This public servant of repute has taken good steps in these 100 days, lagosians have good reasons to trust him

Well done Ambode

2015 and the APC Presidential Primary Election: Before shouting a Buhari-ous Hallelujah
http://sayoaluko..com/2014/12/2015-and-apc-presidential-primary.html


Sayo Aluko

What I saw at the APC Presidential Primary election, which also doubled the third National Convention of the Party, is hope. My convinced sentiments about the predictability of Nigerian politics aside, on that fateful day, I saw hope again.
Doubtless, the APC surely has the machinery to defeat PDP.
Trust me people, if all the good talk by all political actors present were truly heartfelt, then we may just be quite close to finding a cure for the scourge called Nigeria.

Be that as it may, here below are the few insights I drew from the event and its aftermath.

Painfully enough, my informed reservations about General Muhammadu Buhari Rtd. (GMB) are still alive.
"Sai Buhari!”…. and he won, Alhamdulillah.
I do not doubt the fact that Gen. Buhari is a patriot; but my reservations concerning his candidature and emergence as the APC Presidential flag bearer are hinged on two things.


Firstly, by his emergence, I still saw the fulfillment of the ambition of one man, Buhari.
If we want to be really sincere about the notion of change that is being bellowed from all available fronts by the APC, then I believe we'd all agree that a man of Buhari's influence would thrive better as an elder statesman than in the role of an elected president, in the biz of nation building.
Yes, he speaks passionately about his desire to lead Nigeria out of quagmire, but considering the fact that this will be the fourth time he'd be contesting to "become president", it's hard to take it solely as relentlessness, while one hopes that personal ambition doesn't eventually erode his competence quotient.
Well, that the ambition seems personal doesn't necessarily mean it is selfish especially in Buhari's stance, but it’s going to surely take more than just personal ambition to CHANGE this country.
In the eyes of true change, Gen. Buhari, a 1-time Military head of state, a 4-time presidential aspirant, with his undeniable armory of political and patriotic influence, should naturally outgrow the ambitioned jostle of becoming president, and then move into a clearly sacrificial, more grandeur and a "behind-the-scene" role of a PRACTICAL elder statesman, a practical one oh, not the "open-letter" type (Cc: Baba Iyabo) nor the vindictive type. But, a type who will employ his patriotic wit to tackle a boko haram for example or any other national ill whasoever (in his own way), without any ambitious undertone.

Secondly is his age. Abeg, GMB is old, I'm actually tempted to say too old to successfully engage in the absolute rigor involved in the attempt to firstly unseat PDP and then to truly redeem this cataclysmically screwed up Nigeria.
That he was pitted against two largely younger and equally competent candidates makes me heighten my reservation about his emergence.
He may not possess an Umaru kidney nor a Musa Yar'Adua liver, but truth is, a younger and more vibrant candidate would have definitely stood a better chance at fitting up with the rigor than a “Pa Buhari” that I saw at close range firstly at Governor Rauf Aregbesola’s inauguration and then at the convention.

Nigerians, falling my hand since 1805
The social media hurrah that met the announcement of GMB’s emergence was as hurriedly juvenile as it was too overboard, and didn't actually resonate well with the much echoed "change" theme. For God's sake, it's Buhari again, it's the enthronement of our zoning bias again, our cultural sentiments again, it's just an again thing all over again. So, I couldn't understand all the knee-jerk reactions that viralized the Internet over it.
No doubt, in Buhari's APC or APC's Buhari, there are prospects of hope, ehnn, yes, and Change, but most of us Nigerians should learn how to regulate our expectations within the frame of carefulness, always assess the situation thoughtfully, and just stop dancing emotional shoki to some over-fancied Buhari messiah tunes. There's too much to do if Change will be at least set into ignition in Naija, and nothing will be achieved if our smart phones remain smarter than our minds.

Please, don’t tell me this the best modus operandi for conducting party Primaries
I have been present at two different APC primaries in the past week, and I had the same disturbing thought about the strenuous manner by which the elections were conducted.
Yes, the system employed now can be deemed open and seemingly fair, but, my guts just tell me that there must definitely be a saner and fairer substitute to this needlessly long, painfully analog and "Tom Ikimi-reminiscent" way it's been presently conducted.
Even if not entirely digital (which of course will be 10 times better), I believe some set of academics, professionals, and/or our actuarial scientists may be, can be tasked, more like funded, to brew a faster way for enfranchisement. "APC, Change!"...please, let's change this (too).

We must start teaching our children the classy code of order and civility.
I don't just know why Nigerians largely resort to violent ways to state and/or address their displeasure. It's pointblank irksome. The blight of wahala created by the Delta state delegates dented the event, and merely typified the level of native disorganization that is inherent in most Nigerians, especially those involved with politics; another reason why a bunch of the much needed elites just want to stave off it.
Well, for us to really save ourselves from the perennial shame occasioned by this kind of primitive act of retrogression, we need to start engraving the merits of diplomacy and civility on the minds of our children using the tool of knowledge. I've lost hope over adult politicians; they've mastered the art of scaling high gates and throwing poisonous jabs. Pity!

My honest conclusion
All these above summed in one are the bitter truth; now unto some unassailable truth - The APC is the cleaner pig that is seemingly ready for the process of changing into worthy horses. The PDP is just an inedible pig, an absolute no-go. - that is the unassailable truth.
The APC actually had an impressive outing, I salute and commend Dr. Kayode Fayemi and his 27-man convention committee, his composure achieved much.
Now, dear sincere Nigerian, I know a lot of us don't really care anymore whatever the outcomes of these political Yoruba-ngbatis are. It's a very understandable stance considering the many years of disappointment our hearts have suffered. Similarly, I know only a few among us care about one kain Permanent Voters' Card, despite the many sensitization about it, talk less of voting. Yes, things have gone so bad.
But, as I said, I believe I still saw hope in the prospect of change painted by the politics of the APC through the conduct of these primaries; they depicted some fairly tenable levels of progressive development and democratic ethos.
Let us support them.
My Buhari reservation is a refined but belated postmortem, we just have to believe he will survive, stay healthy, stay selfless, stay staunch, stay open, stay resolute, stay off Presidential puff, stay on selfless stuff, hopefully stay on one-term, (Cc: Nelson Mandela) and get motivated to achieve some first steps in our long way back to sanity.
Let us give some chance to this gospel of change.

E go well my people.

Are people not just tired of these usual "CAREER POLITICIANS"?

When will some people just realize that they are as bland and crude as they've always been na?

Koro how? where technocratic professionals like AMBODE and HAMZAT are names also in the race?

Attempting to choose a Koro where one has the choice of an Ambode is like wanting to choose to eat garri without sugar over fried rice, salad and sauteed chicken; - that's some level of insanity

thank you all for the good words and also the sparse critique.

It is well.

Good ambition, wrong platform, wrong affliation, all equals to soiled intention, sullied ambition, no actualization

Sorry Jimi, you just missed it.

Sayo Aluko
PHILOSOPHERS' MAIL

http://sayoaluko..com/2014/07/v-behaviorurldefaultvmlo.html

“Everybody needs love; to get it may come easy, to fall in it mostly comes easier, but to nurture and sustain it for the sake of appreciable growth is hard work, though not rocket science” …………………………………. Sayo Aluko

It used to be when you’d hit certain financial and social milestones; when you had a home to your name, a set of qualifications on the mantelpiece and a few cows and a parcel of land in your possession.

But when, under the influence of Romantic ideology, this grew to seem altogether too mercenary and calculating, the focus shifted to emotions. It came to be thought important to feel the right way. That was the true sign of a good union. And the right feelings included the sense that the other was ‘the one’, that you understood one another perfectly and that you’d both never want to sleep with anyone else again.
These ideas, though touching, have proved to be an almost sure recipe for the eventual dissolution of marriages – and have caused havoc in the emotional lives of millions of otherwise sane and well-meaning couples.
As a corrective to them, what follows is a proposal for a very different set of principles, more Classical in temper, which indicate when two people should properly consider themselves ready for marriage.

We are ready for marriage…

1. When we give up on perfection
We should not only admit in a general way that the person we are marrying is very far from perfect. We should also grasp the specifics of their imperfections: how they will be irritating, difficult, sometimes irrational, and often unable to sympathize or understand us. Vows should be rewritten to include the terse line: ‘I agree to marry this person even though they will, on a regular basis, drive me to distraction.’
However, these flaws should never be interpreted as merely capturing a local problem. No one else would be better. We are as bad. We are a flawed species. Whomever one got together with would be radically imperfect in a host of deeply serious ways. One must conclusively kill the idea that things would be ideal with any other creature in this galaxy. There can only ever be a ‘good enough’ marriage.
For this realization to sink in, it helps to have had a number of relationships before marrying, not in order to have the chance to locate ‘the right person’, but so that one can have ample opportunity to discover at first hand, in many different contexts, the truth that everyone (even the most initially exciting prospect) really is a bit wrong close up.

2. When we despair of being understood
Love starts with the experience of being understood in a deeply supportive and uncommon way. They understand the lonely parts of you; you don’t have to explain why you find a particular joke so funny; you hate the same people; they too want to try out a particular intimate scenario.
This will not continue. Another vow should read: ‘However much the other seems to understand me, there will always be large tracts of my psyche that will remain incomprehensible to them, anyone else and even me.’
We shouldn’t, therefore, blame our lovers for a dereliction of duty in failing to interpret and grasp our internal workings. They were not tragically inept. They simply couldn’t understand who we were and what we needed – which is wholly normal. No one properly understands, and can therefore fully sympathize with, anyone else.

3. When we realize we are crazy
This is deeply counter-intuitive. We seem so normal and mostly so good. It’s the others…
But maturity is founded on an active sense of one’s folly. One is out of control for long periods, one has failed to master one’s past, one projects unhelpfully, one is permanently anxious. One is, to put it mildly, an .
If we are not regularly and very deeply embarrassed about who we are, it can only be because we have a dangerous capacity for selective memory.

4. When we are ready to love rather than be loved
Confusingly, we speak of ‘love’ as one thing, rather than discerning the two very different varieties that lie beneath the single word: being loved and loving. We should marry when we are ready to do the latter and are aware of our unnatural, immature fixation on the former.
We start out knowing only about ‘being loved.’ It comes to seem – very wrongly – like the norm. To the child, it feels as if the parent is simply spontaneously on hand to comfort, guide, entertain, feed, clear up and remain almost always warm and cheerful. Parents don’t reveal how often they have bitten their tongue, fought back the tears and been too tired to take off their clothes after a day of childcare. The relationship is almost entirely non-reciprocal. The parent loves; but they do not expect the favour to be returned in any significant way. The parent does not get upset when the child has not noticed the new hair cut, asked carefully-calibrated questions about how the meeting at work went or suggested that they go upstairs to take a nap. Parent and child may both ‘love’, but each party is on a very different end of the axis, unbeknownst to the child.
This is why in adulthood, when we first say we long for love, what we predominantly mean is that we want to be loved as we were once loved by a parent. We want a recreation in adulthood of what it felt like to be ministered to and indulged. In a secret part of our minds, we picture someone who will understand our needs, bring us what we want, be immensely patient and sympathetic to us, act selflessly and make it all better.
This is – naturally – a disaster. For a marriage to work, we need to move firmly out of the child – and into the parental position. We need to become someone who will be willing to subordinate their own demands and concerns to the needs of another.
There’s a further lesson to be learnt. When a child says to its parent ‘I hate you’, the parent does not automatically go numb with shock or threaten to leave the house and never come back, because the parent knows that the child is not giving the executive summary of a deeply thought-out and patient investigation into the state of the relationship. The cause of these words might be hunger, a lost but crucial piece of Lego, the fact that they went to a cocktail party last night, that they won’t let them play a computer game, or that they have an earache…
Parents become very good at not hearing the explicit words and listening instead to what the child means but doesn’t yet know how to say: ‘I’m lonely, in pain, or frightened’ – distress which then unfairly comes out as an attack on the safest, kindest, most reliable thing in the child’s world: the parent.
We find it exceptionally hard to make this move with our partners: to hear what they truly mean, rather than responding (furiously) to what they are saying.
A third vow should state: ‘Whenever I have the strength in me to do so, I will imitate those who once loved me and take care of my partner as these figures cared for me. The task isn’t an unfair chore or a departure from the true nature of love. It is the only kind of love really worthy of that exalted word.

5. When we are ready for administration
The Romantic person instinctively sees marriage in terms of emotions. But what a couple actually get up to together over a lifetime has much more in common with the workings of a small business. They must draw up work rosters, clean, chauffeur, cook, fix, throw away, mind, hire, fire, reconcile and budget.
None of these activities have any glamour whatsoever within the current arrangement of society. Those obliged to do them are therefore highly likely to resent them and feel that something has gone wrong with their lives for having to involve themselves so closely with them. And yet these tasks are what is truly ‘romantic’ in the sense of ‘conducive and sustaining of love’ and should be interpreted as the bedrock of a successful marriage, and accorded all the honour currently given to other activities in society, like mountain climbing or motor sport.
A central vow should read: ‘I accept the dignity of the ironing board.’

6. When we understand that sex and love do and don’t belong together
The Romantic view expects that love and sex will be aligned. But in truth, they won’t stay so beyond a few months or, at best, one or two years. This is not anyone’s fault. Because marriage has other key concerns (companionship, administration, another generation), sex will suffer. We are ready to get married when we accept a large degree of intimate resignation and the task of sublimation.
The ability to understand how to never objectify each other is key to deciphering the thin-line between the dynamics of having sex and making love. This understanding can be only brewed from depth, nowhere else. The gain here is that, while sex wanes per time and becomes "an issue", making love actually gets virgin per time, quickens sensitivity, it’s “non-libidoic” and seldom becomes an issue.

Both parties must therefore scrupulously avoid making the marriage ‘about sex’. They must also, from the outset, plan for the most challenging issue that will, statistically-speaking, arise for them: that one or the other will have affairs. Someone is properly ready for marriage when they are ready to behave maturely around betraying and being betrayed.
Also at this point, understanding helps to create a mutually-inclusive melting point where personal and religious inferences (not eccentric sentiments) are both respected and inter-played.

The inexperienced, immature view of betrayal goes like this: sex doesn’t have to be part of love. It can be quick and meaningless, just like playing tennis. Two people shouldn’t try to own each other’s bodies. It’s just a bit of fun. So one’s partner shouldn’t mind so much.
But this is willfully to ignore impregnable basics of human nature. No one can be the victim of adultery and not feel that they have been found fundamentally wanting and cut to the core of their being. They will never get over it. It makes no sense, of course, but that isn’t the point. Many things about us make little sense – and yet have to be respected. The adulterer has to be ready to honour and forgive the partner’s extreme capacity for jealousy, and so must as far as is possible resist the urge to have sex with other people, must take every possible measure to prevent it being known if they do and must respond with extraordinary kindness and patience if the truth does ever emerge. They should above all never try to persuade their partner that it isn’t right to be jealous or that jealousy is unnatural, ‘bad’ or a bourgeois construct.
On the other side of the equation, one should ready oneself for betrayal. That is, one should make strenuous efforts to try to understand what might go through the partner’s mind when they have sex with someone else. One is likely to think that there is no other option but that they are deliberately trying to humiliate one and that all their love has evaporated. The more likely truth – that one’s partner just wants to have more, or different, sex – is as hard to master as Mandarin or the oboe and requires as much practice.
One is ready to get married when two very difficult things are in place: one is ready to believe in one’s partner’s genuine capacity to separate love and sex. And at the same time, one is ready to believe in one’s partner’s stubborn inability to keep love and sex apart.
Two people have to be able to master both feats, because they may – over a lifetime – be called upon to demonstrate both capacities. This – rather than a vow never to have sex with another human again – should be the relevant test for getting married.

7. When we are happy to be taught and calm about teaching
We are ready for marriage when we accept that in certain very significant areas, our partners will be wiser, more reasonable and more mature than we are. We should want to learn from them. We should bear having things pointed out to us. We should, at key points, see them as the teacher and ourselves as pupils. At the same time, we should be ready to take on the task of teaching them certain things and like good teachers, not shout, lose our tempers or expect them simply to know. Marriage should be recognised as a process of mutual education.

8. When we realize we’re not that compatible
The Romantic view of marriage stresses that the ‘right’ person means someone who shares our tastes, interests and general attitudes to life. This might be true in the short term. But, over an extended period of time, the relevance of this fades dramatically; because differences inevitably emerge. The person who is truly best suited to us is not the person who shares our tastes, but the person who can negotiate differences in taste intelligently and wisely.
Rather than some notional idea of perfect complementarity, it is the capacity to tolerate difference that is the true marker of the ‘right’ person. Compatibility is an achievement of love; it shouldn’t be its precondition.

Conclusion
We have accepted that it is a truly good idea to attend some classes before having children. This is now the norm for all educated people in all developed nations.
Yet there is as yet no widespread acceptability for the idea of having classes before getting married. The results are around for all to see.
The time has come to bury the Romantic intuition-based view of marriage and learn to practice and rehearse marriage as one would ice-skating, ballet-dancing or violin playing, activities no more complex and no more deserving of systematic periods of instruction.
For now, while the infrastructure of new vows and classes is put in place, we all deserve untold sympathy for our struggles. We are trying to do something enormously difficult without the bare minimum of support necessary. It is not surprising if – very often – we have troubles.
Precis- feelings may run diarrheic, but love isn't sick; perfection is overrated, but rhythm is a more realistic mainstay; selfless depth, not self-censoring shallowness, is companionship's gold; sex starts on the bed and ends there, (figurative), but love-making has no life-cycle; all these, living love, is real hard work, not telemundo.



http://sayoaluko..com/2014/07/v-behaviorurldefaultvmlo.html
sayo aluko
PHILOSOPHERS' MAIL

Sayo Aluko
PHILOSOPHERS' MAIL

http://sayoaluko..com/2014/07/v-behaviorurldefaultvmlo.html

“Everybody needs love; to get it may come easy, to fall in it mostly comes easier, but to nurture and sustain it for the sake of appreciable growth is hard work, though not rocket science” …………………………………. Sayo Aluko

It used to be when you’d hit certain financial and social milestones; when you had a home to your name, a set of qualifications on the mantelpiece and a few cows and a parcel of land in your possession.

But when, under the influence of Romantic ideology, this grew to seem altogether too mercenary and calculating, the focus shifted to emotions. It came to be thought important to feel the right way. That was the true sign of a good union. And the right feelings included the sense that the other was ‘the one’, that you understood one another perfectly and that you’d both never want to sleep with anyone else again.
These ideas, though touching, have proved to be an almost sure recipe for the eventual dissolution of marriages – and have caused havoc in the emotional lives of millions of otherwise sane and well-meaning couples.
As a corrective to them, what follows is a proposal for a very different set of principles, more Classical in temper, which indicate when two people should properly consider themselves ready for marriage.

We are ready for marriage…

1. When we give up on perfection
We should not only admit in a general way that the person we are marrying is very far from perfect. We should also grasp the specifics of their imperfections: how they will be irritating, difficult, sometimes irrational, and often unable to sympathize or understand us. Vows should be rewritten to include the terse line: ‘I agree to marry this person even though they will, on a regular basis, drive me to distraction.’
However, these flaws should never be interpreted as merely capturing a local problem. No one else would be better. We are as bad. We are a flawed species. Whomever one got together with would be radically imperfect in a host of deeply serious ways. One must conclusively kill the idea that things would be ideal with any other creature in this galaxy. There can only ever be a ‘good enough’ marriage.
For this realization to sink in, it helps to have had a number of relationships before marrying, not in order to have the chance to locate ‘the right person’, but so that one can have ample opportunity to discover at first hand, in many different contexts, the truth that everyone (even the most initially exciting prospect) really is a bit wrong close up.

2. When we despair of being understood
Love starts with the experience of being understood in a deeply supportive and uncommon way. They understand the lonely parts of you; you don’t have to explain why you find a particular joke so funny; you hate the same people; they too want to try out a particular sexual scenario.
This will not continue. Another vow should read: ‘However much the other seems to understand me, there will always be large tracts of my psyche that will remain incomprehensible to them, anyone else and even me.’
We shouldn’t, therefore, blame our lovers for a dereliction of duty in failing to interpret and grasp our internal workings. They were not tragically inept. They simply couldn’t understand who we were and what we needed – which is wholly normal. No one properly understands, and can therefore fully sympathize with, anyone else.

3. When we realize we are crazy
This is deeply counter-intuitive. We seem so normal and mostly so good. It’s the others…
But maturity is founded on an active sense of one’s folly. One is out of control for long periods, one has failed to master one’s past, one projects unhelpfully, one is permanently anxious. One is, to put it mildly, an idiot.
If we are not regularly and very deeply embarrassed about who we are, it can only be because we have a dangerous capacity for selective memory.

4. When we are ready to love rather than be loved
Confusingly, we speak of ‘love’ as one thing, rather than discerning the two very different varieties that lie beneath the single word: being loved and loving. We should marry when we are ready to do the latter and are aware of our unnatural, immature fixation on the former.
We start out knowing only about ‘being loved.’ It comes to seem – very wrongly – like the norm. To the child, it feels as if the parent is simply spontaneously on hand to comfort, guide, entertain, feed, clear up and remain almost always warm and cheerful. Parents don’t reveal how often they have bitten their tongue, fought back the tears and been too tired to take off their clothes after a day of childcare. The relationship is almost entirely non-reciprocal. The parent loves; but they do not expect the favour to be returned in any significant way. The parent does not get upset when the child has not noticed the new hair cut, asked carefully-calibrated questions about how the meeting at work went or suggested that they go upstairs to take a nap. Parent and child may both ‘love’, but each party is on a very different end of the axis, unbeknownst to the child.
This is why in adulthood, when we first say we long for love, what we predominantly mean is that we want to be loved as we were once loved by a parent. We want a recreation in adulthood of what it felt like to be ministered to and indulged. In a secret part of our minds, we picture someone who will understand our needs, bring us what we want, be immensely patient and sympathetic to us, act selflessly and make it all better.
This is – naturally – a disaster. For a marriage to work, we need to move firmly out of the child – and into the parental position. We need to become someone who will be willing to subordinate their own demands and concerns to the needs of another.
There’s a further lesson to be learnt. When a child says to its parent ‘I hate you’, the parent does not automatically go numb with shock or threaten to leave the house and never come back, because the parent knows that the child is not giving the executive summary of a deeply thought-out and patient investigation into the state of the relationship. The cause of these words might be hunger, a lost but crucial piece of Lego, the fact that they went to a cocktail party last night, that they won’t let them play a computer game, or that they have an earache…
Parents become very good at not hearing the explicit words and listening instead to what the child means but doesn’t yet know how to say: ‘I’m lonely, in pain, or frightened’ – distress which then unfairly comes out as an attack on the safest, kindest, most reliable thing in the child’s world: the parent.
We find it exceptionally hard to make this move with our partners: to hear what they truly mean, rather than responding (furiously) to what they are saying.
A third vow should state: ‘Whenever I have the strength in me to do so, I will imitate those who once loved me and take care of my partner as these figures cared for me. The task isn’t an unfair chore or a departure from the true nature of love. It is the only kind of love really worthy of that exalted word.

5. When we are ready for administration
The Romantic person instinctively sees marriage in terms of emotions. But what a couple actually get up to together over a lifetime has much more in common with the workings of a small business. They must draw up work rosters, clean, chauffeur, cook, fix, throw away, mind, hire, fire, reconcile and budget.
None of these activities have any glamour whatsoever within the current arrangement of society. Those obliged to do them are therefore highly likely to resent them and feel that something has gone wrong with their lives for having to involve themselves so closely with them. And yet these tasks are what is truly ‘romantic’ in the sense of ‘conducive and sustaining of love’ and should be interpreted as the bedrock of a successful marriage, and accorded all the honour currently given to other activities in society, like mountain climbing or motor sport.
A central vow should read: ‘I accept the dignity of the ironing board.’

6. When we understand that sex and love do and don’t belong together
The Romantic view expects that love and sex will be aligned. But in truth, they won’t stay so beyond a few months or, at best, one or two years. This is not anyone’s fault. Because marriage has other key concerns (companionship, administration, another generation), sex will suffer. We are ready to get married when we accept a large degree of sexual resignation and the task of sublimation.
The ability to understand how to never objectify each other is key to deciphering the thin-line between the dynamics of having sex and making love. This understanding can be only brewed from depth, nowhere else. The gain here is that, while sex wanes per time and becomes "an issue", making love actually gets virgin per time, quickens sensitivity, it’s “non-libidoic” and seldom becomes an issue.

Both parties must therefore scrupulously avoid making the marriage ‘about sex’. They must also, from the outset, plan for the most challenging issue that will, statistically-speaking, arise for them: that one or the other will have affairs. Someone is properly ready for marriage when they are ready to behave maturely around betraying and being betrayed.
Also at this point, understanding helps to create a mutually-inclusive melting point where personal and religious inferences (not eccentric sentiments) are both respected and inter-played.

The inexperienced, immature view of betrayal goes like this: sex doesn’t have to be part of love. It can be quick and meaningless, just like playing tennis. Two people shouldn’t try to own each other’s bodies. It’s just a bit of fun. So one’s partner shouldn’t mind so much.
But this is willfully to ignore impregnable basics of human nature. No one can be the victim of adultery and not feel that they have been found fundamentally wanting and cut to the core of their being. They will never get over it. It makes no sense, of course, but that isn’t the point. Many things about us make little sense – and yet have to be respected. The adulterer has to be ready to honour and forgive the partner’s extreme capacity for jealousy, and so must as far as is possible resist the urge to have sex with other people, must take every possible measure to prevent it being known if they do and must respond with extraordinary kindness and patience if the truth does ever emerge. They should above all never try to persuade their partner that it isn’t right to be jealous or that jealousy is unnatural, ‘bad’ or a bourgeois construct.
On the other side of the equation, one should ready oneself for betrayal. That is, one should make strenuous efforts to try to understand what might go through the partner’s mind when they have sex with someone else. One is likely to think that there is no other option but that they are deliberately trying to humiliate one and that all their love has evaporated. The more likely truth – that one’s partner just wants to have more, or different, sex – is as hard to master as Mandarin or the oboe and requires as much practice.
One is ready to get married when two very difficult things are in place: one is ready to believe in one’s partner’s genuine capacity to separate love and sex. And at the same time, one is ready to believe in one’s partner’s stubborn inability to keep love and sex apart.
Two people have to be able to master both feats, because they may – over a lifetime – be called upon to demonstrate both capacities. This – rather than a vow never to have sex with another human again – should be the relevant test for getting married.

7. When we are happy to be taught and calm about teaching
We are ready for marriage when we accept that in certain very significant areas, our partners will be wiser, more reasonable and more mature than we are. We should want to learn from them. We should bear having things pointed out to us. We should, at key points, see them as the teacher and ourselves as pupils. At the same time, we should be ready to take on the task of teaching them certain things and like good teachers, not shout, lose our tempers or expect them simply to know. Marriage should be recognised as a process of mutual education.

8. When we realize we’re not that compatible
The Romantic view of marriage stresses that the ‘right’ person means someone who shares our tastes, interests and general attitudes to life. This might be true in the short term. But, over an extended period of time, the relevance of this fades dramatically; because differences inevitably emerge. The person who is truly best suited to us is not the person who shares our tastes, but the person who can negotiate differences in taste intelligently and wisely.
Rather than some notional idea of perfect complementarity, it is the capacity to tolerate difference that is the true marker of the ‘right’ person. Compatibility is an achievement of love; it shouldn’t be its precondition.

Conclusion
We have accepted that it is a truly good idea to attend some classes before having children. This is now the norm for all educated people in all developed nations.
Yet there is as yet no widespread acceptability for the idea of having classes before getting married. The results are around for all to see.
The time has come to bury the Romantic intuition-based view of marriage and learn to practice and rehearse marriage as one would ice-skating, ballet-dancing or violin playing, activities no more complex and no more deserving of systematic periods of instruction.
For now, while the infrastructure of new vows and classes is put in place, we all deserve untold sympathy for our struggles. We are trying to do something enormously difficult without the bare minimum of support necessary. It is not surprising if – very often – we have troubles.
Precis- feelings may run diarrheic, but love isn't sick; perfection is overrated, but rhythm is a more realistic mainstay; selfless depth, not self-censoring shallowness, is companionship's gold; sex starts on the bed and ends there, (figurative), but love-making has no life-cycle; all these, living love, is real hard work, not telemundo.



http://sayoaluko..com/2014/07/v-behaviorurldefaultvmlo.html
sayo aluko
PHILOSOPHERS' MAIL

Apatheist: The World's Need by Ella Wheeler Wilcox (1850-1919)

Simple truth, but mutilated, unacceptable to complexed nature. Pity

By Sayo Aluko
http://sayoaluko..com/2014/07/a-christian-or-muslim.html?m=1

Are you a Christian or a Muslim?
The question that should never be asked;
Seemingly harmless, but it's hatred's fundament,
For which the die gets cast,
A limitary insignia, erasing peace so fast.

A Christian or a Muslim?
Creed over humanity, religion over benevolence;
Buoyed by the weighty flak of dogma,
Creed crept into our vantage,
and Humanity, polluted with lethal chasm.

A question, designed to dignify division (how can?);
An open question, but now a cover,
Perfect shade for terror, exact camouflage for malevolence,
Hijacked by the precociously wicked,
No respite for tears shed.
 
Asked by Mr. Paranoia, answered by Mrs. Disdain,
Tethered to doubt, tendered with partisan enthusiasm,
Oh! What a show of confident fear,
Where honest folly is laid bare.
A Christian, or Muslim, is that how far we can fare?

Are you a Christian or a Muslim?
Seemingly simple, at first glance; but,
What motive lies behind its asking?
What advantage does its answer give?
At second glance, it's seen laden with the nothingness of conceit.

A Christian or a Muslim?
The divisive question that sows the discordant seed,
Yes, surreptitiously;
Now, what a bounteous harvest we've got!
Chibok, Nyanya, Jos, Madalla, UN building, Wuse II, the likes,
Blast, Bomb, Blast, Men, just Barbecued....Harvest!

Are you a Christian or a Muslim?
Oh No! ask me no more!
I am MAN, all you need to know,
I am MAN, all you need to understand,
I am a Man, information so enough! So sufficient!

Had Kindness to Man not these calibrated with the cadence of creed,
Had Love to Man not these rationed with the condition of religion,
Maybe bombs wouldn't have kept going off at every whim,
Maybe it wouldn't be so fat, the extremism,
while the chances of humanity's existence remain so slim,
But, oh no! Not again... “Are you a Christian or a Muslim?”

No, I am a Lover, my religion, Love;
The immediate neighbour, my commandment,
Gauge-less compassion, my testament,
Random kindness, my sacrament,
No hostility, no argument.

If God is love, if Allah made Man,
Then, Love made Man, love makes Men
Men, Muhammad, Jesus, Ghandi, Mandela, Theresa,
Men, who simply loved, no drama, no dogma.

Why then create warring divides with a bogus question?
And stray into bigotry away from the exemplary?
And prey into idolatry away from true worship of divinity?
Oh! How the Gods must NOT be crazy, we are.

He calls this blasphemy, Yes, he who is a terrorist,
She holds this in derision, Yes, she who is an abetting simpleton;
A religious hater, A religion racist,
Wielding divisive dedication.

Are you a Christian or a Muslim?
Ask no more, answer no further;
Take it out of the questionnaires, remove from the forms,
Leave out of the curriculum vitae, excise from our norms.

What does it matter, other than scatter?
How does it better, other than embitter?
A Christian or a Muslim?
We shouldn't have asked.

http://sayoaluko..com/2014/07/a-christian-or-muslim.html?m=1

atlwireles: By Femi Aribisala

uf

Tinubu isn't a saint, accepted, his methods of leadership may be extreme at some levels, but, there's no denying that his methods have been largely effective to appreciable grades.

I dislike defamation, the outright type; I also abhor divisive cum discordant articles. Unfortunately these are the three things replete in this Mr. Aribisala article, the three things that unduly shift focus away from lauding improvements in the quest to get more, three things that the scions of negative energy, three things that drawback. Mr Aribisala, why gaining notoriety for being off-course...well, I am commenting here simply cos I deem you witty, and you can surely do much better than wasting wit in this retrogressive charter you've obstinately chosen. There's no point in defaming a set-up without giving an alternative. For example, you pointed out Akinwunmi Ambode as an anointed one, while you "un-anointed" him in the process, but, who do you think surpasses that Ambode guy in competence quotients?..you didn't care to state who could be better than who you tagged "tinubu's anointed"..rather, all you did was simply defame...naa, Mr. Aribisala, this is too bad, too loose, too piquant, too incomplete.

By Sayo Aluko (http://sayoaluko..co.uk/2014/06/reflective-five-5-lessons-from.html?m=1)

It's been almost a week now, and the dust still seems settling. A shocker for a distant few, an expectation for the proximal many, the Ekiti state gubernatorial election in south-west Nigeria came, saw, and "conquered". These below are 5 major realities, lessons sort of, that I've basically tried to decipher from the election as a whole.

1. FINALLY, THE PEOPLES' VOICE GET TO BE HEARD

"So, thumbs can speak again in my Nigeria!" That was my first theme of thought when I heard the results of the #EkitiDecides poll. Don't get me wrong dear ones, this isn't about who won or who lost, it is about the truth that the voices of the masses undeniably had its way, at a high-sounding decibel at that; that is a good sign. For the first time in a long while, there will be no election petition tribunal (bad biz for lawyers), nor accusations and counter-accusations, little or no opposition rhetoric and such likes, that have always plagued post-election moments in our "typical" setting. Impressive! We are getting there! Democracy truly OF and BY the People, for real.

Many, I inclusive, have applauded outgoing Governor Kayode Fayemi for being gracious and gallant in defeat, but really, it'll take only a blind and deaf narcissistic fool to attempt to doubt and question the clarity of that election. It was a clear case of Masses decided, Masses voted, Masses won, simple.Remember, this isn't about a Fayemi or a Fayose, it is about the lesson learnt - "the voice" was resoundingly heard for democracy. It's worth a cheer.

2. BEYOND GRACE, YOU NEED GRIT, AND GUT, TO GET GLORY.

There's a high probability that Governor Fayemi may still be wondering why and how he lost, pondering about what else the Ekitians could have wanted that he didn't give or meet up to, especially when he self-affirms his "achievements", pondering on until he eventually submits to the consolation of Ebenezer Obey's "ko s'ogbon to le da" lullaby. But, it's a pitiful reality, Fayemi just lost.

Truth is, Governor Fayemi had and still has the grace of an amiable leader, copiously at that, but he lacked that matchless gut and unremitting grit, the two attributes needed by any progressive political office holder, to power inimitable policies, from the largely people-oriented to the down right undeniable, all in a quest to satiate the slow (but, at least existent) evolution of the masses.  As I said in my last article (read it http://sayoaluko..co.uk/2014/06/rauf-rochas-ibikunle-nigeria-and-hope.html?m=1), the bar is being raised on a daily, some states in the country are working on a high, with groundbreaking, fresh and pragmatically radical works, all done with even a clear zest for improvement; and so, I personally had the inkling that any other state administration that can't match such productive pace, where grit and gut are important necessities, won't really last. I hope it happens so nationwide.

3. UNFORTUNATELY, HUNGER AND POVERTY ARE STILL POLITICAL BAITS.

It's a pity. Dear masses, we need to evolve beyond this.

Well, of a truth, it is uneasy, and close to impossible, to preach the place of pride and integrity to a hungry man. Perish the thought, a hungry man can't be an angry man (as opposed to what we were made to believe while growing up); I've always wondered how a hungry man will muster strength to express anger. Anyways, simply put, a hungry man needs food, shikena. Unfortunately, years of untoward politicking in the country have found of way of earmarking, sustaining and "maximizing" these two, that is, pandemic poverty and epidemic hunger, as potent campaign fertile grounds. Both Fayemi and Fayose reportedly distributed bags of rice and money to floundering groups of people during campaigns, and to me, asides pre-election violence, that act was another major blight on #EkitiDecides. This isn't ideal at all.

As I pray in hope that hunger and poverty both cease from being the masses' Achilles heel, I look forward to when rice-sharing will be basically replaced with town-hall meetings, college/university symposia, and the likes, where political office seekers' manifestos are empirically made intimate with the masses, where all we want to hear is how plausible their plans are, and thereby simply inform our decisions on such premises, not food, not money. The politicians themselves should also ask, - Why should I share rice during campaigns to the same people I hope employs me to serve them?

If we don't desire to thoughtfully readjust, I don't think even Enyeama will be able to “save” us from perennial ruin.


  
4. STRIKING A BALANCE IS NOW OF UTMOST IMPORTANCE

That serious and success-minded political office holders need to master the art of striking a balance between giving the fruits of governance and greasing the feelings of the governed is another point that the "shock" of #EkitiDecides drove home deeply. In as much as these two things seem largely interdependent, they are also loosely different entities. The average Ekitian, who actually voted out Fayemi as against voting in Fayose, stated ‘disconnect with the masses’, as his/her major reason for ditching the former.

The importance of striking a balance, an art which unfortunately still remains relatively unused even by the appreciably working Governors, can't be overstated.

Balance is what will make the high-tax/must-pay-tax regimes commensurate with high standard (not cost) of living; good infrastructure, yes, but made for happy people (their salaries duly paid, rightly-esteemed, etc); elitist policies, yes, but made easily relatable to and for the average artisan voter, etc.

We can keep arguing about how to rightly place these priorities, but, for your information, dear political office holder, as #EkitiDecides just proved it, serving Nigerians appreciably well is close to being rocket science, you desired the responsibility, deal with it!

5. SO, WE CAN HAVE A PEACEFUL AND VIOLENT-FREE ELECTION DAY AFTER ALL.

Little or no violence occurred on Election Day for #EkitiDecides; that was another high. Bemused, I asked myself, "what could have happened rightly?” I couldn't hinge it merely on heavy military presence which hasn't really ensured violence-free election days in the past; I eventually came to the honest and simple realization that this violencelessness largely boiled down to the Ekitians unanimous decision to simply enfranchise without brouhaha. It was a simple decision. So, if we can decide to have peaceful election D-days without drama and violence, why so much pre-election violence then?

This, I believe points to one lesson, especially to the follwership, who are most times on the receiving end of these needless violence; a lesson that, violence-free campaigns and elections days aren't esoteric, they are achievable, even in military absence.


 It is well.

It's been almost a week now, and the dust still seems settling. A shocker for a distant few, an expectation for the proximal many, the Ekiti state gubernatorial election in south-west Nigeria came, saw, and "conquered". These below are 5 major realities, lessons sort of, that I've basically tried to decipher from the election as a whole.

1. FINALLY, THE PEOPLES' VOICE GET TO BE HEARD

"So, thumbs can speak again in my Nigeria!" That was my first theme of thought when I heard the results of the #EkitiDecides poll. Don't get me wrong dear ones, this isn't about who won or who lost, it is about the truth that the voices of the masses undeniably had its way, at a high-sounding decibel at that; that is a good sign. For the first time in a long while, there will be no election petition tribunal (bad biz for lawyers), nor accusations and counter-accusations, little or no opposition rhetoric and such likes, that have always plagued post-election moments in our "typical" setting. Impressive! We are getting there! Democracy truly OF and BY the People, for real.

Many, I inclusive, have applauded outgoing Governor Kayode Fayemi for being gracious and gallant in defeat, but really, it'll take only a blind and deaf narcissistic fool to attempt to doubt and question the clarity of that election. It was a clear case of Masses decided, Masses voted, Masses won, simple.Remember, this isn't about a Fayemi or a Fayose, it is about the lesson learnt - "the voice" was resoundingly heard for democracy. It's worth a cheer.

2. BEYOND GRACE, YOU NEED GRIT, AND GUT, TO GET GLORY.

There's a high probability that Governor Fayemi may still be wondering why and how he lost, pondering about what else the Ekitians could have wanted that he didn't give or meet up to, especially when he self-affirms his "achievements", pondering on until he eventually submits to the consolation of Ebenezer Obey's "ko s'ogbon to le da" lullaby. But, it's a pitiful reality, Fayemi just lost.

Truth is, Governor Fayemi had and still has the grace of an amiable leader, copiously at that, but he lacked that matchless gut and unremitting grit, the two attributes needed by any progressive political office holder, to power inimitable policies, from the largely people-oriented to the down right undeniable, all in a quest to satiate the slow (but, at least existent) evolution of the masses.  As I said in my last article (read it here http://sayoaluko..co.uk/2014/06/rauf-rochas-ibikunle-nigeria-and-hope.html?m=1), the bar is being raised on a daily, some states in the country are working on a high, with groundbreaking, fresh and pragmatically radical works, all done with even a clear zest for improvement; and so, I personally had the inkling that any other state administration that can't match such productive pace, where grit and gut are important necessities, won't really last. I hope it happens so nationwide.

3. UNFORTUNATELY, HUNGER AND POVERTY ARE STILL POLITICAL BAITS.

It's a pity. Dear masses, we need to evolve beyond this.

Well, of a truth, it is uneasy, and close to impossible, to preach the place of pride and integrity to a hungry man. Perish the thought, a hungry man can't be an angry man (as opposed to what we were made to believe while growing up); I've always wondered how a hungry man will muster strength to express anger. Anyways, simply put, a hungry man needs food, shikena. Unfortunately, years of untoward politicking in the country have found of way of earmarking, sustaining and "maximizing" these two, that is, pandemic poverty and epidemic hunger, as potent campaign fertile grounds. Both Fayemi and Fayose reportedly distributed bags of rice and money to floundering groups of people during campaigns, and to me, asides pre-election violence, that act was another major blight on #EkitiDecides. This isn't ideal at all.

As I pray in hope that hunger and poverty both cease from being the masses' Achilles heel, I look forward to when rice-sharing will be basically replaced with town-hall meetings, college/university symposia, and the likes, where political office seekers' manifestos are empirically made intimate with the masses, where all we want to hear is how plausible their plans are, and thereby simply inform our decisions on such premises, not food, not money. The politicians themselves should also ask, - Why should I share rice during campaigns to the same people I hope employs me to serve them?

If we don't desire to thoughtfully readjust, I don't think even Enyeama will be able to “save” us from perennial ruin.


  
4. STRIKING A BALANCE IS NOW OF UTMOST IMPORTANCE

That serious and success-minded political office holders need to master the art of striking a balance between giving the fruits of governance and greasing the feelings of the governed is another point that the "shock" of #EkitiDecides drove home deeply. In as much as these two things seem largely interdependent, they are also loosely different entities. The average Ekitian, who actually voted out Fayemi as against voting in Fayose, stated ‘disconnect with the masses’, as his/her major reason for ditching the former.

The importance of striking a balance, an art which unfortunately still remains relatively unused even by the appreciably working Governors, can't be overstated.

Balance is what will make the high-tax/must-pay-tax regimes commensurate with high standard (not cost) of living; good infrastructure, yes, but made for happy people (their salaries duly paid, rightly-esteemed, etc); elitist policies, yes, but made easily relatable to and for the average artisan voter, etc.

We can keep arguing about how to rightly place these priorities, but, for your information, dear political office holder, as #EkitiDecides just proved it, serving Nigerians appreciably well is close to being rocket science, you desired the responsibility, deal with it!

5. SO, WE CAN HAVE A PEACEFUL AND VIOLENT-FREE ELECTION DAY AFTER ALL.

Little or no violence occurred on Election Day for #EkitiDecides; that was another high. Bemused, I asked myself, "what could have happened rightly?” I couldn't hinge it merely on heavy military presence which hasn't really ensured violence-free election days in the past; I eventually came to the honest and simple realization that this violencelessness largely boiled down to the Ekitians unanimous decision to simply enfranchise without brouhaha. It was a simple decision. So, if we can decide to have peaceful election D-days without drama and violence, why so much pre-election violence then?

This, I believe points to one lesson, especially to the follwership, who are most times on the receiving end of these needless violence; a lesson that, violence-free campaigns and elections days aren't esoteric, they are achievable, even in military absence.


 It is well.