Hate.

So it’s been a while that I’ve actually written a post myself right? Here’s to breaking that rut.

Hate is such a harsh word, I personally choose to use the word dislike where others use hate i.e. “I dislike amala” because if I say hate it, that means I’ll never be open to eating it even if the world’s best Amala chef prepared it for me. Hate has this absoluteness to it, which is why I choose to use it sparingly; unfortunately not everyone shares my philosophy.

Thus, you should understand why I feel taken aback when someone says, “I hate her.” To me, that means if given the possibility to remove that person from your vicinity, whatever the cost, you would do it. That means, if you saw that person dying of thirst and you had a bottle of water in hand, you’d rather pour it on the ground and watch that person die. Yes, it may sound exaggerated, but if someone truly hates another person, grave measures can be taken against them.

Hate is the opposite of love; so as strong as love can be, hate too can encompass such strength. All those headlines of lovers killing their partner for cheating are examples of the power of hate.

Funny thing about hate is that it requires effort; just as you spend time and mental energy thinking of the person you love, you also do the same for those you hate.

“Love your neighbor as yourself”

A word is enough for the wise.

“I just want to be your friend”

So you saw a beautiful girl on your friend’s BBM Contact list and decided you had to talk to her, so you took her BBM Pin without telling your friend. First Offence.

Next, she accepts the add, as any normal girl would, on the off chance that it’s an old friend who now uses a nickname she isn’t familiar with. You start talking to her and refuse to tell her where you got her details from with the good old “I forgot whose phone I got it from” line. Second offence.

Now, you DEMAND for her attention and quick responses all because you’ve dropped the “I just want to be your friend” line. Gross offence.

Because this is such a recurrent situation I feel it is high time this issue is addressed. If you do not know someone you have NO right to his or her time. Any time given to you is out of courtesy and you should utilize it wisely. If you notice the person isn’t interested – TAKE A HINT! Don’t become a burden. This is the social age, it takes very little effort to delete and block someone, believe me.

So before you go off to annoy another fine girl, take time.

L.O.V.E

       A four-letter word that has, and continues to change lives daily. We hear about it in movies, in books, in churches and in our group chats. The funny thing about what we generally know of love is its application to somebody else. “I love my family, I love my boyfriend, I love Queen Bey”… That’s great; it really is, but what about you? Do you love yourself?

Love starts from within. The mistake people make is trying to find love from outside. You try to get that warm, fuzzy feeling that Disney sold to us all in a plethora of Princess stories. Here’s my question to you – how do you expect to love someone else when you have not learnt to love yourself?

By saying, “love yourself,” I don’t mean become self obsessed or narcissistic, I mean appreciate YOU. Get to know YOU. Find out what YOU like, want, or dream about. What are YOUR goals and ambitions? Who do YOU want to become in five years? You can’t go around with a list of qualities you want in your future partner, when you have not even evaluated yourself to see whether you possess them. That is unrealistic.

Love yourself. Discover who you really are, what your strengths and weaknesses are, and your talents and your unique abilities. Be confident in yourself. “Love the Skin you’re in”  (Olay got that marketing scheme right! J)

The journey to self-discovery is a solo one. The best way to begin loving yourself is to be by yourself - to be single. Because frankly, you can’t give what you don’t have. Being single allows you to learn how to love; with your very own self being the first recipient. You have the extra time to meditate, think and really understand yourself. You learn to accept that “flaw” as a unique feature about you. You learn to see yourself as important and impactful on your environment. One thing I’ve learnt is that you have the absolute power to let external things affect you or be affected by you. A ship is surrounded by water but only sinks when it has a hole in it. People can do or say what they like to you, but so long as you keep their negativity blocked out, your ship will continue sailing.

Today’s society makes out being single as being a social pariah, especially for people in the 21 and older age group. Loose-tongued Aunties start dropping overt comments like “When will you marry? You don’t even have a serious boyfriend at your age!” and “When I was your age I had too many men flocking around me” more and more frequently and you find yourself dodging certain people at family gatherings. Even amongst ourselves, social networks have a way of glorifying relationships with the “relationship goal” pictures and quotes, which make it easy to get sucked in and you find yourself wanting a relationship “just because”. However, do not do it.

Embrace the single life and relish it. If a relationship comes, let it be because you have completed your journey of self-evaluation and now understand and love yourself as an individual. Relationships, like many other things in life are “give and take”, and to give love at all, you must have self-love. Love yourself, or nobody will.

Edited by the wonderful, Modupe Ojelabi.

Originally written for Tundun Kezia.

Response to "Situationships"

Hey there! So due to my laptop crashing (twice!) I haven't been able to blog - however I'm trying out this blogging from my phone thing, but I can't post images :(

Anyways, here's a response to my last post, Situationships - enjoy it - I know I did haha!


Written by Iyebiye Olawuyi ❤️
Reasons you should not be in a situationship 
As a person who has been in over a million situationships (you know that’s exaggerated), I can totally say that a situationship is the worst relationship you could get yourself into. Below are the reasons for such an assertion.
It is a total waste of time. When people say they’ll gain experience and other stuff like that from it, they are only deceiving themselves. You don’t have to learn from your own experiences.
It always ends in heartbreak, especially for the girl. This is because when the guy is tired of her, especially as a result of use, he will find it very easy to walk away because he was not in any formal relationship before then.
No situationship anywhere in the world has ever ended in marriage. Take it or leave it.
After everything ends, the partners never remain as friends and if they do, they’ll always have hurts or grudges against each other no matter how small. One of my friends used to be in a situationship with a guy, now it’s over but almost everything the guy ever does just tends to get her upset.
When you are in such an arrangement (a situationship), you look cheap and also desperate.
You will never know where you stand when you are in such an arrangement. You might think he/she sees you as his/her girl/guy but he/she might just  be seeing you as just a friend, just a reading partner (hahahahahaha), a friend with benefits, a side chick/guy or just a spare part. lol 
You limit your vision. You don’t notice other people because you are too busy trying to  make your situationship work that you either fall into the friendszone with people you could have had profiting relationships with or you don’t even notice them at all. When you are in a situationship, you always think your partner is the best you can find anywhere and you are usually under a false believe that if you let him or her go, you will not find a better person.
You hinder your progress. When you are in a situationship, other guys/girls who see you from afar and want to get close to don’t come near because they feel you are in a relationship, whereas you are only on a roller coaster.
If you are in the kind of situationship where you are being asked out by your partner but you don’t want to say “yes” just yet because you are scared that he/she might break your heart if you both dated, but you do everything that people are dating do and you even cross the line and do stuff meant for married people, I want to tell you from experience that you are really gonna get your fingers burnt in the end. I don’t have the time to explain step by step how it works, but I just want you to know that you are heading for a terrible disaster.
NB: I want you to know that guys looooove situationships (though some girls do too). So if you and a guy are running such an arrangement and you are thinking he is gonna date or even marry you, (give me a few seconds, I need to laugh), you might just be all alone in dreamland or what my people call o.y.o. lmaoooooo 

SITUATIONSHIPS.

Yes I know it is not a real word; but with its rate of occurrence I think Oxford Dictionary’s next edition should seriously consider its insertion.

What is it? A “Situationship” is basically an undefined relationship.

“Let’s not spoil what we have with labels” – situationship.

“Let’s just have a good time and see where this goes” – situationship.

“What are we now?” “We are mere pencils in the hands of the Creator” – SITUATIONSHIP.

Sound familiar? This generation has more and more people who are unwilling to commit, who want to remain “baby boys/baby girls” for as long as possible; and so end up in situationships. They are not in a relationship but their emotions are. Don’t deceive yourself.

Even within the church situationships occur. You’re not sure if the person you are seeing is the “One” so rather than putting a label you get into a situationship – if the person is right you can upgrade to a relationship and if not you can pretend nothing happened. Win-win right? Wrong.

The human alchemy of emotions doesn’t work that way. It is okay to get it wrong sometimes; you learn and move on with new experiences that you can share with those coming up after you.

So, if you’re in a situationship today…you know what to do.

Emotions.

Happy… Sad... Angry.

Confused.

What do you feel? How do you feel?

Do you feel?

Of course you feel. Everyone feels. No matter how hardcore and emotionless you may think you are, so long as you belong to the human race, darling, you’ve got emotions. Whether you show them or not, is a whole different case entirely. Some people can be totally broken inside but on the surface appear to be as jovial as Eddie Murphy – it’s one of those mysteries of life I guess.

For anyone who has studied the brain before (yes, a geeky moment is coming up – I am a medical student after all lol) you would know that the brain is an intensely intricate organ. Every single of the billions of synapses in the brain has a purpose – including the limbic system, which is where the emotion center lies. If we did not need emotions why would a whole system of the brain be dedicated to its management?

Don’t be embarrassed to feel. It’s normal. It’s what makes you sane. So what if the way someone chews gum irks you? It doesn’t make you a bad person; if nothing in this life ever aroused a response from your limbic system would you really be living?