Internal Jihad Screaming in a Sea of Silence
Every other dawn before the birds take to their singing, I sit at my desk thinking of the myriad ways a story can be told or a life lived to appease a foe’s aggro or appeal to the sentiments of readers and spectators waiting to be intrigued; people asking to be enthralled in a web, a weaving that transforms the acts and flaws of a character into the magic created from a marriage of the mind, the ink, and a blank sheet of paper; the most perfect threesome ever since man opened his eyes to see the breaking of dawn and the falling of dusk, the two constants that determine his days, ways, and the canvas on which he paints his masterpieces.
The choices we make, the parts we play, and the path we take in life—these are our meaning, our triumphs and retributions, and the stories that fulfill our days. I have always thought it is befitting for everyone to look before a leap and for every judge of character to consider the origins before he or she admonishes or condemns another man for his chosen life and path. No one has the prerogative to project on others, even as a tool of oppression, the fears and guilt stemming from their personal failures emboldened by feelings and yearnings that lie dormant within them, which they’re too cowardly to express. We live in a world where people easily hurl accusations at the audacious ones who have the courage to venture into areas others only dream of because they constantly look up to the world for approval on how to act and what to say, even when their actions have oppressed no one. They seek validation from a world that thrives on fabricated cultural paradoxes and wonder why their lives remain marred by existential upheavals.
Life fashioned and forced into conformity with prevailing indoctrinations will lead to only one end: the shame we hide that torments the life we have. Which will gradually morph into the burden we carry and drag with us everywhere we go, to the wounding of our innocence and humanity, begging to be set free. There is a luxuriantly sprawling, ineffable desire within to let loose and defy the confines of culture and tradition that have fettered so many to the apron strings of a society that dictates beliefs, proclivities, and aspirations as inherited from our respective lineages, branded on our consciences as with a hot iron, the guilt of an original sin that has become inseparable from us, inhibiting our freedom of expression and association.
We turn our backs in defeat towards reality and move into our respective mental monastic cells for a lifetime of self-mortification and unfounded penitence, often mistaken for the admission of a guilt we truly know nothing of but willingly accept because we riddle our hearts with an inherited premonition of guiltiness for what we forget to do and the things we leave undone, besides the burden we already saddled on our shoulders and the erroneous judgment we mete out unto others because we cannot stand the shame of watching them live rightly, our shattered dreams. We cloak these animosities as constructive criticisms just to appear diplomatic and without blemish.
I may decide to write about my Canadian experiences, which are in marked contrast to what my life was like in Nigeria. I may stress the physics of all that entices me and tickles my heart, for the acceptance and appreciation of anyone who cares to read a fantasy or a ballad written solely for the invocation of an audience’s attention. But what about the faceless stories of the internal jihad that take form in the emptiness of our inner space, populating it with dreams, proclivities, and discrete indulgences jousting in the shadows for freedom and the audacity to come alive?
