on THE BEETLE STORY
How to keep going when everything around you is screaming stop!
What do you do when everything comes rumbling down?
Here I am sitting here, on this bench as the wind blows by, just like the howling wind there are so many thoughts in my head screaming for attention.
I ignore them all, focus was needed if I was going to achieve worthwhile today.
It’s twilight and the last rays of sunlight just vanished at the end of the horizon. Quiet and peaceful that is what defines this atmosphere. Bunmi just went to check if her friend was around.
I ponder on different things as my mind wonders over events that are coming up; My trip to Abuja, the idea pitch I have coming up in April and most persistent of all my switch in careers from Digital Marketing on it’s own to strictly writing. I try to write out actionable steps to help me get through successfully but as I focus more, my eye catches something…
Black and glossy looking just at the edge of the pillar in front of me, “What’s that I wonder?” on closer inspection it’s a dung beetle climbing up the pillar. For no reason in particular asides evolutionary predator instinct I raise my hand to swat it and kill it but stop myself at the last moment.
Instead I knock it off softly to the ground, I’m curious and this question pops up in my head “ Will it climb up or give up?” or “ Will it accept defeat and stay low on the ground?”. I stop what I’m doing to focus on it totally. It falls on it’s back and squirms for some seconds before it approaches the pillar and starts climbing up again. Like clockwork I get ready to hit it down again, but this time I let it climb a little higher than last time, let’s give it false hope, then bam! I hit it down again.
The beetle must have been startled, intimidated or both because this time it ran to a corner and buried it’s head there, not doing anything, not even moving an inch.
Failure!
I conclude and turn back to what I was doing, how I was going to succeed in writing.
About five minutes into doing exactly this, I notice something. Our dear friend beetle was up again, climbing. This time I do nothing, I let it go and watch as it climbs to the top of the pillar. It reaches it’s goal takes a bend and I do not see it again.
If you’ve read up to this point, Congratulations!!!!
I have news for you, below is the true story.
The Story behind that story…
…After watching the beetle and all that happened I sat back down and decided to write about this.
This particular story is beyond the beetle,
It’s not just about the beetle.
It’s about me and about you and everyone else out there in the world who has something they want to do or accomplish. It’s good to have lofty ideas and plans and actionable steps but just as that is absolutely necessary, it is perfectly natural to have oppositions arise in the course of getting to our desired destination.
At every point in time when we’re faced with oppositions we are faced with two choices:
“Should I stay or just give up?”
“Should I continue?”
“Is this even worth it at all?”
Life as usual hits us down to ask us one question “Do you really want this?” and when you answer “Yes”
It hits you down again and asks “How badly?”
At times like that it can get so bad that it looks like all we’ve done has come crashing down and all our efforts and actions were meaningless.
But…
…the question remains there “Will you climb up again?”
I’ll tell you what you’ve probably heard before but it is so important I have to make sure you hear it again:
CLIMB UP!!!
Start again. Find a way, if there isn’t, make one!
Because as crazy as it sounds YOU CAN DO IT, everything you need to get ahead you have
YOU CAN DO IT, YOU CAN!!!
I’m switching careers directly and even I think this is crazy but it feels right.
So I’ll keep going.
So don’t you stop…
..In all remember this one thing…
As long as you want to accomplish anything worthwhile, Life is going to ask you this one question
“ How badly do you want it?”
And the secret to answering is knowing not to answer in just words but with ACTION.
Ta Asteria…
