Till today, I still find it weird how they rate stubborn people very highly while the calm ones are seen as "mugu" (foolish). I fall into the category of the "calm ones," and oftentimes, I have been likened to someone who can't match up to the kind of madness that one needs to excel in this life, which is very true because it takes a lot of craziness to attain some things in the world we live in today. But also, even in my calm state, I've been able to build and attract great respect, especially in my hometown.
But I have been stubborn at times, and it saved me, while some other times, it backfired. My stubbornness comes from the strong will to stand for what I know is right, even when others, at that moment, see it as wrong.
Hold on,
What is stubbornness?*
I see stubbornness as being hard to bend and, sometimes, being the odd one out.
There was a time I had a heated confrontation with one of my uncles, and I didn't take it slowly at all. I was so angry with him and even challenged him to a fight because he really stepped on my toes. After that day, the elders judged me to be wrong and decided that I should go and apologize to my uncle, and that was when I unleashed my stubborn side. I refused to apologize because I believed I wasn't wrong. They talked and talked, but I completely refused to apologize. Thankfully, the holiday season ended, and I returned to school without apologizing. The next holiday when I visited home, I noticed how the issue had been buried, and this uncle of mine began to accord me an unusual level of respect. His approach towards me, or anything that concerned me, changed totally, for good. I became his favourite "brother," as he usually calls the male children of my father.
That's the only time in my adulthood that I decided to be stubborn, and fortunately for me, it ended on a positive note.
Way back in my teens, I was not very obedient and didn't adhere to advice, especially the ones that restricted us as teenagers from having fun. My dad had a lot of rules set in the house, and it was so difficult for me to obey them. These rules included no playing of games on the VCD, no going to the "Bridge" River, and no going on cashew and mango hunts.
Back in those days, these adventures were the fun available to us as children and teenagers, and we couldn't just resist the urge to do any of those things, especially when there were other children who were comfortably doing them.
My dad really got angry and beat me for violating these rules, especially the "do not play games" and "do not go to the Bridge River" rules. The Bridge River was the one that we loved so much because we jumped from the bridge into the high-frequency flowing river, and the road was always used by fast-moving vehicles, where lives were claimed very often through accidents on the bridge.
That's for reading.
Photo: Own photo
