When the Darkness wakes up in the morning, the first thing it does is to look out of the window, see the Light shinning outside – and become full of anger, envy and rage all over again.
Because yesterday when night fell and it went to sleep, it made the great mistake of thinking that the Light is now dead.
The Light is never dead. It will rise again. It is we who turn our backs on it.
But it will rise again.
– Che Chidi Chukwumerije
Back in 2008 when I used to work partly in Nigeria, partly in Ghana and partly in Equatorial Guinea, the late great Sir Maliki Showman – the wonderful man who taught me how to play the saxophone (that’s a tale I’ll tell another day) – told me that if I ever had the chance , I should pay a visit to and say Hello to the pioneer of Afrobeat music and one of the greatest living Nigerian saxophonists of all time, Orlando Julius, who had at that time temporarily moved from Nigeria to the Ghanaian countryside, to a quiet village on the outskirts of Accra.
So one weekend in Accra, I chartered a Taxi and drove over, where I met the maestro himself, Orlando Julius Ekemode, and his incredibly gracious and beautiful wife and dancer, Latoya Aduke Ekemode. I have seldom experienced greater hospitality than they showered to me on that day. They took me as their son, we ate together, drank together and the great man regaled me with funny and touching and inspiring tales from the good old days of Nigerian music long before I was born – just like his friend Maliki Showman always used to do too.
Finally Orlando brought out his tenor sax and asked me to unpack mine which I had brought along. And after I showed him how far Sir Maliki had already brought me as at that time, Orlando Julius proceeded to lovingly show me new tricks on the Tenor sax and to expand my knowledge of the instrument and of African and Jazz music, like a father would. These are precious memories I‘ll never forget.
And last night, in Frankfurt, more than a decade later, and many years after the death of my friend and teacher Maliki Showman, it was such a joy for me to see Orlando Julius and his wife Latoya and his whole band again on stage, slamming out one great old hit after another. At 74 he is still going strong and the tunes are still as irresistible as ever.
To crown it all, they saw me in the crowd and they remembered. Latoya told the crowd how I had come to visit them in Ghana years ago. And then Orlando asked me to dance with them on stage. New precious memories. Great great people.
Highlife, Afrobeat, Funk, Jazz – they all originate from okdschool African Music… and Orlando Julius remains among the greatest of all time.
– Che Chidi Chukwumerije
Nigeria has not yet had a Nigerian President. South Africa has had many Presidents, but only Nelson Mandela was a South African President. The others, before and after him, white and black, have all been just sectional leaders. Africa has had very very few AFRICAN leaders-of-state, Pan-African heads of government. Selfless father-figures and servants who are a father to all and a mother to all, regardless of ethnic or religious affiliation.
Why? Because it is not easy. It is not easy to place loyalty to high ideals above loyalty to tribe, religion, family and every thing else. When people come campaigning for votes and popularity, and they claim they will be „President of everybody“, „there will be no sacred cows“, they will be „everybody‘s friend and nobody‘s friend“, „everybody will be equal under the law“, they will rise above „tribalism and religious chauvinism“, they will not favour „their side above any other side“, etc etc etc…
Look at them carefully or just wait for it. In time, they have almost always turned out to be just a Big Fraud.
Why? Because it is not easy. Deep in their heart, everyone loves their ethnic nationality, their religion, their spiritual philosophy, their origin. And there is absolutely nothing wrong with this. It is normal and healthy. The question is: WHO loves the Truth and Justice MORE than he or she loves ANY OTHER THING? That is the Point. Who, above loving his tribe or faith, loves the progress of the Whole more than any other thing.
Not everybody is born to be a leader at the highest levels. Many are good enough to be administrators or guides or governors at lower- and mid-levels of groupings. But at the highest levels, only those human beings should qualify who have made the transition from healthy love of self to healthy love for all.
It is not easy. It requires honest and painful soul-searching. It requires self-unmasking experiencing. It requires self-conquest. It requires, not self-abnegation (for you cannot deny who you are, and anyone who denies who he or she is, is a liar or is still in the process of finding himself). It requires Ennoblement and Maturity. It requires elevation into Selfless Love.
These are the new kinds of leaders we need in Africa now and in the future. These are the people we should look for and encourage, instead of discouraging them. These are the people we should begin to awaken within our own souls. These are the Neo-Africans.
– Che Chidi Chukwumerije.
Every profession can bring out the best in you or the worst in you.
A policeman can over the course of his career develop an ever stronger urge to protect the weak and to prevent the unjust victimization of the innocent. Or he can nurture hatred and suspicion in his heart, and actively seek the demonization and destruction of those that fit certain stereotypes. And whenever a policeman passes by you and you look deep into each other’s eyes, you know which off the two he or she has become.
A politician can be or become a selfless servant or a selfish manipulator.
A teacher can become ever more patient with the slow-at-learning and develop an ever greater capacity and urge to accommodate and further each and every student. Or he can become one of those teachers who focus on and take delight only in the bright students, and say to the Slow students: “Nothing good will ever come of you in life.”
A teacher can also, over time, grow more fascinated and convinced of the unique miracle in each child, and try to patiently seek out, recognize and nurture whatever special flower is waiting to blossom in each young soul. Or she can become impatient, self-centered and self-absorbed, and seek to impose a one-size-fits-all grooming and goal on all students.
A teacher can become a fair defender of humanity who sees all children as God’s creatures. Or a teacher can become a biased agent of a one-sided ideology that favors some children and disadvantages others on grounds of origin or appearance.
A teacher can become an even more avid learner than his students. Or he can stop learning altogether, because he knows it all.
And so it is with all professions, situations, and life.
Events do not shape people. Professions do not shape people. They only offer options for development. The Free Will of each individual alone it is that determines if and in what way each individual will be shaped.
At some point, we have to accept responsibility for who and what and how we are. Like spring that dawns anew every year, every human personality feels an impetus once in a while, over the course of an earth life, to re-examine themselves and their character, to re-appraise how they look at life and how they react to life; to make a fresh new decision about what kind of person they want to be.
When you look into the past and remember all the forces that have shaped you…; When you look around you and consider all the forces pressuring you and moulding you…; When you look into the future and imagine all the forces that will happen upon and hit you…; – do not forget to also include one special force in the list of all those forces that shape your spiritual destiny; the one force that will always be with you: YOUR OWN FREE WILL.
It is the strongest power of all in the determination of what kind of Human Being you become.
Don’t blame your parents forever.
Don’t blame your teachers forever.
Don’t blame your country forever.
Don’t blame your culture and tradition forever.
Don’t blame your religion forever.
Don’t blame your employers forever.
Don’t blame Injustice and Unfairness forever.
Don’t blame your physical body forever.
You will blame them for a while, I know. We all do. We are human, and we need time to heal.
But don’t blame them forever.
In you is the power and the force to birth a new you. It is your FREE WILL. Don’t be deceived by the simplicity of that thought. It is really true. You are the reincarnation, the result and the resolution… of yourself. You are a Jedi – and the Force is already with you.
Use it.
– Che Chidi Chukwumerije.
That feeling that you‘ve gone down a path before and seen the outcome… And now you‘re watching others go down that same path.
And you know that no amount of warning or explanation will make them stop going that way. The only thing that can help is the recognition that comes at the end, when everything is over and it‘s too late to change anything. But then, just the bequeathing of this recognition is also what is needed too.
So, instead of preaching to them to not go that path, you start to wish them the opposite: that they go it QUICKLY, and get to the end quickly, so that they can come to the recognition sooner than later.
Just like Jesus Christ said to Judas: „That which you are about to do – do it quickly!“
Sometimes, a Fall is the fastest way to Rise Up!
– Che Chidi Chukwumerije.
I know how it feels to die, having done so twice in this earthlife. The third time, I guess, will be the last.
In everything, I’ve learned that life comes and goes, like the leaves of a tree, like the steps of a journey, like the chapters of a book, in phases, steps and stages. And the most important recognition of all was this: Don‘t live in the past.
You can never be again the person you once were, nor do you need to. When you wonder – „What happened to me?“ – you miss the point. You are on a journey, a journey of inner development; a journey of character and personality growth; a journey of spiritual maturing. This is the real journey of life.
On this journey, you will pass through many phases of personality, different characteristics of character, you will be different people at different times.
Have the courage to become the new – and when it has grown old, have the courage again to shed it, leave it behind and move seekingly towards the new New. Do not be enticed by outward gains to stay in the old; nor pressured by difficulties to abandon the present or the New. Go your way with integrity, dignity and trust, because Vanity and Indolence are the true enemies on the journey of life.
You will be born many times, and die many times. And the past will be as a Dream. Just like a new born baby cannot remember it’s former earth-lives, so will you even within one earth-life sometimes die and wonder „What happened to me?“
Life happened to you, my friend. Like a train going from station to station, you are journeying from one state of being to another. It might be an upward journey or a downward journey – the choice is yours.
Just remember, what ever you do: Do not live in the past – no matter how good or bad it was. Like a boxer in a fight, sitting in the corner between rounds, you cannot go back and correct a bad round, but you can get up and fight the next one better.
Like a boxer in a fight, sitting in the corner between rounds, you cannot go back and hold on to the last good round you fought. Then you were fresh, now you‘re tired. Then you were strong, now you‘re injured. But you‘ve grown too, in knowledge and experience. So, get up and go into the next round – and give your best.
One good thing about life: it is not boxing. It is greater. Your best rounds are the rounds in which you give not darkness, but Love.
Che Chi-di Chukwu-meri-je.
Brotherhood means to stand and work in the same spirit.
When you are a child, then brotherhood means to be born of the same parent or parents.
But the older one gets, and the more mature one grows; the more one enters into the living gout of one’s destiny, and the more one senses and fulfill one’s destiny, then the less brotherhood remains a being born of the same parents and becomes a standing and working in the same spirit. Spiritual homogeneity is true brotherhood.
The same thing with sisterhood.
– Che Chidi Chukwumerije
Holding yourself back because you think that by acting freely in the fullness of your power and ability, you might sin against the laws of God and bind yourself to the earth or even to the lower planes. Fear of sinning and falling makes you afraid to spread your wings and fly to the heights, afraid to do anything apart from what seems safely and totally within the sphere of activity of Light-seeking and Light-serving. Thereby you bottle up and suppress everything within you which could make you happy, and which is urging for expression through you and out of you. Thus you step out of yourself and begin to look at yourself as the enemy of your own Light-salvation. You consider yourself the enemy and fight against yourself. You thereby fight against everything that can help you develop to the fullest the fullness of what you could or should be and make you happy. You become a prisoner of self, someone who has enchained and imprisoned himself or herself by himself or herself.
This is a terrible condition of consciousness, because the only thing that can free the prisoner is a change of consciousness, a new thought, a new consideration about how to live one’s life, be one’s self and go one’s path. But JUST THIS VERY new thought cannot break through within the consciousness of the prisoner of self, because the very basis of this consciousness is the suppression of such a thought. This bound consciousness IS the living expression of the fear of this thought; it is the living expression of the urge to prevent just this very thought from breaking through from the depths of the sub-conscious and becoming the new consciousness, greater SELF-consciousness.
The only thing that can help one out of this condition is the severe Love of the Light, the Grace which reaches one upon the bridge of one’s longing for true living. This Grace however manifests usually not in indulgent divine caresses, ironically, but as a gridlock of painful experiences which drive one to the end of the self-chosen path, at which end-point one finds – instead of fulfillment, salvation, completion, paradise and joy – inner emptiness, despair, confusion, doubt and self-doubt, a sense of betrayal and the feeling of being even further away from one’s goal than at the start of the journey of the earnestly-meant striving. Desperation and futility seize one’s soul.
At this point, one stands before the opportunity to awaken into a new conviction, fructified by a new, higher, freer, truer thought. To let go of the fear born of indolence and vanity, of egotism: The self-seeking fear that wears the false countenance of humble selflessness.
You have to become honest – to yourself, about yourself. Honest to the world about yourself. Who you are. What you are. You have to free yourself of the fear of failing and, even more accurately, of being seen to fail – which is vanity. The ugliest fruit of this vanity, the deepest sin, is the inglorious ambition to impress God. And, in consequence, to impress those who one supposes to be God’s representatives on earth. This is not necessary, as it only distracts one from God’s true nature – the height of naturalness and authenticity itself. It separates one from the inner state, the condition of self-consciousness, needed to be in contact, via homogeneity, with Paradise.
It is better to be yourself. Your truest deepest realest self. Because Paradise is inside you.
– Che Chidi Chukwumerije.
They say I was born rich
So nobody nobody nobody
Wipes my tears when I weep
Not my rich father
Nor my poor mother
Not my sister, not my brother
Not my society or any other
Only my own hands
Only my own hands
Gonna wipe my own tears
I’ve learnt my lesson
Gonna be my own person
Lordy, I’m gonna be my own person
They say I was born gifted
So nobody nobody nobody
Feeds me when I’m down and hungry
Not my father who doesn’t understand me
Nor my mother who overrates me
Not my sister, not my brother though they love me
But they’ll never never know me
If you want to know humanity
Look down when you’re up
And look up when you’re down
And pray
To never get caught in the middle
The middle pays for the poor’s pains
And the rich’s gains
And goes to bed empty-handed on an empty stomach
Hungry for work that really pays the needed holidays
I’ve learnt my lesson
Lordy, I’m gonna be my own person.
They say I was born poor
So I have no right to share in the fruits of others’ labour
I should use my own gifts
And I should be grateful for every little favor
Favour is the taste of their flavour
But a drowning man’s got no choice
Truth and irony – they are my voice
That’s why nobody understands us.
– Che Chidi Chukwumerije
I have a longing for intimacy
Not satisfied by sex
A craving for voyeurism
Not quenched by porn
A yearning for universal entanglement
Not gratified by orgies
And a need for intense borderlessness
Not staked by perversity
What is it?
I have an itch for mystification
Not calmed by lying
A desire for friction
Not stilled by confrontation
A propensity for destruction
Not quelled by murder
And a burning for escape
Not silenced by suicide
What is it?
It’s like I am separated from myself
And watch myself through a window
And everything that I do
Is actually being done by my shadow
While I wait for something real
Really really real.
– Che Chidi Chukwumerije.
Che Chidi Chukwumerije 