Skip to main content

The OLT Syndrome



This piece is simple, relational and confrontational. It will stare you in the face regarding some things you do. Don't dismiss it, ignore it or defend yourself. Adjust where you have to, change where necessary and above all, take positive action. 

We all have been its victim at one point in time in our lives. We have danced to its tune and played to its gallery. It has deprived some of the opportunity to move ahead, caging them in an enclave of some habits, making them go round in a circle, revolving in an orbit like they are sitting on a barber's seat and never making headway. And as you read this piece, you may still be a victim of one or two of such caprices. 

Let me tell you a bit about my story. Growing up as a pastor's kid, by belief and upbringing, I knew stealing was morally wrong and a sin. So whenever the urge to steal comes up, the routine mental process was, let me just do this for the last time, after which I'm done. Well, that's how the one last time syndrome kept me in that kind of life for a decade until grace saved me.

Habits are the physical manifestation of mentally and internally accumulated seeming insignificant decisions and actions made and done over time. These habits culminate into our character, and character is who we truly are. Hence, whether good or bad, habits that we permit persists, and whatever persists define us. If we have been servants to the one last time syndrome, especially when it comes to habits, decisions and actions that shouldn't be part of our fruitful life, then it is unfortunate. 

The One Last Time (OLT) Syndrome is that subtle yet simple pattern of habit, covert yet overt manner of approaching bad decisions, toxic attitudes, and harmful actions with laxity and complacency, laced with the underlining wishful thinking of stopping but the overriding desire of repeating same. It's that harmful addiction and obsession that you confess daily the need to cut it off from your life but when it comes to putting words to action the practicality of it eludes you. Succinctly, we are sometimes helpless against this, showing how frail and helpless we are as mortals and how desperately we need God.

By now, I am sure you are assessing yourself and pointing out all those actions and decisions that you are often prey to this syndrome in their regard. What is that habit, action, or decision that you know is getting the best of your life but every time you are about to indulge it you find solace in "let me just do it one last time"?  The more you indulge it the more neck-deep you are into it, it's like a bite of it leaves you asking for more. It's time to turn the tides around for good. 

Why then are we often prone to this syndrome? It was Jean de La Bruyère who said: "No vice exists which does not pretend to be more or less like some virtue, and which does not take advantage of this assumed resemblance". Martin Meadows added that "Bad habits are so difficult to give up not only because they’re pleasant, but also because they often masquerade as virtues. When you think of your vice as a friend rather than your enemy, it’s even harder to eliminate it from your life".

The one last time syndrome will keep you in an endless circle of unproductive life, it steals from you and makes you steal from yourself as well. Don't go this way anymore, it's a death trap. It saps all the productive efforts and creative energy you would have directed towards a worthwhile venture and channel the same on the same old vices that have hitherto stuck your life. Watch it from now henceforth, and don't let this syndrome make you live your life for less.

You need self-discipline and will power to say no anytime you want to entertain it. " Let me do it just one last time" is a lie and you know it. It's a bait that ends up hooking you on the cheap, transient and harmful thrill and pleasure that will end up ruining your life. You are made for something more, and to live life to the fullest, you must trust God to help you, to go beyond mere confessing your need for change into repentance and living a new life outside the OLT syndrome. You are made of more and for more.

Thank you for reading

Be free to leave your comments

Comments

  1. Unknown28 February 2021 at 09:10

    Very true and beautiful piece.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Unknown28 February 2021 at 09:50

    Thank you

    ReplyDelete
  3. BanDashan28 February 2021 at 11:23

    It is unproductive and it steals from you. Thanks boss

    ReplyDelete
  4. Unknown28 February 2021 at 16:37

    This is a serious battle one needs to take serious time fight. Weldon sir its so inspiring

    ReplyDelete
  5. MD Star Concepts1 March 2021 at 07:54

    Thanks for the piece. It helps a lot. Blessings

    ReplyDelete

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

OUR LOVE STORY - WAL & NEN

  HOW WE MET Wal We have been friends on Facebook for quite some time but have not been conversing until December 6th, 2020, when she first replied to my message. That evening marked the beginning of the journey that led us here. We quickly blended in conversation, intellectually and spiritually, and by Christmas, we had agreed to meet for the first time by December 30th at the Jos Wildlife Park. Well, that meeting defined everything that we have today for me. I had told my kid brother two days earlier that once I meet her, and if the physical Meemwa aligns with the virtual one, that would be the bus stop for me - I would have found my wife. Meemwa One faithful morning I woke up and decided to check my messages on Facebook and came across new messages which I replied to and got an immediate response from this young man we started chatting on Facebook and after some days my cousin and friend came to visit, and I was giving them updates then they asked of the name and it turned o
5 comments
Read more

IF YOU WERE PHILIP

  Permit me to tell you a bit about Philip. I met Philip in our undergraduate days at the University of Jos. He was never late even though he usually comes from home. I tried several times to beat him in punctuality but I failed on several attempts. Philip was cheerful, full of life, and always the spark of the house.  Last week was a tough yet defining week for me, I lost Philip who has been a friend for 10 years. Did I see it coming? Certainly not. Was I anticipating it sooner? I doubt it. But will we all die? Of course yes.  This is not a tribute but be patient with me as I share with you the lessons I have learned at the cause of his demise this week. I have no doubt they will bless your heart. Philip lived well : I know people are often guilty of saying things about people who are gone that are not usually true, but with a deep sense of honesty, humility, and certitude, at 27, Philip lived well. This is no fallacy, this young man touched lives everywhere he went, if not with his s
15 comments
Read more

THE CRACKED POT

There was once a servant water bearer who had two pots tied to a wooden bar, which he used to hang on his shoulder to supply water to his master from a stream down the hilly house. The pot on the left side is perfect and in good shape fulfilling its purpose effectively, whereas the one on the right is cracked and leaks water right from the stream up to the master’s house. For two years, the water bearer kept using those two pots just the way they were, with the perfect pot delivering full quantity of water and the cracked one delivering just half. Hence for two good years, the water bearer could only deliver one and half pot of water to his master on every trip he made to the stream instead of   two whole pots which ought to be some sort of reward for his effort of shouldering two pots. One fateful day, the cracked pot got worried and apologized to the water bearer, expressing how sorry it was for the imperfection that has marred its being, for leaking water from the stre
11 comments
Read more