DAY1: Learn to Pay Attention to Life Itself and Value Small Successes — additional

by Ng’winula ‘Unu’ Kingamkono, Dar es Salaam, Tanzania, Februari 2017

To Goodluck: Open Letter to my LEARNING BROTHER

(In ddition to the 1st of 100 DAYS OF LEARNING at Thinkers Tech)

Dear Goodluck,

How have you been? Are you well? How is life treating you in college? Already breaking hearts? I hope happiness comes your way and that you enjoy this brief yet wonderful moment called life.

Having being brought up from a background of multi disciplines, you and I, have learned at an early age that it is possible to learn multiple things simultaneously whether you’re conscious of it or not.

Having being brought up by our grandmother (mostly), who retired as a teacher, it was obvious for us that learning needs no classrooms to happen.

Today, I would like to share with a you not a lesson rather a walk down unknown journey of unconscious studies.

A common Swahili idiom states “maisha ni safari” which translates to life is a journey and who else to quote other than J. R. R. Tolkien the author of a famous story depicting one of the best journeys ever taken by a hobbit. Tolkien said “It’s the job that’s never started that takes the longest to finish”.

Part of my journey took me to Samaki Samaki where I had my first job, young and ambitious and like most people, unconscious. One day my former boss shared a book titled “The Power of Now” by Eckhart Tolle and he claimed it changed his life, I found it hard to believe. I read the book anyway.

Read the letter and spoke about you (Goodluck) on the first day of 100 Days of Learning and showed the book that changed me (sorta).

The book has one particular intriguing line “It is not uncommon for people to spend their whole life waiting to start living.” and some other things that insisted on paying attention to things that happen to you right now.

To put it in perspective — why worry about the past if we can not change things that have happened since they’ve already happened and why worry about the future when we can not change things that have not yet happened. The most important time is NOW when things are happening.

On that note, today I would pose questions that I have no answers to and maybe someone does or in hopes maybe someone will do. I can not help but wonder how much knowledge do we need to be happy?

What happens to us when we learn things unconsciously by watching TV, observing our friends, foes and those we love and from commercials, tweets, speeches and the like? How much of that knowledge is designed to corrupt our very will of existence as humans? How much of that knowledge controls our decisions? Are they our decisions anyway?

WHAT IF WE START PAYING ATTENTION TO THINGS WE LEARN?

To you dear one, my purpose here is not to fill your head with a multitude of unanswered questions but I aim to share one of the best journeys I took. Before I do so I will read, of course you know my singing is terrible, a verse from a song that Hobbits sing before undertaking a journey and it goes

“The Road goes ever on and on
Down from the door where it began.

Now far ahead the Road has gone,
And I must follow, if I can,

Pursuing it with eager feet,
Until it joins some larger way

Where many paths and errands meet.
And whither then? I cannot say.”

End of the verse. Today what I hope to achieve is but one thing. That is, YOU start paying attention to life and most importantly to things you learn. I pledge thereof to “bully myself into paying attention even to slightest details in lessons to come”.

For I am my brothers’ keeper I therefore am your friend for life,

Unu.

PS: Keep making great music and dance all the way. Attached is a copy of The Power of Now by Eckhart Tolle.

DISCLAIMER: Be careful the book contains knowledge that might change your life.

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About 100 Days of Learning

Age of Wonderland 2017 presents 100 DAYS OF LEARNING, a global learning event to exchange valuable life experiences with peers. Doers and thinkers from around the world — innovators, scientists, engineers, artists, designers, social entrepreneurs — are invited to share their personal stories, ideas, and practice, not to be found in textbooks. Aim is to rediscover knowledge, challenge beliefs, and exchange life lessons with others. To make the world a better place, we need to embrace change on an individual level, and inspire others to do the same.