–but what do we call that other voice that whispers, ‘Think…’

THE other voices we hear at times are the things you may have heard before, sometimes years before, from an adult, while your thoughts were elsewhere, but a seed was planted when you did not want to listen.
One of the old-school timetable practices that helped my generation to decipher the art of the choice was that Wednesday afternoon session they called, ‘Reading’, when we would read from a school library book of the teacher’s choice. ‘We’, meant one student reading a paragraph or two, then another student would follow with the next two paragraphs. Perhaps it was Ulysses telling the Cyclops (who were mythical giants), that his name was ‘Nobody’. So when he made his cunning but brutal escape from Polyphemos, the man-eating Cyclops, and the other giants came to help their screaming fellow, and he told them that ‘Nobody’ had hurt him, they walked away, presuming that he was mad.

Such fables did help to create an understanding of good and bad, and that sometimes in dealing with the bad, you, too, may have to be bad, because, in life, we will meet friends who will propose initiation rites or group habits into acceptance that may not be beneficial. I can point to a real example. I onced worked at Rice Marketing Board for some years. There was a habit every Friday to proceed into Kingston at a shop Frankie’s lady owned and drink beers. I made enemies with my fellow workmates, because I opted out of that Friday rendezvous. So, there was a price to pay. I became a focus for aggression, not physical, but sarcasm and name-calling. Suddenly, I was a miser and a Jew. Fact is, I had some furniture at ‘Bow Foot’s joinery shop on Princess Street, and I was eager to pay them off, and make my ‘crib’ look good for my then lady friend when she visited. It happened that she stayed, till now. Therefore, some choices make you dislikeable, so ‘join de style’ will guide one way ‘fuh de moment’, but ‘thinking’ is the inner voice of the future.

Sometimes fate drops you in a spot, a choice between the humbleness of a relentless struggle, while change beckons with easy prosperity, at the cost of your soul. Your mindset may be defined by the principles you’ve believed in from late childhood into your teens. ‘Change ‘ will urge you on, “Who cares, bro, mek ah change; yuh ent getting younger, yuh might never get another chance like this. Plus, once yuh get through, yuh ent got fuh reason with no one.”

CHANGE IS INEVITABLE

Change is inevitable, but change must collaborate with the process we call, Thinking it out. ‘Thinking’ reminds you, “Yuh got fuh reason with yuhself. Every quiet moment, yuh gon ask yuhself is wuh ah do? Next yuh got fu tek thing fuh sleep, ‘cause quick change gone; only you leff”. Some proverbs seh “duh body born widout soul”; it ent mean everybody born suh. Think; remind yuhself that the ancients said, “Man, know thyself” first.

Life has a way of teaching you the truth. How that manifests depends on how you go about it. Do not make bad choices willingly; explore the commitments and obligations you will have to stand by. Whether ‘change’ is pursued legally or illegally, there are separate rules; all require sacrifice, not controlled by Salawala and spirits, but by you on your life and those loved ones who depend on you. Indeed, some sacrifices will be greater than others. Take, for example, in the arts, there is a saying that while you pursue your dream, ‘keep the day job’ – unless you can entwine your skill successfully and retain and insert protection of rights into the day job. Some things take time because there is so much you need to know to protect your sanity in your quest for fulfillment. ‘Change’ is inevitable, but ‘Thinking’ and not the excitement of euphoria is the greatest companion of ‘Change’ if you can get these two faculties of your nature to work together.

In closing, this article was composed for some anxious friends, trying to make sense of the world within and without that we now live in and its real options. I’ll close with Aesop the Ethiopian, who related the story of the wily Leopard who wanted to eat the three bulls, but what prevented him was their bond of friendship that kept them together, so he began to spread rumours among them until he had created so much jealously and distrust among the bulls, that they moved away from each other, and with their broken bond. The Jaguar slew and devoured them all, one by one.