A paradigm shift is constant

Sometimes a man cannot live up to the best idea he dared to have―Javier Merizalde

One of the weaknesses of human nature is the desire for things to improve or to achieve a particular result without putting in the work required to attain the results. We often want good things in life: We want progress, we want peace, we want good health, we want good relationships, lucrative businesses, thriving careers, fat investment accounts, a good reputation and so on; but we often either sit around and expect these things to materialise on their own or we entertain and tolerate and foster the very actions that lead to results opposite to our desires.

There are a lot of occasions in social, professional and personal situations where people feel entitled to things, acknowledgements, positions and benefits that they have not actually earned, do not deserve, do not have a full right to (if any) or have not invested in in any way. Sometimes, we delude ourselves that our wants and desires are actually our entitlements and allocated attainments.

People who pride themselves in their “complexity” and deride others for being “simplistic” should realise that the truth is often not very complicated. What gets complex is evading the truth. This is according to Thomas Sowell.

There are many occasions where progress is not made because “we have always done it this way”; there are a lot of ideologies and traditions that we stick to that do not add much value to the bottom line and usually cannot be comprehensively articulated by the people sticking to them, except for comfort of sticking to familiar washed-out traditions or an overblown or deluded sense of control.

A good example is how we expect bereaved families to feed the whole village on top of grieving and catering for general funeral costs. When a relation dies, the household and compound will be filled up and sometimes with others that only come out of some undefined obligation like escorting someone who knows someone who is related to someone who knows someone at the funeral.

And everyone will expect to be fed by the bereaved family; posing an unnecessary burden.

We should constantly question what certain ‘traditions’ and ‘habits’ are actually achieving in our lives. Many times, we complicate things unnecessarily and hinder progress.

The greatest discovery of all time is that a person can change his future by merely changing his attitude -Oprah Winfrey.

Most problems seem unfixable, most goals unattainable, most crises unsalvageable because of the attitude towards them. A simple change in attitude makes a big difference, a full paradigm shift.

We always call for improved health care, a robust education system, a vibrant social welfare, food security, progressive local development, national economic independence and national synergy; but if we look at how we run our day-to-day activities from personal to national level; we find that we are not really speaking into these priorities.

I often lament about our behaviour on the roads of Malawi, for instance; half the time one deals with selfish and reckless drivers who only care about moving their car irrespective of other road users and set regulations.

We also have equally selfish and reckless pedestrians who jump onto the road at any random interval, distract or delay other road users unnecessarily.

And we have all heard the story of the home owner who demarcates their plot to release all its rubbish and waste material to the surrounding neighbours instead of talking full responsibility to manage the waste and be sensitive towards those that surround him.

My question is: if we cannot make the effort in small things, how do we expect to make effort in bigger things and how do we expect to grow our communities or nurture our young to be leaders?

We need to shift our attitudes to a point where we take direct responsibility for the developments that fall our way, for the goals we want to attain, for the people we want to be and for the society and nation we want to build.

I rest my case