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WHAT IS YOUR STORY?

 


I was late, hence in a hurry, trying to wrap up quickly with the packaging at the factory so I could meet up with the grand opening of my friend who was opening her eatery. Well, I was in for a surprise; I was planning to spend roughly an hour, but I ended up spending three, thereby missing out on the opening. My major takeaway was the nugget I got from the factory owner who in the course of our conversation said to me "Great men are known by their stories". 


His statement aligned with what I said to one of my friends who shared some of her challenges with me within the week. I tell her that all she is going through, good or bad constitutes her life's story and there would be no story to tell without all these experiences. 


Whenever I am on social media, I am very deliberate with my conversations, especially with those I am meeting for the first time. Often, I will first express my gratitude for the person’s acceptance of my request and my intention of having a meaningful conversation with the person, (i.e. in the situation that I did send the friend request), after which I will delve straight into knowing the person by asking about his/her story. Some will be like: “what? My story?”  And I will be like “Yes your story”, this is simply because I strongly believe we all have our life’s stories to tell.


You see, we all are wonderful storytellers and amazing writers. I strongly believe we all have our unique yet equally important life’s story to tell. 


Writing is done by professional writers and for many purposes; some write to inform, some to educate, others write to entertain and amuse; while others write to recount events of the past, some write about current happenings and others write to project into the future. However, in this case, we all are writers, daily writing the lines of our life’s story in the pages of history; as time unfolds and events reveal, we all will know which kind of writers we are. 


Books are made up of words, sentences, paragraphs, pages and chapters, coherently designed and bound together to communicate a specific message. Daily we are presented with the raw ideas to write the story of our lives. Life presents to us through people we meet, situations we encounter, circumstances and experiences we come across the right words to develop into sentences, paragraphs, pages and chapters of our life’s story. How we fuse these will determine and define the kind of story we write.


However, what counts when you are gone is the kind of story you have written in the hearts of men with your actions and inactions throughout your lifetime. A hymn writer once said we can only be remembered by what we have done, and yes it is true that we can only resonate in the future through the kind of story our lives are writing daily.



More practically, permit me to ask you this soul searching question: what is your story? What kind of writer are you? What kind of story is your life writing in the heart of others and pages of history at large? Will your life’s story be referred to when you are gone to help in solving the problems of other people’s lives or will it be another Shakespearean tragedy? Honestly, generations will come that long to learn one or two things from our lives and our present generation; we cannot afford to fail them by writing just anyhow story. 


Your situations may give you every reason to doubt whether a beautiful story will come out of your life, and all evidence may point to the reality that your story is just another tragedy that will grace the earth in space and time. I want to remind you that all great stories don’t start great, there are always twists and turns and catastrophic intermissions. However, every new day comes with a new sheet from God to pen down a new episode of your life, He is committed to ensuring that your life’s story turns out great. 


In years to come, whether I live or I die, God helping me, I desire that many will come to find my life’s story encouraging, life-giving, inspiring, and worth emulating. I desire that the story of my life will go down history, breaking the barriers of tribe, ethnicity, religion and nationality. I have resolved to live my life and die my death to honour God and serve humanity in all the ways I can. We can change the world if only we start being deliberate with the kind of stories we write with our life.


Again I ask, what is your story?


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