is something I think about. Who quenches the ocean’s thirst? Who warms the sun? Who does God cry to? It is difficult for me to wrap my head around it because even with people I look up to, I’ve grown to realise that they are facing challenges and they don’t have all the answers.
Perhaps that’s why monks spend years in meditation. Maybe that’s why they spend so many years seeking the elusive enlightenment. Will Smith’s movie calls it The Pursuit of Happiness. It is in the confines of your own being that you will find an understanding of self.
What I mean is, the ocean’s thirst is quenched by the rivers that flow back to it. It might be different in composition but it is still water. The ocean gives the water to the land and the land returns it. Thus, the ocean I’d believe does not think that it is thirsty. I would believe that the ocean does not then stop and ask, why am I thirsty? The ocean just is and in that, so is the water that quenches its thirst.
What we humans most often do, is pause and ask ourselves, how will I quench the thirst? We do not allow the thirst to quench itself. We become fully engulfed in the idea of being that we forget to be.
You see, when this young man was asking for guidance, I did not simply give it. I did not trust in the fact that God is the one who gave me this talent and so God will provide the right guidance. I paused and asked myself how can I provide guidance. I attempted to quench the thirst not realising that I had the bottle of water adequate for the job.
And so, I failed him. I could not offer him the guidance he was seeking. And since then, I have been on a path of rediscovering myself. Yes, I do not hold mentoring as a badge of honour but I understand that God gave me this talent. It is like Christ who did not want to go to the cross but he knew He had to. It is with that logic I respect the talent.
It does not, however, take away the difficulty of the task. Especially when you realise that some answers you need to find for yourself. There are some answers that no one close to you has answers to. A simple example, if you desire to become a millionaire and there’s no millionaire in your family, then understand that your family can never teach you to become a millionaire. That will call on you to study millionaires that you’ll probably never meet. It will mean studying books and praying they are not just PR stunts to promote the millionaire.
Like water finding its way back to the ocean, there are aspects of this world that will find you. But in finding you, your mind needs to be ready for it. Imagine if the ocean was thirsty but built a wall of sand at estuaries where the rivers meet the ocean. The ocean will then continue being thirsty and forever wonder how it quench its thirst.
I write this because I have come to realise that God did not make me a lecturer by mistake. It is a role that satisfies my soul. Trust me, the pay sucks, especially at private institutions. Every day, I feel like singing freedom songs because old White bosses test me continually (I’ve joined the union because the freedom fighter in me has had enough). I still believe that employment is modern-day slavery but when I leave a classroom, my soul feels satisfied. And so, each year there is a student or two who asks I help them walk a path higher than the one they currently working.
Sometimes, I fall from that higher path. I too find myself seeking to walk that path. But I realise that when one is in a situation where those who guide you cannot guide you, being within yourself is the best mentor. Sitting quietly under a tree, walking peacefully in nature, allowing your being to drink the abundant water that streams freely all around us, that is the best mentorship that you’ll receive.
Sometimes we become so preoccupied in being that we forget to be. The ocean is the ocean without being the ocean. It is the ocean. It merely exists as is, it is an ocean and so, to be an ocean is to be an ocean. And to be an ocean, rivers flow back to it so the ocean never knows thirst.
If a lake were to try being an ocean, it would find itself thirsting for water. Yes, streams and creeks flow to lakes but they can never be the large rivers that flow to oceans. Lakes being oceans will find themselves wondering how to quench their thirst. And they will fabricate canals and other methods to attempt to quench their thirst. The ocean does not have that problem.
To be is to be self. To be self is to be with self. The self has what it needs to quench its own thirst, to guide its own mind. The trick is to be self; not try being self.
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