TAMING ‘ME’

‘That’s just me being me’.

        It’s one of the worst and most used clichés I’ve come across in my lifetime. We use it to excuse the stupid things we do. When we do people wrong and would rather not apologise for our idiocy. When we don’t want to push ourselves to get a better result but would rather stay in our comfort zone(s). when we just refuse to conform to the ‘norm’ in our environment (which could be positive at times).

I’m one of the people who finds a reason every day to be grateful to God for the way I am. Not that I’m perfect (absolutely not) but I most certainly adore myself. I believe in the power of the individual very much and as such am fascinated with ME. But then again, even I recognize that little pal ME has a huge tendency to become rather self-indulgent and go overboard at times:

Sometimes, there is a need to tame ME:

When ME hurts others without thinking about it:

There’s a saying in law that ‘your right to scratch your nose ends where my right to protect my nose begins’ (in other words, you’re allowed to scratch your nose but don’t elbow me in the face while at it). One of the downsides of being the lastborn in a yoruba home is that I started cooking for the family and doing practically all the house chores when I was barely 12 so I basically grew up a ‘caretaker’. So on some days, I wake up seeking only to do something for myself and just be selfish for once and Lord knows I need it occasionally or I would just go insane. That’s just ok but watch out for the times when in your bid to have your complete 3-square meal you walk past someone who’s still hoping for just one or spill sand in theirs. Insensitivity I have discovered is a kind of sensitivity too; except that it is sensitivity only to one’s self.

When ME postpones growth

I love ME days or as some people call it ME time. I get to do all the things I love to do but haven’t done in a while because I have to do other serious things like read ahead of my bar exams or write an article I have to submit at work or cook for my family. Left to me, I’d rather just sit around and watch movies all day or listen to music and fantasize about my big future. To some people, everyday is ‘me’ day. Pushing things that help your future till tomorrow because ‘they just don’t seem appealing right now’. Trust me, they never do; that’s why we’d rather read a novel than read a textbook or a bible and we could sit through an entire season of the 24 series in a day but not through a sermon or a 3hour lecture. Weigh your activities. If you find you’ve been putting off too many important things for the easy stuff just cos you’re waiting to ‘feel like it’, I think its time to tame ME.

When ME is someone else

If you can attach most of the things you do and call ‘me’ to one person or the other and even though you love doing those things, you find they’re not originally your ideas and you would otherwise have not done them then I think your ‘me’ needs some cheking and redefining.

When ME always takes but never gives

That’s the worst and unfortunately most common human trait. Odd that its easy to not notice it. We look to people hoping to receive. We wait to be greeted but get angry when someone walks past us without saying hi, dress to be complemented but we wouldn’t tell a person they look good just so they don’t think too much of themselves. We pray to be forgiven but demand an apology for every wrong done to us. We want showers of blessing but would only pay tithe when its not a chunk of our salary or when all other expenses have been sorted out and we’re sure to be secure for a while. We wouldn’t say a simple ‘please’ or ‘thank you’ to the hairdresser, the gateman or the supermarket attendant because we pay them afterall but we expect our boss to repect us because we work hard and dress corporate anyway.

When ME is self indulgent

There’s a difference between having a life of your own (being able to do things alone and achieve much with standalone efforts even in the absence of company) and being supercilious (contemptuously indifferent and arrogant). Its ok to have a life not necessarily linked to another’s like the dependence of Siamese twins conjoined in the head but when you begin to see people as pawns on a chessboard who are of no importance and lifeless except you chose to move them at will, ME is in need of taming.

When ME is afraid

Sometimes we want things so badly and deep down inside we know we can do it but on the outside, everyone agrees that we’re the quiet reserved one who doesn’t want much out of life because we wont show it. Like when you realize you just cant step away from the mirror when you’re alone because it’s the only one that knows how well you can act but you’d never act in church or take up a role in a class presentation. You write beautifully but its all in your journal locked up somewhere and you say things like ‘that journal is my life’. No offence but I think your ‘me’ sucks and needs suppressing for a bolder ‘me’ to take over.

My opinion; be who you are as much as you can but take a break from time to time to see the world around you. Don’t desire things so much that it makes you harm another or forget the inconsistency that life represents. Don’t get too comfortable; you could swap places with anyone in the blink of an eye so in whichever place you find your ‘me’, let there be balance.

Bukola T. Odu

TWIS