All men is dealt a measure of pain – Unknown
As the cliché goes, everyone is fighting something. Life gives each man his own fair share of troubles, hurts and demons. No one is spared. Don’t let appearance or status delude you, we all have issues in our lives and we all have that one thing we struggle to tell anyone about. Some of us have just made a mastery of dealing with it diligently and astutely without finding sympathizers.
If you live very long enough, you will discover that everyman has his own fair share of pain. Do not let appearances and outlook fool you. We are all fighting something and as T.D jakes once put it ‘We all have a private wound in a private place.’ It is for this reason that you have to be careful when you point an accusing finger to the next man. When you see a child go wayward, don’t be quick to throw jibes at the parent for doing a poor job at parenthood. You simply don’t know the full story. And as it often happens in life, your case might be worse. Sometimes, life just happens. I remember seeing a movie titled ‘The Words’ and the young lady asked the old man in the movie after so many years of youthful promise that ended in broken dreams ‘What happened to you?’ and gazing into nothingness, the man replied ‘Life.’ You must recognize that at times in our world, life just happens amidst all your plans, dedication and hardwork.
For some of us, we have lost loved ones when we really prayed and did all we could to save them. For some, you have cried yourself to sleep in fighting that habit that is threatening your destiny. In this world we all will suffer. The perfection of creation was corrupted by the fall and, with it, human nature. So, because of the fall, we must do our work while feeling the prick of thorns. Even the good book said, "In this world you will have trouble. But take heart! I have overcome the world" There is comfort in suffering--because there is purpose to it. Like David we all can say, "It was good for me to be afflicted. Now I obey your law." As Jamie Buckingham once said "He whom God loveth he beateth the hell out of."
Sometimes we just live in worlds where we see the outside and forget the inside. We forget that so many of us are walking journeys that aren’t easy or ideal. We see the other mums who seem to have it all together and then we wonder why we don’t. We see and think that everyone else is happy and yet we can’t even make it through a game of Old Maid with the kids before we’re wishing to get something else checked off the list. Nothing in life is perfect. Nothing. It doesn’t matter if what we post on social media says otherwise. If everyone’s lives were exactly the way they made it out to look like on Instagram and Facebook, their lives would be so put together. Flawless, even. But is that the case? No. Not even a little bit. So, don’t get worked up thinking it is only you dealing with the lions in the den because your life doesn’t appear as perfect as that your university friend on Facebook, Snapchat or Instagram.
Most times, the problem isn’t that life is unfair. It is often our broken idea of fairness that is the problem. Our idea of fairness isn’t actually obtainable. It’s really just a cloak for wishful thinking. The reality is that everyman goes through issues and situation that some of us will never fathom. Whether it meets our definition of life being fair is a different subject. Of all the things that can be stolen from you – your possessions, your youth, your health, your words, your rights – what no one can ever take from you is your freedom to choose what you will believe in, and it is pertinent to believe rightly. Everyman in life gets his own fair share of pains.
(Culled From My Book ‘The Path Less Travelled’. To read the book review or purchase on Amazon, follow this link: https://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_sb_noss?url=search-alias%3Dstripbooks&field-keywords=samuel+okonkwo).
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