WATERCOOLER MOMENTS: It’s like a symphony, just keep listening

This week a giant for the women leaders in Africa and beyond fell. Winnie Mandela will remain an Icon for many reasons; chief amongst them is her fidelity to what she believed in and her stubborn pursuit of standing by her convictions even when the price to pay was dearly steep.

It did not matter that it was solitary confinement in jail, inhumane treatment whilst there, no access to family especially her young children, a failed marriage or even death. She was proudly defiant! She remained Winnie!

There are countless lessons that we the women of Africa and indeed the world can draw from Mama Winnie, the one lesson that draws me the most is; sense of purpose. She lived a life of purpose, she knew who Winnie was, but more importantly what Winnie was.

Commonly, we stumble over ourselves as we try desperately to figure out what that one thing that we were meant to be is. Perhaps focusing on the idea that it is one thing makes it even harder to figure it out, what if we reframed our thinking that it isn’t necessarily one thing, that it can be many things? What if we thought about it in more practical terms like for example reframing our thinking to ‘what we can do with our time that is truly important?’

Whichever approach one may decide to take in finding what their contribution to the world or universe is, it is an uneasy conversation many have within themselves.

Allow me to share this beautiful piece of poetry by Stephanie Mabey, which is a powerful analogy and reflection of the internal conversations that go on about finding our purpose.

There are times when

You might feel aimless

And you can’t see the places

Where you belong

But you will find that

There is a purpose

It’s been there within you,

All along

And when you’re near it,

You can almost hear it

It’s like a symphony,

Just keep listening

And pretty soon you’ll start

To figure out your part

Everyone plays a piece

And there are melodies

In each one of us

Ooohh it’s glorious

And you will know how

To let it ring out

As you discover

Who you are

Others around you

Will start to wake up

To the sounds that are

In their hearts

It’s so amazing

What we’re all creating

Some may argue that whilst one may find or stumble on their purpose, for others, purpose finds them. This may indeed be true, it may very well be that if apartheid hadn’t existed in the Rainbow Nation, we might not have had the good fortune of experiencing Mama Winnie’s magic in the manner that we did, we might have had a different twist or flavour.

There are schools of thought that advocate for a reflection of what our earliest steadfast memories of the contribution we wanted to make to society were, or what it is that we can be engaged in for hours and not notice the time whizz past or makes one forget to eat, yet others go down the spiritual route and encourage us to pray and ask our Maker to reveal to us what our purpose is. The late Steve Jobs famously spoke about being able to join the dots only looking backwards. There is obviously no shortage of interest nor divergent thinking around the subject; ultimately I think that it is a deeply seated desire in all of us to leave a mark. Maybe, it is the threat of finality that death presents, that drives our wish to leave a trail, that even if it only says ‘I was hear’ then we truly live forever.

Mama Winnie listened to the notes that life played, and responded to the music that she heard, she kept listening and no doubt figuring out the next set of actions. With every step, taking up her part, boldly and unapologetically! Irrespective of which formula, angle or school of thought one wishes to apply in their pursuit of what their meaningful and important contribution is, regardless of how we respond to the philosophical questions of Who am I? What am I and What was I meant to be, Mama Winnie has taught us and demonstrated in the way she lived, that in the face of harrowing and deathly choices, one can triumph against the challenges that life presents and remain steadfastly true to their purpose!

She sleeps in power! She lives forever!

Ms Terry Ramadhani is a senior manager in the Human Resources Department, East Africa Aga Khan University