If you want to make God laugh, tell him your plans. ~Woody Allen
I didn’t know how to start this piece, so I thought of a humorous intro and came up with this quote. I laughed hard before hammering my keyboard.
I needed it, and I hope you laugh too before reading this.
We live in a productivity-obsessed society where success metrics are usually the number of tasks crossed off our to-do lists, the credit alerts we receive, and ultimately, how quickly we climb the social ladder.
How many of us pause to truly chill, refresh, and return wiser and more productive?
Instead, everything revolves around getting things done.
Speed is the prevailing cultural currency, so we rush through our days, sacrificing the present on the altar of a future that may never arrive.
Like you, I mull over the life we live, the legacy we want to leave behind and the fact that nothing is infinitely under our control.
Last month, after a tumultuous period of doomscrolling, I reflected and began making plans to grind through the final quarter of the year.
I planned a meeting to set a deadline for our project.
“A deadline will create urgency, reduce distractions, force me to become more resourceful, and ultimately build the much-needed momentum,” I wrote.
But somehow, nature always finds a way to stop us in our tracks.
Man proposes, as they say…you know the rest.
Life took an unexpected turn shortly after that story.
First, my niece went missing…just like that..on October 1, 2026.
Another family member’s diagnosis stirred anxiety.
And then I fell ill myself.
It was one hell of a traumatic period during which I questioned everything about life.
I was taking analgesics twice daily to calm the fever.
I drank warm fluids countless times to keep myself hydrated.
Yet the irritating symptoms persisted.
Occasionally, while lying on my “sick couch,” as I comically called it, I would plug in my earbuds and listen to Peter Tosh.
As he reeled off the ailments marijuana could cure, I would smile..only for the thought of my missing niece to interrupt the joy.
I would turn on Prime to watch Terminal List, and just as the suspense began to build, her picture would flash through my mind and cut short the excitement.
Where is she?
What is she going through?
How did a 19-year-old, 400-level student offend the world?
One week became two, and now it has been over a month.
How? Why??
I questioned God.
I blamed Nigeria.
I cursed humanity.
I beat myself up for being so helpless.
Back in my CIC days, we would stiffen our bodies to absorb lashes on the backside. It is defiance… we let the flogger know we feel zero pain… it may come later, but in that moment we feel nothing.
After a very close friend’s sudden death in 2014, I cried my eyes out and finally accepted the finitude of life.
So I thought I had learned to handle both physical and emotional pain.
But I just couldn’t deal with this one.
If she was abducted, why haven’t her kidnappers made contact?
Why haven’t we received a ransom demand?
And why have all tracing efforts hit a brick wall?
Bizarre!
For hours, I would sink into despondency, damn the rest of the world and slip under my duvet.
I decided to take a break..apart from occasional forays into X, I did take a good long break. Stayed off social media and even stopped marketing on WhatsApp.
Eventually, I pulled myself together.
Our only option is to make lemonade when we get lemons.
Oh yes, life cannot stop. It has never stopped. It must go on.
And much of our life over here is work, productivity.
You gotta pay the endless bills.
Then I pause again and wonder. Do we really have to?
I mean, if you don’t accumulate these bills, surely you won’t have to pay them.
But how on earth can anyone live without bills?
Besides the free air we breathe, every other life essential has a price..food, water, shelter, clothes, etc.
Wait, then how do loafers survive?
They do not earn, so they can’t pay for anything.
Okay, I get it, they sleep on sidewalks and beg for food and water.
They practically depend on others to survive.
Is that what I want for myself?
Do I want to live at the mercy of others?
Even if I could, who would take responsibility for my children?
There are too many uncertainties woven into that path.
And I loathe uncertainty.
Yet, there seems to be an intentional pushback gaining traction among our disruptive Gen Z: the art of contracting your space and living slowly.
And no, it is neither haughtiness, laziness, nor deliberate stagnation.
I believe it is a conscious decision to slow down, prioritise depth over breadth, and align one’s life with a sustainable rhythm in a manageable space.
You know, like being into stuff such as yoga, gardening or birdwatching. Better still, joining a volunteer group and serving humanity just for the freaking satisfying fun of it.
At its heart, the disposition is the philosophy that life shouldn’t be a sprint toward a finish line where the winner is the person who dies with the most completed tasks.
Instead, life should be a finite canvas, to be painted with passionate strokes savoured by those who genuinely appreciate you.
Of course, this outlook comes with knotty challenges like social and financial pressure. Still, its profound mental, physical, and creative benefits make a compelling case for embracing it..or at the very least, finding a delicate balance between productivity and chilling.
Because the reality is you only live once and very few people truly care about you.
Well, I think I’ve tried with this stream of consciousness.
As we continue searching and praying, the good thing for me is that November kicked off with some good news.
A friend who had lived in Europe for over two decades finally got his residency and visited Nigeria.
Another in North America became a Canadian citizen.
I started teaching English in a classroom.
And I am recuperating well.
So today, I am taking a break.
It’s a good way to appreciate God’s mighty mercies.
Yes, I’ve prayed, read nice stories, eaten well, rested and written this story.
Next up is the gym — for the first time in about a month — to slowly begin working back to fitness.
Then tomorrow, I will amuse God by presenting my plans again.
Yep! Because whether we like it or not, life goes on and it’s only for the living.
Thanks for reading. Please share and hit the follow button.
If you wish to emigrate, collaborate or join our community of digital creatives at cmonionline.com, email admin@cmonionline.com
