Feel Great.
Body and Mind.

What to write?

I have contemplated for months what my blog should be about. Finding a niche can be hard when you are multi Talented 😉 and have many interests. There was also the occasional self-doubt of “I am not a writer” and will my content be good enough for people to read. Well after the self-doubt, here I am braving into this world of blogging/ writing. Knowing that tomorrow’s article will be better than today’s and that, if I end up being the only one who reads my blog, then maybe I have curated a journal of my thoughts and experiences. A place where I can always look back and self examine, noting my progress, life journey and exciting moments. I would have a well catalogued archive of Grace.

What is my niche?

If you have gone through the website you will know I am a pan-Africanist, an impact consultant, teacher, project manager and self dubbed cheerleader for African women micro small and medium-sized enterprises. I am a policy advocate and currently enrolled into the School of Politics Policy and Governance 😁, implying I am also a student. Most important to me is I advocate for #ChooseKindness, I do believe that in face of everything if we choose kindness for ourselves and other, the world will be a much better place. And I salute everyone who INTENTIONALLY choses kindness even when the odds are not in your favour. My niche is all of the above, occasionally I may step away from my work to share other parts of myself.

Kindness is something anyone can give without losing anything themselves.

Raktivist

Welcome

Well, now we know what we are here for, so buckle your seat belts and enjoy the ride. The objective is to post an article every Saturdays, I trust myself to stay faithful to this goal and if I fail I hope you would hold me accountable. As I share my work and life with you, I humbly ask that you leave a comment, question, or feedback. It will help me know how best to curate content you like.

Welcome once more and see you next Saturday for another post.

How to Live with Purpose

Hello and welcome to my very first article of 2023, I had a couple of topics in mind but, given we are in the spirit of new beginnings, this piece won the elections. It was not until 2019 that I started the process of articulating what my purpose was and in 2020 I shared a piece about it on my LinkedIn. Before I arrived at this milestone, my life was a series of unending existential crises, cause like most of you, I didn’t just want a job … call it privilege, but I wanted more than a job, I wanted a mission. My friend Regina used to say “it’s over sabi that is your problem”… lol.

So yay me, I found my purpose, I know what I want to spend my life doing, I have a mission, and I honestly hand to God believed that was going to be it. Having identified it, it was going to be all kumbaya, and you know my life will be like a Tom Cruise Mission Impossible sequel where I get to save the world. I just had an outburst of laughter and some tears. That wasn’t how it turned out. The last 3 years have rather been a Bridget Jones film where It’s just as hard walking and working in your purpose. To answer your question, yes. I still have existential crises with a garnish of self-doubt.

I had a moment I stood right there, and my life flashed before my eyes, and I remember the lines from one of my favourite books The Subtle Art of not giving a F*ck, which reads “hell is dying, and seeing what you could be, and what you were”. I imagine myself being trapped in this loop, where I have died, and I keep seeing how small my life was in comparison to all the things I could’ve had and done. You know… like when you negotiate a job offer, and you’re excited, thinking you got the best deal. You are on cloud nine and nobody can touch you, I imagine you listening to Best Day of My Life by the American Authors on repeat. But wait day 1 on the job you realised you short-changed yourself by a lot and other people in the same role earn probably 10 times more than you … Yikes, and it gets worse, there is a clause on your contract, this offer is for eternity, you will never get to renegotiate, you are stuck. That’s my mind sporadically and it sucks.

Finding your purpose is one thing and fulfilling your purpose is another journey all together, and I believe a lot of emphasis has been placed on the former. So how do I live with my purpose? You learn. It is a continuous journey of progress and iteration not to the mission but to how we attain this mission. Taking purposeful steps to accomplish your dreams. In Paulo Coelho’s The Alchemist the lines “when you really want something the entire universe conspires in your favour” is my favourite from the book. It teaches me that if I know what I want and work towards it then everything else works in my favour. That said Ladies and gents here are a few ways you can learn to live with purpose.

• Stop overthinking; I am not going to belabour the point, but please read Soundtrack by Jon Acuff. The time overthinking steals from you is time you can make your dreams come true.
• Take Small steps every day; like James Clear explains in Atomic Habits make 1% progress every day and by the end of the year you will be 37% better. Finding purpose doesn’t make you a magician, there is no magic wand, but you can take purposeful steps every day to improve. How do we achieve better results and take small daily actions to improve? Every day identify your 1% and do it.
• Have a community; I recently watched the YouTube video of the girl who won the Guinness World Book Record for the highest number of Burpees. She did Burpees for 24 hours. I had tears at the end of that video and part was because I can’t even do 1 burpee, I hate them and every gym instructor or trainer I have ever had knows this. Do Not put a burpee in my face. But here is this girl who did it for 24 hours, and surpassed her initial set goal of 5000, she did almost 7,000. Mind Blown. What was interesting to watch in that video was her community, she had people who believed in her, who took care of her after every set, carried her to the washroom, fed her, and towards the end joined her in getting in that last rep. It was phenomenal and if you ask me everyone in that room with her won that award because I do not believe she would have done it alone. I mean have you ever tried massaging your calves, how effective is it. So my friend find your people, your tribe, people who will believe in you, invest in you. People who will cheer you own and remind you to be gracious to yourself. Community is essential to success.
• Positive mindset; I read an article that said research shows people with positive attitudes have better skin, wow, so your negativity could be the reason your skincare doesn’t work… don’t look at me, I don’t know either. I am not about to motivate you, but you have to believe you can do it. And this is not you can fly type of bullshit. With your actions, and community you have to become a positive person. Jon Acuff says you have to be ridiculously optimistic about life in a way that makes you doubt your own sanity. Cynics don’t change the world my darling. The story of everyone who has been great, you will never hear them say oh I thought I was going to fail, I planned on failing, and I still don’t believe in all this, life sucks, but anyway I still got the award so thanks. If you have please share that with me via email I would like to study them.

I could add other things like getting a mentor, and get a sponsor (btw these can be one person or two different people) but these people are part of your community.

I want you to remember that it’s okay to get tired, to doubt your purpose, to feel discouraged and quite frankly to want to resign. But there are blessings in battles so when you have those days, say a prayer in your heart and find the strength to still do your 1 per cent. That is my goal this year, not to be resigned to whatever life throws at me or just take it but even in the acceptance of my feelings and situation, do my 1% for the day. Today my 1% was writing this article and I hope you enjoyed it.

Happy New Year 2023. May the year be kind to us and may we daily find the courage to live with our calling.

Urban planning and the urgency for a resilient Africa

It is 2023 and in all my visits across the continent, I am yet to visit or live in an African city that doesn’t flood when it rains. 

I know we are all excited about the possibilities of the new year, but some part of me is still stuck in the horrendous floods that plagued the south-eastern and south-southern regions of Nigeria last year — and these sad weather occurrences weren’t only in Nigeria. Douala, Kumba, Limbe in Cameroon, Kinshasa -DRC, and many others were not spared.

Taking a look at the trends and drawing from research as well as similar incidences around the world, we can all agree that these damaging phenomena are the handiwork of our dear friend, Ms Climate Change.

While West and Central Africa prayed for some dryness, over 21 million people in Somalia, Kenya, and Ethiopia faced a huge food security crisis. In fact, about 1.7 million people in Somalia were displaced due to prolonged drought (NASA Earth Observatory, 2022).

Before we continue, I would like to say that I am not an expert in the subject, but having lived in several African cities, I have the authority to speak on it from my perspective and experience.

Let us take a look at some definitions…

The McGill School of Urban Planning defines urban planning as the “technical and political process concerned with the welfare of people, control of the use of land, design of the urban environment (including transportation and communication networks) and protection and enhancement of natural processes.” 

I love this definition because it does not only capture the technical and political aspects of urban planning but also states its primary goal as being concerned with the welfare of people. So, when major streets and boulevards are designed with no pedestrian paths, I do not believe you care about the well-being of the people or think that we are not allowed to walk on streets.

I first came across the term “urban resilience” during the initial stages of planning the Congo Bulaya Project when I worked with Centre d’Innovation Lubumbashi. Urban resilience, as defined by the Resilient Cities Network, is the capacity of a city’s systems, businesses, institutions, communities, and individuals to survive, adapt, and thrive no matter what chronic stresses and acute shocks they experience.

It calls for the comprehensive evaluation of the capacity and risks that cities have and are exposed to, and the intentional engagement with the most vulnerable members of the community. 

From droughts to flooding, increase in internal displacements both due to insecurity and climate disasters, and rapid migration in search for better economic prospects, all these expose cities to a range of shocks and stresses — both natural and man-made — which they have to prepare for. 

The image below is some facts and figures on urban challenges by the UN-Habitats Urban Resilience Hub, which also describes a resilient city as a city that “assesses, plans and acts to prepare for and respond to all hazards – sudden and slow-onset, expected and unexpected”.

Going by the above definitions, a city cannot be resilient without the right planning. Therefore, in the initial design process of a city, experts, politicians, and communities have to:

i) Intentionally co-create spaces and build communities that are functional

ii) Consider the welfare of the people and ensure their safety in the likelihood of a crisis, shock, or stress (be it man-made or natural).

Now, let’s explore Lagos. I have been fortunate to live in Africa’s most populous city for about 2 years now and counting. Prior to my relocation, the one thing all my research and contacts pointed to was the “Lagos Floods”.

The advice I got from friends ranged from “Make sure you find accommodation in a community that doesn’t flood” to “Don’t live on the first floor”. I have heard rumours of communities and buildings that flood so much during the rainy season that the ground floor is inhabitable.

We have seen this happen in Kinshasa and Doula as well, yet, after all these years, there seems to be no progress on this particular issue — and it goes beyond the floods. It’s the traffic in these cities, the accidents, the waste management problems, the inadequate water supply, and the noise.

I did a comparative analysis of the population growth rate of Lagos to that of London and as you would expect, Lagos has grown exponentially since the 1950s when compared to almost any European city. 

In 1950, London was home to over 8,360,000 people while Lagos had a population of 325,000 people. Fast-forward to 73 years later, Lagos is now home to an estimated 15.9 million people (some argue that the city is at 18-24 million inhabitants and London is at an estimated 9.6 million people).

This is a trend that goes beyond Lagos but affects all major economic cities in Africa. If these cities are growing/will continue to grow in population exponentially, then urban resilience becomes of the utmost urgency.

Have you ever wondered what would have become of Africa if the torrential rains and floods that hit Europe in 2021 happened on the continent? I have nightmares just thinking of what would happen if we had an earthquake or tsunami in these parts of the world.

The reason we experience greatly the negative effects of climate change compared to other regions is the clear lack of preparedness, lack of infrastructure, little to no planning, and snail-like steps by governments and community leaders in addressing the problems.

The 2021 World Risk Poll by Lloyd Register Foundation in partnership with Gallup gathered the polling sample from 125,000 people across 121 countries. The report covered risks across the digital world, COVID-19, and climate change. 

The Understanding Vulnerability in a Changing Climate part of the report revealed that, in contrast to South-East Asia where 71% of the respondents asserted to be prepared in the event of a climate crisis, only 29% in West and Central Africa could make the same claim. I didn’t take the survey, but I know that I am not among the 29%.

The report further assessed the confidence level of individuals in their national government, hospitals, and local government in terms of disaster preparedness.

Unsurprisingly, the confidence levels in Central/Western Africa were all below 50%, and rightfully so. Even I wouldn’t trust the dentists in the region… again, my lived experience tells me not to.

Overall, an underwhelming 56% of respondents from the region said their government did not care about them at all.

I understand that we score relatively low to other continents when it comes to responding to disasters and shocks as the most predominant form of natural disasters experienced on the African continent is flood/heavy rain followed by drought and wildfire.

Notwithstanding, statistics have shown an increase in its occurrence over the years, implying that we may soon get to the same levels as Southeast Asia and other parts of the world. As such, it is of paramount importance that communities, governments, you (yes, you!), and I take intentional steps in improving our resilience ratings.

Simple things like reducing your carbon and plastic footprint, planting trees, having a plan, voting for the right representatives, and actively working with them to co-create more resilient and sustainable communities will go a long way in plugging future disasters.

Like it or not, climate change is real and disasters are bound to happen. While we can’t control when or how it happens, we can control our ability to respond to it.

I plead with all residents and governments in vulnerable communities to take purposeful action. Let us ditch the reactive mode of waiting for another rainy season to start responding to crises, for the proactive mode of planning ahead.

It is only through intentional, proactive, purposeful, and inclusive actions that we can build better communities.