What really is leadership?

There are so many definitions, but here’s how I’ll put my own.

A leader is someone who isn’t bossy and who you can submit to or follow without feeling drained.

What is submission?

It means giving way to someone with more authority.

Many African men think leadership is when the children run helter-skelter to their room whenever he comes home, or when the wife kneels down to serve him food or to greet him. Some even think leadership is embarrassing or correcting his wife in public when she goes wrong. There are so many... gosh!!

A huge number of them now wonder why children are always celebrating their mothers more.

That’s why many fathers are lonely in old age.

One of the reasons why many people have a distorted view of God as The Father is the way earthly fathers raised them. So when God is showing us His love, the fragile part of Him, when He’s showing us His emotions, we run away. Not because we want to, but because we’ve been wired that way. A part of us wants to protect our inner child.

I’m writing this so we can change the narrative. Upcoming fathers can change this usual pattern and make submission easy for women and children.

Don’t be afraid to love loudly. Don’t be bossy. Don’t provoke your children. Love your wife. Lead her well.

Be present!

Be emotionally stable.

Change the narrative.

In my own definition, loneliness means feeling incomplete, empty and void.

I’ll use my own story as a case study.

I’ve always felt lonely all my life. Even when my family was with me or my friends were with me, it still felt like they couldn’t fill the space. Nobody knew because it wasn’t written on my face — it was hidden in my soul. I was just looking for something no one seemed to understand.

But ever since I started doing certain things, everything changed.

As a single lady, you must understand the difference between being alone and being lonely. Many of us are caught in the web of loneliness, and we feel that having a boyfriend or husband will cure it. My dear, it’ll only make it worse. You have to be complete in God and in yourself. Humans can’t cure your loneliness.

You have to cure loneliness because it will affect every relationship you find yourself in — romantic, platonic or otherwise. Why? Because you’ll be looking for fulfillment in another person and you can’t find it there. It isn’t possible.

A few years ago, I listened to P. Daniel’s message about marriage. He said, “When 1 + ½ get married, it will make ½.” When a lonely man or woman marries a fulfilled person, that marriage is likely to be shaken.

So please, young boys and girls, fix yourself. Here are the 3 things that worked for me:

1. Intimacy with the Holy Ghost

Aya! 🔥 If you don’t have this, you can’t cure loneliness. Only God can fill that void, I promise you. Fellowship with God does.

Intimacy is coming as you are. Don’t hide your feelings from Him. Don’t be too “posh” in the presence of God. As long as you’ve given your life to Christ, you carry the presence of God.

So when you’re in your room feeling lonely and heavy, tell it to the Holy Spirit exactly as it is. He’s listening and He’s always ready to talk to you — you just haven’t been paying attention. He will always come down to your level. Just keep doing this. Try it for a week and you’ll see changes. But it has to be continuous. It should be a daily thing. A forever thing with God.

2. Self-Development

If you don’t work on yourself, nobody will. Read therapeutic books. Read books on purpose and on finances. Read books about every sphere of life. Get therapy if you have to. Yes, the Holy Spirit is powerful, but that doesn’t mean therapy is useless. There’s a balance to everything. A Christian therapist can guide you and help you in the way of the Lord.

Learn a skill. Discover your purpose and study in line with your purpose. Listen to messages. Watch podcasts. Keep yourself busy with productive things and things that improve your mindset. Fix your character. Be kind. Just do healthy things that will help you become the best version of you.

3. Meditation

In simple terms, it means ruminating and thinking deeply about something over and over again. It’s like worrying, but this time it’s on the Word of God. You ponder the Word again and again until light breaks forth.

Take Jeremiah 29:11, for example. Ponder it over and over. Keep saying it to yourself. Keep meditating on it. You don’t have to rush it. It may take days or weeks. What matters is that you get the light from it.

These are the few things that helped me. I still talk and gist with my friends, but my wholeness isn’t in them. Without them, I can still be myself. I’m still on the journey of becoming a whole person. There are days it may be tough, but be persistent. The flesh won’t like it.

There’s more, but these are the top 3 that helped me. I hope this blessed you.

I’m Nigerian, and it’s part of our culture to greet and respect elders whenever we see them. There’s no problem with that.

What I’m talking about are the ones you didn’t see, but they saw you and chose to ignore you because you were supposed to greet them first. The ones who walk past you, and because you weren’t paying attention, you miss them. Then they get angry and report you to your parents: “You don’t greet?” As if it happens all the time. It’s a communication issue, but that’s a story for another day.

There are times I pass adults who are loudly arguing about something, and as a Yoruba lady with good home training, I greet them: “Good afternoon, ma.” No response. “Good afternoon, ma,” a second time. Still no response. So I decided I wouldn’t greet adults who are arguing, because they won’t hear me anyway, even though they saw me. I hope you get my point.

Then they go and report me to my mum that I didn’t greet them properly, so she warns me. It makes me question: who raised this adult? Or is it just a cultural thing?

My point is, I don’t think it’s bad for an elder to greet a child or younger person first if the elder sees them before the child does. It won’t harm anyone, and it doesn’t add to or remove from anyone’s account balance.

I’m not against greeting elders — I still do it whenever I see them. It’s our culture. All I’m saying is that both the old and the young deserve respect and shouldn’t be treated any differently.

As the first child, I had an intense hatred for taking the blame for whatever happened at home. As the oldest, I was always reminded of how I could have done better, or at least guided my younger ones.

I didn’t know how badly it affected me until I grew older.

Some years ago, while I was in senior secondary school, we went to visit a classmate who was feeling under the weather. We got to the gate and started knocking, but it wasn’t loud enough. So Tomi and I picked up a stone to knock. It was so loud that the neighbors came outside to complain and shout at us. It really triggered me, and I pushed the blame onto Tomi. My other friends joined in too, so she felt defenseless and started crying.

That’s when I realized what I had done. I felt terrible, but I thought, “The deed has been done.” I always saw myself as the victim in every situation.

Now, I’m on a journey of self-evaluation with the Holy Spirit. A few days ago, I was praying, and yes, the Holy Spirit was very firm with me. He tells me the truth plainly. Sometimes it hurts, but that’s the truth — it isn’t meant to be sweet. He told me to open my Bible to James 5, and I read the verse He directed me to. I felt really bad. My ego was bruised. But God corrects those He loves.

He tells me things other people wouldn’t say because they don’t want to hurt my feelings. In that moment, I felt loved and seen by God. The Holy Spirit took note of my weaknesses and didn’t use them against me. He corrected me instead.

Sincerely, there are times I try to sweet-talk myself out of God’s voice. I’ll try to convince myself that it isn’t God… LOL. Who am I kidding? It just keeps ringing in my spirit.

I want to urge and encourage everyone reading this: try it too. Evaluate every area of your life with the Holy Spirit, like you would with your best friend, and watch how He disciplines and comforts you at the same time 😄