When I grow up

As a small girl I watched an advert that always ran before the seven o'clock news. I guess it was for an insurance company, in the ad children often said what they want to be when they grow up. One particular boy caught my attention because he proclaimed without a doubt that he wanted to be like his father when he grew up. For him it did not matter what career path his father had taken but that his father could never be wrong.

Fast forward and I am a big girl, still curving the path to growth. Every morning I wake up and seek the drive that will see me through the day and bring out  better person at dusk than I was at dawn. It is futile to look if all you see is nothing, you are better off with your eyes shut. It is possible to learn something new even if you have walked the same path everyday for ten years but only if you set out to. This fact has not spared me, hence the need for me to open my inner eyes that I may see something that will draw me nearer to my grown up self. 

Everyday I have been challenged to pick something new from every quarter, it could be that little person in my "study of little people" or a grown person who has chosen a path that has obviously led them to their present. Recently, I spent the evening with a visionary little person, this boy commuted everyday to and from school in such a hustle. He woke up at 5am and often went without breakfast to beat traffic, connected two matts and the story was no different in the evening needless mention that at the end of the year he will have a national exam to sit. This he narrated to me with so much enthusiasm. He went on to tell me how excited he was because next year he will go to boarding school like his elder brother and eventually become a lawyer... that is who he wants to be when he grows up. I was awed and challenged all at once. As we parted ways I went away deep in thought.

Here I am, all set to for my daily audit of the events that have transpired and their impact on my life for the day. You see, growth is a long winding road with all sorts of distractions and it is easy to feel like you are the end when you are barely started. There are times I have felt lost or lost the desire to carry on. I wonder how normal this is. Every morning I get up and pray that my person will set the stage and I can hopefully cover the distance I require to draw nearer. In my quest, I have wanted to be one person and that is my  CEO, an amazing woman with a heart of gold and ooh, hasn't she traveled the road of life. This amazing lady fetes accolades one after another. Just when we think she is done growing another feather on her hat! Someday I plan to ask her whether she is "grown up" and if not, what is the one place that she sees herself at as a "grown up"? So I settled, eyes on the prize and striving to become. 

This morning, I read about a lot of leaders who have transformed the face of many sectors that hold this country together, did I mention that my CEO is one of them? Yes, I work with influential leaders, he he. As I went through these peculiar people's profiles, I met with one man, he touched my heart and moved my spirit. There I was all in tears at the end of his profile. I was humbled, that a human being of such high caliber has chosen to fold his sleeves and get right down to the business of improving the lives of poor village people whose own government has turned its back on. He has mobilized the corporate citizen and raised fund in tunes of billions to feed the hungry. He has adopted a small village school and educated over half a million children and he is not finished yet!

People, if there is a person to be when I grow up, it has got to be him!