WHO AM I

The greatest question young men have had to answer is that of “Who Am I.” Tough question. A question of purpose, life’s mission, a question of values and principles, of fulfillment and commitment. I know most men come to this crossroad and probably all. Young rising men becoming self-aware in a competitive world, a ruthless world.

Of course some parents do better to inspire ambition and confidence in the ability to pursue dreams and not without inculcating the vital element of humility and sometimes a child is with good responsive spirit, learns and evokes awe. And it’s beautiful. A proper mix of humility, human sensitivity, discipline, diligence and commitment to core values and to family.

At times however, and with due regard to internal personal turmoil, children harbor or acquire hubris, reckless spirit, defensive and closed mindedness. Every now and then, this rigidity represents a steadfast resolve to pursue a certain path and eventually leads to splendid results. More often than not, it is a frantic attempt at self-definition, a mindless spree to self-express but with potential catastrophic repercussions.

Good Parenting and ingenuous personalities aside, the normal young man walking out of the embers of adolescence has some fundamental questions to answer and some numerous myths to break. He has abundant teachings from various sages he has met in his brief existence. Lessons that the advancing life has rendered irrelevant. He is gaining admission into the over-eighteen materials and his childhood teachings do not necessarily agree with these.

Here then comes the question: Who Am I? And I have not exhaustively explored the number of questions a young man has to come to. In his position, the black and white he enjoyed in childhood disappears into a massive grey and a clandestine curiosity to get a glimpse of the prohibited goes rogue. He goes by the curiosity and he gets severe whipping by his fragile conscience. He makes resolutions which he breaks from time to time and this is his process of orientation, in that direction or otherwise.

Such questions as sex and sexuality, in the premise of waiting till marriage vis-à-vis not. The associated mental debate and the psychological beating involved if the decision is to go for early sex, such an excruciating psychological beating, guilt and self-rejection. Of course there are exotic hyenas who will never wink afterwards and for them this is like crossing a puddle. And for the normal young man this again follows a path of orientation where repeat could lead to acclimatization, addiction, recklessness or astute sensibility and modesty, faithfulness to a partner and abstinence - good resolve to carry this through with many amazing experiences following.

In this is also the question of acceptance, do the ladies approve of my looks and my finances. Does my personality buy me audience and the self-criticisms involved? Acquisition or loss of confidence, and by extension the respect of colleagues and intellectual standing among peers. Ability to compete for attention, comparative look and emotional intelligence to demote the factors that don’t quite matter as price of outfit, body size without loss of esteem and promote, at least by understanding, the values that matter as education, intellectual prowess and the faith that this can be developed, and commitment to first be a human with a kind heart.

Passion is Great! But does this prophesy doom for those yet to figure? This is mind boggling, especially if the Joint Admissions Board randomly assigned you a course or your parents prescribed a career. The future becomes hard to imagine. Every fresh advice makes more sense than the previous one and you wonder why the other people have so figured it out. It’s actually sweet to meet a fellow lost soul whose situation resonates with your predicament. Its honestly sweet, ooh the joys of life.

In this rumination which goes on for years in college as you take your course, one will lose morale and settle, enjoy the company of the class and flow like a river with colleagues enjoying abundance of the campus till he is forcefully ejected into society into a life of hustling. This entry into society with dismal performance is in itself the beginning of a story whose ending is not predetermined by the University training, but he is also not predisposed for success, at least not in the corporate setting but luck always has its ways. Many of this allegory fail.

Other young men, seek courage and seek to discover. And life rewards those who knock doors and many of these meet opportunities that rebuff them, that amaze them and like a bouncing ball find their path down the hill, a great Path, and many live on to leave inspiring trails that others can follow and define themselves. I have to say however that in seeking; time, effort, sweat and blood is expended. The journey is gruelling and wrought with painful sacrifices, embarrassments and criticisms.

Theodore Roosevelt put it this way: “It is not the critic who counts; not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles, or where the doer of deeds could have done them better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood; who strives valiantly; who errs, who comes short again and again, because there is no effort without error and shortcoming; but who does actually strive to do the deeds; who knows great enthusiasms, the great devotions; who spends himself in a worthy cause; who at the best knows in the end the triumph of high achievement, and who at the worst, if he fails, at least fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who neither know victory nor defeat.”

These young men are open minded, they are bold and daring and if shy do not let their timidity to get in their way. They take up uncommon roles of sales people, conference facilitators, dishwashers, shop and supermarket attendants, volunteers, stewards, club and project leaders. This initiative puts them in a position to learn the corporate meshwork, the business insights, the attitudes, the art of public relations, interpersonal and organizational politics, the resilience in adversity, they build the networks and earn themselves some sort of corporate or entrepreneurial godfathers and ultimately taste the blood of self-sufficiency and awaken to the truth of personal capacity and potential.

A student who has gotten this glimpse in their early years in the campus is the person Robert Schuller calls the One thousand man in his book “Tough Times Never Last but tough People Do”, He is the young man in Earl Nightingales story running to meet the business manager at a train station because in his research he heard this manager to Interview him arrives at a certain time, and in his enthusiasm he forgets to asks how much the job pays. This young man is well on his way to knowing himself having grasped the fundamentals of self-awareness.

The Greek oracle resounds through generations with the maxim; “Know Thyself” which Socrates further expounds as; ‘the unexamined life is not worth living’. Indeed, the process of knowing self is a lifetime engagement and the better refined the better fulfilled and the closer one becomes to self-actualization. But for the young man it is a difficult one. One in which the solidification of beliefs and discovery of the great ‘self’ hidden behind fear takes place. A great many questions including those bounding on religion, alcohol, karma, concept of God, superstition bombard the young man until by process of internal debate and negotiation the man comes to an agreement with self and builds his true north, the compass and yardstick for measuring all matters life. How great a man in the human society then is how well refined the true north and the yardstick is. 

Special thanks to Peter Ndirangu and Carol Muturi