We Should Make It All Count – Vonayi Nyamazana

I guess it depends on your vantage point; it may be that it’s easier said than done.

Personally? I would want to make everything count, that is the good, the bad and the ugly, but then I guess that’s because of my vantage point. When you’ve got a few years under your belt, and there are more years behind you than ahead of you, well, let’s just say that you begin to view life differently.

Life is a great adventure to be enjoyed. It is a beautiful gift that we wake up to every day, hopefully with great expectations because each day we are spoilt for choice; people to see, places to go, lives to impact, love to give away, the list is endless. Some days rush ahead of us at full speed, so much to accomplish and not enough time! And yet some days are so slow; nothing is happening, and all you want to do is hide. But hey, that’s life, it dishes out lemons as well as oranges, and we’ve all had our fair share of the lemons. People fail us, we make mistakes, we suffer losses, we get betrayed, and al this is painful, but we need these experiences because they make us. We learn from these experiences even though some you find yourself in a dry place with zero passion, zero courage and no strength to squeeze those lemons into lemonade.

This might sound a bit too cliché, but we only live once. And our lives are more valuable than all the riches of this world. We cannot afford to be laissez-faire about it nor to wallow in pity parties when it doesn’t go the way we want it. We cannot afford to give up on it because frankly, it is all we have. We can and must sacrifice the discomfort that comes with stepping out of our comfort zone and our go-to comfort crutches. We must do so, for us; for this life.

I am an advocate of doing all we can to make our lives count because our lives matter. We must lift our heads from the sand and open our eyes to the beauty of creation that surrounds us and the opportunities available to us each day. Each day is a new page to create an exciting chapter in your life only if you will get up and look for the sun and the colours and say yes to each day.

2020 has had harsh reviews and at its worst has been written off by most. Why? Because it has not dished out oranges, it has thrown unexpected bitter fruit that has been impossible to chew, let alone swallow. Yes, it has been harsh, but can we make it count? I would beg you all to make 2020 count because it is real and we will have to live out the full 12 months of it whether we like it or not. God will not bring it to a halt mid-year and go oops, delete that and bring in 2021. We are here for an allocated time. In that time we will celebrate, rejoice, weep, hurt; we will experience a whole range of emotions. We have this one life, let’s make the most of it. Let’s choose to make every experience count. Let’s squeeze lemonade out of the bitter lemons and make life worth living and worth looking forward to:

Be an active part in the creation of your day.

Learn something out of everything.

Create a solution out of the crisis.

As we come to the end of 2020, we will look back over the months, and a tear may roll down our cheek, we may catch a sob, or smile over its happenings. History has been made this year, and we have been a part of it. I will have a story that my grandchildren will read about from the year of the Covid19. I will have lessons that I have learnt from the year of the Coronavirus. I will tell of the things that have been birthed in this year of 2020. What will you have to tell of this year? What lemonade have you squeezed from the challenges of this year? We have one life and one chance to make it all count for something, and you can do or be something to someone worse off.

Every experience shapes or reshapes us, and we have the choice to be shaped into something better or something bitter. The ball is in our court. Find your joy, your peace and your happy place and keep running your race. For as long as you have breath in you, there are things to do and people to see. You have a purpose; it’s not over until it’s over. Make every experience count.

Say yes to your life.

Then go ahead and make every aspect of it count.

Vonayi Nyamazana

The Writer’s Suite