Know your value

That is not the first step, though. Yes, knowing your value is important but it is not the most important aspect of the set-up. Growing your value is. Spare no cost and no time to develop yourself.

Before knowing your value, spend time nurturing it. That way, there is something to know. Something worth knowing, something worth showcasing. Thereafter, spend time knowing both your value and place per person, per situation and per time.

Failure to achieve that trajectory is responsible for people leading their lives on batteries which are only 40% charged. Yes, people who do not work to grow their value have nothing to know as own value and therefore can never know their place in others’ lives. They are almost always poorly treated by others who see them as people with no other choice. You do not have to look too far away from where you are to find perfect examples, especially if you are close to Nigerian politicians.

Most of those men and women and youth are slave drivers, evil masters. They use and dump those who make themselves usable and dumpable. Unfortunately, double unfortunately, these usable and dumpable guys are always available, only good at smiling in front and grumbling behind. Just how on earth do people succeed in living like that?

E no gud, e no gud, e dey help. They use that Pidgin cliché all too often to colour or excuse their idiocy. Because they think there is no other way out, they allow another human being to treat them as second-class. People like that spend their days in sorrow, pure sorrow.

They all are fools, forever. But, just. They can walk free today, and become a better person who shall be treated better by even the best. Be warned: ignoring this means forever remaining the fools they are thought to be.

First, deliberately work to add verifiable value to self. Upgrade mindset, belief system, and therefore mind power. Read more, learn more, qualify more. Balance alone time and good people time and see how that accentuates social capital as well as mien.

You gradually become a more smiling or a happier person, likable or outright more attractive. Instantly, you find yourself bolder, less bothered about nonentities and nonsense and, surprisingly, more in haste to walk away from people who treat you badly. That is the day you start living the life God gave you. That also is the day you start making God happy and proud!

But, there again, most people cannot clearly distinguish when they are being used. I cannot believe that, but I can readily share a dozen contextual examples so by their fruits you can henceforth spot out the scoundrels. If you walk or work with a person who chooses when they need your help as about the only time they answer or talk to you: beware. Fortunately, these satanic users are the people most betrayed in the nick of time -as Nigerians shall again see in 2027.

If the person is fond of flaunting how godly they are, fond of double talk, fond of listening to and acting on gossips, fond of publishing their so-called generosity, as well as fond of rewarding mediocrity: beware. That brings it so far to half a dozen examples: do you see them? Next is a subset: if the person never forgets to display admiration for evil but remembers to hide his disdain for goodness, never forgets mistakes but never remembers a foot put right, never forgets to condemn but never remembers to praise; beware. And, if the person is a chronic egoist, a chronic pretender and a chronic trickster: beware!

Know your value, and accord that value some respect. You cannot be an academic but carry on like an undergrad. A lion cannot and should never plead to be a goat. Beyond name which helps for recognition, it is value that defines a person above every reasonable doubt.

So, learn to honour yourself by walking away from users who disrespect and dishonour you. Stop leading them on or tolerating them but using your alone moments to grumble how they dehumanise you. Ad hoc depression is a function more of how you allowed them treat you than of the treatment itself. Ruminate on that, even if you cannot.

Reaction is more powerful than action. Sick people die not because of the disease, they die because of their reaction to it. That is why people survive acute forms of a disease but others die of something far milder. Reaction might be secondary but it is more potent than action.

Even if action killed, it is reaction that has the final say on the matter. It still goes right back to value. Value is king. Value, even in the face of the most provocative action, never reacts emptily or angrily.

When you know your value, nobody can humiliate or use you let alone force or trick you to react like a valueless person would. A valueful person has an abundance of personal restraint which is the uncanny ability to hardly respond to pitfalls or traps. They draw from that vault, from that well, every time value needs to speak back or do back. Most importantly, value is not timid; it never ever recoils to lick public wounds in private.

Let us next discuss situations or times that could challenge value. Of course, in a country as messed up by politics and politicians as Nigeria, the first matter that arises at this juncture is how the game throws up a thousand and one relationship landmines, nationwide. In spite of and despite the monumental crass ingratitude, hypocrisy and allied versions of ungodliness that bestride the polity, value never copies nor avenges. This report is the same even in religious, even in educational, even in family or any situation.

So, I say to you: no matter what they bring or throw, no matter how they treat you, no matter how they blackmail or make to humiliate you, react valuefully. Per situation, and per time. No matter what they do or say to draw you out, no matter how desperate they get to force you into the ring, no matter how sweet they sound to coax you to descend into the village arena, remember you are a person of immense value. And, value is too brilliant to react like a fool, the way the enemy wants.

Do not be like Nedu Wazobia who got to learn -too, too, too late- that all those assurers and laughers and smilers with whom he bantered and dined and wined and slept and woke up, all his celebrity life had all along been wolves in sheep clothing. He is blessed to have survived. Too many do not live to tell the story. Thankfully, value never dies; an eagle always flies high and above all the bitter competition again.

An eagle cannot and should not be caught arguing with a cock, because -I mean- what areas of interest and competition exist? Never forget that line. Value is right up there, too above to care about crumbs or such other ground pickings. Knowing your value affords you the wisdom to know with whom and when and how you roll.

God bless Nigeria!