Life’s A Scratch Card.

It’s been almost a month since I turned 50. The eager calmness and reassurance I felt persists. But the wasiwasi (concern) of when the show begins is creeping up on me. I’m still keen to maximise this decade and I know I shall. But I’ve been getting some different signals with a common theme of chilling instead of making moves.

I’m now reading another halftime book by Lloyd Reeb – From Success to Significance. He likens the first half journey to swimming upstream. The picture I have in mind is of those bears in the US wilderness during the salmon migration just before winter. They position themselves on rocks where the water is flowing downstream. The instinct of the fish is to swim up in search of a good location to lay their eggs where the water is slow or still. And for the bears they need to eat as much fish as possible to bulk up and hopefully survive winter. It’s always a spectacle to watch as the fish jump out of the water and some unluckily end up in the waiting bears’ mouths. Many don’t make it to the spawning grounds.

That’s how life is in the first half. We take huge risks hoping for huge returns in the process. We lose some and win some. That’s allowed when we are younger and more driven to acquire. What we do and learn during that period determines to a huge extent how our second half plays out. There were several instances I can think of when I was the fish jumping out of the water trying to get upstream to a deal. Thankfully I missed some bears’ jaws of failure and being conned as I pursued business success.

Today some of those decisions have helped me settle in one way or another especially as far as investments are concerned. My dad would often reassure me when I came venting to him about how times are tough. He would remind me that at least I have something I can sell and sort my issue. Some of my peers don’t have either the asset or the cash and time is also well spent for them. Now that’s a dire situation. A poor ageing man is an image from a horror movie in my view. So to all those peers who swam upstream despite the risks, kudos you avoided the bear’s jaws and made it this far. Now that we have reached the spawning grounds may we be clear what eggs of success we will lay (or fertilize) that will outlive us.

I liked how my mentor Mzee told me that maybe in our 50s we should engage more in stuff that comes to us and we should swim upstream less. I found that comforting. Since I believe in God-incidences (coincidences that are orchestrated by Sir God), I had a call with a pleasant Nigerian lady living in Texas and she confirmed it. We explored how we can spread halftime in Africa. She ended our call with a prayer. She prayed for ease. That the things we wish for will come to us with relative ease. I even opened my eyes to hear her better hehe. It was like a prophecy.

Was it a message from Sir God that I should strive less and shine more on the fifth floor? Could it be that many of us in this age have earned our stripes but we are still forcing more stripes? Maybe the stripes earned so far are enough to switch places with the bears. At 50 some fish of good opportunities should be jumping straight into our mouths with minimal effort on our part. And that should be because we have earned our position at the prime fishing spot in the river.

Maybe it’s time our stripes worked for us more. Another subtle coincidence was in a group I am in where a lady who just turned 50 shared a song dedicated to all the 50s in the group. The spiritual song by Phil Thompson invites us to come receive the harvest. It’s about redeeming the years and restoration of everything that we have lost along the way. That’s what happens in the year of jubilee (50).  Folks, what the bears may have eaten as you swam upstream will be restored in this season. Beauty for ashes is loading. The song says, there will be a double portion for the shame. Few of us live half a century without some shame picked along the way. Well, it’s time to shed that off now and turn those scars into scars.

The third picture that came to mind was when climbing Mt Kilimanjaro or Mt Kenya last year. There were many steep upclimbs that seemed to last forever. The muscles were refusing but we had to keep moving however slowly. After a long climb, we would then appear on flat ground and what a relief that was. We could regain our energy walking in readiness for the next climbing section. The sweetest part was getting to the summit. Made the grind worth it.

Life isn’t always about climbing. If that was the case it would be one long life of hard labor. There are times when we should enjoy the reward of our hard work. It’s like buying those airtime scratch cards. You buy it, scratch it then enjoy the airtime after loading the many digits on your phone. So we could say life is like a scratch card. You enjoy the airtime after the hard work of buying, scratching and loading it.

Folks at 50 (and 40s too) maybe now we deserve to live, laugh, love for long. I wish you all those Ls in your life. For me I think they were meant for me as even my name starts with an L… hehe…

May we use our airtime calling out a life of joy, impact and balance.