There was a country, full of zombies, each with his/her gifts, talents and ideas. Some were called CEOs, others employees, some job seekers, some students, some parents, some celebrities, some were mere citizens, others were in the class of the rich, some belonged to the poor community. Different communities existed in that colony: the rich, the poor, the famous, the mediocre, the fraudulent, the righteous and the ordinary folk’s community – each man with his own hands or by inheritance determined the community he/she would belong to. In that country every positive community had an opposite which was the negative; because there was a rich community, there was also a poor community, because there was the healthy community there was also the sick community. A lion separated the positive community from the negative community but even with the presence of a lion in the streets people moved from one negative community to the positive one from time to time – poor zombies switched from the poor communities to the rich zones.
In this country lived Zech, he was by inheritance born into the poor, sick and low life community but he kept hearing the tale of how someone moved from their community to the rich, healthy and high-class but he had actually never seen anyone who offered to go along with him to the streets; he had often conducted his poor, sick and low life trade within the confines of his community but deep down in his heart he knew his destiny belonged to the other community even though he was too scared of the lion in the street.
After consulting with the elders of the land about what it took to move to the other side he became discouraged; they told him how difficult it was to get to the other community, how big the lion was and how impossible it was for him to go through the street without encountering the lion. “Do you want to die? If you want to die, then go ahead into the street; be contented with what you have my son”, one of the elders said emphatically. He gave up the idea but every time he slept, his dreams of a better life came back to him; he woke up one morning excited and decided to go into the street even if it meant death. “If I stay here, I’ll surely die but if I go I might be lucky as some others before me”, he said to himself.
He packed all that belonged to him and traded them for cash to prepare for his journey as the custom of anyone leaving the community did; leaving everything behind was one of the reasons people stayed in the community, they could not afford to part with all that they had even though what they had was a tiny fraction of what they could have in their new community. Zech stepped out of the community gate walking carefully hoping that he would not wake up the lion but as he got to an end of the road he heard a ferocious sound like the roar of a lion, he ran back towards his old community but they wouldn’t open the gate for him at the time because they were also afraid of the sound. He summoned courage and every time he got to that junction he would hear noises that felt like the roar of a lion and he would run back to his community gate. Then it occurred to him that he wasn’t making progress, he had to either go or not go regardless of the sound; the next time he got to the junction he heard the sound again and he stayed at a spot trying to catch a glimpse of the lion. After some minutes two zombies approached him from nowhere and led him to the gate, it was the gate of the rich, healthy and high-class community. He thought they were going to feed him to the lion but as they moved he kept seeing affluence, good health, wealth around many more zombies.
He entered into the gate and met with the council of chiefs who were ready to interview him. He didn’t understand what was going on. They told him that every time someone dared to come from the poor, sick and low life community to their junction a sound will automatically be triggered off but it wasn’t the sound of a lion but a gong that sounded like a lion – the sound was to announce the arrival of the latest rich, healthy and high-class zombie and to summon the council of chiefs together for the interview and the induction ceremony. It was that same sound that kept many in the poor community up until when they spoke, said one of the elders.
Zech was amazed at the realization; he was angry at himself and everyone whoever told him that it was impossible to move to the other community.
‘There is a fierce lion in the streets’, so said the lazy man until he stepped out – the situation is not different from what we have here in our own country and community. Many people have what you want to have and that is proof that you can also have those things. Many people are what you want to be and that is proof that you can also be what they are – the sound of lion you hear is only a sound, if you keep moving, if you stay on that junction regardless of the sound you will enter into your place of greatness.
N.B: Bring out the lessons in today’s #MondayInspiration and list them in the comment segment below. We will look through them and the winner will win an airtime of their choice or get their business advertised on next week's #MondayInspiration. Game is only open to residents in Nigeria. Drop your email address and your twitter handle where the airtime will be sent in case you are the winner.
Keep on Keeping on.
Gabriel Olatunji ‘Legend’ is @OLATUNJISPEAKS on Twitter – your Inspirational blogger. You can send him a mail on olatunjispeaks@gmail.com – Let’s Talk.
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