The Untold Story - Who is Nelsiwe part 2

My Epiphany

It was a year after I started high school that I had an epiphany. I was just in Form 2 when I woke up one day and suddenly all was clear. It dawned on me that if I was ever going to change my past and fully embrace my mother’s teachings, I had to get out of  my self-pity mode; thinking that I was as stupid and poor as some the students had tried to make me feel.

I finally tapped into my inner strength, my God given talent to be a success “you’ll notice that I call it a God given talent”. Yes - I am true believer that God took his time to create and make me special, make me the best gift to my parents, friends and family. He had and still has a plan for my life, a plan to prosper and grant me peace, a plan to grant me joy.

In my imperfections in character He continues to make me perfect in my spirit and heart.

I was going to be the smart kid

All the experiences I went through as a teenager made me realize one thing, that if I wasn’t going to win the girls over, if I wasn’t going to be able to will my way into a rich family or worse still, find my way back home having run away from the challenge I was facing around the more popular girls, I was going to beat them by being the smartest student. I knew then that, if I paid attention to what was important to ensuring that I could build a secure future and grow to succeed in life, only then was I was going to come out a winner.

From form 2 to my final year in high school therefore I concentrated hard to the lessons from each teacher that took pains to stand in front of each of us trying to instill knowledge and shape our lives. I probed and queried any new concept and idea, I became the most attentive and inquisitive student and soon I was one of the best in my class. I don’t really believe that it was all because I was naturally gifted (of course I have been blessed with a good brain), but I do have confidence in that the ultimate outcome came from the drive and ambition to beat everyone else at the one thing that they couldn’t take away from me. It was more my hunger and desperation to succeed that propelled me and in time, centered me. I knew then that I only had myself to depend on, myself to determine and earn what I deserved from life. After all, I never had the cushioning that comes from having rich parents. To me the reality was - I simply had to find a way to improve my life, to foster success and from that I grew to believe in my own inner strength.

I wasn’t going to be the most popular
 

It wasn’t long after I was the smart student that I had “friends” stemming out from all corners of the school, mostly because they needed assistance in one subject or another. Although my profile grew, I still wasn’t the most popular student. I then also realized something profound. I didn’t actually have to become the most popular. I didn’t need to crave attention and want to be known, accepted or heard. I simply had to be the best at what I chose to do, in who I am, and concentrate all my energies to building a character that I would be proud of.

In my quest for more knowledge I discovered reading.

 

In the pages of a book I could become the star, heroine, senator, president, CEO; anyone that I dreamt and read about. In those pages I was beautiful, smart, rich, happy and mostly - truly alive. It was there that my passion for life was rekindled, my passion for writing instigated. I started teaching myself a new word every day, finding ways to apply it in every day life’s phrases and poems. I became a scholar of life and understood that if I was to build a successful future I needed to learn on a daily basis to be a better individual than I was before, and that I needed to depend on my own ability to turn a challenge into a lesson, my own passion for finding solutions to everyday life’s problems.

Once I fully embraced my strength, it was then that for the first time in my life I found life to be a splendor.

My last year in high school was simply a breeze. I was appointed Head Girl and for me that honor was the payoff that I needed to truly appreciate that dedicated effort and never giving up in life pays huge dividends. It was then that a new Self was reborn. I started appreciating every experience, every challenge as a chance to grow your soul and become even better at living than you were the previous day.

Soon I found myself in university and there I got to enjoy life. Somewhere in the process though I, like everyone else who is privileged, stupidly began to forget what was important in life. I had learnt to fit in, to be the best and as you know sometimes having it all can create a monster, I soon lost the values that I had learnt so hard in high school. I started thinking I was invincible and convincing myself that I was smart “stupid and childish me”. Today, thinking about it, I’ll blame it on the exuberance of youth.

Life will surely humble you

As I write today I will tell you this, I absolutely respect and love life. It has a way of teaching us hard lessons, humbling the most conceited of characters. It’s as if once you think you are a bird that can fly anywhere, you wake up one day to find your wings chipped off and there you stand, having to learn how to walk again.

I am grateful that I learnt my lesson quickly at a time when I was still young enough to be able to change and mold the person that I was going to become.

I was at the peak of my imaginary invincibility when I was dealt a hard hand. Just when I was thinking I’ve finally moved forward and had earned my being proud of whom I had managed to become, I failed my last year at university. Yes, I had to repeat my last year.

This was the much needed wake up call. Hard as it was, I am grateful for that experience for I would probably be a different person today had I not learnt that;

“as much as life can raise you up, if you are not careful and humble; if you forget to learn and appreciate more, if you don’t remember to continuously work harder and instead stop to be a human being with heart, you are likely to lose it all”.

I repeated my last year and that, while was a hard lesson, it also became my most valuable experience to date. Having been sponsored by government, the reality of how I was going to raise the money hit hard. I was desperate to complete and my family “though a bit better financially than they had been while in high school”, still struggled to make ends meet, least of all afford to pay for all my fees and accommodation. That year I truly grew up. That experience taught me a lot about life.

That is the year in which I became an Adult!

to be continued……..